“Now, hold up there, darlin’. Don’t go being hasty.” Clay risked it and took a step closer. The warning look she shot him froze him in place.
“You’re right. It’s not our place. So then tell us. What
do
you want us to do, April?” Mason always was the more logical of the two of them.
“I don’t want to have to choose between you.” Her voice sounded quiet, desperate.
Lips clamped tightly shut, Mason drew a deep breath in through his nose. Clay waited and finally, Mason spoke, “Okay.”
Clay raised a brow in surprise. “Okay?”
“Okay. She doesn’t have to choose. We continue as we have been, the three of us, until she goes to college and I go to boot camp. Then, after that, we’ll see what happens.” Mason finally cracked a wry smile. “Who knows? Maybe she’ll find some college boy and dump us both.”
April frowned. “Hey.”
“Kidding, baby. Kidding.” Mason laughed for real this time. It was a good sound.
She screwed up her face, apparently not quite ready to forgive them yet. Walking away, she shot back at them over her shoulder, “I suppose I’ll be seeing you both tonight in my room.”
Or maybe she had forgiven them.
It wasn’t exactly an engraved invite, but it was good enough for Clay. They both watched her walk away. Once she was back in the house, Clay turned to Mason. “You really okay with this?”
Mason stared into space for a second. “Yeah. I think I really am. It’s kind of a relief to stop worrying about who she’d choose if we forced her to.”
Clay let out a deep breath, nearly vibrating at the thought of what April had said when she left. “So, tonight, huh?”
Mason nodded. “Yup. Seems like. And before tonight, you and I have something we need to do.”
***
It was that statement that had led to the two of them borrowing Clay’s mother’s car and standing in the condom aisle of a convenience store three towns away where they hoped no one would know them.
Mason had picked up a small package but Clay shook his head. “Better get the big box.”
With a raised brow, he picked up the large one marked “value pack” instead while Clay reached past him and grabbed a bottle of personal lubricant off the shelf. “This too.”
Clay had watched Mason swallow as his eyes opened wider. “Okay. Is that it?”
Nodding, Clay had taken a few bills out of his wallet. “Yeah. Let’s pay and get the hell out of here.”
Now Clay stood with Mason beneath April’s window, a not-so-small brown paper bag containing a box of three-dozen condoms and a bottle of lube in hand.
“Why the hell am I nervous?” Clay whispered to Mason.
“Because this is the first time we’ve actually planned it. Before, it just kind of happened.”
Deciding the only way to get over the nerves was to get on with it, Clay grabbed the windowsill. “Come on.”
Once inside, Clay’s eyes searched the dark room. He saw April lying on the bed, but not in an oversized T-shirt like she usually wore. It appeared she had done a bit of shopping of her own. She was laid out before them like a centerfold. Blond hair splayed on the pillow, breasts spilling from two small pyramids of white lace, with another matching lace triangle between her legs.
Clay swallowed hard, damn glad they’d come with provisions, because looking at her now, laid out like a sexual buffet, there was no way they weren’t going to take advantage of every inch of her.
Mason stood next to him, still as a statue. “Where do we start?”
Clay laughed, knowing exactly where he wanted to start. He opened the bag, dumped the contents on the end of the bed, grabbed April’s feet and pulled her to the edge of the mattress as she squealed.
“Clay.”
“Mmm. You can’t look like this and expect to not be ravaged by the two cowboys you invited to your bedroom after dark, darlin’.”
She giggled as he planted her feet on his chest and leaned down to nibble on one bare toe. The view looking down her long, lean legs to that tempting triangle was pretty damn nice. Clay decided to take a closer look and kneeled at the end of the bed, eyelevel with his heart’s desire.
He discovered the panties were a thong. Nothing but a string on each hip and one between her ass cheeks held that piece of lace on her enticing body. Clay released another groan. “I want you, April. I want this.”
Her knees were looped over his arms, her ass high off the bed, as he pushed that lace aside and ran the tip of his tongue from front to back, pausing to tease her back entrance. He heard her breath catch in her throat and felt the shudder run through her at the unexpected touch of his tongue there.
Grinning, he watched her eyes close as she pushed closer to him. Clay stopped teasing her with his tongue just long enough to ask, “You like that, darlin’?”
She nodded.
“Want more?”
April nodded again, her voice soft and oh so sexy. “Yes.”
Clay used everything he had, teeth, tongue and hands to torture April, but he avoided the one place he knew she really wanted—no,
needed
to be touched—until both of them couldn’t take much more.
He stood again, undid his jeans and noticed the tremble in his hands. Heart pounding, he pushed his pants down over his ankles. Opening the condom box was difficult with shaking hands. Ripping the foil and covering himself wasn’t much easier.
Of all the other stuff they’d done before, what he was about to do had only happened in his dreams. Mason may think Clay had slept with April that night he’d gone to her alone, but he hadn’t. Yeah, they’d done a lot together, but this, right now, would be their first real time.
April’s eyes were barely focused, desire written clearly on her face, as she looked up at him. He pulled off the thong. It had served its purpose of tantalizing him, but now he wanted April, just her, no decorations. Clay wanted to make love to her, pure and simple.
Clay watched her reaction as he pushed against her. She was tight, hot, and sliding into her felt better than he ever imagined. Thrusting into her was even better. Unbelievable, in fact.
He wanted to feel her come around him, and he knew how to make it happen. With one hand, he blindly sought for the bottle on the bed, finally opening his eyes to find it in front of Mason. That was when Clay remembered Mason was still in the room, a fact he’d conveniently forgotten in the ecstasy of being buried inside April.
Mason sat in the chair next to the bed, watching Clay and April while stroking his glistening oiled cock. He was getting off from watching them together. That should probably bother Clay, maybe it would later, but somehow right now, it didn’t. What it did was make him want to come inside her and claim her for his own.
Clay grabbed the bottle from the end of the bed in front of Mason and quickly drizzled lube onto one hand. He slid one lube-slickened finger easily inside April’s ass, almost immediately throwing her over the edge. As Clay pounded them both to completion he heard Mason’s now labored breathing culminate in one final grunt as he came too.
Still throbbing inside April, Clay opened his eyes and watched Mason grab a tissue from the box next to the bed, wipe his hand clean and then strip off his boots, pants and underwear before he crawled onto the bed next to her.
Clay watched Mason kiss the woman who was still breathless from his loving. While still semi-hard and pulsing with aftershocks inside of her, Clay realized the time he’d had to pretend that she was his and his alone had come to an abrupt end. He watched Mason, already hard again, reach for the box of condoms.
Pulling out of April, he took a shaky step back, away from the bed.
Watching Mason roll on top of April, seeing his hands on her thighs, spreading them so his cock could slide into her where Clay’s had just been, had Clay swallowing hard past the lump lodged in his throat. Clay heard April’s moan as Mason penetrated her. He watched April raise her hips off the bed as her hands gripped Mason’s ass and pulled him into her deeper. He saw her slowly begin to tremble beneath Mason, saw the scratches her nails left on his best friend’s skin, and he heard exactly when Mason made her come before his muscles tensed as he thrust into her one last time and then sunk down heavily on top of her.
Clay stood off to the side in the darkness with his stomach feeling as heavy as a rock in his gut and realized they had to get back to the place they’d all been before the word “love” had ever been uttered. That place where he and Mason had both been grateful to simply share her. They would fix it. They had to, because if they continued like this, jealousy would eat him up and destroy them all.
As Clay’s mind whirled and his insides churned, April stretched one hand out. “Clay?”
He closed the distance, taking her fingers in his own. “I’m here, darlin’.”
“Come to bed.”
Mason rolled bonelessly off of April as Clay slipped onto the rumpled, sweaty sheets on the other side of her.
April yawned, her eyes closed. “I love you both.”
Clay gazed down upon the look of total contentment on the face of the woman between them. The irony wasn’t lost on Clay. April, who’d had problems with the situation in the beginning, was now perfectly happy loving and being loved by both of them, while Clay and Mason struggled with it all.
He caught Mason’s gaze and said, “We love ya too, darlin’.”
It was going to be one hell of a summer.
Part Two
Chapter Nine
April Dawn, antsy in the chute, snorted out a loud breath when she saw Clay swing up onto the metal rails of the bucking chute. She was his girl. The horse he’d bought green at the stock auction with his saved prize money and trained to be the best damn bucking bronco he’d ever ridden. Yeah, most of the horses that stock trainers preferred to use for rough stock events were geldings, not mares, because they traveled easier in a group. But Clay had loved this horse from the moment he first laid eyes on her—one reason he’d named her after the only other female he’d loved in his life. April Dawn was an angel to handle on the ground, but she was pure hellfire between his legs—another reason she reminded him of his April.
This may be only a practice, but she worked as hard with the arena empty as she would if the seats were full of thousands of cheering fans.
He spoke softly to her. “Ho, girl. It won’t be long now.”
Clay swung into his custom-made saddle and slid his boots into the stirrups. He grasped the hack rein in one gloved hand and held the other high in the air. At his nod, the gate opened and April Dawn surged forward, bucking beneath him.
Eight seconds took on all new meaning atop a bronc intent on bucking you off, but when Clay finally heard the buzzer, he was still in the saddle and that was a good thing. He freed his hand from the rope as the pickup man rode up next to him and helped him to the ground. With a grin on his face, Clay landed on his feet—another good thing. He pulled out the mouth guard designed to save his teeth during the ride and stashed it in the pocket of his protective vest as he headed for the exit.
“That is some bronc you trained there, Harris. You interested in selling her yet? I could make her into a star of the PRCA.”
Clay raised a brow at the stock contractor next to him. “No, sir. The answer’s the same as the last time you asked me.”
“I’d pay you well.”
“I’ve got plenty of money,” Clay told him.
The man shook his head good-naturedly. “Well, if you change your mind…”
“I know where to find you.” Clay tipped his hat and headed to the stall where April Dawn had been put away by one of the stock handlers.
“Great ride, Clay.”
Looking up from beneath the brim of his hat, Clay found one of the pro female barrel racers who’d been dogging his steps for the past few competitions and stifled a groan. “Thanks, Kit.”
He kept walking, but unfortunately, she followed. He tried not to notice how low cut her shirt was, but it was hard not to with her throwing her chest out toward his face constantly. “I got some nice cold beer in my trailer, if you want to kick back and relax for a bit.”
He stared overly hard at his feet as he walked. “Thanks, Kit. I appreciate the offer, but I don’t think so.”
They reached April Dawn’s stall. Someone had already unsaddled her for him, probably Mike, one of the other riders he’d gotten friendly with on the circuit. The only thing Clay could do was start grooming her and hope Kit took the hint and went away.
She didn’t.
“Who you keeping yourself for, sugar? I never see you with any women and it’s not for lack of attention on their part. A good-looking, top-ranking, pro rider like yourself is a hot commodity, so what has you sleeping alone every night when you could be keeping company with someone?”
Someone
meaning her.
Out of the corner of his eye, he could see her checking him out as her eyes moved from his chest, to his chap-covered thighs, to his denim-covered ass as he bent over to grab a curry comb. This woman was totally ruining the only serenity Clay could seem to find lately, the time he spent alone with his horse.
He let out a sigh. Maybe she’d leave him be if he told her. “Her name’s April.”