Blackthorne, Fiona - Moonstruck [Blue Moon 1] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (7 page)

“It was built in 1697,” Declan said with a chuckle. “The original manor house burnt to the ground three nights after Ezra appeared to Aristide.”

Ava bit her lip to keep from laughing. Aristide was obviously a little off kilter, probably a trait that had passed down through the generations to these guys. He probably torched his own manor, maybe not even knowing he did it. Suddenly, the desire to laugh died. What if he had done just that and hadn’t known he was doing it? If something
dark
had made him do it?

No, ridiculous. That was a stupid thought. No more of it. No, the story was a story. A good one with publishing potential, and it had helped take her mind off the more immediate problem of what to do about the three men she had slept with. Now that she was calm, she needed to deal with that.

“Well,” she said, struggling for a way to open what promised to be an awkward conversation, “thanks for the story, and the coffee, and the breakfast, and…uh…last night, but, unfortunately, I have things to do today.”

She wanted to stand up, well, no. She didn’t want to stand up, but she knew she needed to.

“Spend the day with us,” Sean said, his golden-amber eyes darkening. “Let us show you around, spend time with you.”

“That’s very sweet,” she replied, blushing and feeling her heart beat a little faster with unnamed feelings. “But, I really can’t. I need to go do things.”

Robert suddenly turned and came back to his chair, grasping her hands almost painfully tight.

“Promise you won’t go in the woods, Ava,” he demanded harshly, but with an unmistakable note of fear.

“Well, not today at least,” she replied as lightly as she could. “My cell phone battery needs to charge up again.”

“Never without us,” Robert insisted.

Ava felt her jaw tighten, even though her heart tugged toward Robert, toward his roughness and command. She wasn’t going to be ordered around by any man. Ever again.

“I don’t make promises I can’t keep,” she said flatly. “And, I’m sorry, but you guys are not seeming to get the point that I’ve been trying to make as nicely as I can. Where I go and what I do is just not any of your concern. What happened last night was…well, it was. It happened. I can’t take it back. I never meant to lead anyone on. I never do this sort of thing, and well, I can’t see it happening again, no matter—”

Ava’s words got swallowed by Declan’s full kiss on her lips. His mouth demanded hers, hungry, plundering with his tongue as she fought herself to keep from responding.

That was a losing battle, though, as she felt a hundred thousand nerve points ignite in her body. Then, there were the hands again, hands that slid up her knees to her waist to undo the buttons of her jeans. Sean’s fingers slipped beneath her panties to touch her slit that was already growing wet. His thumb teasingly brushed her clit, causing her to squirm on Declan’s lap, his cock rock hard against her bottom in a way that felt deliciously bad and naughty.

Robert leaned in, running his hands up under her shirt, pulling it with them until her bra was exposed. Deftly, he pushed it aside and lowered his lips to one breast while his hand played with the other nipple.

It was so much sensation everywhere, all at once. Every part of her was rocked by violent need. The need raced through her veins and mixed with her blood until she could no more do without the three brothers than she could do without air to breathe.

Declan’s tongue punished her mouth as he devoured her, sucking the very breath of her life into his lungs, leaving her gasping and panting and wanting more. Sean drove his fingers inside her, first one, then two, then stretching her with three as his thumb began to press and stroke against her nub. Between Sean’s thumb and Robert’s mouth and hand, Ava felt like she was going to climax in every part of her body.

Robert teethed her nipples, biting them then licking them in a painful, sweet torture that made her buck her hips against Sean’s hand to seek relief from the growing need for release. Declan’s kisses kept her drowning in senselessness, and he wrapped his fingers around her throat, not squeezing but holding her firmly in place, making her feel frighteningly fragile and incredibly, erotically vulnerable.

Ava thought she would pass out from too much pleasure building without release. She needed to come, and the wordless silence that enveloped them made the experience all the more intense. Declan bit her lip at the same moment as Robert bit one nipple and pinched the other, and as Sean pinched her clit. She shattered, crying out into Declan’s mouth, bucking and shuddering as they kept touching, biting and stroking her, stretching the waves of pleasure to an almost painful extreme.

Gasping, she floated back from the mindless high into Declan’s arms and Sean’s kisses and Robert’s caresses. Her clothes were rearranged as she sleepily leaned in comfortably against Declan’s chest. She felt herself lifted and carried then set down on what she thought was the sofa. She could hear the crackle of crumpling paper and the snap of kindling as fire caught on the paper and wood in the hearth.

She drifted blissfully, even though some part of her was aware she needed to get up and do things. Blankets covered her, and pillows were slipped under her head. Three kisses touched her cheek, and she sensed the loss of Robert, Declan, and Sean’s presence as they slipped away.

“Don’t go into the woods, Ava,” Robert said, his soft growl the last thing she heard before she slipped away into warmth and darkness.

Chapter 7

“What was up with you in there?” Sean snapped, smacking Robert on the arm as they got in the SUV in front of the cottage. Declan had already stripped down and shifted, and he was busy sniffing out the perimeter of the cottage. Sean knew he’d stay there until tonight, when Robert would take over.

His insides warmed at the thought that it hadn’t even been twenty-four hours since Ava had walked into his life, but now, he couldn’t imagine life without her. It wasn’t just the sex. She was smart, damn smart, and that was so damn sexy. None of the other girls he’d ever been with had been as smart as Ava. Or as beautiful. Or as desirable. Or had such a hold over his heart as she did. She had to be the one.

None of it was going to work, though, if Robert kept behaving like an asshole. Robert didn’t answer him, and Sean threw him a grin.

“Come on, bro,” he said.

“I can’t help it,” Robert said between clenched teeth. “Just the thought of her in danger makes me see red. Literally. Red.”

“I gotcha,” Sean replied, the engine roaring to life as he backed down the dirt path and onto the gritty road. “But, you gotta rein it in. You’re going to scare her off.”

“She won’t listen to us. She’s going to put herself in danger, and I won’t let her.”

“None of us are going to let her,” Sean said patiently. “Dude, you also have to stop growling around her. You’re going to give us away before we have a chance to explain us to her.”

Robert ran his hand through his hair and sighed, then laughed ruefully.

“Okay, little brother.” He chuckled. “I will be on my best behavior until we can explain everything to Ava.” He sobered. “What if she’s not the one?”

“She
has
to be,” Sean said firmly. “Grace will know. We’ll ask her.”

“You really believe, don’t you?”

“I always have.”

Robert smiled, and Sean grinned as he turned onto Long Road.

* * * *

At first, Ava woke up, feeling amazing. Every muscle in her body was relaxed. She was warm and content, blissful, in fact. Pink fuzziness filled her brain, and she stretched luxuriously until she hit the end of the couch. Then, it all came back, along with her own personal black cloud of anger and humiliation…and the ache in her heart that was almost physically palpable.

What had she done? Not even twelve hours after having sex with three men, she had done it again? Let three men touch her and explore her body to bring her to, well, an amazing climax. Still. This was not her. She couldn’t believe it.

Sloughing off the blanket that covered her—they must have put it on her—she got to her feet and went to the bathroom. Looking in the small mirror over the sink, she studied her face. No, she was the same Ava Bell, Harvard PhD candidate in American History. The same dark-brown eyes. The same brown hair with the slate gray cast to it. The same quirk of the eyebrows and skeptical twist of her lips, or maybe her mouth always looked skeptical because she only saw it when she looked in the mirror and never liked what she saw. Too pale, too pinched, not pretty. Not ugly, but not pretty.

Memories of what Robert, Declan, and Sean had told her of the ghost story of White Farm bubbled to the surface, and for a moment, she was distracted. She couldn’t help but be interested in that story, and she decided that it would be a good little side project while she was here.

While she was here…

She was due back on December 20 to turn in her final draft of her dissertation. Her advisor had promised to read it over the holidays, his “Christmas present” from her, he had called it. It was November 18, and she had made good progress in editing so far, but she had a ways to go before she packed up on December 18 and drove back down. Just one month away, and half the manuscript to edit. Well, she could do this. She would do it, and she wouldn’t let herself be distracted by men.

And yet…she missed them. She missed them? What the hell? She barely knew them. Looking herself straight in the eye in the mirror, she admitted that she viscerally missed their presence. The thought of their kisses, their touches, their cocks made her body burn and throb in all its most sensitive places.

“Okay, Ava,” she said to her reflection. “You haven’t had sex in years. You’re probably just feeling the need for physical contact, and you’re getting it in spades. Yes, it’s good, but no, you are not going to let yourself get into any kind of mess up here.”

She set her jaw and nodded at herself. Suddenly, she shivered, goose bumps springing up on her arms as the temperature suddenly dropped. She took in a deep breath to calm herself, but gasped when she exhaled and could actually see her breath in a frosty cloud. What the hell was that? The cottage was nice and toasty because of the big fire the guys had made before they left. She shook her head, trying to rid herself of the sensation of being cold.

“Old, drafty place,” she muttered to her reflection. “The wind.”

She took another breath and exhaled it slowly, feeling the temperature rise again around her.
See? Just a gust of cold wind coming through the cracked old caulking of the bathroom window.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a shadow flit across the doorway to the bathroom, dark and quick. Heart pounding, she spun around, leaning back against the sink for support.

“Who’s there?” she called out. Then, she realized what she was doing and shook her head. It had just been a bird or something flying across the window that made the shadow.

“Stupid power of suggestion,” she said out loud, forcing a smile. “No more ghost stories on an empty stomach.”

The sound of her voice reassured her, and she stepped into the main room of the cabin. Everything was fine, perfectly normal. She just wasn’t used to country living. She thought about getting out her laptop and files and working through a few pages before lunch, but the rumbling in her stomach told her that lunch was going to take precedence over editing. Maybe going out for lunch would help her. A breath of cold, fresh ocean air and some other people would help her regain her equilibrium, no doubt.

Grabbing her keys, cell phone, and wallet, she shrugged on her parka and went out to her beat-up silver hatchback parked alongside the house. It wasn’t raining outside, but it was misting, and she could taste the salt in the air. She’d have lunch then settle in for a long afternoon of editing by the fire with a bottle of wine. That sounded like a plan.

She drove down Long Road, carefully navigating its twists and turns. She had seen local pickup trucks tearing down this road, taking the curves at crazy speeds, but she didn’t know the road well enough to do that. Yet. Being a Boston driver, there was little she was afraid of…except trees, deer, and moose.