Grace's friend – Rose? – just laughs. "You definitely don't have a career in politics, doll. Anyone ever tell you you're a terrible liar?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"I'm her best friend," she says. "I know. You want to see her, right?"
"Yes."
She looks behind us at Aiden. "You too?"
"Are you taking us to her?"
"Depends," she says, stopping as we get to the hallway. Both of Grace's security detail stand in front of a door at the end of the hall. Grace's friend – Violet? That's it. Violet. No, Vi—crosses her arms. "Why are you here?"
"To see her," I answer.
She looks around before dropping her voice to a whisper. "Why?"
"To apologize," Aiden says.
Vi scowls. "You effed up."
I nod. "We did."
"She might not want to see you."
"We know."
She narrows her eyes. "So why should she talk to you? What are you going to say that she'd want to hear?"
Irritation rushes through my veins, and I look around the hallway, my fists clenched into balls as I lean forward and whisper to Grace's friend. "It's none of your business what we want to tell our girl, so quit cock-blocking us and get out of the way."
I expect her to slap me and call Grace's security detail, but she doesn't. A smile slowly spreads over her face. "I'm only getting out of your way if you're about to go in there and tell her that yourself."
"Tell her that you're cock-blocking us?"
"The part about her being your girl." Vi looks at Aiden. "Does that bit go for you too, hotshot?"
Aiden's face turns pink and he shuffles awkwardly. "Yeah. Me too."
"All right. Then I'll take you in there."
43
Grace
I text Vi again while only half-listening to my father's campaign manager give me instructions.
Are you stuck with the lobbyist? My dad is late. Now I'm going onstage a little earlier.
"We'll just have you kick off the first speaker introduction instead of your father's. Notes are on this card." The campaign manager – I can't remember her name, my father just fired his old one for some hot-shot new one - stands in front of me wearing a no-nonsense silk suit and directing one of her assistants. "Get her a mic. No, not that one. Why would you bring her one we were having problems with earlier tonight? Get one that works, for Christ's sake." She turns toward me, her voice low. "I swear, these college interns don't know their heads from their asses."
"I'm sure my parents will be here in a few –"
The door opens and Vi stands there. Thank God.
"Could I just steal her for a tiny second? I'm her designer and I need to adjust her dress." Vi asks the question in a way that's not really asking.
"Perfect," the coordinator says as a young girl in a black cocktail dress breezes past Vi with a battery pack and a mic. "We'll just need to get you hooked up and –"
"I can take care of the mic," Vi says, smiling sweetly. "We'll just be five minutes. That's all I need. It's really a delicate fashion issue, and I'm sure the First Daughter would prefer a bit of privacy."
"Okay." The woman holds up the pack. "The switch is on the back. You've used a million of these, I'm sure. You'll exit there and walk out down the hallway, where we'll be waiting to escort you on stage. Don't turn the mic on – we'll do it when we get out there. It won't be a live feed until we introduce you anyway. I'll have another mic for you in case this one's a dud. I swear we've had nothing but technical problems tonight already." She whirls around, whisking the frightened-looking intern away with her and out the door.
As soon as she leaves, Vi takes the mic pack from my hands. "I'll help you get this on, but there's someone – someones – here to see you."
My heart races. "They cannot be back here, Vi. You need to tell them to leave."
"Two seconds," she says, her tone leaving no room for argument. "Brooks and Davis will get them out of here before your parents even get near the building."
"I don't want to do this here –"
"Just hear them out, that's all." She gives me a long look. "You admitted yourself that walking out was a mistake. You were afraid. And they make you happy. Make up with them and go home and screw their brains out and be happy."
She goes to the door, pulling it open to let Noah and Aiden step inside.
My heart skips a few beats at the sight of both of them in tuxedos, arousal immediately flooding my body.
"Give me one second to get this mic on her and then I'll give you some privacy," Vi says, walking over to adjust my dress.
"You're sure that's turned off, right?" I whisper as Vi situates the pack under the back of my dress.
"It's definitely off. I'm not even sure it's working at all, actually. The light isn't coming on. I'll grab a new one for you." Vi dashes out of the room before even waiting for me to respond.
"I have to go out in ten minutes," I warn them. "My parents are late. I have to introduce someone and –"
"We'll be here and gone," Noah says. "We just have something to say, all right?"
"I –" I start. I have something to say too. I want to tell them I shouldn't have run out like that.
"Me first," he says. "I should have told you about the fact that I was looking at offers all over the place. The truth is, I was going to, but then things kept happening with you – with the three of us – and I didn't know what the hell was going on. First I thought it was just fun, what was happening – and by the time I realized it might be something more than that, it was too late to just tell you. I'd already kept it a secret, and I thought if I told you, it would screw things up for sure. And Dallas and Miami aren't far, and I didn't think it was lying exactly."
He runs his hand through his hair, a pained look on his face.
"I shouldn't have just run out of there. I just– it felt like you were deliberately trying to hide it, but everyone else in the world knew about it. So I was just the idiot girl you were screwing who wasn't in on the joke."
They walk up close to me, and I inhale sharply at their proximity, breathing them in. I'm heady just at their scent, reminded that it's been two days since I've been in their bed. Every part of my body is turned on at the thought of being between them.
Noah slides his fingers under my jaw, turning my face up to him. "You're not the idiot girl we're fucking."
"We royally screwed up by not telling you," Aiden says, his hand going up to my hair, tucking an errant strand behind my ear before grazing my neck with his palm, sending goose bumps over my skin. "I screwed up as much as he did. You should have known from the beginning, gone in with eyes open."
"It's just– this whole thing has been insane," I say, my words already breathy. I close my eyes as Aiden's hand moves down my arm, as my body responds immediately to their touch. "You're backstage here– at a charity event where my parents are going to show up any second. You can't be here. And I don't think I would have even risked it if I knew you were just leaving and–"
They don't let me finish talking. Noah puts his hands on the sides of my dress, hiking it up over my thighs as I let out a little squeal, then picks me up and carries me to the nearest wall, pushing my back up hard against it. The mic pack digs into my back, but I don't care.
My breath catches in my throat as he puts his lips against mine, and my body responds to his touch. I let out a moan as he slides to his knees in his tuxedo, pushing my thighs further apart. His fingertips graze the fabric covering my pussy. "Your panties are all wet," he whispers, but it's more like a groan.
"I'm wet, and I have to go in ten– eight– minutes," I whisper. "And neither of you should be here."
"We want– no, we need– to apologize," Aiden says. Standing beside me, he turns my face toward his to kiss me hard on the mouth, his tongue seeking out mine as Noah slides his finger under the fabric of my panties. I let out a long, desperate moan into Aiden's mouth.
"I need to apologi
ze on my knees," Noah growls. "I need to smell you. I need to taste you. I need to make you come."
Oh my God.
It's wrong– so wrong– that I'm even considering doing this right now. I'm minutes away from needing to be out there on stage, and I'm going to go out there disheveled and reeking of orgasm? And I'm in here with them when I could so easily be caught and- oh, shit, Aiden is slipping his fingers down the front of my dress, covering my nipple, and Noah is pushing my panties to the side, his warm mouth between my legs.
How in the world can I think rationally when they're doing what they're doing right now?
I can't. I spread my thighs wider for Noah, groaning as he thrusts his fingers inside my slick pussy before covering my clit with his mouth. "Oh my God," I breathe. My body responds instantly– so quickl– to the sensation, the fact that it's been two days since I've felt either of them between my legs made instantly obvious.
I'm so quickly near climax I can hardly stand it.
"This is just a preview," Noah says as he flicks his tongue over and over my clit. I'm so wet I think I'm dripping down my legs as Aiden reaches around my back, fumbling with the zipper to my dress. He yanks out the mic pack.
"I'm taking this off," he growls. "I want your tits in my mouth."
"You… can't," I breathe. "Oh my God. You can't. I have to go out there and you can't make me look like I've been…"
"Fucked?" Aiden growls. He throws the mic pack on the ground.
"Fucked. Yes," I breathe. "Holy shit."
Aiden pulls the loosened fabric of my dress down over my breast and tongues my nipple as Noah fucks me harder with his fingers.
"When you finish with this political bullshit, you're going to come straight to our bed, Grace Sullivan, and I'm going to come in this sweet–"
Noah thrusts inside me with his fingers.
"Oh, God."
"Tight–"
Thrust again.
"Perfect little pussy of yours," Noah says, the tips of his fingers pressing against the sensitive spot inside me.
"And I'm going to come in your tight, little, almost-virgin asshole," Aiden says.
"Oh, fuck," I breathe. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck me." Aiden stifles my moan with his mouth, but it hardly does anything to mute me as I come so hard with Noah's face between my thighs.
The door bursts open.
I'm still coming as Brooks, Davis, and Vi run into the room. Noah's fingers are still between my legs, my pussy still contracting around him and I'm dizzy, so completely out of it, I don't even understand what's going on.
"Vi! What's wrong with you?! Get out of here!" I shriek.
"Don't say anything!" Vi orders, her voice shrill. "Don't say another word!" She slides in her skirt and heels, grabbing the mic pack off the floor and yanking the cords from it before she tears across the room and tosses the entire thing in a pitcher of water.
"Ma'am, you need to come with us," Brooks says, her voice measured, as if it's every day she walks in on the president's daughter getting it on with two football players.
"Fuck," I whisper, panic rushing through me. "Turn around!"
They all spin around, and Noah slips his fingers from between my legs, standing and pulling down my skirt as total chaos erupts. Vi and I are whisked out of the room by Brooks and Davis while Noah and Aiden are immediately escorted behind us by other Secret Service agents.
I can hardly catch my breath, my heart beating furiously. "What the hell is going on?" I ask the question, even though I have a sinking suspicion based on Vi's behavior with the mic pack.
But I don't want to say the words.
Brooks and Davis push us toward the SUV, but Vi puts her hand up. "Like hell that's happening," she says, her voice tight. "Someone's already got the valet pulling my car up, Grace."
"Ma'am, we need you to come with us," Brooks says firmly. "Your father–"
"My father wants me to get in the car?" I look behind me for Noah and Aiden, but I don't see them. I look at Vi. "Where's your car?"
"Come on," Vi says, taking my hand and pulling me behind her. The valet pulls up in her car just as we reach it, and Vi is peeling away from the building as soon as she shuts her car door. "Your security will follow us, but it beats being trapped with your parents on Air Force One or something."
"Noah and Aiden–" I start, looking in the side mirror behind us.
Vi shakes her head. "Out of there in the opposite direction," she says.
I exhale heavily. "Please tell me what I think just happened didn't just happen," I say, my voice trembling.
"I'm sorry, Grace."
"How?"
"The campaign manager had some dumb intern running the live feed, and the girl turned it on early, I guess. Your mic pack didn't even look like it was working when I left, so I'm not sure how I even missed something like that–"
The image of Aiden tossing the mic pack on the floor flashes into my mind. "Oh, God. It must have jarred something loose when he threw it or hit the on button… Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no." The full realization of what everyone must have heard hits me all at once and I collapse heavily back against the seat.
"They only heard part of it– thirty seconds, maybe. But it was the last thirty seconds when Noah and Aiden were telling you–"
Oh, God. Telling me exactly what they wanted to do to me.
I think my heart actually stops beating.
Everyone heard that and… the rest of it…
I'm going to be sick.
"No," I whisper.
Vi's hand flies to her mouth. "I'm so sorry, Grace," she repeats. "The room heard a live feed of two football players giving the president's daughter an orgasm."
Everything spins. I think I'm going to faint. Vi is saying something now, but it sounds like she's speaking from far away, like she's in a tunnel. My phone is ringing and ringing and ringing, interspersed with Vi's ringtone over and over and over.
"Grace?" Vi asks. "Grace?"
Everything goes dark.
44
Grace
"Hiding here was the right decision- the only right decision you've made in a long time," my mother says with a scowl. She's wearing an all-white suit standing in the middle of the expansive, modern, all-white room in one of Vi's ex's mansions on Star Island where she practically blends in with the living room.
Vi drove us from Colorado to Miami– nearly three full days of driving- where her very wealthy ex (I'd call him a boyfriend but Vi doesn't do boyfriends) took us into his gated compound, and we've