Three Little Words (17 page)

            I watched as the cat moved over the sneaker, the purring increasing in volume.

            “Uh... I don’t think she’s snuggling.” I couldn’t hold back my giggle as the cat’s movements became more frenzied. She... or I supposed it could have been a he... let loose with one final yowl, then hopped off the sneaker and sat down primly, running her paws over her whiskers.

            I burst out laughing when I saw Dorian’s face. He looked horrified.

            I hopped from the van, slid my feet into my boots, then gingerly picked up the Converse and handed it to Dorian. It looked unmaimed, and the cat blinked at us, apparently unperturbed that we were making off with the object of her affection.

            “She seems quite pleased with herself.” My lips twitched as I tried to hold back the full extent of my amusement. Shaking his head, Dorian cast that wicked grin of his my way, slid the shoe on his foot with only a small grimace, then hopped down from the van to stand beside me.

            Drawing me into his arms, he pressed a kiss to the centre of my forehead, then chucked me under the chin.

            “So do you, love. So do you.”

            MAL

            I was seated on a couch at the front of the coffee shop with a scalding mug of coffee in my hands when Adele entered through the back door. Dorian was with her, his arm wrapped possessively around her shoulders, his fingers threaded through her hair.

            The flush on her cheeks was one that I remembered only too well, and it told me exactly what the two of them had been up to.

            She looked around the room, obviously searching for someone, and my heart jolted in my chest when she landed on me. After a single hint of uncertainty showed on her face, she lifted her chin and gave me a warm smile, smiled up at Dorian, then broke away, heading for me.

            Dorian sent me a pointed look, and I got the message loud and clear.

           
It’s only a big deal if one of us makes it that way
. And truthfully, the spark of jealousy was smothered when the girl of my dreams sat down next to me, her thigh pressed against my own, telling me that I wasn’t out of the running.

            If she’d chosen Dorian over me, I would have had to go punch a wall... and I wasn’t the kind of guy who was prone to violence. But suddenly, the idea of her being with both of us no longer seemed so strange.

            “Hi,” she said, squeezing my thigh with her hand. The slight touch sent blood rushing to my cock, and I took a couple of deep breaths to avoid embarrassing myself in public.

            “Hi, yourself.” I wondered if I could get away with leaning over and kissing her when the side of her thigh started vibrating.

            Adele swore, reaching into the pocket of her snug shorts and retrieving a phone.

            “Damn it, I still have Dorian’s cell.” She stared down at it like it was going to come to life, and moving on impulse, I took it from her hand and opened it, moving through the screens of apps until I found the camera.

            “Smile.” I held up the phone, framing Adele in the screen, watching as she stiffened, her eyes wide.

            “Mal.” She bit my name out, her voice harsh. “No.”

            “Are you okay?” I didn’t drop the phone, startled by her reaction, though I did lower it. The idea of having her picture taken was clearly freaking her out, but I had no idea why.

            “Mal.” She said my name again, and this time it sounded like she was reminding herself of who was holding that device.

            She looked at me through that camera, and I watched as she moved from fear to anxiety to determination, shoving each out of the way.

            “Do it.” She said finally, and I heard the way her teeth ground together. “Take the picture.”

            Clearly there was something deeper at work here than just catching a simple snapshot. I raised it back up slowly then, going on instinct, I lowered the camera again, just for a moment.

            “Let’s give you something to smile about first.” Leaning over, I pressed a kiss to her lips, a soft one that quickly became more, the need vibrating in the air, a tangible thing.

            She moaned softly when I pulled away. Quickly I held the camera back up, then urged her to smile.

            I caught her with the look of a wicked seductress on her face, a sensual smile on her lips. In that picture she looked the way I saw her—a goddess made to be worshipped—though I knew that that wasn’t the way that she saw herself.

            “Let’s give that fucker something to pine after.” Grinning at her to cover the sudden rapid pounding of my heart, I quickly set the image to show up as the background on Dorian’s screen.

            “Hmm.” Adele smiled at me mischievously, seeming more relaxed now, then took the phone from my hand. I watched as she scrolled through the contacts, then pulled up my information.

            She typed a message that I couldn’t see, attached the image, then hit send. A moment later my own phone buzzed in my pocket. Raising an eyebrow in her direction, I tugged it from my pocket and flicked my finger over the screen.

            There was the picture of Adele, reminding me of some painting I’d seen once of a redheaded goddess rising from a seashell. And underneath it was her message.

           
I’m glad you’re here.

            Unbidden, my heart flip-flopped in my chest. Never mind that it had only been a few days, I knew now what I hadn’t been able to admit when we were younger.

            And before I could tell her that, I had some things that I had to say.

            “I need to apologize to you.” I turned to face Adele head on, and she tilted her head to the side quizzically, a question in her eyes.

            “When we were together the first time, I was into you. So into you. I don’t want you to ever doubt that again.” I shook my head when she opened her mouth; I had to get this out or I might never say it.

            “I let the opinions of a few assholes influence me, make me question what we had between us. I was young and stupid. And that’s a reason, but not an excuse. And I’m sorry.” I waited, studying every nuance of her beautiful face as she appeared to ponder that.

            I thought she would have a lot of questions for me; instead she asked only one.

            “What’s changed?”

            I couldn’t stop myself from leaning over, from cupping her face in my hands.
This
I had an answer for.

            “I did.”

            She placed her hand on my thigh as I spoke, and this time I couldn’t stop the erection from springing to life.
This time
, however, I didn’t care if anyone else noticed.

            I only cared about Adele.

            Leaning in, she pressed her lips to my ear. The damp heat of her breath on my lobe drove me wild.

            “I have to apologize, too.” She pressed a finger to my lips to hush me when I started to disagree.

            “Yes, I do. Because I cared what yours friends thought too. I shouldn’t have. I should have fought for you. For us.”

            Pulling back, she squeezed the muscles of my thigh, and I swallowed a groan at the touch. The grin she gave me then was wicked.

            “Dorian would tell us to live for tomorrow, not yesterday.”

            I thought of the ravens that soared across her back, and finally understood their true meaning.

            And Dorian was right. More than that, this
felt
right, curling up with Adele on a couch at a coffeehouse to watch some music, even felt strangely right that I could still smell him on her skin.

           
It’s only a big deal if one of us makes it that way
.

            Keeping that in mind, I pulled Adele’s head down to rest on my shoulder, then settled in to watch the show.

            DORIAN

            From the stage, I watched as Adele moved in close to Mal, her skin still flushed from my touch.

            Something had happened to link them together again, but rather than making me jealous, I found that I liked it.

            The three of us in sync together just felt... right.

            I poured myself into the show like I never had, and I knew that I was singing for Adele. God, I couldn’t take my eyes off of her, never mind all of the scantily clad girls who ‘danced’ right in front of the stage, showing me what they had to offer.

            I didn’t want any of it. All I wanted was Adele. Every time I looked at her I got hotter, and I was damn glad that I had my guitar strapped over my shoulders, the instrument hiding prying eyes from seeing just what watching Adele and Mal casually touch one another was doing for me.

            I was incredibly relieved when the band reached the last song. I nodded to Pax, my signal that I was ready—he’d forgiven me for going off on him, I knew, though he probably still didn’t understand it.

            “Thanks for coming out tonight, everyone.” Clearing my throat, I grabbed the mic, pulled the stand toward me, cast a quick look around the rest of the room.

            I’d stood on a stage like this thousands of times before, but sometimes—like now—I still couldn’t quite believe that these people were here to see us.

            “I’d like to dedicate our last song of the night to someone very special. Two someones, in fact.”

            Raking my hands through my hair to rid my hand of the sweat I’d worked up from being on stage in the bright light, I cast a wicked grin around the room, heard the excitement of some of the girls, then zeroed in on Adele.

            The heat radiating between the two of us—the three of us—was palpable. Fuck, I’d just been inside of her, and I couldn’t wait to be there again.

            “So... this one is for two very special friends, one new, one old.” I saw Adele part her lips, saw her hand stray to rest on Mal’s thigh. Mal dipped his head to press a kiss to her hair, then turned to look me right in the eye.

            I felt a jolt when I took in his measured stare.

            I wasn’t going to go slapping a label on it... but, fuck yeah, the three of us together felt right.

            Swallowing thickly, I forced my attention back to the show.

            “Here’s our biggest hit, mates, and thank you for coming. This is Three Little Words.” Turning from Mal and Adele, I winked at the crowd, then poured myself into the song.

           
Three little words are all you want to hear

           
You reach out for me when I’m gone

           
What I feel for you, when I hold you near

           
Three little words will never be enough.

            I was singing it all for her.

            When the show was over, I all but leapt off the stage—no encore tonight, I was too keyed up.

            Sneaking looks at Mal and Adele—well, probably I wasn’t so sneaky—I helped the guys pack up our gear.

            I’d never wanted to be somewhere else more in my life, but the band only worked if we all did our share.

            By the time we’d loaded the van up—and I was never again going to be able to ride in that thing without getting a hard-on—most of the crowd in the coffee shop had dispersed. It was coming up on closing time, and most of the customers had been students who had class in the morning.

            “Sure you won’t come for a pint or two?” Pax gave me a light punch in the arm. The guys were walking to a pub a few blocks away for a post show beer or two, something that wasn’t an official Three Little Words ritual, but that we usually did anyway.

            I hesitated for a long moment before shaking my head—I knew what the guys were thinking.

            I was blowing them off for a girl. A hot girl, but still just a piece of tail to their way of thinking.

            And I’d known Wyatt, Levi and Pax for over ten years.

            “Ah, lay off him, Pax.” Levi waggled his eyebrows at me lewdly, and I shoved lightly at his shoulder. “Can’t you see our Dorian is in
love
?”

            Pax smirked at me; I narrowed my eyes back. Damn it, I was usually the one in control, poking fun at the others. Wanting Adele had completely thrown me off of my game.

            “Yeah, but is he in love with the strawberry tart, or with the guy who was making goo-goo eyes at D throughout the show?” Pax quirked an eyebrow at me, and I stared at him, caught entirely off guard.

            “Goo-goo eyes?” I asked when I’d found my voice. “The fuck he was.”

            My voice sounded strangled even to my own ears. I’d known there was some kind of... energy...

            between Mal and I, energy that centered on Adele. And I was an open minded guy. Musicians tended to be, I’d found.

            But having one of my friends comment on it... I wasn’t sure what to say.

           
“There’s a pervert in all of us, mate. Some just hide it better than others.”

            I’d been poking fun at Mal when I’d said that, though I’d been half serious—I’d always believed that society made us humans bury the sexual desires that really drove us all, just to fit into what someone, somewhere, had once decided was normal.

            But this... this wasn’t something I’d ever really thought of as being part of my own brand of kink.

            And yet I couldn’t bring myself to deny anything.

            Huh. That would be something to chew over later.

            “Have a stubbie on me, mates.” Fishing a twenty from my pocket, I flicked it at Wyatt, who somehow managed to catch it in his teeth. Grinning, he ushered Pax and Levi up the street, leaving me behind.

            They were my closest mates, my brothers, but I couldn’t wait for them to go.

            Pushing through the back door, I returned inside, moving straight to where Mal and Adele were still melded together on the couch. Adele handed me my phone with a sweet smile, and I found that I was ridiculously pleased by the photo of her that was now my screen’s background.