Authors: Tamsin Baker
Holy
hell, that
sounded intense!
“What
can I get you to drink?” the bartender asked them, and Laura swung around her
seat, facing the cute guy and giving him an automatic smile.
“Renee?”
She turned to the woman who had befriended her before she’d known a thing about
her.
“Yeah.
Whiskey for
me.”
Laura
grimaced. “Yuck.
Red wine for me, please.”
A
hand pushed some money across the bar and Laura looked up to see Tyler paying
for her drink.
“Thanks, sweetie.”
Tyler
dropped his head and planted a kiss on her lips. It was hard, possessive, and
very thorough. Laura threaded her hands through his hair and held him tight as
white light tingled around her brain. When he finally lifted his head, his
expression was soft.
“You
okay?”
Laura
nodded.
“Of course.
You go talk to your friends. I’ll
hang with Renee for a bit.”
Tyler
glanced over to the corner where Brandon was standing with a group of guys.
“Okay,
but come find me as soon as you can.”
He
kissed her once more and swaggered over to cheers by the group.
“What
was that about?” She indicated to the men, who were handing beers around the
group.
Renee
laughed. “Tyler’s been sulking for months now. His friends will give him a bit
of crap tonight, but they’re happy for him and Brandon.”
Laura
frowned, watching the back-slapping and beer-guzzling with a jaded eye.
“Is
this what every Saturday night is going to be like from now on then?”
Renee
handed her a glass of red wine and they clinked the glasses together.
“Cheers, and to answer your
question, no.
I have a feeling this may be one of the last times you’ll be here. The boys are
too in love with you to take you to places like this.”
Laura
was forever grateful she hadn’t been drinking her wine when Renee said such a
thing. She would have sprayed it all over the gorgeous woman.
“Did
you just say ‘in love with me’?”
Renee
could not mean that.
“Yeah, of course.”
Renee grinned and threw back her
whiskey, swallowing it in one smooth motion.
“But…it’s
only been a week!” This made no sense to her whatsoever.
“Shifters
are like that. Mate for life, fated soul mates.
Blah, blah,
blah.”
Heat
seared Laura’s cheeks and she looked away for a moment. She was still finding
it a little hard dealing with the whole,
men-who-turn-into-mountain-lions
thing, but Renee of course had been dealing with it her entire life.
“
Nae
!”
“Rosie!”
Renee waved at a cute little blonde woman across the bar.
“Do
you mind if I run over to chat with Rosie for one second?”
Laura
waved her off. “Go, go. I’m going to enjoy my wine and think.”
Renee
winked and jumped up, her sexy little bum sashaying away. Laura would have been
so jealous of Renee’s physique, if she even had an ounce of spare energy to do
so. Tyler and Brandon had worn her out completely, making love to her in every
way she knew, and ways she’d never dreamed of. Why be worried?
“So
you’re the new girl Tyler’s screwing?”
Laura
swiveled on her stool, gaping at the tart sneering at her. Was this woman
really talking to her?
“Excuse
me?”
Her
eyes slid up and down the woman in front of her. This could not be the sort of
bed partner Tyler usually went for. She was dark and short, attractive in a
skanky sort of way. But her aura was horrible, all ice and flint.
The
woman tossed her head like a horse. “Tyler and his brother have slept with most
of the women in this bar. I wanted to warn you not to get too close.”
Another
woman, this one tall and blonde, stepped up beside the dark one.
“Yeah,
you know you won’t last, right? Those two never keep any woman around for more
than a week or two.”
Laura
swallowed the burning in her throat and tried not to think about her lovers
taking these women into their beds.
“Is
there any reason you’re talking to me?”
The
dark one nodded. “You should be warned. You look like a nice chick. They take
you to their beds, make you feel loved, act like you’re special, and shit…do
they know how to screw.”
Acid
burned in Laura’s tummy and she placed the wineglass down with shaking hands.
“Do
they now? How would you know? Had both of them, have you?”
The
blonde narrowed her eyes at Laura. “They never cross swords. I slept with
Brandon a few weeks ago, and he told me his brother and he never share.”
A
small flame of triumph flared in Laura’s belly, despite the anger and jealousy
threatening to consume her. Her heart was pounding and she could barely swallow
the bile that was rising in her throat. This was a nightmare come true.
“Well,
I’m glad you weren’t good enough for both of them. But I am.”
The
women reeled back as though she’d struck them.
“What?”
The blonde gasped. “You’re screwing
both
of them?”
Laura
shuddered at the word, unable to link the two images together—the way her men
touched her, loved her, and the crude way these women were expressing it. These
women had shared the same things with Brandon and Tyler as she had?
Impossible.
“No.
I make love to them.”
The
women began to laugh, a cackling, evil sort of sound. “You’re kidding, right?
Those boys fuck anything with tits and a cunt. They may talk sweet, but then
they fuck you all night long.”
Laura
was going to be sick, she actually dry-retched and gagged. Visions of her men
doing those exact things to her flashed before her eyes. Heat bloomed in her
cheeks and she gripped onto the bar so she didn’t topple off her seat.
Another
woman came along and the dark one grabbed her.
“This
is Tyler’s new chick.”
The
new one, who had beautiful eyes, smirked at her.
“Lucky bitch.
Enjoy him while you can. He has
the most talented tongue I’ve ever come across. I’ve tried to get back in with
him, but he likes new flesh.”
The
beautiful eyes looked Laura up and down, showing her true colors as the
ugliness surged, transforming her once-pretty face.
“And
there’s
plenty of you to go around, so you might last
longer than us.”
Laura
was really going to be sick now. Her stomach surged and she jumped up. “I have
to go.”
She
pushed through the group of women, their laughter following her as she made her
way to the toilet. She burst into the dirty little room and locked herself in a
stall, shaking uncontrollably with hot tears rolling down her face. How many
historical romance novels had she read that said the best men to love were
reformed rakes? A bad boy who turned good just for you?
It
so wasn’t true. Loving men like that hurt. The sobbing started and she covered
her mouth with her hand, rocking forward and back. She couldn’t compete with
women like that. She didn’t want to. How could she ever believe that they’d
stay with her, if those were the sort of women they
liked.
Laura
unrolled some toilet paper and wiped at her face, memories of their times
together flashing in her mind like some sort of porn movie. She’d believed them
when they said she was special. But she wasn’t. She was just one of the many
women they’d fucked and the first they’d tried sharing. How many women had they
licked? How many vaginas had those cocks been in? She’d sucked them and loved
every minute of it. How could she make love to them now that she knew what sort
of men they were?
Laura
took a deep, shuddering breath as a group of girls burst into the bathroom. She
needed to get home—
now
, where she
could be alone. She stood up on shaky legs, making sure her breathing was at
least a little regular,
then
she stepped out into the
room.
The
women all stared at her, one little redhead stepping close.
“You
okay?”
She
nodded, walking to the mirror and inspecting the damage.
Crap.
Thank God she didn’t wear much makeup.
She
turned to the woman close by. “I need to get out of here, but don’t have my
car. Are there any taxi’s out front?”
The
redhead
lay
a gentle hand on her arm. “Sure. When you
go out, just turn left and follow the hallway. It’ll take you right to the
front where the
taxi’s
are.”
Laura
gave the woman a smile and checked her pockets. She still had her phone and
money on her. Perfect. She was so done living in this fantasy world. Better to
get out now before she got her heart totally shattered.
“Thanks.”
She nodded at the one kind woman she’d met tonight and ducked out the door. She
ran straight into a gorgeous, skinny, platinum-blonde.
“Look
who we have here. You’re Laura, aren’t you?”
Laura
nodded, defeated. What more could be said to her tonight?
“Well,
I’m Simone.”
The
woman placed her hand on her hip and flipped her hair, the tone of her voice
making it clear that she thought she was important.
“Yeah, so?”
Simone
glared at her, fire spitting out of her ugly aura. “You know Brandon left you
to come to me last night?”
What?!
White
noise filled her head as the breath froze in her lungs.
“What
are you talking about?”
The
blonde tossed her glistening long hair over her shoulder.
“Brandon
was in my bed last night. I know you think you have them all to yourself, but
you don’t. They’ll always find a way to get what they need, and you obviously
can’t give it to them.”
Pain
shot through Laura’s chest.
A piercing, crippling sensation
that had her staggering back and fumbling along the wall toward the back door.
This couldn’t be happening. She should have listened to her inner voice when
it’d told her it had all been too good to be true.
Her
phone was vibrating in her pocket, and it made her move faster. Her men were
too smooth-tongued to trust them to tell the truth. She fell out the back door
and into the cold night air. A white cab waited by the curb and she stumbled
toward it. She yanked open the door and told the man her address.
Her
swollen eyelids slid down over her painfully gritty eyes and she wrapped her
arms around her shaking body. She felt cold, empty, and disgusting. Had she
just left a part of her soul back in that club?
As
the silence fell down on her like a brick wall, she knew she’d have to face the
truth. She’d already fallen in love with Tyler and Brandon, and without them
she’d live her life as though half of her soul were missing.
****
Tyler
walked to the back of the darkened room again and looked over to where Renee
stood by the bar. She lifted her arms in a confused shrug and Tyler closed his
eyes briefly. What the hell happened? One minute he’d been drinking beer with
some mates and the next thing he knew, their woman was missing. He made his way
back to Renee in time to meet up with Brandon, who’d been doing another lap
outside.
“One
of the bouncers said she left in a taxi about half an hour ago.”
“What?”
Tyler couldn’t believe it. “Why would she do that?”
He
turned to his sister. “
Nae
, what did you say to her?”
Renee
held up her hands and stepped back as though she’d been struck. “Nothing, I
swear.
Although, I probably shouldn’t have left her alone for
so long.
I did see a couple of women talking to her but didn’t think
much of it.”
Tyler
shuddered as an ex of his walked past and gave him fluttery eyes. He looked
away with a grimace.
“Did
we do something totally moronic bringing her here?” he asked his brother, a
feeling of cold dread slithering up his spine and circling his chest.
“I’m
gonna
’ call her again.”
“No.
You’ve already called her ten times.” Tyler thought quickly. What to do?
“Let’s
drive over to her place. If the lights are on, we’ll bang on her door, and if
they’re not, we’ll come back in the morning.”
Brandon
grunted his ascent and they both headed toward the door.
Twenty
minutes later, they were sitting in the car outside Laura’s house, staring at
the bricks and mortar.