JR (31 page)

As Kurt invaded her from behind, Luke began to thrust inside her in short strokes that renewed the stimulation on her clit as they fucked her together. They were far too accomplished at tandem loving for this to be the first time they’d shared a woman.

The strong arms banded around her, the muscular wall of Luke’s chest, his searing kisses and the primal possession of Kurt behind her combined to set her on the edge of oblivion in minutes.

“Please Kurt, now,” she begged. “Please.”

He surged into her, filling her with all he had. He moaned against her neck before he sucked her earlobe into his mouth. So close, he whispered, “You’re mine, Becca. Mine.”

He rammed into her again and again. Luke rocked beneath her as she thrust her ass against Kurt. Pressure built in her like water on a dam.

“I can’t hold back. Feels too good.” Luke called mercy below her. His muscles tensed impossibly. Then his guttural cry sent a shockwave up her spine as he emptied himself inside her pussy. The heat of his come blasting inside her in jets of pleasure made her shudder around him. But the shout from above had satisfaction exploding through her as Kurt spilled his semen in her ass. It set her off like the grand finale of a Fourth of July fireworks display.

“
Mine!
” he growled in her ear as they both spent themselves in her willing body.

“Kurt,” she screamed as she came.

First, she saw stars as she clenched her eyes shut.

Then, the whole world went black.

Rebecca either slept or hovered in a disembodied state of euphoria. Groggy and sated, she bobbed there.

Sentient awareness of her body didn’t translate to control of her muscles, leaving her unable to escape the horror stalking her.

A dream lurked on the fringes of her awareness.

Sex with two amazing men had doused her in rapture—opening her mind to infinite carnal possibilities—

but something ominous chased her in the quiet after the storm, permeating her ecstasy with a sense of doom.

Utter mental relaxation allowed the scene to play in her mind though she wished she could block it out.

Not a dream. A nightmare.

Everything had been a lie.

She moaned low in her throat as the pain of Kurt’s deception smacked her. Yet, the perturbing vision continued to play as if she had a front row seat to the latest horror blockbuster. A corrupted daydream about an experiment flashed in her imagination. Her ultimate fantasy—the sixth REM cycle—featured her as the subject of a fiendish experiment.

In an instant, it all made sense. Kurt must have tested the Dream Machine on her before this week’s adventure. She couldn’t understand how or when but the whole study had been a ploy.

Not only had he used potentially harmful emerging technology on her without her consent, but he’d also previewed her desires then played right to them. He’d manipulated her into believing he needed the same things she did—that chemistry, or magic, had led her to the one man who could fulfill all her fantasies without effort.

Instead, she’d been nothing more than a temporary fuck toy. The entire experience had been a sham. This couldn’t be happening. She thrashed to the surface through the sinister remnants of her dream but gentle hands sheltered her shoulders, preventing her from moving or injuring herself.

“You’re all right, Becca. Lie still, catch your breath and everything will be okay. You just passed out for a second.” Luke attempted to calm her. She collapsed on his chest, which still rose and fell in rapid succession, confirming little time had passed. She’d really been unconscious just a few enlightening moments. Everything required proof as she began to doubt all her presumed truths. The trust she’d built with Kurt over the past week crumbled to dust.

Nothing would ever be okay again.

“No.” She tried to shove away from him with wet-noodle arms but, still disoriented, she slipped.

Luke wrapped his hand around her upper arm to steady her but his kindness only compounded her confinement. She had to flee from their betrayal.

“No! Let me go.”

Kurt struggled to gain his footing behind her. His questioning gaze seared her back. She couldn’t stand the tearing agony anymore. Before she could suppress it, a sob broke from her splintering chest.

“Calm down, baby. Everything’s fine.” Kurt reached out to stroke her hair but she wrenched from his putrid touch. Luke’s flaccid flesh slipped free from the clasp of her traitorous, still clenching, sex as she flung herself off his torso. She banged her hip into the corner of the couch but the bruising impact couldn’t compete with the rending of her soul.

“Stay away from me,” she shrieked.

“Baby, what’s wrong?” Kurt crooned.

Luke caught sight of her wild eyes then cursed under his breath. “Oh shit, Kurt. She knows.”

She whipped around. Panic emanated in searing rays from Kurt’s tense shoulders and slack jaw. Their gazes collided.

It was true.

“You lied to me.” The simple accusation hung between them. She couldn’t utter another word before the bile in her stomach threatened to choke her. Then, in a whisper she didn’t mean to articulate, “I trusted you.”

While she scrutinized Kurt’s expression, desiring with the last shred of hope to see some flicker of denial but finding none, Luke inched closer. “Give him a chance to explain, Becca.”

Trapped like a caged animal between two tamers, she crab-walked backward. She stamped out the throbbing twinges of pleasure still zinging through her as she scrambled from between their sleek bodies.

How could she have been so stupid? Her mother’s experience had warned her. Men always lied to get what they wanted. But Kurt had seemed so sincere about his intent to make her his partner.

She should have known all he cared about was the Dream Machine.

Dazed, still trying to filter fantasy from reality, Rebecca blinked at the two men in front of her. She couldn’t bear to look Kurt in the face so she missed out on any clues to his thoughts. Yet, he hadn’t denied her accusations.

He took one halting step closer. Self-perseverance kicked in. She bolted as her mind raced to puzzle everything out. Streaking up from the sitting area, she dove for the coat rack beside the door. She tore one of his long overcoats from the hanger as she fumbled for the knob with her other shaking hand.

“Becca! Wait!” He tried to catch her but she heard Luke intervene on her behalf.

“Let her go, Kurt. She needs to sort this out on her own.”

Wrapping the slicker around herself haphazardly, she dashed out of the office barefoot then sprinted toward her apartment as tears streamed down her face.

Rebecca shed Kurt’s coat and the lingering scent of his cologne on the way to a hot shower, realizing she’d jogged all the way home as naked as a flasher under the jacket. For some reason the image struck her as funny.

Hysteria tinged her cackle.

“Am I losing it?” she asked herself in a voice raw from sobbing as she stepped under the steaming water.

She doubted she could scrub away the disgust clawing at her but she had to give it a shot.

She almost never allowed herself the luxury of tears but the betrayal slicing her heart overwhelmed what inhibitions she had remaining. In the wake of such agony, she couldn’t deny the magnitude of what she’d surrendered to Kurt.

Dear God, she loved him.

Nothing could have obliterated a lifetime of denial, her personal coat of armor, and altered her so thoroughly unless it was that. Her outstretched arms locked to brace against the shower wall as she bowed her head under the weight of the revelation. Though she suspected she’d loved him for years—or at least the seeds of affection had lain dormant, waiting for the slightest encouragement to grow—she’d admitted it to herself too late.

Cruel fate had bestowed her wildest dreams then yanked them from her before she understood what lie within her grasp. But every sparkling promise her interlude with Kurt had implied had turned out to be a tarnished lie.

From the start, he’d shown her infinite kindnesses. He’d mentored her, supported her through school, let her experience life on her own, and chosen her out of a field of talented candidates to develop. He’d seemed like a sexy, benevolent genius to her naïve mind.

Everyone had flaws, but how could she have misjudged him so completely?

Traversing the tracks of sweat, tears and desperation dripping from her face, her fingers walked their way down her body. The slippery mixture of all three of their secretions lingered between her thighs. Touching the evidence drove home the evolution she’d undergone in the past brief days. From a young, inexperienced student to a world-weary doctor, the transition hadn’t quite gone according to plan.

Yet, beneath the confusion, grief and outrage, a flicker of arousal stirred in her gut at the memory of two well-muscled bodies sandwiching her. The permanent alterations the experiment had wrought in her sexuality would not die along with her childish notions of love and honor.

Maybe someday she could find solace in that.

***

How could she have been so blind?

Is this what her mother had experienced so many years ago? Was she doomed to repeat her torrid family history?

Before she consciously accepted her intentions, her hand snaked onto the coffee table in front of her then retrieved her cell phone. A single touch on the first speed dial setting connected her to her mother’s house before she thought better of the action.

“Hello?” Her mother’s question sounded lucid. Rebecca speculated at what had possessed the woman to answer the phone. A rare occurrence. Her sleep deprived and pain-fuzzed mind prevented her from responding while she debated hanging up.

“Becca, is that you? I see your number on the caller ID.”

“Um… Y-yes, Mom. It’s me. Sorry.” Forcing her ragged vocal chords to produce sound irritated her throat.

“Are you sick? You don’t sound well.”

“No. Not sick. I’m…” She couldn’t utter the largest lie of her life and claim to be fine.

Horrified, a sob bubbled from behind her clamped lips.

“Becca?”

The terrified note in her mother’s inquiry prompted her to reassure the woman but, for once, she couldn’t.

For once, she needed someone to comfort her.

“What’s wrong? Is it Elsa?”

“Elsa? No, Mom.” The soul searching Rebecca had done during the sleepless night nagged her. Some of the strain in her relationship with her mother stemmed from her need for control. Growing up, her mother had been willing to hand over the family reins but Rebecca had snatched them up to avoid being vulnerable.

Maybe it was time to start opening up. It couldn’t hurt any worse than it already did.

Her mother waited with patient silence for Rebecca to divulge the reason for her call. Pressuring her had never worked in the past. Little did her mother know, today differed from all the others in her life.

“I need to ask you something.” She dragged a breath through the razor wire of her constricted chest. “I hope it doesn’t upset you.”

“Go ahead.” Did she imagine the spark of encouragement and anticipation in her mother’s tone?

How much had Rebecca driven the solitary existence she’d led by calling her independence necessary for survival? Her whole world had warped in a matter of hours. She saw everything through a new lens.

“How could you love my father even after he betrayed you?” The question escaped before she could censor it.

A harsh inhalation, painful to hear, rushed through the speaker of her phone. After several calming breaths, her mother’s voice wavered across the line.

“You’ve never understood, Becca. How could you? You’re so much like him. So caught up in thinking you forget to feel. You’ve always seen me as weak.”

Shame layered over the agony of loss rending her soul in two.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that as the accusation it sounded like.” She suppressed another sob but tears ran hot down her cheek. “I-I need to know. Why can you love someone when they’ve hurt you so much? It’s not fair, damn it!”

Her mother sniffled on the other end of the line as Rebecca’s contagious misery spread.

“Someone’s broken your heart.” Resentment spiked her mother’s statement. The protective instincts she rarely displayed broke through the underlying tension of their conversation. “I wished you girls would never experience heartache. I thought you were safe, Becca. I didn’t think you’d let anyone in.”

The admission stung. Had she really become so cold? She wouldn’t make that mistake again. She could reveal this much at least. “I’m afraid, Mom. What if I never get over him?”

“I can’t promise you will, sweetheart. We both know it’s not true. If he’s really the one for you, no one will be able to replace him. I’m so sorry. I wish I could say otherwise.”

“Is that why Joe left you? Did Elsa’s dad know you didn’t love him as much as you loved my dad?”

“What made you think he left me, Becca?” Her mother’s soft question alerted her to the dangerous grounds she trod.

“I…I guess I just assumed. You were so depressed, then he stopped coming around.” Rebecca’s breathing hitched as she now understood the stinging impact such a separation could inflict.

“Maybe it’s time I told you this story from the beginning. I was younger than you, just eighteen.” Her mother’s pause before her trembling exhalation broadcast the effort it cost her to share her experience with her suffering daughter.