She glanced over her shoulder to see Tate sound asleep on the other side of her. They weren’t completely naked. At some point they’d retrieved their underwear, which amused her for some reason. Maybe men didn’t want their dangly parts observed at full rest.
So where was Chase?
A distant sound told her he was probably in the kitchen, which meant he was probably fixing breakfast. She could eat a cow right now, she was so hungry. That much of a sexual workout would give anyone an appetite.
After the episode in the living room, they’d gone to the bedroom, and the rest of the night was a blur. She’d had sex with Tate. She’d had sex with Brody. She’d had sex with both of them. They’d finished off the night with a foursome on the bed, and she still couldn’t remember who went where, but she could still remember how their hands and mouths felt on her skin and how their cocks felt in her body.
A delicious shiver skirted down her arms. It had been a spectacular experience. She was just sorry it was over.
With a rueful smile, she eased up and crept down the middle of the bed so she wouldn’t wake the guys. She had no idea where her clothes had gotten to, so she snagged Brody’s T-shirt and pulled it over her head. Then she went off in search of Chase.
As expected, she found him in the kitchen working on breakfast. She sneaked up behind him, wrapped her arms around his waist, and rested her cheek against his back.
“Morning, sleepyhead.”
“Good morning,” she mumbled against his back.
He turned in her arms until they faced each other. He smiled down at her and then lowered his mouth to kiss her.
“How are you this morning?”
“Sore,” she admitted. “I may not want sex for a week.”
He grinned. “If you go a week without sex, that’ll be a record.”
She blinked up at him with mock incredulity. “Are you saying I’m some kind of nymphomaniac?”
His eyes widened innocently. “Would I say something like that?”
She gave him an oh-please look in response.
He leaned back against the counter and pulled her with him so she was nestled in his arms.
“So give me the verdict. Was it everything you expected? Were we too rough?”
His face had grown more serious, and there was a distinct edge of worry in his voice. She smiled and ran her hands up his muscled arms and then looped them around his neck.
“Have I told you lately how fantastic you are? Have I told you how lucky I am to have a guy who understands me so completely and who busts his ass to please me?”
“Hmm, maybe, but I’m not opposed to hearing it a few more times,” he said in a husky voice.
“If I weren’t so tired and sore, I’d totally take you over to the couch and jump your bones,” she said regretfully.
He laughed and squeezed her a little tighter. “You need to take it easy for a few days, baby. That was one hell of a workout you got last night.”
She leaned into his chest and rested her forehead against his chin. “We still have today and tomorrow off together.”
“Yep.”
She leaned back to look at him again. “Do we have any plans beyond being couch bums?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I thought about taking you to dinner tonight. Maybe a movie.”
“Ooooh, date night!”
“And tomorrow I thought we’d have some guys over from the station for a barbecue. Or if you prefer, we can keep it to just you, me, Brody, and Tate.”
Remembering her teasing Brody the previous night, she frowned and nibbled at her bottom lip.
“Something wrong?” Chase asked.
She met his gaze, unsure of how to say what was on her mind. “You don’t think . . . You don’t think things will be weird between us now, do you? I mean with Brody and Tate?”
“You’re wanting to know if your having sex with them changes things.”
She nodded. “Well, yeah . . . and between you and me.”
As if sensing the very real worry in her voice, he cupped her face and ran his thumb over her lips.
“I can’t speak for Brody and Tate. But I can most assuredly tell you that this changes nothing between you and me. In some ways . . . I think it’s better. Right now I swear I just want to sweep you into my arms and hold you for the next two days. I can’t explain it, but what happened was so absolutely awesome. I don’t even have words. It went beyond a simple fantasy fulfillment. Maybe a part of me worried you wouldn’t be into it. Maybe I worried I wouldn’t be into it. But right now I feel really damn lucky that I have a woman who understands my kinks and fantasies, has a set of her own, and doesn’t mind acting on mine or hers. That freaking rocks, Zoe. Maybe I’m a little relieved because I feel like we’re being more honest with each other than ever. I’m not saying I could have never not shared this kind of stuff with you. I think we would have been just fine and our relationship would have been as incredible as it’s always been. But now? I feel like I’ve been given a bonus on top of everything else.”
She stared at him in shock. This was the most talkative Chase had ever been when it came to the two of them. Their relationship had always been a study in fun, comfortable, and great sex. She’d been willing to go along with the status quo because she wasn’t someone who ever liked to rock the boat. And why fuck up something good by demanding more?
Her heart squeezed when she saw the absolute conviction in his eyes.
God, but she loved this man. She’d loved him for a long time. No, it hadn’t been some overnight revelation. It had been more like a gradual awareness, something that grew day by day until she hadn’t been able to imagine her life without him.
It bloomed and grew, continued to grow each day they were together. It was comfortable. It was steady. Like him.
Shouldn’t she tell him? Shouldn’t she say the words? Somehow she imagined a better place than the kitchen of a deer camp after a night of hedonistic debauchery. For now, it was enough to know that it was there. He wasn’t going anywhere, and neither was she. She’d find the right time. She wanted it to be perfect.
CHAPTER
|
NINE
To her relief, things hadn’t gotten weird between her, Brody, and
Tate. It had been a constant worry on her mind the few days following the night at the deer camp. They looked at her differently, but then she looked at them a whole lot different too.
On an emotional level, nothing had changed. She’d always cared very deeply for her two friends. Oh, she’d always thought they were hot. What normal female wouldn’t? She’d even had her moments of imagining what they’d be like in bed.
Now she knew, and when she looked at them, she remembered every detail.
“Hey, Zoe, you ready? We’re going to be late,” Brody bellowed from the kitchen.
She grinned, finished lacing her tennis shoe, and headed out of her bedroom to meet him and Tate.
They were standing in the kitchen when she walked in. Brody had the keys in his hand and was waiting by the door. He made a show of checking his watch, and she rolled her eyes.
“I’m not playing this time,” she reminded them.
“You will if one of ours doesn’t show,” Tate said. “Where else are we going to get a sub?”
“Ask one of the wives to play.”
“We like your breasts better,” Brody teased.
A hot flush worked up her neck. Damn it. In the past, not only had that sort of remark been common, but she damn sure wouldn’t have blushed like a moron—or remembered his mouth around her breasts.
She glanced down at her plain T-shirt. “I came better prepared this time. No way can I come out of this one.”
“Pity,” Tate said. “That was the high point of the last game.”
She scowled up at him.
Tate put his hands on her shoulders and herded her out the door. “Besides, Chase is going to be there. He had some paperwork to finish at the station, but he said he’d meet us there.”
Her eyes narrowed. “Uh-huh, provided he doesn’t meet with an untimely delay.”
Brody chuckled as he got into the truck. “We’d never sabotage the team captain.”
Zoe climbed into the back and shoved over Brody’s pile of stuff so she could have room on the seat. Thank goodness he kept the house cleaner than his truck.
She leaned up between the two seats as Brody backed out of the drive. “So what’s on the line today? Beer? Barbecue? Glory?”
“Yeah, yeah, and yeah,” Tate said. “Loser has to throw a barbecue—complete with beer, lots of beer, for the winner.”
She frowned. “Is it bad of me to hope we lose then?”
Tate whipped his head around and looked at her aghast. “Traitor!”
She gave him a smug smile. “C’mon, Tate. Nobody cooks barbecue better than Chief Maxwell. Do we really want to eat whatever the sheriff’s department comes up with?”
“She has a point there,” Brody said.
“Well, hell, now we have to throw the damn game?” Tate asked.
“Maybe you should renegotiate the winner’s terms,” Zoe suggested. “That way you don’t forfeit all your manly glory and you still get something good out of the deal.”
Brody’s face twisted in thought. “Beer . . . and what?”
She laughed. “As long as the beer’s covered, do you care?”
He grinned at her in the rearview mirror. “Weeell, I suppose we could have a side wager. Just between us.”
She raised an eyebrow and stared back at him. “Oh? Do tell.”
“Since we’d be deprived of decent barbecue if we won, it seems like Tate and I should be amply rewarded if we prove our manhood on the ball field.”
Tate snorted and covered his mouth as he began laughing.
“Oh Jesus,” she muttered. “What did you have in mind?”
Brody glanced over at Tate, and she could see the mischief gleaming in both the men’s eyes. Then Brody looked back at her in the mirror again. His eyes were all wide and innocent.
“You in a bow? Like a really small bow?”
She almost swallowed her tongue. Then she recovered enough to tease back. “Just a bow? So all I have to do is parade around in a bow and you’ll be happy.”
“That’s not what he’s saying at all,” Tate growled. “It begins with you in a bow. A fantasy of ours. But that’s only the beginning. It ends with you, sans bow, bent over the arm of the couch while we fuck your brains out.”
“Speak for yourself,” Brody shot back. “My fantasy involves her on her knees, between my legs, her mouth around ...”
“Okay, okay, I get it!” she said, throwing her hands over her ears. Then she dissolved into laughter. “You two are terrible.”
Then she had a thought.
“Uh-oh,” Tate muttered. “I don’t like that evil gleam that just appeared in her eyes.”
“So what do I get if you lose?” she smirked.
Brody’s brow wrinkled in thought. “Is our losing even an option? What do you have in mind?”
“Well,” she began, “it seems to me if you guys get rewarded for winning, you should have to pay up if you lose.”
“We’re listening,” Tate said. “What do you have in mind?”
Now she scrambled to come up with something. Her brain was fried, damn it.
“Okay, if you lose, I get a full-body massage from both of you, and I want the works. Oh, and dinner. A really yummy dinner. And,” she added, warming to her topic, “I want my chores done for a week.”
Tate shot Brody a disgusted look. “She’s such a girl.”
“Couldn’t you come up with something good?” Brody asked.
“Hey, to a guy sex is the ultimate reward. To a woman? Having a man do the cooking and cleaning is better than an orgasm any day.”
“That’s not what you were saying a few nights ago,” Tate muttered.
Her cheeks warmed again, but this time she was determined not to let embarrassment take over. She loved that they could joke and kid around about what had happened. Her biggest fear had been about residual awkwardness. As it stood, she was the only one acting stupid.
“Okay so maybe after you cook and clean, you can give me a screaming orgasm,” she said cheekily.
Brody grinned. “Works for me.”
Hours later, Zoe traipsed into the house with three very smug
males. Having been told all about the wager between Zoe, Brody, and Tate, Chase had added his own to the mix.
If the firemen won, Zoe had to serve them dinner—naked. If they lost, well, since Chase was so sure they wouldn’t lose, he’d never offered anything to Zoe. Smug bastard.
And since they’d handily defeated the sheriff’s department, Zoe now had to pay up. Three times.
“Cheer up, baby,” Chase teased.
She shot him a glare and kicked off her shoes in the doorway. “And when, pray tell, am I expected to pay up?”
The three men exchanged looks.
“Uh, now would be good,” Tate suggested with a grin.
Well hell. They were really going to make her pay up.
“If I’ve got to cook, then get the hell out of my kitchen. I’ll serve it up in the living room.”
She made shooing motions with her hands. Chase caught one of them and brought her fingers to his lips.
“Don’t forget the most important part of serving dinner,” he said. “Make sure you’re naked.”
Brody and Tate burst into laughter but hurried out of the kitchen before Zoe could retaliate.
She shook her head but grinned as Chase disappeared behind them.
She made quick work of dinner because quite frankly she was more interested in what happened after dinner. If Brody could get away with making burgers for his turn at supper, so could she. It beat Spaghetti-O’s out of a can, at any rate.
Twenty minutes later, she had the burgers on a platter complete with drinks and a bag of chips. Hey, they couldn’t be picky if she was serving food naked, right?
She set the tray on the counter and then sucked in a deep breath. She stripped out of her clothes and left them in a pile on the kitchen floor. Lord, she felt ridiculous, but a bet was a bet.