Three to Tango (15 page)

Eleven

“
W
ow. Candles.” Jeremy pulled an impressed face, then sniffed the air. “And you made lasagna?”

Kerry’s laugh sounded forced as she kissed him. “It’s your favorite.”

Jeremy pulled her closer to look into her eyes. “You sure about this? You seem really nervous.”

“I’m fine.” She kissed him again and pulled away. “I have to check the garlic bread.”

“Babe, relax. It’s just dinner, right?” Jeremy followed her into the kitchen to watch as she pulled the loaf of garlic bread from the oven and set it on top of the stove to cool.

She turned, taking off the oven mitts, and then went to the sink to wash her hands. She needed to occupy herself to keep herself from thinking too much about this. Brian and Jeremy in the same room. With her. Kerry’s skin crawled for a second, though whether it was with loathing or excitement, she couldn’t be sure.

It had been Brian’s idea. They’d made love, and it had been as good as it always was, but afterward in the dark he’d asked her about Jeremy. Before that he’d never even said Jeremy’s name. Never asked one word about him. Kerry had never hidden anything from Brian, but it was very clear that Brian wasn’t interested in knowing anything about Jeremy. At least, not until two nights ago when Brian pulled her close and asked if he could meet him.

“It’s just weird,” she said finally, unable to look away from Jeremy’s knowing gaze. “You and him. Together.”

“I feel like I know him already.”

What Jeremy didn’t know was that Kerry hadn’t told him everything. Oh, sure, when he pushed inside her asking if this was how Brian did it, if this was how Brian made her come, she always said yes, because that got Jeremy off. But it wasn’t true. Not exactly. She didn’t tell him how it really was with her and Brian, and hadn’t since the first few times. It felt wrong, somehow, to mix what she felt with one man into what she felt for the other. It was different with each of them, and that’s how it should stay.

“I don’t know why he’s so suddenly interested,” she said.

“Maybe he’s scoping me out.”

She studied him. “And you don’t care.”

The words came out flat. She’d stopped asking Jeremy if he were jealous about the time she spent with Brian, because the answer was always the same. And he proved it, too, that he really did get turned on by hearing her talk about what she did with another man. She sought his face for any sign, any hint or glimmer of jealousy anyway, though she knew by now there’d be none.

“He sounds like a cool guy. Hey, you’re not asking him to move in with us, are you?” Jeremy laughed as though that were the funniest thing he’d ever heard.

“No.” Kerry didn’t laugh.

The front doorbell rang. Jeremy looked toward it but didn’t move. Kerry stood, frozen. She didn’t want to open it. She didn’t want these two pieces of her life to join. The bell rang again. Before she could move, Jeremy moved easily across the kitchen, out the door. Kerry couldn’t make her feet move but forced herself to follow. She got into the living room just in time to see Jeremy open the door.

Brian was on the other side. Oh God. He’d combed his hair, slicked it back with water or gel, she couldn’t tell. He’d shaved. He wore a pair of nice black trousers, shiny shoes, a white dress shirt. No tie or jacket, but he looked polished and put together just the same. Jeremy on the other hand, wore faded jeans with ragged hems and an old T-shirt. Scruffy beard, rumpled hair.

The men stared at each other for a second too long before Brian held out his hand. “Brian Jordan.”

“Jeremy Kent. C’mon in.” Jeremy shook Brian’s hand and stepped aside to let Brian pass.

Brian smiled when he saw her. That was a good sign. He held up a bottle of red wine, the kind she’d told him she liked best. “I brought this. I hope it’s okay.”

“It’ll be perfect. I made lasagna.” What did she do now? Move forward? Kiss him? Shake his hand? Kerry froze again.

This was never how she’d imagined her life would end up. In all the years she’d thought about what it would be like to end up with Brian, nowhere had there ever been another guy in the picture. In the times when she’d imagined herself settling down with Jeremy, maybe getting married, maybe just living in sin for a while, she’d never pictured another guy, either.

It had been a long time since she’d imagined herself marrying Jeremy.

“C’mon in.” Jeremy held out his hand for the bottle. “Nice. I’ll get some glasses. Make yourself comfortable. Babe, maybe Brian wants some of that cheese spread you put out.”

It disturbed her, somehow, to see Jeremy acting the part of gracious host with the man Kerry had spent so many hours fucking. Jeremy never played host when anyone else came over. She was the one fussing over cheese platters and veggie trays. To look at him now, you’d think he’d been the one to invite Brian instead of her.

Kerry drew a deep breath and made a choice. She crossed the room with false confidence and offered her cheek. Not her mouth. That would’ve been too weird. “Hi, Brian.”

“Hey.” He squeezed her hip, just for a second, but long enough for her to feel it all the way to her toes. Then he looked at Jeremy. “Cheese sounds great.”

“Let’s go in the kitchen. Kerry’ll make you feel like we’re fancy folks, but that’s just not right.” Jeremy lifted the bottle. “Let’s get this cracked open.”

Dinner went better than she thought. Almost too well, as a matter of fact. Jeremy proved to be just as charming to Brian as he’d always been to Kerry. To everyone, really. Jeremy was just that way. He put Brian at ease with jokes, asking exactly the right sorts of questions to keep the conversation rolling. Brian answered, not quite as spontaneously funny as Jeremy but holding his own.

If Brian minded the way Jeremy casually linked his fingers through Kerry’s to kiss her hand when he praised the meal, he didn’t show it. Or when Jeremy squeezed her ass as she passed, or when he slung an arm around her shoulder and bragged, saying, “She’s an amazing woman, isn’t she?”

All Brian said was, “Yes. Absolutely.”

Kerry, for her part, was quieter than usual. Jeremy didn’t seem to notice, but she felt the weight of Brian’s gaze on her. Jeremy for all his touchy-feelyness barely looked at all.

Maybe he never really had, she thought suddenly as Jeremy started in on another one of his stories. At least, he never had the way Brian did. The way Brian was now.

After dinner, in the living room where they’d all gone at Jeremy’s suggestion, Kerry sat on the couch next to Brian while Jeremy took a seat at the chair across from them. His eyes were bright, his jokes a little more frenetic. Brian, in contrast, had gone slow and low. He still answered Jeremy’s questions and laughed at the jokes, but his focus remained on Kerry.

It was coming. Kerry knew it was. If it wasn’t what Brian had intended when he asked if he could come over and meet Jeremy, it surely was what Jeremy’d planned when he said he thought that would be a great idea. And then …

“So, Brian.” Jeremy’s voice, finally, dipped lower than usual. He leaned forward. “This is kinda awkward, right?”

“Yeah. A little.” Beside her, Brian didn’t shift closer to her.

He might as well have, though, for how sensitized she’d become to him. Her nipples peaked, but Kerry couldn’t tell if it were from arousal or the chill skittering up and down her spine as she watched the two men in her life face off. Only it wasn’t like that. Jeremy wasn’t threatening. Brian didn’t seem threatened.

The only one in the room who seemed to feel uncomfortable was her.

“But I’m glad you came over. I’m glad we had a chance to meet. It’s not every day a guy gets to meet his girlfriend’s boyfriend, right?”

Kerry’s muscles twitched. She and Brian had been very careful to never call each other boyfriend or girlfriend, reserving that title for her and Jeremy. Brian cleared his throat. Jeremy’s eyes gleamed.

“I figured it was time,” Brian said. “Since I’ve been fucking her for almost a month.”

The bottom of her stomach fell out, exactly the way it did on the first downhill rush of a roller-coaster ride. Brian, unlike Jeremy, even unlike herself, hardly ever swore. She’d heard him say fuck a few times, but always while they were … well, fucking. Hearing him say it now was unbearably sexy and disturbing at the same time.

Jeremy leaned forward a little bit more. “Yeah. She’s amazing, isn’t she?”

Brian nodded without looking at her. “She is.”

“Believe me, man, I’ve been hearing about you since I first met her. Brian Jordan this, Brian Jordan that. Brian Jordan was the one I wanted and never had.” For the first time, Jeremy’s voice had an edge to it. Kerry’s cheeks burned in mortification at the way he tossed out the words. They were true, she’d said them to Brian himself, but it was different hearing them come from Jeremy. “I’m glad she finally had a chance with you.”

“Yeah?” Brian’s voice sounded a little tight.

Kerry tensed. Her palms were sweating. The easy casualness of dinner had been replaced by something else. She looked back and forth from Brian to Jeremy.

“Jeremy,” she said quietly.

“It’s okay,” Brian said. “I’m glad you had a chance with me, too.”

Kerry swallowed. “Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea.”

Brian looked at her, his usually open expression unreadable. “I thought it’s what you’d want.”

“How could—?” She broke off, catching herself. She looked at Jeremy, still leaning forward, his eyes gleaming with interest. He rubbed his palms on the thighs of his jeans. His lower lip was wet. He’d licked it.

Brian looked at her, then. “I thought it would be better this way, you know? So it wasn’t between us like some secret. I mean, it’s not a secret, is it? Any of this? You tell him all about us, right? That’s what you like, man, right?”

Jeremy looked at Brian. Then he nodded, slowly. No more jokes. “Yeah. I like it.”

“You like hearing about what we do?”

“I fucking love it.” Jeremy’s voice hitched. “You know when she comes home from being with you, I can smell you on her. She smells like sex. And she’s so fucking hot, coming in with her hair all messy, that mouth all rubbed raw from where you kissed her. And her pussy’s still so wet. You can’t even imagine how fucking hot it is, man. And it’s like all I have to do is touch her, just a little, and she’s off like a fucking rocket. Because she’s still thinking about you.”

Kerry shuddered and closed her eyes for a moment. She swallowed, her throat tight with emotion she couldn’t put a name to. Electric, sparking heat twisted inside her, but what that meant, she couldn’t say.

“She never talks about you,” Brian said.

Kerry opened her eyes. Jeremy blinked, for too brief a moment looking taken aback before the gleam returned to his gaze. He smiled and shrugged, held out his hands with the palms up.

“It’s my thing,” he said. “I take it it’s not yours.”

Brian shook his head in silence.

Jeremy nodded. Something passed between them. Jeremy looked at Kerry.

“You want to fuck him right now, don’t you?”

Actually, she did not. She did not want to fuck Brian here, in this house she shared with Jeremy. In front of Jeremy. Yet Brian was turning toward her, and she tipped her face to kiss him because it was Brian, and she couldn’t resist taking just a taste, no matter what else was going on.

Brian didn’t kiss her. He paused just before he reached her mouth, but unlike the times he’d so teased her, she didn’t feel like this was part of some game. Brian searched her eyes. His hand came up to cup her cheek, then to brush her hair off her shoulder. His smile didn’t reach his eyes.

He said into her ear, “I can’t do this anymore.”

Then he stood. Jeremy stood, too, looking perplexed. Kerry couldn’t move.

“I have to go,” Brian said. “Jeremy, nice meeting you.”

“But … wait a minute.” Jeremy never stuttered, but now he did. “I thought you’d … But don’t you want to …”

“Oh, I want to,” Brian said easily enough without even a glance at her. “I want to so bad it hurts. I just can’t. Not like this.”

“I could leave,” Jeremy said hastily. “I mean, I get it. You don’t want to do it in front of me. That’s cool. I don’t want to harsh your scene, Brian, that’s not my thing.”

“No. Don’t leave.” Brian shook his head. “This is your house. That’s your girlfriend.”

Jeremy blew out an irritated breath and looked at Kerry. “Yeah … and you’re the guy who’s been fucking her for almost a month, remember?”

“Oh yeah, I remember. The problem is, I can’t forget.”

With that, Brian left.

Jeremy waited until the front door closed behind him, then turned to her. “The fuck’s his problem?”

Trembling, Kerry fought the sting at the backs of her eyes. “Forget him.”

The problem was, just like Brian, Kerry was pretty sure she couldn’t forget.

Twelve

H
e almost didn’t answer the phone when she called, but in the end Brian could no more let a call from Kerry go unanswered than he could forget her. “Hi.”

“Brian. I’m sorry. I never should have had you over.”

“No. It was important I see.” He sighed into the phone, thinking of the nights they’d talked in the dark this way. Sometimes he’d had a hand on his dick while he listened to her make herself come. Now he couldn’t stop wondering if Jeremy had been beside her, watching. Listening. Hell, maybe helping. The thought sent a shudder of distaste through him.

“See what? Jeremy?”

“You,” Brian said. “You with him.”

Silence, broken only by the harsh hitch of a breath.

“He’s a decent guy,” Brian said. “I wanted to hate him.”

“Do … do you hate me, instead?” she asked in a tiny voice that made him hate himself.

“No. I could never. But I can’t do this anymore, Kerry. I thought maybe I could, but I can’t.”

Another hitch of breath and the soft sniffle that meant she was crying. His gut clenched, but her tears couldn’t change anything. Brian closed his eyes in the dark, the phone to his ear, and hoped she’d hang up.

“I’m sorry, Brian.”

“Hey.” He tried to sound jovial and only sounded slightly manic. “Don’t worry about it. We both got what we wanted, right? Finished up all those years of wishful thinking.”

“That’s not it,” Kerry said. “That’s not what it was. Not all of it, anyway. I miss you, Brian.”

“It’s only been a couple days.”

“I can’t miss you even if it’s only been a couple days?” She sounded a little more like her normal self, and he had no trouble imagining her small grin.

“I don’t want you to miss me at all.”

“But I do.” Her whisper burned him even through the phone.

“You’re his,” Brian said, the weeks of frustration coming out at last. “Not mine. And I can’t fucking stand it.”

Kerry gasped; the sound was so different from the noise she sometimes made when he entered her that he wanted to curl up and die from it. “I’m not …
his
. I’m not something to own, Brian. You can’t buy and sell me like a damn car.”

“No, I can’t buy you. I guess I just leased you for a while.”

She gasped again. “What a shitty thing to say!”

“Tell me it’s different,” Brian said, ashamed of taking such a cheap shot and helpless to stop. “I’ll tell you you’re a liar.”

“You knew … maybe not from the start, but you knew about him,” she said in a low, hoarse voice. “And you were okay with it. So don’t act like it matters now.”

“But it does, Kerry. I don’t care if Jeremy doesn’t mind sharing you. I do. I can’t.” His voice cracked, and he cleared his throat, determined not to let her hear him sound so upset. “I want you all to myself. I love you.”

There. It was out. It had been like ripping off a bandage, but having said it, the pain was fading quickly. It would leave a scar, though. Brian was sure of that.

“Brian—”

“Don’t,” he cut in. “I don’t want to hear any more, Kerry. Okay? I can’t.”

She hung up before he could.

“What did he say?” Jeremy looked up from the book he was reading in their bed.

Kerry had made sure to splash her face with ice water to remove any sign of her tears, but she couldn’t disguise the pain in her voice. “He doesn’t want to see me anymore. He said … he doesn’t want to share me.”

Jeremy snorted, rolling his eyes. “Lame.”

Maybe it was the blur of tears, but Kerry looked at him with a fresh vision. “Why is it lame?”

“Babe, c’mon. He knew all along what he was getting into. Some guys just can’t handle it. I mean, sure, he wants you all to himself, who wouldn’t?”

“You,” she said.

Jeremy looked guilty. Caught. The expression passed, replaced by one of concern. “Don’t be like that.”

“But it’s true, isn’t it?” She made it a question, not a demand. She already knew the answer.

Jeremy put the book aside. “I told you. I like the idea—”

“You’d have watched me fuck him right in front of you.”

“Yeah. I would’ve. But he couldn’t handle it.”

“I couldn’t handle it, either,” Kerry said. “I didn’t want to.”

Jeremy shrugged. “Okay, fine. His loss.”

But it wasn’t Brian’s loss. It was hers.

“Let me ask you something,” Kerry said carefully, knowing already this was the end of everything, hoping at least it wasn’t too late for the beginning of something new. “Do you love me?”

Jeremy’s gaze flickered. “Babe. You know I do.”

“You don’t say you do.”

“You know how I feel about that sort of thing … It’s not what you say, it’s what you do.”

She lifted her chin, expecting more tears and feeling only emptiness. “And what you do is let me go off with another guy. And you don’t get jealous. Or even care.”

“It’s not that I don’t care,” Jeremy said, then paused, brow furrowing. “Ah, fuck. He said he loves you. Didn’t he?”

She didn’t say anything.

“You think that just because Mr. Salesman in his sharp suit and expensive ride says he loves you that he means it? He was okay with fucking another man’s girlfriend, Kerry. What sort of guy does that tell you he is?”

“And you were okay with me fucking him,” she said evenly. “What kind of guy does that make you?”

“You love him.” Jeremy’s lip curled. “Why? Because he’s a great lay? Because a hundred years ago he got your panties damp? None of that’s real, Kerry, don’t you get it?”

But it was real. And she’d been a fool not to see it. Kerry went to the closet to begin throwing some clothes in a bag.

Jeremy followed. “Wait a minute. Just wait. I love you, Kerry. Okay? Is that what you want to hear?”

It had never much bothered her that Jeremy didn’t say it, and that made her sadder than anything else that had happened. She turned to face him. “I’m leaving you, Jeremy.”

“Why? Because he doesn’t want to share you?”

“No,” Kerry said quietly, knowing it was unlikely he’d ever understand. “Because you do.”