Siren in Bloom [Texas Sirens 6] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) (17 page)

Leo closed his eyes, his head against the door. “I guess so. I just know that I felt more for her than I’ve felt for anyone in a long time. I might flirt with my friends’ wives, but I wouldn’t touch them. They’re safe. So are the subs I work with.”

Yes, Leo had been running from the whole idea of commitment for a really long time. “So after years of anonymous sex and flirting with no real intent, you meet Shelley and suddenly you can’t help yourself. I can see it. She’s amazing. She’s gorgeous. She’s funny. So why didn’t you try to get her away from that asshole?”

Leo’s eyes flew open, and his face hardened. “You think I didn’t? Goddamn it, Wolf, I offered to take her away. I told her I loved her. She told me to stay out of her marriage.”

Wolf could guess what had happened next. Leo would have stepped back and walked away. “Why did she do that?”

“Because she didn’t want me.”

“Bullshit. Why did she do it? I’ve known her a month and I would bet my life she did it because she thought she was protecting you. But your pride got hurt and you walked away when you should have tied her ass up and shoved her in your truck.”

Leo leaned forward. “It’s nice to know you would have done it differently. It’s over now.”

“Is it? Does it have to be? Do you want it to be?”

Leo laughed, but there wasn’t a damn thing humorous about it. “You’re going to give her up?”

“Why should I have to?” There, he’d put it out as flatly as he could.

Leo stood and slammed open his locker. “You’ve spent too much time in Bliss. It wouldn’t work. I’m too possessive. I can’t share.”

“Bullshit. You aren’t possessive enough.” Maybe it had been too soon to bring that up. Wolf grabbed his jeans and started to get dressed. “You can use a word like possessive all day long, brother, but you let Janine walk out on you. Now you’re letting Shelley walk away.” He shoved his feet into his boots. “But I’m not going to make the same mistake. She’s the one. I’m crazy about her, and I think I can get her to love me.”

Leo sighed, the sound making Wolf feel like he was five years old again. “You’ve known her for a fucking month. You just met her in person. God, Wolf, you have always just jumped in with both feet never bothering to look and see what you’re jumping into.”

Wolf wasn’t about to argue with that assessment. “I go with my gut. My gut tells me Shelley is special. My gut tells me to go for what I want. And my gut tells me to share her with you because we could give her what she needs. But I’ll handle it by myself if I have to. She has ménage fantasies. I thought you could help with that. But I have friends who won’t mind.”

“Don’t you fucking dare.”

That was what he wanted to hear. His brother was actually quite possessive, though he had spent the last several years hiding it well. Or he simply hadn’t cared enough about anyone to be possessive. Wolf knew the feeling well. “It’s my job to give her what she needs. If I decide that she needs a ménage, then I’ll make it happen.”

He wouldn’t. He wouldn’t share her with anyone except Leo, but Leo didn’t have to know it. Wolf had known the minute he’d laid eyes on Shelley that he wouldn’t share her. He’d enjoyed the ménages he’d shared with his friends, but she was serious and only a seriously committed ménage would work. If Leo wouldn’t go along with it, then Shelley would have to be satisfied with toys and fantasy.

Wolf had needs, too, and in this case, they trumped hers. He needed her for himself—and his brother.

Leo’s fists tightened at his sides. “I swear to god if you hurt her, Wolf, I’ll kill you myself.”

“Yeah, that should be a pleasant conversation with Ma.” He felt unaccountably better. If Leo had shrugged and said go for it, he would have known it was all over. But he hadn’t, and seeing that Wolf intended to put his little sub on display as often as possible, Leo wouldn’t stand a chance. He would come after Shelley.

The only question was, would he accept Wolf as his partner?

It was a dangerous game he was playing. Wolf knew that. But he didn’t have another choice. The minute he’d figured out Shelley and Leo’s deep connection, he’d known it was only a matter of time. He was crazy about Shelley. He loved his brother. He wanted the best for both of them.

And he wanted the best for himself.

“I’ll stay at Shelley’s tonight. I don’t like the idea of her being alone until we figure out if the robbery was random.” Wolf glanced at himself in the mirror. He didn’t look terrible, but he could use a good night’s sleep. He probably wouldn’t get it on Shelley’s couch, but he also wasn’t going to press his luck.

She was probably in some serious deep scene dive. He’d seen it before. She’d been caught up in the adrenaline of the scene, and now she would be thinking about the fact that she’d been naked. He would have to calm her fears by taking it slow.

But he didn’t want to. He wanted to take her back to her place and shove his cock deep inside her.

“Dear god, Wolf, can’t you control that thing?” Leo asked, his eyes rolling.

Yep, he had an erection again. “Nope. Little Wolf is very upset, but there ain’t a damn thing happening to you tonight, buddy.”

A smile finally broke over Leo’s face. “It’s good to know you still talk to your cock.”

“Hey, sometimes it’s been my best friend.” It was an old joke between them. One they had started when Wolf was twelve and had gotten caught in the middle of math class with an erection because Penny Wells had worn a V-neck for the first time and she’d magically grown breasts over the Christmas break.

“Go and take care of her.” Leo looked weary. “Call me if you need me.”

Wolf started out the door.

“And Wolf?”

He turned. His brother’s eyes opened and a sad smile crossed his face. “I’m glad you’re here. We’ll work this out. And god, don’t bring Ma down on me.”

“I promise nothing.” Wolf walked out the door, pleased with the way the evening had gone.

* * * *

She stood right outside the women’s dressing room. She practically cringed every time someone walked in or out and gave her a little smile.

Were they smiling because they were friendly or laughing because they’d seen her ass? It had seemed so hot at the time, but now she was thinking about the fact that her ass wasn’t as perky as it had been. And she’d never actually gotten a mirror out and looked at her pussy. It could be hideous.

And Leo had seen her.
God
. She’d spread her legs in front of Leo Meyer and writhed on his brother’s lap. When she went wild, she really went wild.

“Hi, Shelley. Great scene. Very hot.” Marcy, a sub who also worked at the bar, said as she walked up. “My Master was impressed. He shoved me onto a sawhorse and, wow. That was some of the best quickie sex I’ve ever had.”

Shelley felt her cheeks go up in flames. “Glad I could help.”

Marcy had a pixie-like bob that shook slightly as she spoke. “I always thought you would end up breaking Leo’s self-imposed exile, but, hey, his brother is even hotter. Although he’s a little informal for my tastes.”

Yeah, high-fiving wouldn’t make everyone take Wolf seriously. “He’s different.”

“Oh, yeah. I’ll say.” Tara, a regular who attended with her husband, agreed. She was a cute redhead who had very patiently answered many of Shelley’s questions when she’d first been interested in the lifestyle. “I just wish he’d managed to get his leathers off.”

“I heard that, sub. That’s ten,” her husband called out. But he was wearing a grin on his face as he slapped her ass. “Come on, baby, give me another ten.”

“Wolf Meyer is hot.”

“Oh, yeah. Now I’m getting the crop out.” Tara’s husband kissed her cheek and strode into the men’s locker room.

It was that sort of easy relationship she wanted. Tara didn’t look like she would be sitting around terrified someone was making fun of her cellulite. Tara seemed deeply secure in her relationship, and Marcy looked perfectly happy to have just had some amazing sex.

“I hear you’re getting all the little subs in trouble, love.”

God, he was so damn sexy. Wolf stood in the entryway to the locker room wearing a perfectly respectable pair of jeans, a T-shirt, and a light leather jacket that he somehow turned into something ultra sexy. His broad shoulders filled the entryway, but she was caught on his male-model-worthy smile. She sighed.

And so did Tara and Marcy.

Tara leaned over and gave her a hug. “I’m going to change before I really get in trouble. I’m into Darin for double digits with a crop already. If he catches me mooning over the new Dom, he just might attach a TENS unit to my pink parts.”

“God, and you’re running from that?” Marcy asked, giving Shelley a little wink before she followed her friend.

“I’m glad to see you’re getting along with the other subs.”

He looked so self-satisfied that Shelley had to wonder just what he’d overheard. “They were sympathizing with me because my Dom is so sadly unattractive.”

His grin grew. “Is that right? Poor Shelley. Well, I’m the lucky one because all anyone can talk about is just how hot my sub is.”

How did he do that? One minute she was vowing to never be naked again and the next she was perfectly willing to throw off her clothes as long as he took her.

“Come on, sweetheart, I’m going to take you home.”

The evening was ending already? “I thought we were going to have a drink?”

“Fet wear only in the bar. I thought we could stop somewhere vanilla. If we stay here, we’ll have to talk to other people, and I would like to focus on you. And then I can get you drunk enough that you don’t fight me when I tell you I’m sleeping on your couch tonight.”

He was what? “Wolf, why would you sleep on my couch?”

“Because you got mugged and you might have nightmares?”

The truth hit her with all the subtlety of a runaway train. “You think it was a setup. You think he knew who I was. Why would he steal my laptop? Oh, god, he was looking for information.”

It was happening again.

“Hey.” Wolf reached out and grabbed her hand. “I’m just being paranoid. As a man who used to fight some of the worst human beings and terrorists in the world, you have to just understand that I sometimes see the glass as half empty and maybe there’s a bomb at the bottom of it.”

But what if he was right? It had always been there in the back of her mind. The press had reviled her for months. It didn’t matter that she’d been cleared. She’d been the one who had unwittingly placed the cameras that had caught the blackmail material Bryce had used on her clients. For months, she’d received nasty phone calls and e-mails calling her every bad name in the world. After a year, it had quieted down, and she’d hoped it was over.

What if it wasn’t over? Her son-of-a-bitch husband was never going to let her go. He still had a hold on her, even from beyond the grave. She was going to have to give up another man she cared about.

She shook her head. “No. You should stay here. You shouldn’t get involved in this.”

Wolf took a step forward, his lips curving into a little snarl. “What did you say?”

“She said you should leave her alone, Wolf. She obviously wants to be assaulted.” Leo was suddenly beside him, the Meyer brothers taking up all the available space.

She found herself pressed against the wall. “I’m just trying to protect him.”

Leo snorted a little and slapped his brother on the back. “This two hundred and twenty pounds of pure Navy SEAL?”

“He isn’t a SEAL anymore,” Shelley pointed out. He could be out of practice.

“Once a SEAL, always a SEAL, love.” Wolf’s tight smile seemed predatory.

And Leo’s matched him. “So you think you’re going to be able to handle this better than Wolf?”

He was willfully misunderstanding her. “I think Wolf shouldn’t have to handle this.”

“I disagree, and I damn sure think he disagrees. I watched him bring you to orgasm not half an hour ago. You had your legs spread wide for him, and you gave him everything he asked for. He owes you his protection.”

“He doesn’t owe me anything,” Shelley insisted. The last thing she wanted to do was to bring Wolf into her nightmare. It wasn’t fair. He hadn’t done anything wrong, and he could get seriously hurt if he got involved. She couldn’t live with Wolf getting hurt any more than she’d been able to handle the thought of Bryce hurting Leo.

“Then you were using me?” Wolf asked, his eyes stony.

“I told you,” Leo said to his brother in his first sign of sibling solidarity. Naturally it was against her. “She did the same thing to me. When she no longer needed me, she told me to get out of her life. At least she gave you some sort of excuse. She just told me to leave.”

He hadn’t been willing to discuss this for almost a year and a half, but he brought it up now? Frustration threatened to overtake Shelley. “I had a reason. God, Leo, I tried to explain that to you. I didn’t want Bryce to hurt you.”

Leo’s eyes rolled. “Yes, Bryce Hughes, who I outweigh by forty pounds of muscle. Bryce Hughes, who ran away from a bar fight. Yes, he was going to take me out. Bullshit. It’s a ridiculous argument, and it won’t fly.”

“He had guns, Leo. I found them that day.” She could remember how terrified she’d been when she’d opened the drawer to Bryce’s desk and found his gun. All she’d been able to think about was Leo taking one of those shiny bullets.