His Secret

  “Two minutes,” he said. “Just two minutes.”

  Two minutes wasn’t that long. I didn’t know why he felt the need to reassure me. I gasped as he fastened one clothespin to my nipple, but after the initial shock wore off, it was far from the most painful thing I’d ever experienced.

  He lowered his head to my other nipple, repeating the process. Except by the time he was ready to put on the other clothespin, I felt like my entire breast was on fire. I squirmed, but the motion only made things worse. It should have been time to take it off. We had to be way over two minutes.

  “Almost there,” Blake said. He ran his hand over my stomach, letting his thumb tease across the curls I kept neatly trimmed.

  I wanted his fingers lower, but I didn’t think I could manage an articulate request at this moment. My other nipple was starting to hurt now, the pain traveling down my breasts and into the tight coil of pleasure that sat low in my belly. Instead of chasing the pleasure away, it mixed, mingled, and became something else. Something deeper, more intense.

  Something I hadn’t realized I’d wanted until now.

  What we’d done before had been a little different, and I’d liked it, but part of me hadn’t understood just how much I wanted this sort of thing to be an option.

  “All right,” he said. “One’s done.”

  I was so focused on getting the clothespin off that I hadn’t taken the time to think what it would feel like to have the pressure released.

  When I was young, I’d been playing in an area where my parents had been building something, and I’d tripped. I’d fallen on a strip of sandpaper that had abraded the skin from my elbow to half-way down my forearm.

  Having the first clothespin removed felt something like that.

  The second was worse, making my eyes water.

  “Fuck!” I writhed on the bed, no longer caring about whether I was moving toward or away from Blake. I just needed to move, to do something, anything, to distract me.

  Then his tongue was there, soothing my flesh, distracting me. My breath caught in my throat, air escaping in a near-soundless whimper. His hand moved between my legs, fingers finding that slick bundle of nerves, and I lost the ability to think about anything more than how he made me feel.

  “Fucking gorgeous.” He pressed his mouth against my throat and slid two fingers inside me. “You smell amazing. Like…pineapples.”

  I would’ve laughed if he hadn’t chosen that moment to curl his fingers and rub against that spot inside me. A lightning strike couldn’t have matched the electricity that coursed through my body as I came. I screamed, and part of my mind was functioning enough for me to be grateful that I didn’t have any neighbors close enough to hear.

  “Damn,” he growled. “That’s the sexiest sound I’ve ever heard.”

  He covered my mouth with his again, his tongue plundering, exploring, claiming. He slid his body along mine, skin against skin, and I pulled on my restraints again, desperate to touch him, to mark him as mine.

  Because he was mine.

  I smiled, and he raised his head, his expression puzzled. “I’m hoping that’s a ‘great kiss, Blake’ smile, and not a ‘that’s a funny kiss’ smile.”

  “You’re mine,” I said.

  He took my bottom lip between his teeth and gave it a tug before releasing it. “And you’re mine.” A shadow passed across his face. “You are, aren’t you?”

  “I am,” I said. “I’m also getting a little chilly.”

  Blake lowered his body onto mine, and I shifted to get him to settle more comfortably. I loved the way our bodies fit together, not just in sex, but like this too. I already knew we were great in bed together – sometimes figuratively rather than literally – but we needed more than sex if we were going to make things work between us. This gave me hope. Lying like this, comfortable in our own skins, smiling and talking.

  He brushed hair back from my face. “We don’t have to go any further than this. If I can lay here tonight with you, hold you, I’ll be happy.”

  I tried to reach for him, but my hands were still stopped short. “If we don’t go any further, I’m not sure I’ll be happy.”

  He laughed, and I loved the feel of it almost as much as I loved the sound. “Let’s get you untied.” He reached up and tugged on one sock, then the other, and they both came free easily.

  My fingers tingled as the blood flow returned to normal, but I barely noticed. I was more concerned with touching. His face, his hair, his back. The scruff on his face was rough against my palms, and I couldn’t wait to feel it against other, more sensitive, parts of my body.

  “Condom?” he asked.

  I didn’t even need to think about it. “I’m on the pill.”

  He kissed me hard, then went up on his knees, his cock jutting out in front of him. His hands slid from my hips down my legs to my knees, then over my calves. He lifted my legs, raising them straight until my ankles rested near his shoulders.

  “Is this okay?”

  I nodded. I’d feel the burn soon, but I’d always been quite flexible. What I hadn’t counted on was how tight this position would make me. I was wet, but as Blake pushed inside me, my eyelids fluttered. He groaned, the sound vibrating through me, adding a whole new sensation.

  “Fuck, Blake.” I grabbed my blanket, twisting it in my hands. I was too full, stretched too much, but it wasn’t bad. It was good. Too good. “Fuck! Fuck!”

  “That’s what I’m trying to do.”

  I opened my eyes and glared at him. “If you can talk, you’re not doing–”

  The word became an inarticulate shout as he leaned forward and started pounding into me. My knees were almost to my chest, and the backs of my thighs screamed in protest, but the pain was only in the background, adding to the other sensations that Blake was causing. I was dimly aware that I was begging, but I couldn’t feel even a little self-conscious, not when he was saying my name over and over.

  He dropped my legs, leaning down to capture my mouth. As his tongue tangled with mine, I locked my ankles around his waist, pulling myself up to meet his thrusts. Our bodies slammed together with no pretense of gentleness. We caught ragged breaths between kisses, both of us racing toward climax. I grabbed his ass, digging my nails into the firm flesh, and he retaliated by biting my lip. Sex with him somehow felt a bit like fighting, but it was a whole different form of fighting.

  A sexy one that I liked a whole lot more than the other kind.

  He came first, the feeling of him emptying inside me triggering my own orgasm, and we rode the waves together, wrapped around each other until we collapsed in a sweaty pile of limbs.

  I could get used to this.

  Twenty-Nine

  Blake

  I didn’t want to leave. Not when I was in bed with a warm and naked Brea. And not when she was pushing back against me, hooking one leg behind her to open her up to me. I slid inside, and our bodies began to move together again.

  We’d barely slept, but I felt invigorated rather than tired. We’d made love – and no matter how we did it, that’s what it had been – all night, sleeping, waking, coming back together again. I was surprised I could even still come, but I would never say no to being inside her.

  After we finished, Brea slipped back to sleep again, and I climbed out of bed. As much as I wanted to stay with her, I knew I needed to get back to my brothers. Brea would be here when they went back home, and I knew she’d understand.

  I took a quick shower, checked on her again, then wrote her a quick note to let her know where I was going, and that I’d be back. The whole way to the retreat, I steeled myself for what I was going to do next. The fact that my brothers had put my reconciliation with Brea above what they wanted had meant something to me.

  I didn’t knock on the suite door since I had my key, but a part of me suspected that they’d all be gone, tired of waiting for me to deal with my shit. But, instead, they were sitting around the table, eating breakfast, but all looked up when I came in
.

  Before I could fall back into my old ways, I went straight to Jax. “Thank you,” I said, “for going to Brea.”

  “You made things, right?” Jax asked.

  “I did.” I sat down in the empty seat and reached for a muffin. This next part wasn’t going to be nearly as much fun. “And now I want us to do the same.”

  “We didn’t know,” Slade said, “what it was like for you. That’s on us. All three of us. We got caught up in our own shit and never stopped to think what things were like for you.”

  “You guys were kids,” I said, looking at each of them. “I wanted to blame you for everything because I felt like you’d at least gotten a bit of a normal life and I never did. I was wrong.”

  “Grandfather should have talked to us,” Cai said. “I should have spoken up more often. Jax should have been our brother instead of feeling like he had to be a parent. Slade shouldn’t have felt like he needed to make peace all the time. You shouldn’t have felt like you were alone in this. All of us are at fault, and none of us are. One person isn’t to blame for how we reacted to a horrible situation.”

  I stared at my usually quiet brother. That was one of the longest speeches I’d ever heard him make. And it all made sense.

  “Can we all agree that we’ve all done stupid shit, treated each other badly, and made basic asses of ourselves?” Slade asked. “And then can we agree to move past it?”

  I looked at Jax, then at Cai. They both nodded. “I’m game if you are,” I said.

  I’d heard people talk about weights being lifted, but I’d never actually experienced it until now. We hadn’t needed a big discussion or some sort of deep breakthrough. No crying or hugging or apologies. Just an acknowledgment of what we’d each experienced and a promise to never ignore each other again.

  And it was done.

  “I meant what I said before,” I said. “I don’t need Grandfather’s money.”

  “None of us really do,” Slade said. “I’ve barely touched my trust fund.”

  Cai shook his head. “Me either, but I think we can all agree that it’ll be good to get Grandfather’s estate settled. And I’m sure we can all find some uses for our portions.”

  We fell silent for a while, and for the first time ever, I felt like part of the group. Like a man with his three brothers, wondering how things would change from here.

  “There is something else we need to talk about,” Jax said. “And it’s not going to be a fun conversation to have.”

  “Because these last couple days have been a blast,” I said. I was half-joking, which surprised me, but one look at Jax’s face told me that he was serious. “What’s going on?”

  Jax met my gaze, held it with a seriousness that made adrenaline surge through my system. “I’ve already talked to Cai and Slade about this. But only because–”

  “It’s okay,” I said, holding up a hand. “I get it. They were available, and I was ignoring all of you. No hard feelings.”

  “Thanks.” Jax smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. He sighed and leaned back. “This is going to sound crazy at first, but the three of us have checked into things, and it looks like the truth.”

  “What looks like the truth?” I asked.

  When Jax opened his mouth and started to tell me all about the letter Grandfather wrote and his suspicions, I almost thought it was a joke. Except Jax didn’t usually joke, and he didn’t joke about the accident that killed our parents and sister.

  Except if he was right, it hadn’t been an accident. Someone had done it intentionally.

  “Dad had a couple big stories he was working on,” Cai said. “The PI involved in all this talked to another journalist who’d worked with Dad on occasion.”

  Slade picked it up. “A few days before the accident, they’d been talking about this new story, and it was something huge. There weren’t any details out there, but it sounded like something that someone might go to some pretty drastic measures to protect.”

  “Let me see if I understand,” I said slowly. “A cop tells Grandfather that everyone else is wrong and the accident wasn’t an accident at all. Grandfather hires a private investigator, but he didn’t find much of anything in the last twenty-four years. Still, Grandfather thinks someone else needs to know, so he has the PI send a letter he wrote, telling you all of this. How am I doing so far?”

  “Yeah, that’s accurate,” Jax said. “I told you it was going to sound crazy.”

  “It does,” I said. “But what makes you guys think that anything new will be found after this long?”

  The others all exchanged looks, and I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like what came next.

  “Because he has access to possible leads that he didn’t have before,” Cai said.

  “What possible leads?”

  “Us,” Jax said. “Grandfather wouldn’t let us talk to him before, but he can talk to us now.”

  “What could we possibly remember?” I looked at all three of them in turn. “We were kids. It wasn’t like we would’ve even known what to look for back then.”

  Jax looked uncomfortable, but I had to give him credit. He didn’t back away. “Actually, it’s you he thinks might know something. About that day. About the crash.”

  About the one day I never, ever wanted to remember.

  Thirty

  Brea

  I pulled Blake’s note out and read it again even though I had it memorized.

  I need to talk to my brothers, but I’d rather have stayed with you. Come back to the retreat, and I’ll see you later. B

  Not a declaration of love, but I understood the effort he was making. Besides, he’d said it plenty of times last night.

  I smiled at the memories of all the things we’d done. My body ached, but in a good way, like every twinge was an acknowledgment that it’d really happened, that things between us had changed. Every time my bra rubbed against my sore nipples, I’d think of those clothespins. Every reflective surface had me checking how well my makeup was holding up. If I’d been in town, I wouldn’t have really cared if anyone saw the marks Blake had left, but at my parents’ business, with Blake’s brothers here, I wanted to stay professional and discreet.

  I glanced at my phone. His text had come through around two, and it’d been vague about whatever they were talking about, but he’d ended it by asking if he could come by my room even if it was late. I’d said yes.

  He hadn’t responded to the text I’d just sent, but that was okay. I’d only needed him to know that I was going to take a shower, but he could let himself in.

  I made my shower thorough but as quick as I could, more thankful than ever that I’d cut my hair. When I emerged from the bathroom, wrapped in the new red silk robe that my parents had brought back from one of their recent trips to Japan, I was glad I’d taken a shower when I had. Blake was sitting on my bed, a shell-shocked expression on his face.

  I sat next to him and put my hand on his arm. “Are you okay?”

  “I-I don’t know,” he said. He didn’t look at me, but I got the impression that he wasn’t looking at anything, really.

  “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “We talked,” he said woodenly. “My brothers and me. Made apologies. I thought everything would be good from there. We’d forget about the past and move on.”

  After a minute of silence, I prompted, “And that’s not what happened?”

  He shrugged, the movement jerky. “I guess it did. It is.” He raised his head, and the pain I saw in his eyes pierced me. “My parents and sister were murdered.”

  I didn’t know what to say to that. Who would? Then Jax’s words came back to me, and I went from horrified to confused. “I thought they were in a car accident.”

  “Me too.” He scrubbed his hands over his face. “But my grandfather thought it could be murder. He even hired a PI. Jax got a letter. They think our dad was working on a story and made the wrong people mad.”

  I had a million more questions, but all of them
were unimportant next to taking care of Blake. He’d fill me in later. Right now, he needed me.

  “What can I do to help you?” I asked, combing my fingers through his hair.

  He leaned into my touch. “I need to forget. Can you help me forget?”

  I pressed my lips against his cheek. “I can do that.”

  I slid off the bed until I was on my knees in front of him. He looked down at me as I undid his belt and then went for his pants. I pulled them down enough that I could get to what I wanted. He wasn’t hard yet, but the moment I touched his cock, it twitched.

  I took all of him into my mouth, enjoying the way he moaned my name as I swirled my tongue around the swelling shaft. His hand came down on my head, but he wasn’t pushing me. He let me set the pace, using my hands and mouth to get him nice and hard. I’d always been amazed at the way a man’s penis could be soft and hard at the same time. The silky skin and firm muscle, each erotic in their own way. Knowing that I was responsible for his body’s reaction gave me a power that I liked. I’d never had issues with body image, and the men I’d dated in the past had always complimented me, but something about being this way with Blake made it…better.

  As he grew, I took less and less of him in my mouth, unable to go any deeper without gagging. I had one hand around the base, moving in short quick movements as I continued to work my way around the rest of him. The hair on his thighs was rough against the palm of my hand, against my cheeks, but I didn’t mind. I wanted every part of him. I dropped my hand down to cup his balls. I rolled them between my fingers, explored every inch of them.

  His hips started to jerk, pushing him deeper into my mouth, and he pulled on my hair.