Beyond Jealousy

For everyone who celebrates love, no matter what shape it takes or how it comes to people.

She's been looking for the perfect man. She found two
.

When Rachel Riley sacrificed a life in Eden to protect the O'Kanes, she earned her place in the powerful Sector Four gang. But the former crime princess is tired of being everyone's sweet little sister . It's time for her to get wild, to embrace her fantasies as only an O'Kane can--with a delicious exiled soldier and the gang's wickedly sinful tattoo artist.

A saint...

Lorenzo Cruz is a warrior, taught by his commanding officers in Eden that involvement equals distraction. Emotion is a liability, and desire a sin. In Sector Four, he finds decadence, shameless sex--and his own dark urges. No battle strategy prepared him for how Rachel makes his heart race...or the way his rival for her affections sets his blood on fire.

...and a sinner.

Ace Santana has a dirty reputation and a mind to match, especially where his new lovers are concerned. He's eager to help Cruz embrace his dominant side, and to explore the lines between pleasure and pain with Rachel. But corrupting them quickly becomes an obsession, a need he can't deny--and a love he never imagined.

Three hearts on the line means a hundred ways their ménage a trois could go wrong. After all, even O'Kanes do forever two-by-two. One of them could be the missing piece that makes them all whole...or a temporary diversion destined for a broken heart.

She'd turned into a creeper, and it was all Ace's fault.

Rachel drained her third shot of tequila and fought a losing battle to drag her covetous gaze away from the cage--and the man inside it.

Of course, everyone was watching. It was hard not to when Cruz was setting a Sector Four record by taking on three opponents at once. And he'd apparently decided to go big or go home, because not a single one of the poor bastards had managed to land a solid shot on him.

It wasn't fair when even three-on-one odds couldn't bring a man down.

Rachel half wished she'd laid money on the match, just to have an excuse for her galloping pulse, not to mention the tiny drop of sweat that rolled down the small of her back. But she'd never been good at lying to herself, so there it was. The truth, in mesmerizing Technicolor.

Lorenzo Cruz, stripped to the waist and fighting like his life and dark mood depended on it, was a beautiful sight. Damn near enough to make a woman come from thirty feet away.

A tug on her shirt drew her attention away from the cage. "Show me where you want this?"

Shit, she'd forgotten all about Gunner, their conversation--and, frankly, anything that didn't have to do with licking a path straight down the center of Cruz's chest. "Uh, yeah." She lifted her hands automatically, allowing Gunner to pull her shirt higher. "I know the ribs hurt, but I was thinking my left side?"

"Sure, sure. No problem." He grinned at her. "I can put it anywhere you want."

"A tattoo," she said firmly. "Don't get your hopes--or anything else--up."

Gunner winked, a gesture more playful than suggestive. He knew better than to push his luck with an O'Kane, especially in the heart of their compound. "I'll be a perfect gentleman," he assured her, crouching to get a better look at her side. "So you want a fallen angel right across here?"

"Falling," she corrected. Not just an angel, and not one lying on the ground, her wings broken. That wasn't her. What she wanted to capture was the journey, the dizzy, spinning descent. "I want--"

Someone reached around her waist and jerked her shirt back down into place. Even before she looked down at the brash, beautiful sleeves of ink covering those arms, she knew who it was from the zing of awareness that rocked her.

Ace.

She slapped his fingers and turned to face him. "Hands off, Santana. I'm having a conversation here."

Ace's gorgeous face twisted into a scowl. "Not with him, you're not.
Hell
no."

It wasn't enough for him to dominate her thoughts, her fantasies. He had to own her skin, too. "Seriously? You think I'm gonna come to you for this?"

He shifted his gaze to Gunner, as if she hadn't spoken. "I thought we had an understanding, man. You got a sudden death wish?"

Gunner raised both hands in clear surrender, and Rachel shoved him out of the way. It wasn't about him anyway, not really. "If you have a problem with my life choices, Ace, have the respect to take it up with
me
."

Now she had his attention, one hundred and ten percent of it. He was usually so easygoing that she forgot how intense it could be when he fixed his dark gaze on her. "Letting that bastard ink you isn't a life choice. It's a
fuck you
."

She swallowed hard. "Don't you think you've earned it?"

"Maybe, but there are better ways to say it." He leaned in, the air between them heavy, electric, and even the roar of the crowd around them couldn't shatter the illusion that they were trapped in their own tiny world. "Did you think past sticking it to me? About how long it would take, how much it would sting? How high you'd be flying, with only some fucking outsider there to catch you if you fell too fast?"

"I hate you." The words slipped out, and she immediately wanted to snatch them back. Not because they weren't true--he'd hurt her, more than once, in ways that couldn't have been accidental--but because they revealed too much. How much she cared, when she shouldn't have, not at all.

Her cheeks burned. She turned on her heel and fled, heading for the back hallway and its maze of rooms and exits. Plenty of places to hide until the waves of mortification settled. She'd blame it on the tequila, laugh it off the way they did everything else--

"Rachel, wait."

"No way."

Ace caught her arm and hauled her to a stop. "Fucking hell, woman,
stop
for a second!"

"What?" She jerked away and smacked her shoulder against the hallway wall. At least the darkness would hide the sudden tears of pain that stung her eyes, though it did nothing to conceal her stupidity. "What do you want from me, Ace?"

"Fuck." His hand hovered over her shoulder. "I want to stop hurting you. But it's the one thing I manage, no matter what I do."

Did he stop to wonder why? To think about all the ways he was in her face, every day, showing her there was nothing he couldn't have if he wanted it? Nothing and no one, including Cruz.

Including her.

"I don't--" Her voice failed her, and she fought to speak past the thick, painful lump in her throat. "I don't want to do this anymore. We should just stay out of each other's way, okay?"

"Easier said than done," he whispered, dropping his hand to her wrist. He slid a fingertip over the cuff obscuring her city bar code, the first tattoo he'd ever given her.

The moment was burned into her memory. Ace had set her at ease with his friendly jokes and warm smiles, turning a terrifying moment into something simple, almost sweet. She'd clung to it, the only solid thing in a whirling storm of uncertainty.

He pulled away. As light as the caress had been, its absence was a punch to the gut. "If you don't trust me with your ink anymore, fine. But Emma's got more talent in one toe than that bastard will ever have in his life. And she's one of us."

"Okay, you win." The words caught on a hitch, and Rachel shook her head. "You always win."

"Sure as hell doesn't feel like it, angel."

"That's your own damn fault." She looked away, toward the low red light glowing at the end of the hallway. "You didn't even ask me why."

"Would you have answered?"

He was leaning closer. She could feel it, and she steeled herself against the seductive tug before she looked up and met his gaze. "Anything."

The space between them was too precise not to be deliberate. He should have been touching her somehow--an accidental bump of his hand, his chest grazing hers when she dragged in a breath--but the prickle over her skin was nothing but pure anticipation.

He let her hang there forever before closing his eyes. "Maybe I don't want to hear you say how much you hate me again. Once a night is all my wounded, delicate heart can handle."

Instead of temper, the words sparked a tiny frisson of guilt. "I meant it. But not the way you think."

The corner of his mouth kicked up. "My mistake. It's the good kind of hate."

"The frustrated kind." He always found a way to hide behind his joking words. Exasperated, Rachel reached down and grabbed his belt buckle, curling her fingers beneath the warm metal. "I know what sorts of games you and Cruz are playing these days. How come you two haven't knocked on
my
door yet? Think I can't handle it?"

"And what do you think you know?" Ace demanded, his eyes snapping open. His hands hit the wall on either side of her head, caging her. Trapping her. "Don't skimp on the filthy details. You know how I love dirty talk, angel."

She'd lost her mind--it was the only explanation for why she didn't retreat. "You've been sharing your women." She leaned closer, her mouth next to his ear. "Is it about pleasure or conquest, Ace? And do you take turns, or fuck them at the same time?"

"Conquest?" His eyes narrowed, and a new expression darkened his features, one she'd never seen directed at her before.

Anger.

Good. She could work with him hating her, too. At least that made sense.

Rachel snatched her hand back. "Sorry, I forgot the rules. Everything's a joke until it's not, and words don't mean anything until you want them to."

The arms on either side of her tensed, muscles flexing under ink. "We fuck them at the same time, because that's what they want. What
he
wants. Is that what you really need to know? What your city boy's doing now? How filthy he's gotten? Because you sure as fuck don't seem to give a shit about me."

If only.

Her eyes burned, and she bit the inside of her cheek until she tasted blood. It didn't stop the first hot tear from spilling down her cheek, or the ragged sob that tore through the knot in her throat.