Erogenous Zones: Monica's Secret (16 page)

What she didn’t need was raw emotions and the fear of being hurt even more. “Let me go.”

She could see the strength of his will in his eyes. They were black, denying what she was saying. But he clenched his lips together, and released her.

“I’ll let you go…for now.” That sounded like a warning.

Monica moved, turning away.

I have to pull back, before I spin out of control.

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Monica had said goodbye and walked away. Alec was astonished that Owen had let her do that.

The police arrived a moment later. Things were taken out of their control, discussions and procedures demanded their full attention. Later, once he saw Owen leave, Alec made his excuses and headed back to the suite.

By the time Alec got there Owen was packing.

Alec couldn’t handle it. Just lately he’d thought Owen and him would go on forever, but not now, not if he was willing to walk away from Monica that easily. His heart thumped against the wall of his chest, his mouth going dry. “You can’t just leave!”

“I can. Our work here is done.”

Shocked, Alec stared at him. “You can’t just walk away from Monica, she’s too special.”

Owen stopped what he was doing. “I’m not walking away. I’m merely getting ready to leave. We’re going home. We’re taking her home.” He walked over to Alec and put his hand on Alec’s shoulder. “She needed time.”

Alec felt something inside him buckle. “Right, okay.” He pushed his hand through his hair. When Owen smiled at him as if amused by his emotional state, he grinned. “I’m sorry, I lost it.”

“I forgive you. Just don’t do it again.” Owen winked. “Now let’s finish up here quickly. We’ve got to be ready to catch the lady when she makes her move.”

“You don’t think she’s gone already?”

“No. She’s in mourning for this place.” Owen took off his tie and reached into the wardrobe for his leather jacket, which he shucked on. “We’re going to have to break her connection with this branch, don’t you think?”

It took a moment for Alec to get the gist of Owen’s thoughts, but when he did he nodded quickly. “Absolutely!”

* * * *

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Monica grabbed her coat and bag from her office and located a vacant guest room. Not one of the suites, just a regular room where she could stay away from everyone without the fear of anyone banging on the office door. When she put her phone on the bedside table, she double checked it was on silent then saw that Owen had already sent a couple of text messages. She wanted to read them, but she knew she needed some time alone. She would go home to her flat when all the furore had died down and she didn’t have to speak to anyone. That’s when she would read them.

There in the anonymous hotel space, she lay on the bed with her hands carefully folded over her waist, and closed her eyes.

Eventually, she dozed.

Strange images assailed her in odd, disjointed dreams. She found herself at the door of the suite where the handcuffs had been found, staring at the door handle and afraid to touch it—afraid to experience whatever mysteries and pleasures awaited her inside.

When she jerked awake, it was with a feeling of loss.

She sat up on the bed and sighed. She’d expected to feel sad that it was over and her secret lovers moved on, their job here done. What she didn’t expect was to be left with her former structured and safe world in ruins, or as good as.

Sleet and rain lashed at the window, drawing her attention. It was late, nearly ten. It was time to go home. With resignation, she slid on her shoes and collected her things. Before she left the room she logged in and made a note on the electronic staff calendar for housekeeping to come in and make over the room in the morning. She opted for the stairs and when she pulled on her raincoat she tied the belt tightly and put her collar up. In an effort to go unrecognised as she walked through reception she also let her hair down.

Luckily, the reception area was busy. A coach load of Italian guests had just arrived and were checking in. The large expanse of black and white marble floor was littered with suitcases. As she made her way across the space, she glanced at the open fireplace on her left, where a roaring fire welcomed the guests to London. The myriad of lamps around the place and low, comfortable armchairs were so familiar, and yet she felt she was looking at it all with a new perspective. Distance, even. Nothing had been what it seemed. She’d come here every day thinking that her job and the hotel was her safe place. She couldn’t have been more wrong. Integrity was no longer the key to success here, as she had been told when she joined

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the company. Her trust had been misplaced, and it appeared that she’d been oblivious of the real story.

As she stepped through the sliding glass door, the icy cold air outside hit her. It felt fresh and exhilarating. Perhaps some time away from Cumbernauld’s would be a good idea.

She pulled her collar higher. Moments later, she sidestepped the doorman then hurried down the steps and away from the awnings over the entrance to the hotel, before darting away into the rainy night.

She’d scarcely got twenty paces when Owen stepped out in front of her.

“Monica, we have to talk.” He wore a leather jacket, collar up. Rain glistened on his shoulders and his hair was stuck to his head. The sight of him waiting for her in the night affected her strangely. She noticed how handsome he was, how intense. Determined, too.

He’d been waiting in the sleet and rain. For her. She glanced past him, but there was no sign of Alec.

“I can’t, not right now, I need…space.” Even as she said it, it felt like a lie. What she needed was to be in his arms. She was reeling herself in, trying to make everything right in her world, because this couldn’t last. The secret that she lived with meant it was impossible for her to have a normal relationship. The longer she tried to do that, the harder it would get.

And yet here he was.

He didn’t say anything, which unnerved her. Instead he studied her intently.

How long had he been waiting out here for her? For a moment she thought she couldn’t force herself to turn away, but she made herself to step to one side to get past. When she did, he arrested her with his hands around her shoulders, pinning her to the spot. The scent of his cologne reached her and the familiarity of it made her yearn to move closer against him, to allow him to hold her, but it was a risk she couldn’t take. She was too fragile.

“Let me go, I want to go home.”

“I’m taking you home.”

She stared at him, unsure of his meaning.

“I want you to give it a chance, we both do. Come home with us and we’ll start at the beginning.”

She shook her head, knowing that if she went somewhere more private, into their personal space, it would be even harder to draw a line under this. “I’m not normal, Owen. I

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can’t even have a relationship with one man, let alone two. I have to stop now because it’s getting harder and harder to protect myself.”

“You don’t need to protect yourself any more. I’m here to protect you. Alec, too.”

Frustration doubled up inside her. “You don’t understand what my life is like, no one does.”

“We will. We’re trying. I’m warning you, we’re tenacious bastards, both of us, and we want more of you.”

How good that sounded, and how much it scared her.
I want to go with him.

Monica glanced away and looked up at Cumbernauld’s. It was her place, her rock, or it had been, for so long. But all of that had changed and she was on the outside now. It became starkly apparent to her that she’d relied on this place too much. It was wrong to feel as if whole world fell apart, just because things weren’t as she assumed at her place of work.

Most of all she knew that wasn’t why she wanted to go with him. She wanted to go with him because this was the chance of everything she thought she’d never be able to have, a loving relationship. It might be split between two men, but in an odd way that worked, for them all.

His hands were still locked on her shoulders

What if I fail them? What if I can’t cope?
“It’ll be too hard.” She glanced back at him, pleading with him to help her sort it out. She needed his control, his discipline in her crazy world.

“We’ll take it slowly. It won’t be too much pressure because there are three of us.

Monica, we’ve been looking for you. We want you to be our third.”

She saw the honesty in his eyes, the belief. He really wanted this. He thought it could work. “You’ve only known me for four days, how can you be sure?”

“We’re willing to work at this.”

“I’m scared that I won’t be able to be what you want.”

A wry smile flitted across his handsome face. He drew her closer. “Put your hands on my chest.”

She shook her head and attempted to pull free.

“Monica, put your hands on my chest.” He spoke deliberately, forbidding her to disobey.

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Every part of her yearned for him, for his instinct and the measured control that helped her make sense of her strange, isolated world. But she couldn’t put her hands on his chest, because he was such an intense man. She didn’t want to learn things about him that would spoil the memory of what they’d had. “I can’t. Let me just remember it as it was.”

“That’s not enough, and you know it. Give us a chance.” He moved his hands down her arms to her wrists. “Give yourself a chance.”

Still her instinct was to turn away, to pull free of his grip and run. When he drew her hands up to his chest, her fingers curled into fists.

But Owen wasn’t having any of that. He gently eased his thumbs into her palms, massaging his way, opening her up, then he took her hands flat to his chest, fingers splayed.

“Look at me.”

Monica shook her head, attempting to pull back. Doubt assailed her. But then she felt it. Even before her hands made contact with his jacket—even when they were still an inch from him—the energy and emotions funnelled towards her arrested her attention, making her falter.

Owen locked her hands there.

Images flashed through her mind, images of herself in orgasm. Entwined with that was the immense pleasure and pride he felt in bringing her to that point. With an astonished cry, she met his gaze.

He nodded. “When you touched my lips last night, it wasn’t negative. I had to try this to stop you running away.”

Monica nodded, remembering. Her heart hammered in her chest, and she realised how cautious he’d been, how caring and how determined. A knot of emotion built in her chest. Then he encouraged her, and she moved her fingers inside his jacket and splayed them on his shirt. There she could feel the warm heat of his body through the fabric, and she opened herself fully to it.

She felt his joy, the deep longing he had to be with her, as images of their time together flashed through her mind. She had never seen herself away before and it astonished her.
This man cares about me. Really cares
.

“Owen, oh, Owen, hold me.” She moved her hands, but only so that she could press herself closer against him. Her fingers locked on his shoulders, and she clung to him, her face against his chest where she could feel his heart beating.

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A moment later he lifted her chin. “Let me put this out there right now. If you ever experience my memories of other woman, all that you’ll see is that not one of them ever compared to you.” He smiled and took her hand to his mouth, resting a kiss on her splayed fingers. “We want you to be our woman.”

Dizzy with emotion and weak with gratitude, she clutched at his lapel, the wet leather slippery under her fingers. She blinked. Her vision was being obscured by rain.
Not crying.

Owen kissed her cheekbone—kissed away those tears. “As you may have noticed,” he added, “we like a challenge, and you’re it, Monica Evans.”

“Owen…” It was all she could muster, but it was enough.

“Come on, Alec is waiting in the car, we’re going home.” He put his arm around her shoulder and turned her to the kerb. For the first time she noticed that a black limousine was parked nearby, idling, the wipers constantly swiping away the rain.

As they approached the door opened, and she saw Alec waited inside.

A uniformed chauffeur was at the wheel, hived off by a mirrored glass wall.

Alec had been watching. He’d been waiting for her too. She felt weak with relief, and when he put out his hand to her, Monica didn’t hesitate. She took it.

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The noise from the outside world was muted, making the luxurious limousine the perfect place for her to catch her breath and address the step she had just taken. The interior lights were low, and the faint sound of music only just reached them from sound system.

And the two men who were with her watched over her adoringly.

Monica felt buoyant, surreal, and yet she was growing mellow, too.

She rested her head on Alec’s shoulder, savouring the way his shoulder felt against her face and body. As they travelled through London, the images outside the window blurred together in the rainy night and she let the comfortable interior of the limousine soothe her. Whatever happened, happened. They had convinced her and she was going to give it a go. The sense of liberation that she experienced after making that decision was unbelievable. It was as if a huge weight had been lifted from her, a weight which she had been carrying for so long. The truth of it was she was a woman and she needed fulfilment.

She had to pursue the chance for happiness, and if they were willing to give it a go she shouldn’t fight it, not any more.

After they’d been driving for a while, Owen latched his hand around the back of her knees and swung her legs so that they were across his lap. He took off her high-heeled shoes and massaged her toes through her stockings. She chuckled softly when he tickled her. With her upper body cocooned by Alec’s embrace, and Owen’s attention to her feet, she wondered if she was dreaming.

“You’re wet through,” she commented as she looked at Owen.

“I’ve got a big tub at home. Big enough for three.”

Somehow she could have guessed that. “No kidding.”

“Maybe I can convince you to scrub my back.”

“Maybe you can.” She felt a bit like a stray kitten they’d picked up in the street and were taking back to their place. Maybe she was. The strangeness of the day was giving way to hope, curiosity and anticipation.

“Where are you taking me? Where is it that you live?” There was so much about them that she didn’t know. It was so odd, the way life unfolded. She felt so close to these two men,

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and yet there was so much more to explore. It suddenly occurred to her that if he was a new member of the Board of Directors—and Jack Monroe’s son—his home might be in Switzerland.

“Hampstead. I have a house there.”

That was a relief. Her curiosity was up and running.

“Do you live together?” She knew they slept together and worked together, but she didn’t know what their living arrangements were.

Alec ran his fingers through her hair and kissed her forehead before he responded. “I have a place of my own, a flat by the river.”

“He also has a key to my place.” Owen smiled at her.

“Do you two ever kiss?”

She’d never seen them kiss. She’d seen plenty of other intimate contact, but it made her curious that she hadn’t seen that. Perhaps they didn’t kiss. If that was true, it was a real shame.

Alec grinned. “You were right,” he said to Owen, “she really is into man-on-man.” He prodded her with an accusing finger. “Pervert.”

Monica chuckled. “You look really hot together. I can’t help it if I like to see it.”

She thought about that, looking from one to the other of them, picturing it. She didn’t have to picture it for long. Alec leant over and wrapped his hand around the back of Owen’s head. Before he moved in, Owen shot her a smouldering glance. Then his mouth was on Alec’s, his arms wrapped around his lover’s neck as they kissed, right there in front of her.

Monica stared, loving the way they looked, and when Alec thrust his tongue into Owen’s mouth her core clenched, the need to grind down onto the seat—or preferably a willing erection—gripping her. When they drew apart a moment later, Owen ducked his head and gave Alec a play-bite on the jaw. That these two were very familiar with kissing one another was obvious.

Owen sat back and resumed his attention to her feet. “Happy now?”

His eyes twinkled when he asked the question. It had amused him greatly that she’d asked that.

She shrugged. “I wouldn’t mind seeing some more.”

“Oh, you will.” He moved his thumbs over the balls of her feet, stimulating her nerve endings and making the tiny muscles in her feet bliss out.

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She nodded at the mirrored divide between them and the driver. “I assume the driver can’t see what’s going on in here.”

“Yes, he can,” Alec replied, “in fact he begs to drive us around all day so he can see what we get up to. He’s a pervert, much like you.”

Monica laughed and the remaining tension faded away as she basked in their presence. “You are kidding, right?”

“He’s kidding,” Owen replied. “The driver can’t see what’s going on here.”

When she looked into his eyes, she had the strange feeling that he didn’t really care if he was seen. It made sense. Owen was sure and happy in his self, which meant that he didn’t need to worry about what other people thought. She doubted he made a big song and dance about who he slept with, he was discreet in all things, but he wouldn’t shy away from it.

Instinctively she knew that.

“How much of a pervert are you?” Owen added, and that wicked smile of his was back. “I think we need to know, don’t you, Alec?”

“Yes, I think you should confess.” Alec kissed her neck while he spoke, his breath hot against her tender skin on her throat.

Monica attempted to feign an innocent expression. It was hard with so much male testosterone surrounding her and the potential for hot sex imminent.

Alec moved in against her ear, kissed her there then whispered. “How about a bit of man-on-man-on-woman? Do you think you could handle that?”

Monica pictured it, and her body responded instantly. The simmering arousal she felt turned quickly into a blazing inferno of desire. She squirmed on her seat and her head dropped back against Alec’s shoulder.

“We’ll take that as a sign of interest then, shall we?” Alec teased.

Moments later the limousine pulled in at a beautiful Georgian town house.

Monica climbed out of the car and looked at the place. It was familiar to her, and she knew why. While Alec opened the door to the house, she recalled the early images that she’d seen when she’d handled his keys She touched the door as she passed. This was Owen’s home.

It was a palatial house and when she stood in the hallway with her coat and bag clutched in her hand, she felt suddenly unprepared. Alec took her damp coat and arranged it on the back of a chair. Then he was back at her side, embracing her easily as if there was

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nothing he enjoyed more. The way he foiled her body, standing behind her and stroking her hip bones while he kissed her neck, made her feel safe again and she savoured it. “It’s been such a weird day. This means a lot to me, you bringing me here.”

Owen closed the gap between them. “This is just the beginning.” He stared at her, looking deep into her eyes, daring her to defy that comment.

With a trembling intake of breath, she nodded.

At her back, Alec growled possessively.

Owen reached into his pocket, and pulled out a set of handcuffs.

“Oh, they are beautiful.” Monica stared at them, entranced. They were delicately made, and when he held them up to the light, she saw that the slender metal wristbands were engraved with her name.

Owen smiled, and closed his hand over the cuffs, keeping them there in the palm of his hand. Desire fluttered in the pit of her belly.

“So, would you like to see the kitchen first, or the bedroom?” He lifted an eyebrow.

“As house guest you get to decide.”

“Sex first, then food,” she replied, without hesitation. The need to seal her commitment to them was urgent.

“Good choice,” Alec said.

Owen rested his hand around her waist and led her up the marble staircase.

She moved as if walking through a dream, but she knew it was real. It struck her again how sensitive he was about her issues with touch. The logical thing would have been to go for her hand, but he remembered. She knew it took effort. It took effort on her own part, and this was new to them. Would she ever be able to show them just how much that meant to her? She was sure as hell going to try.

Owen’s bedroom was large, spacious and yet understated. There were amber coloured blinds on the windows which warmed the streetlight they let into the room. A Tiffany lamp by the bed was the only obvious decadence. The bed itself was huge, but she kind of expected that from him.

Alec began to undress her, and she felt deliriously happy, like it was the most natural thing in the world to stand there as he disrobed her, while Owen watched. High on the moment, she could barely take her eyes off the pair of them to look at her surroundings.

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Alec unlatched her bra, casting it aside. Then he reached around from behind and lifted her breasts and hands, rubbing his fingers over the peaked nipples as if offering them to Owen. It made her hips roll, and when Owen’s gaze dropped to look at her chest, she lifted one foot from the ground, barely able to stand still because of the intense desire spiralling inside her. The heady atmosphere was enchanting, the shift in their relationship that the day had brought about spinning magic through each and every moment. She felt drunk on it.

Owen unbuttoned his shirt and took it off. He approached with the handcuffs in his hand and she instinctively put her wrists out for him. When he slid the slender cuffs around her wrists, the muscles in his chest and upper arms rippled, and the sight of his gorgeous body naked and flexing made her ache for contact.

While Owen secured the cuffs, Alec dropped to a squat behind her and drew her undies down the length of her legs. When they were off, he slid his fingers into the juncture between her thighs and stroked her right there in the hot niche of her pussy.

She was so wet that his thumb slid easily inside her, and he unfurled one finger pushed it between her thighs and rested it over her clit. When she moaned with pleasure, he blew across the backs of her thighs, which made her legs tremble under her. She felt him brush the back of her thigh and he kissed her there, so she glanced back at him and saw that his eyes were bright with suggestion as he looked up at her.

Owen clicked the cuffs shut. “I think Alec wants to fuck you.”

Monica’s heart tripped. Her attention went from one to the other and when she looked back down Alec, he nodded and there was a slight pout to his lips. He had not yet penetrated her that way, and she sensed that he’d been biding his time, waiting for Owen to indicate it was the right moment. Was that it, Owen would only share the ultimate act of intimacy once he was sure this was moving forward? Breathless, fascinated and massively aroused, she marvelled at the subtle symbiosis between them.

Alec moved his thumb slowly, exploring her opening, and when he stretched her open suggestively the idea of having his cock there ricocheted through her senses, making her need urgent.

“I’d like that, I’d like that a lot,” she managed to respond.

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Alec eased his thumb out and for a moment he sucked on it, his eyes filled with mischief. She laughed softly and Owen latched his hand over the chain between her cuffed wrists, and led her to the bed.

Owen patted the bed, and she sat down then laid out on it as he directed, allowing him to guide her with a tug on the cuffs. When she was comfortable he moved her cuffed hands above her head, resting them safely between two pillows. He then arranged another pillow beneath her shoulders, and looked her over as if assuring himself of her comfort. She felt treasured, wanted, and cared for.

Each moment was precious and she savoured it, almost afraid that she’d wake up back on that bed in the hotel room at Cumbernauld’s, where she’d felt as if her whole world was crumbling. Instead, she was here, on the brink of something that was entirely possible because they wanted to make it so. More than anything, she wanted them both. She wanted everything—every combination and every decadence that their relationship offered. She knew they would protect her from too much when it mattered, and she trusted them with that.

When he was undressed, Alec stood at the side of the bed and rolled a rubber onto his erection. He was more serious than he had been before, and she could tell he’d been anticipating this. How unnerving, how rewarding. All the things they had already done together flitted through her mind, and her hips lifted and rolled against the bed.

Alec climbed over her and between her legs. He kissed her mouth, his hands caressing her sides, his thumbs stroking the soft skin beneath her breasts. “I’ve been longing to do this.”

The weight and pressure of his erection against the seam of her pussy and her swollen clit was too good. “I’m ready.”

A fleeting smile crossed his face as he directed his cock to her opening, easing it inside. The feeling of him stretching her open made her cuffed wrists lift from their nest between the pillows and her body arched. She put her feet flat to the bed, drawing her knees up, inviting him in.

Then she saw Owen.

Nothing could have prepared her for the intensity of having Alec enter her, while Owen watched from beyond. She could see the possessive look burning in his eyes, but it

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was possessive of both of them. The pleasure he took in seeing them united this way was deeply special to him, something she wondered if he’d ever approved before.

“Oh, yes, you feel so good,” Alec whispered, as he thrust the length of his erect cock inside her. He arched over her, weight balanced on his elbows as his hips thrust back and forth in a slow, seductive rhythm. A moment later she gasped and caught her bottom lip between her teeth because he smiled and paused to grind his hips deep against her centre, sensitising her core to the max. She whimpered aloud, the skin all over her body prickling.

He began to thrust again and buried his head at her neck, kissing her and licking her skin. The stimulation made her arch from the bed so that she could press her peaked nipples against the hard wall of his chest, making them sting. Pleasure looped through her, and when her eyes locked with Owen’s, she felt her world click into place as surely as the cuffs he had clicked round her wrists.