Their Summer Heat (7 page)

“Tell me, sweetheart, what’s it going to feel like when one of us is in your pussy and the other in your ass?”

Before she could answer, shake her head no, cool gel dribbled down her ass. The lubricant felt smooth and velvety against her virgin skin. Straight up vanilla was her flavor; this was not vanilla. Where did the gel come from? Did they carry condoms and lube?

Before she could analyze her questions, pressure against her anus caused her to flinch at the invasion. Her whole body convulsed as innocent flesh yielded.

“Oh, bro. She’s so tight here.”

The pressure increased when he added a second digit. He swirled. He pumped. He stretched.

“I’ve got some butt plugs that’ll prepare you for us.”

What? Was this part of the deal she’d made with them?

“Tell me,” he said.

Summer struggled to process his request. Did he want her to give him permission or did he want to hear her beg? Struggling with the wicked sensations robbed all the oxygen from her brain.

“Well?”

“I don’t understand…the question.”

“Tell me you’ll let us stretch this little hole.”

“I don’t know.” Hell, she didn’t know her name at this exact moment. “I haven’t had time to process this experiment yet.”

A laugh rumbled from Max as another smack landed on her behind. Warmth spread through her. Her pussy wept, juice flowing from the folds. Her body wasn’t her own. It belonged to two men she barely knew.

For the second time tonight, a different brother ripped a packet. Her body tensed when cool latex pressed inside her pussy, slowly…too slow.

“She’s is tight,” said Max.

Her gaze flew to Logan’s.

“I know. Seems like she’s made just for us,” said Logan.

“I give you permission to use your hand to play with your clit,” said Max.

She started to tell him she didn’t need his permission, but the fight wasn’t worth the effort. Her fingers found her nub distended and sensitive, coated with her juices. She toyed with it, teased it lightly. It was swollen more than she’d ever experienced before, throbbed with desire she knew was attributed to these two males.

Max gripped her hips as he set up a furious rhythm. Her pleasure built with the sweet slide of friction. Her nipples, sensitive with need, rocked against the solid desk.

His hard thrusts were relentless, drove her higher and higher. Her hand beat furiously over her clit. When she came, she cried out as she shuddered. Max leaned over her, sank his teeth into her shoulder as he climaxed.

Summer collapsed, her last thought was to get a tetanus shot.

Late Sunday afternoon, Summer tried but failed to squelch the blush creeping up her face when the hired car stopped outside her dilapidated apartment building. At least the structure didn’t have a butcher shop or a deli on the ground floor. Hell, the damn limo probably cost more than the entire shithole.

Max grabbed her hand and lightly kissed her palm. “You’re not thinking about backing out on us, are you?”

She should. It would be the sensible thing to do, but she was apparently short on sensible. Gosh darn, she’d allowed them to fuck her on an office desk. “I’m not backin’ out, but you have to give me some space.”

“Just tell us to back off, and we will,” said Max.

Summer didn’t believe it for a second but couldn’t call forth the drive to argue the point. She was running on little sleep, which she was used to, but her whole system was unbalanced, her normal rhythm disturbed with too much sex, too much bubbly, too much rich food, too much male.

Max helped her out of the car, and she led them up the chipped brick steps and into the lobby with its peeling green paint and faint Salvation Army-like smell.

“You don’t have a secured front door?” asked Logan.

She had to smile at the innocence of the question. “No. There are people in New York who can’t afford housing with heat, much less security for the whole buildin’.”

Summer dreaded witnessing the shock on their faces when she invited them into her actual living space—God, they’d probably hightail it back to their expensive apartments, leaving her behind in their dust. But a one-bedroom apartment wasn’t easy to find in New York, and she was lucky her neighbors were decent, elderly people who were
sawing logs
when she came home early in the morning. She subleased from Mrs. Winters and considered herself immensely fortunate to have a sweet old lady for a landlord.

The brothers stopped at the elevators, but she kept on walking and took the stairs.

“Does the elevator even work?” asked Max.

“Sometimes, fifty-fifty at best. Lucky for you two out-of-shape studs, it’s only three short flights up.”

“I think she needs a spanking, bro.” Max’s hand landed firmly on her ass.

She yelped, more because he’d touched her so intimately in a public place than because of pain.

“Fine with me,” replied Logan. “I know it’ll blush a pretty pink.”

Her insides turned over. Why did that statement turned her on? Did she have a hidden submissive somewhere deep inside her? She was amazed at how comfortable she was with them, as if having sex with two men was the most natural thing in the world. “Behave, you two. You’ll give the old folks a heart attack with such talk.”

When they reached her floor, she fished around in her purse for her keys.

“There she is.”

Summer turned to find Mrs. Winters pointing a gnarly, arthritic finger at her.

Summer rushed to her landlady, who stood in the barely lit hallway, flanked by two men dressed in dark suits.

“Mrs. Winters, is there a problem? Are you all right?”

“Oh, honey, I’m fine. These detectives are looking for you.”

Detectives?

“Are you Summer Heat?” asked the taller one on the left.

She was surprised when Max and Logan took up warrior stances on each side of her, causing one of the suits to raise a curious brow.

“Yes, I’m Summer Heat.”

“We’d like you to come down to the precinct and answer a few questions,” the short detective said.

Confusion slid across her skin as a thousand questions of her own rushed through her head. “May I inquire as to what this is about?”

“It would be better if we talked downtown,” said Shorty.

“For you, maybe, but not for me.” She didn’t intimidate easily. There was no way she’d make this easy for them if they couldn’t be polite and answer a simple question.

“Bates,” said Max. “As Miss Heat’s attorney, I advise her not to answer any questions without representation, and you know I can be extremely difficult to work with unless you give me a good reason to be reasonable.” Max paused, as if giving the men the opportunity to consider his statement. “Telling her what this is about would be a good start to making me less difficult.”

The easygoing Max who’d made love to her hours earlier had vanished, and in his place was the New York Shark. Only this time, she wasn’t the object of his steely gaze or icy voice; this poor man named Bates was on the receiving end. The two men had a history, had encountered one another before—or maybe Bates had just heard about Max’s reputation. Either way, she didn’t want her Max to be anything other than the sexy man who had fucked her senseless.

“Well, that’s fine with me,” said Bates. “Because you and your brother were next on our list.”

“Really?” Max smiled like the Cheshire cat. “Then I advise us
all
not to answer your questions.”

Summer hid a smile at Max’s quick wit.

The tall man huffed and stepped in front of Shorty. “Miss Heat, I’m Detective Sam Connors, and this is Frank Bates. Do you know Margo Swenson?”

“I know
of
her. I’ve only been in the same room with her three times in my life. I spoke to her for the first time at the gala Friday night.”

Lord, what was up with Margo? Did she want a refund because the Prestons hadn’t fallen into her bed after dinner last night?

“So, the last time you saw her was Friday night at the gala?” asked Bates.

Isn’t that what I just said?
Summer bit back the smart-ass answer and nodded. “Yes, sir.”

“And you two?” asked the tall man.

“The last time was during dinner Saturday night at the Strip House at eight o’clock, but you already know that because it was all over the news,” answered Logan. “Margo arrived by herself and left by herself at around 9:30.”

“And where were you three between two and five this morning.”

“In bed,” said Max.

“Me too,” replied Logan.

At their answers, Summer experienced a shocked jolt. Four sets of eyes landed on her. She tried to think professionally. Answering in the affirmative would be the truth, but if Detective Connors were any good, he’d ask all of them if anyone could verify their alibis. Max arched a brow at her, and she knew he wanted her to follow their lead.

“Before I answer that, can you tell me why you are inquirin’ about Miss Swenson?”

The two detectives exchanged looks before Connors relented. “Miss Swenson was found dead in her apartment this morning.”

Summer swayed as her brain tried to process the impossibility of what her ears had heard. Good Lord, she’d just talked with Margo two short days ago. The fact the detectives thought she had anything to do with Margo’s death sent a lightning surge through her system.

“How…about…we take this inside my apartment,” offered Summer. She spun and walked back to her door, needing to escape the fetid air in the hallway.

She wiggled the key to get it into the ancient lock that had to date back to World War One. It was a temperamental thing on a good day, and her hands shook so hard, Logan had to take the keys and let them in.

Summer stepped into the room and halted as her belly dropped like an elevator from the twentieth floor. Dingy stuffing from her small, seventies-model dark green vinyl couch was strewn about like dirty snow, her yellow thrift-store ginger jar lamp was now a jigsaw puzzle, and the bookshelf had been overturned. A quick glance told her just about everything she owned had been upended or busted.

Logan immediately pulled her behind him. The two detectives drew their weapons, and Summer found herself sandwiched between the brothers, Max’s hands resting gently on her shoulders.

Even if she didn’t have much, what she did have was neat and tidy and hers, just hers. Her hands trembled, and she clenched them to hide the shakes, forced herself to breathe slowly.
It isn’t the end of the world. It’s just stuff.

But it was the end of Margo’s world.

She flinched. Why did her mind go there?

The detectives returned, tucking their guns into holsters.

“It’s clear,” said Detective Connors.

Summer stepped around Logan. “Well, I’d like to file a police report. Seems I’ve been vandalized.”

“There’s something else you should see, Miss Heat,” said Bates.

She followed him toward her bedroom, fear making her legs heavy. She didn’t want to look, but a herd of wild horses couldn’t keep her away. She stepped through the door, her gaze moving from left to right, stopping above her bed.

You belong to me!

The message had been scrawled in some kind of red liquid, and drips tracked down the wall.
Please, please, please, don’t let it be blood.
Summer stood frozen, rooted in time, her heart racing, threatening to explode. She wanted to move her feet, run from the mayhem and never look back, but her legs wouldn’t cooperate.

Logan snagged her arm, folded her into his chest. Wrapping her arms around him, she tried to suck the heat from his body. Her frantic mind searched for a logical reason why someone would do this to her. Until two days ago, she’d been a nobody. She could count all her New York friends on one hand—even with a couple of fingers missing—and someone thought she belonged to them?

“Do you think her…eh…death is related to my break-in?” she asked.

“Definitely,” replied Detective Connors.

“How so?” asked Max.

“There was writing on her wall, too.” He pulled up a photo on his phone and handed it to her.

You’re not Summer Heat bitch

This message also leaked red.

“So, who would call you a bitch?” asked Bates.

Summer studied the photo. The handwriting was the same jerky, creepy scrawl. “Margo called me a bitch.”

Max cursed, but he didn’t know that all Margo’s friends had witnessed Margo’s statement and would no doubt tell the detectives all about it, so telling the truth was the only option.

Connors took the phone from her and handed
it
to Max. “So Miss Heat, where were you between two and five a.m.?”

“In bed…with Logan…and Max. I spent the night in Logan’s penthouse atop of Preston Real Estate.”

Her cheeks burned. Even though she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her whole, there was no point in trying to hide the truth. A woman had lost her life. Summer wasn’t ashamed of what she had done, just didn’t want anyone to know about it.

Detective Connors turned to Logan and Max. “Is that right?”

“Yes,” they both replied.

“You can have full access to the video footage,” said Logan. “But it only covers the egresses and the front lobby.”

“About the note on Margo’s wall, I think
it’s
callin’ her a bitch instead of me.”

Bates frowned. “How do you figure, Miss Heat?”

“Dependin’ on how grammar savvy this person is, if he’d put a comma after Heat, he…or she would be callin’ her a bitch.”

He cocked his head to the side, as if shifting brain matter would help him comprehend.

“If you replace bitch with Margo and add a comma, you get you’re not Summer Heat comma Margo.”

Bates rolled in his lips. “Maybe.”

“Just a thought,” she offered. Hell, she had no idea what the demented mind had meant.

“How was Margo killed?” asked Max.

“With a knife,” Summer replied.

Four sets of male eyes zeroed in on her.

Max scowled. “Honey, can you keep your mouth shut?”

“Eh, sorry. I said that because he or she has shredded everythin’ in my apartment, includin’ my bed and my clothes, with somethin’ extremely sharp. If it’s the same person, they wouldn’t have changed weapons.”