James can’t actually follow through on his threat. We’re both bigger and younger, but he’s her protective father and he deserves our reassurance.

  “Understood, sir.” I nod.

  Josh follows suit. “Absolutely.”

  Mariah turns back to the luggage rack. “Great. What about Kate’s suitcase?”

  Before Josh or I can tell her to leave it, Kate pushes the door open and strides into the room, scanning us collectively with tight-lipped impatience. And hurt. She’s trying her best to hide it.

  Josh and I need to repair the heart we bruised. We exchange a glance. I’m relieved we’re finally on the same page.

  She turns to her sister. “What’s taking so long? Are we almost ready to go?”

  I stalk over to Kate, who retreats with every step I close in—until her back hits the wall.

  “Stop it,” she demands. “I’m not intimidated by this…whatever your behavior is.” She gestures toward me, but when she swallows and her nipples stiffen, it’s obvious she’s affected. “I came to get my suitcase and tell you and Josh that you’re wrong. I’m nothing like Taylor. Not that it matters anymore. We’re done. I’ll see you Monday morning at the airport.” She leans around me to make eye contact with her sister. “Let’s go. Do you need me to get that?”

  Before Kate can breeze past me, I grab her arm, then turn to Mariah, leveling her a silent demand for help.

  “I’ll get it in a minute, Katie. You three talk first.” She nods her father’s way. “Come on, Dad.”

  James gives Kate a somber smile, pats her shoulder, then heads for the exit, ushering Mariah out in front of him.

  Once they’re gone, the door closes. Silence falls in their wake.

  “Why are you doing this? We don’t have anything to say.” Kate raises her chin, all but daring me to refute her.

  Lifting her in my arms, I settle her back against the wall. She squeals and fights—until I dip my head and seize her lips, stamping my mouth onto hers before I nudge her open, slide inside, and sweep in deep. Her breath catches. Her body goes taut. I fist the hair at her nape and pull until she offers me more with a trembling groan. Then I surge in deeper.

  She stops fighting. Her lips soften. Her fingers creep up to grip my shoulders.

  When she melts against me, I ease back. “We have a lot to say, baby girl. But I’ll start with I’m sorry.”

  Josh nudges me to her side, then cradles her face in his hands and brushes a lingering kiss over her lips. “We’re sorry. Stay put, okay? Give us an hour. If you’re not happy after that and you still want to go, we won’t fight you.”

  Kate presses her lips together, looking torn.

  As he reaches for the key to the rental car, I grab yesterday’s T-shirt from my duffel nearby and slide it over my head, then pick up my wallet. “You’ll be here when we come back, right? If you’re not, we’ll hunt you down.”

  “Fine,” she huffs. “One hour. And only because I want to hear you say you’re sorry a lot more.”

  “You got it, sweetheart.” Josh lavishes another kiss on her pretty bow of a mouth before we hustle out the door, heading for the elevator.

  “Think she’ll still be here when we return?”

  He shrugs. “We’ll find out. I think it’s a fifty-fifty proposition. She’s stubborn, and we fucked up.”

  I’m not convinced our odds are even that good, but it won’t matter. Come hell or high water, Kate Evans will be ours.

  Chapter Eight

  Kate

  Thirty minutes later, I quit fidgeting with my makeup and sigh. What am I doing here, knotted up about Josh and Marcus like some teenager with an irrepressible crush? After Derrick, I swore I would never hang my future happiness on any man again. Yet here I am, not only anxious but waiting around on two.

  It’s ridiculous. I should go.

  But they apologized, my hopeful heart points out. Something your ex never did…

  Derrick’s version of an apology was to deliver polished explanations in a not-quite-remorseful tone. Josh and Marcus actually said the words and sounded sincerely contrite. And they kissed me like I’m their world.

  They wouldn’t do that if you didn’t matter to them, right?

  Maybe, but it wasn’t long before that they accused me of being like their callous ex and treating them like a fling. I thought that’s what we were having. No, that is what we were having—until I broke the rules and fell in love. Then, instead of asking about my feelings, they walked out. My battered heart isn’t okay with that.

  Yet here I am, staying put like they insisted.

  Because they broke the rules and fell, too. Josh said they love you! After all, would they have been upset about you treating them like the secret, post-divorce booty call they accused you of being if they didn’t want more?

  As reasonable as that sounds, they left abruptly again…and here I am, hanging my future happiness on them.

  It’s terrifying.

  I slam down my tube of lipstick. I need to think past my hopes and fears and figure out what’s best for me. Which choice would keep me truest to myself?

  On the one hand, I made an egregious error, both in starting this workplace fling and losing my heart. And if I was purely using logic, I would leave—Hawaii, Force Financial, and this relationship.

  But love isn’t logical. If Josh and Marcus truly love me—like Derrick never did—why would I just give up? Every time I talk to Mariah, I see how happy she is. How grounded and protected Todd makes her feel. I want that for myself. Now that it might be within reach, should I really throw in the towel?

  Suddenly, the hotel room’s door bursts open and bangs against the wall. I start, letting out a gasp, and turn to find Marcus stalking inside, his stare laser-focused on me, silently telling me he intends to strip me bare and consume me until I scream. Josh is right beside him, looking no less intent.

  Instinctively, I take a step back, but I flare hot all over.

  Marcus grabs my arm. “Baby girl…”

  I shiver every time he calls me that. My mouth goes dry with sudden nerves. “W-we should talk.”

  Josh’s expression hardens as he yanks off his tie. “Damn right. We’re going to get to that.”

  “Eventually.” Marcus peels off his T-shirt and tosses it in the vague direction of his suitcase.

  “Sex isn’t going to solve what’s wrong between us.” Despite knowing that’s true, I can’t stop looking as he bares his chest.

  “It’s not.” His smile turns filthy. “But it will feel awfully good.”

  Josh stares at me like he intends to swallow me whole. “And once we’ve channeled some of your anger and our frustration into pleasure, then we’ll be able to talk.”

  That’s crazy. They’re crazy…but as he peels off his coat and dress shirt while Marcus loses his gym shorts, revealing the fact he’s not wearing a damn thing underneath, my mouth goes dry.

  Lazily, Marcus strokes his hard cock, and I can’t stop watching.

  “You need to be wearing a lot less,” he growls. “You want to take off that skirt for us or should we just lift it?”

  “The blouse has to go, too,” Josh says.

  “Absolutely.” Marcus turns to me. “You want us to suck your nipples through the fabric?”

  I swallow, clenching against the surge of need their words incite. My head races but my thoughts won’t solidify. “It’s silk.”

  He shrugs like he doesn’t care. “Take it off, or it will be ruined.”

  Josh drops his pants and steps out of them. His boxer-briefs don’t leave much to the imagination, but the way he fills them out makes me weak-kneed. “Let’s get it off. You need help, sweetheart?”

  “T-this isn’t smart. We should be talking about the future and—”

  Marcus cuts me off with a kiss, slanting his lips over mine and surging inside my mouth as if he owns me. Josh saunters up behind me, blanketing my back with his body heat. His male scent—something sophisticated and musky—teases my senses and combines with Marcus’s salty pheromone bomb to make my heart jolt and race. Then Josh’s lips climb up my neck, and he lingers at my ear, nipping at my sensitive lobe with hot breaths. I whimper.

  “If you don’t want this, tell us to stop.” He unfastens the buttons down the back of my blouse, kissing my spine until I shiver.

  “One word is all it will take,” Marcus taunts, slowly thumbing my nipple through the silk and dragging his lips across my jaw before devouring my throat. “Can you say it?”

  No. I’m toast. A voice in the back of my head tells me not to give in, but the way they touch and fondle me drowns me in a dark, hot pool of desire. Need swirls and twists between my legs. My skin is on fire. Every cell in my body feels attuned to them, in sync with them, desperate to rub up against them.

  With an impatient cry, I give in to my need to feel them one more time and pull the blouse over my head, tossing it away while Josh unhooks my bra. As he slings it across the room, the cool air stiffens my nipples. But Marcus is ready with waiting palms and a hungry mouth to inflame them even more.

  I nearly swoon in bliss.

  Josh toys with the zipper at the back of my skirt. “Do you want this off? Do you want us to make you feel way more than good?”

  When he fits a hand under my hem and settles insistent fingers across my panties, directly over my aching sex, the demands of my desire outweigh the practicalities of logic. I gasp. “Please.”

  “That’s our girl,” he croons as he lowers the zipper and slides the satiny garment down my hips.

  Marcus lifts his voracious mouth from one breast and sucks the other, tucking his fingers inside the waistband of my panties and prying between my folds. As he nips my tender tips with his teeth, his fingertips find my clit and start circling. Electricity lights me up. I grab him for support.

  “I got you,” he murmurs before he inhales my stiff peak again and groans. “She’s sopping wet, buddy.”

  “Just the way we like her.” Satisfaction rings in Josh’s voice. “Let’s pull those panties off and get inside her.”

  “A-fucking-men.” Marcus nearly shreds my delicate underwear as he tugs them down my thighs.

  Suddenly, Josh kisses the backs of my knees—which are surprisingly sensitive—and taps my ankle. “Step out.”

  Hoping they ease my growing need soon, I stumble out of the last of my undergarments. Moments later, Josh’s underwear sails across the room to land near the mingled heap of our clothes.

  We’re all naked.

  Slowly, he kisses his way up my legs, gently nibbles my ass, then laves his way up my spine. Gasping, I shudder with sensation. Between him teasing the back half of my body and Marcus fondling and suckling the front, I’m dying for relief.

  “Hurry,” I whine. “I need someone inside me.”

  Josh’s mouth settles at my ear again. “Your wish is my command. You want babies, sweetheart?”

  My heart starts racing even faster. Why is he asking…unless he wants to get me pregnant now?

  It’s stupid and totally irresponsible, but the idea of having kids with him and Marcus shoots an unexpected thrill through me. “Yes.”

  “Hmm.” He tongues his way up the back of my neck and plucks at the nipple Marcus isn’t consuming with his Hoover-like pulls that tug directly on the clit he’s manipulating close to orgasm. “Where are you in your cycle?”

  I try my best to think, but all I can focus on is my desperate need to come apart in their arms. Vaguely, I recall my period ending a couple of days before I flew to Boston. “The middle.”

  “Perfect. Let’s get her on the bed,” Josh says.

  Marcus grunts like he’s opposed to anything that interrupts his access to my body, but he grudgingly lifts me and carries me across the room.

  I don’t understand. “You want me pregnant soon?”

  Josh lays out across the mattress, then reaches up to guide me onto his waiting cock. Marcus helps, settling me onto Josh so I’m straddling his hips. Gravity does the rest, and suddenly I’m full of his unbelievably stiff erection.

  “Now,” Josh groans as he begins a slow, hypnotic rhythm. “We want you pregnant now.”

  I should be responsible, not turned on. What they’re saying and doing shouldn’t make my ovaries explode and my girl parts tango.

  But it does.

  I join the cadence of his thrusts inside me, seconds from combusting into a million twinkling stars of pleasure.

  Then Marcus drops a heavy hand on my shoulder, shoving every one of Josh’s overwhelming inches even deeper inside me. With his other hand, he rubs something slick and cool against the orifice no one has ever touched, then inserts a finger, awakening nerves I never knew I had. Then he adds another and parts them, stretching me before delving deeper and adding a third. I wince at the tight squeeze, even more strained with Josh inside me. Marcus widens his fingers again, opening me even more, patiently and methodically torquing me up as he prepares me for what’s next.

  I feel empty when he finally pulls free. “Marcus…”

  “Shh. It’s time,” he says, his voice husky as he bends me to lie on Josh’s chest, then nudges my opening with his fat crest. “Bear down, push out, and take me.”

  “B-but you know I’ve never—”

  “That’s why I prepared you. I’ll go slow, but brace yourself. We’re about to make you melt between us.”

  His words alone nearly undo me. Desire tightens my aching body. I don’t remember why I was angry, and I don’t care anymore. I simply give myself over to them.

  Marcus grips my hips, gliding worshipping thumbs over the small of my back as he tunnels inside me in a molasses stroke, gradually filling me up like I never imagined. Together, the two of them leave me feeling packed deliriously tight. The sting of stretching to accommodate them is an unexpected thrill. So are their groans in my ears, wordlessly telling me how much pleasure I give them.

  “Fuck, yes,” Marcus growls in my ear as he grinds deeper. “You’re ours now, baby girl.”

  “Yes!” The cry slips from my lips automatically.

  “I tried so fucking hard to resist the three of us. I didn’t want to go down the same road…”

  “I’m not Taylor,” I protest.

  “We know that now,” Josh assures, rocking under me and nudging that one spot that leaves me open-mouthed, shuddering, and clawing at him for more.

  “You’re fucking not,” Marcus agrees as he withdraws and surges into my ass again. “You’re ours forever. I love you.”

  Between the shock and the sensations, I gape wide-eyed at Josh, who grabs my hot cheeks in his hands. “I love you, too.”

  Tears spring to my eyes. He said it before…but this time his stare is as naked as his body. I feel their devotion in the love they’re making to me. It’s filling me all over and reaching into my heart.

  “I don’t know when or how…” I whisper. “I meant to keep everything between us professional.”

  Marcus snorts. “I was always going to fuck you.”

  “Absolutely,” Josh confirms. “Same. We just weren’t going to do you together.”

  But love had other ideas.

  I’m not sure whether to laugh, cry, or come apart, but I slant my lips over Josh’s and reach around to grip Marcus’s thigh, giving them each my touch. “I love you both, too.”

  “Oh, thank fuck.” Marcus thrusts into me faster and deeper, now with the assurance of a man who knows he’s with the woman he’s meant to spend his life with.

  “Yes. Yes. Yes!” Josh chants, his strokes picking up pace as he swells and stretches me even more.

  He’s going to come inside me. Deep. Against my womb. Without any protection. I’m going to get pregnant tonight. I feel it in my bones. Come July, I’ll be giving birth to their son or daughter.

  I can’t wait.

  Syncing up with their rhythm, I let arousal grow, bliss gather, then ecstasy overtake me. Just like they warned, I melt between them, screaming their names. Their growls deepen. Their thrusts roughen. Their grips tighten.

  “Fuck!” Marcus grinds out like the desire is agonizing, like it’s flaying his flesh and burning him alive.

  It drives my climax even higher.

  With his hot stare fused to mine, Josh hurtles over the edge of pleasure. He lets loose a low howl of torment as he sprays my insides with his seed. Marcus lets go, too, his labored breaths painting my sensitive nape, making my body wrack. Together, they wring the last of my orgasm from me.

  As I let out the final shudder of pleasure, I sag against Josh. He cups my shoulders and pulls me closer. Behind me, Marcus shoves my hair to one side and presses his lips to my fever-hot skin.

  “Amazing,” he gasps out.

  “Incredible.” Josh kisses me like he’s going to love me forever.

  Marcus asks in my ear. “Feel better, baby girl?”

  “Boneless but happy.” I sigh, closing my eyes to enjoy the pure unabashed peace of the moment.

  But I know there’s a conversation we need to have. We shouldn’t put it off anymore.

  “Good. Now let’s talk.” Josh peers up at Marcus. “You gotta let me up, buddy.”

  He doesn’t. “Did you come inside her?”

  “God, you’re not subtle.” Josh laughs. “Yes, I came inside her like a never-ending geyser.”

  I feel Marcus’s satisfaction before I hear it in his voice. “Excellent.”

  “Be careful what you wish for. If I’m pregnant, you’re stuck with me.” I keep my tone light, but inside I’m quaking. Derrick left me because I was unlovable. My head keeps telling me that’s untrue, but the heart he broke still carries scars.

  “Oh, sweetheart…” Josh caresses my face. “You were stuck with me the moment I set eyes on you. I fell for you then. I love you even more now.”

  It’s impossible not to be moved when he says the sweetest things. And his expression tells me he’s not kidding. He’s not lying. And he’s not going to change his mind.

  Hope fills my wounded heart.

  “It took me a little longer. I fell for you the first time you sucked my cock.” Amusement laces Marcus’s voice.