"Not even close." Jonas joined in.
"You want to help. You help by keeping safe, so I don't have to split my attention between you and the perp. You out of harm’s way is the best thing you can do for me."
It made sense. Made perfect sense, and he seemed deadly calm right now. They both did, and that was saying something for Jonas, considering he was still bleeding and his face had been split. Nadia nodded reluctantly, but first threw herself against Caleb with a sob. "Oh, God. Please don't get dead. Please just promise you won't get dead."
He hugged her back and kissed her on the crown of her head as he shoved her under the car.
"I promise. You too. Stay safe. You fucking know you are more than just a job to us, so do as you're told. And remember. Stay put until I bring you out myself."
"Yes, sir." She agreed and slid under.
"Nadia, Reach one hand out and hold on to my ankle. That way I know you're still there." Jonas ordered and she did without hesitation. After about thirty seconds a horrible flaw in this plan occurred to her.
"Jonas! You are practically blind right now. What if he comes for you while Caleb is checking the house? Get under here with-" A shot rang out that was louder and larger than any that had been fired before, and Nadia screamed as her body jolted.
"You get him?" Jonas called out, sounding bored.
"Of course. What else did you expect?" Caleb answered, and she thought he sounded smug.
"Well that worked like a charm." Jonas said, easing down carefully to sit on the ground with his back against the tire. "Wounded bait does the trick again."
"Always does." Caleb said from a closer distance and she watched, confused and baffled, as his boots sauntered in and out of her line of sight. "It's a shame really how gullible and predictable some scum bags are. That was almost too easy."
"Yeah. True that." Jonas agreed, then added. "Only next time, you get shot and I'll play the hero."
"I'll give you that point. Sucks to be you." Nadia assumed that Caleb must consider his own bullet wound not worth mentioning.
"Umm, can I come out now?" Nadia asked, since they were chatting like the danger had passed.
"Not just yet baby." Jonas said. “Give Caleb time to make sure he's dead or if not, then cuffed and neutralized.”
"Okay." Made sense to her. Suddenly, at the thought that there could be a dead person out there, she no longer had any desire whatsoever of coming out.
There was grunting and scuffling. Since the grunting was coming from two different voices, Nadia made the assumption that the stalker had survived, and in spite of everything, she was relieved. Not for him, no she could care less about him after the hell he'd put them through, but for Caleb. She hated the thought of him having another man's blood on his hands. No matter the reason.
"Goddamn this guy’s heavy." Caleb said and dropped his prisoner to the ground with a grunt. "It's safe now, Nadia. You can come out. But I don't think you are going to like what you see."
Nadia took a deep breath and bellied her way out from under the car. When she stood up and got her first look at her stalker, a cry of denial burst out from her chest with terrible betrayal.
"Johnny?" Her agent. He'd been her agent from the beginning. He read every manuscript she'd ever written and handled everything for her in her career. "You? You're my stalker?" Tears fell and her lip trembled, as memories of late night deadline crunches and celebratory dinners flashed through her mind like a movie montage. "I don't understand?"
"You wanna give her the courtesy of an explanation?" Caleb nudged Johnny with the barrel of his shotgun.
Johnny's face folded into lines of disgust. "Me explain to her?" He spat with more venom than she thought any human capable of. "She's the one who should be explaining to me! Why Nadia? Why? After all these years I've waited for you and slaved for you, and you let them have you? These mutants? When I've been making do with hookers and hand jobs?"
Nadia took a step back from him, and thought for the second time that day that she was going to throw up.
"No. No Johnny. You started this months before I hired them to protect me. And I hired them to protect me from you."
"That was just foreplay!" His expression turned pleading, and bile rolled in her belly like a witches brew. "See. After your last book, I finally got it! You wanted me to pursue you. You've been telling me how to all along in your books, and when you wrote Casper, I knew it was the sign that you were ready."
"Casper?" Nadia was horrified anew. "Johnny, Casper was a psychotic killer. He dies at the end. The real hero kills him."
"That was just code. I saw that. I knew that. You couldn't have a boring hero come out and do all the really kinky things. Society wouldn't accept our kind of love. That was why you had to kill him off. But I knew the truth. I knew that was what you really wanted from me."
Nadia shook her head as she saw true madness in a face she had always believed a friend. When he saw her backing away, his eyes widened, and he struggled to get up. There was a bullet in his leg, effectively keeping him down, and Caleb added to that by clamping a hand on his shoulder.
"Then you got confused and let these creeps into your house. Into your body! My body, Nadia! You hear me, slut? You're mine! I've waited long enough, and we're going to be together. Just help me out of these cuffs. I'll shoot them. Finish them off and we can run away together. We'll be out of the country before anyone knows. You can write under a new name in any country you want. You hear me any-"
"Enough of this shit." Caleb said as he brought the shotgun down on the back of Johnny's head, knocking him out cold.
"Thank God," Jonas said in a tone of disgust. "What the hell took you so long?"
Nadia looked at the sad scene in front of her and could hardly believe her own eyes. All three men were bloody and bruised. Two of them she'd loved for less than a week, while the other she'd loved for more than a decade. With a hand clamped to her stomach, no longer able to hold it off, Nadia ran for the house and the bathroom. She didn't come out for a very long time.
Epilogue
Six months later, Nadia was sitting on a lounge chair under a healing sun, as waves splashed lazily at the shore, and she sipped from a drink that she couldn't remember the name of but was deliciously doing the trick of drowning her sorrows.
The courts had been swift and harsh with her former agent. He had three counts of attempted murder on top of the stalking charges. With his very obvious mental break, the D.A. assigned to the case had assured her that there was little chance he would ever see the outside of a locked facility ever again.
She'd had to put her home up for sale. It was too tainted now. Knowing how often he'd been there under the guise of an invited guest had just creeped her out too much. Had he used her toothbrush before? Had he-dear God I hope not-ejaculated on other of her belongings and she'd just blindly touched those things all unknowing?
No, the house had to go. And she was fine with that. it was just a house, and she was sure that soon she would find another she could love.
But, the heart break had come from her decision to leave the men. Her world had just taken too much of a blow for her to stay with them. How can I trust my own judgment right now? She'd asked them. How can I trust my own heart.
She had been completely unable to tear herself away while Jonas was healing. Wounded and valiant and stoic, he had been impossible to abandon. Then throughout the trial they had both stood by her side. Nadia had refused their offer to stay at one of their homes and when she chose to stay in the penthouse of the local hotel, it hadn't surprised her that they insisted on staying with her. It hadn't surprised her, but it had touched her. Deeply.
With tears in her eyes, she'd admitted to them that she thought she was in love with both of them, and that alone was reason enough for her to question her sanity. A woman doesn't fall completely head over heels in love with two men at the same time. It was impossible. So the best thing for her to do was walk away.
They hadn't lik
ed it. Caleb, with his stoic and pragmatic demeanor, had only nodded and told her she was free to go, of course. But warned her it wasn't over. Not by a long shot. She'd smiled at that, because that was what he'd told her on many occasions when they'd been in the throes of lovemaking.
Jonas had been different. He'd still had his bandages on, and she'd felt like the worst kind of villain as he’d ranted and shouted his denials. He'd told her she was theirs and that of course she could love them. That it made perfect sense, considering they loved her back.
She hadn't been swayed from her course of action however, and with a heart that felt shattered into a million pieces, she'd left.
First a month long cruise on the Mediterranean, filled with endless floating and all you could eat buffets. Then three weeks on a guided tour of Italy, from Venice to Sicily.
Lastly, she was here on the most beautiful beach in France.
Was she lonely? Yes. Did she still feel like she was in love with both Caleb and Jonas? Most definitely. Did she ever think that would change? "God, I hope so." She whispered to herself. If not, she was going to be miserable for the rest of her life. It was misery, too. She was completely, utterly, miserable and Nadia was more than a little afraid that was never going to change. That she had made a desperate and tragic mistake in leaving them.
When lounge chairs plopped down a little too close for comfort on either side of her, Nadia tried not to sigh. European men were very forward, and unlike American men who could be moved along with subtle hints, she'd learned in her short stay that the only way to get them to leave her alone was to be painfully blunt.
Instead of trying to fight for her beach space, Nadia decided that she would just take her chair and find another slice of beach. They could have this one, even though it was right outside her bungalow and maybe a more willing woman would catch their eye.
"Move from that chair after the hell we had finding you these last two months and I'll tan your stubborn ass." Nadia's sun hat fell to the sand, when she whipped her head to stare open mouthed at Caleb as he settled back into his lounge chair with a sigh.
Jonas wasn't playing it so cool. He chose that moment to grab her face and kiss her like he hadn't seen her in years rather than months.
"What? How? What?" Nadia was beyond the ability to form a coherent sentence, as the men whose memories she'd been running from were here. In France.
"For someone who makes her living off words, you seem to be surprisingly lacking in them," Caleb stated, and looked at her over his black sunglasses. Nadia felt a brilliant joy spring to life within her heart as she drank in this first sight of them.
"I told you, Nadia. " Caleb said as he took off his glasses and shifted in his seat to face her fully. "We're not through, baby. Not by a long shot. Not ever."
Tears filled her eyes, and Caleb's expression softened as he looked at her for a long, tender moment. "You miss us, baby?" Nadia nodded immediately and without hesitation.
Jonas shifted, and sat next to Caleb, facing her as well. "You love us, baby?" He asked her next.
Tears fell with a small cry as she nodded again. "I do." She hiccupped. "I really, really do."
Caleb leaned forward and laid his lips with gentle care on hers. The kiss was as tender and sweet as Jonas' had been rough and passionate a moment ago.
"Then that's all that matters," he whispered with his forehead pressed to hers. "I love you, Nadia. Let us love you." The words were breathed against her lips with a sincerity she couldn't deny. She nodded as the tears continued to fall, and when Jonas pressed close to her, she turned the scant inches required to meet his look.
"I love you, too, Nadia." His voice cracked as emotion got the better of him. "I love you so much, these months apart have killed me. Killed us." Nadia freed one arm to clasp around his neck and she told him; "Me too, Jonas. It killed me too. God, I love you." She pulled him in for a kiss every bit as desperate and passionate as the one he'd given her. "Don't let me go again." She pleaded. "Please. Don't ever let me go again." Then she flung herself against both of them and hung on for all she was worth.
"We won't, baby." They vowed in unison. "Not ever again." Caleb eased her back and pulled something from his pocket.
"Holy crap!" They chuckled at her delighted and shocked expression as she recognized what he was offering her. A collar. It was a diamond encrusted choker that had two interlocking hearts in the middle of it.
"We mean it, baby girl. Forever." Jonas told her and grasped one end of it in one hand while Caleb held the other.
"Yes." Tears of relief and joy continued to fall as Nadia lifter her hair to the side and bowed her head so they could put it on her. For a submissive this moment was as binding as a wedding and Nadia thought she couldn't have written a more beautiful setting.
As soon as the collar was in place the men stood and Jonas lifted her into his arms. "This one's yours right?" He asked indicating with a nod the bungalow behind them.
"Yes." Nadia was filled with an indescribable feeling now that the collar was in place. It was hope, and elation and mad, raging need all at once and if they didn't get their hands on her right now she was going to scream.
Inside it was cool and shady and they stumbled to the bed as the three of them tugged and pulled so that clothes flew in a flurry about the room.
"Now. Now. Oh please! Now!" Nadia pleaded as soon as her bare flesh hit the mattress. Caleb kneed onto the bed and lifted her hips to his mouth with a hungry growl.
It was divine and she screamed for him even as she continued to beg. She needed them inside her right now. Nothing else would do but that.
They must've felt the same because just then Caleb dropped her hips and slid his body up till they were face to face.
"Both of us baby girl." He commanded, lifting her leg as he shifted her to lay on her side facing him. "You're taking both of us. Now and forever."
Her hand gripped the side of his beloved face as she kissed him and nodded at the same time, on fire for what lay ahead. When the bed dipped behind her, Nadia whimpered into Caleb's mouth. Anticipation made her tremble and pant and Caleb drank in her sighs of pleasure like they were wine.
Jonas nuzzled her ear and whispered; "Safe word baby girl. What's your safe word?" As he spread the cheeks of her ass and she felt the lubricated head of his shaft circle and nudge her back hole.
"B-Bruce." The word ended on a groan as he pressed forward, past the tight ring of muscles where pain made her gasp to deep within her and pleasure made her moan.
"Fuck! Oh fucking hell, Caleb." Jonas' voice was reverent as his hips took slow and steady glides in and out of her. "Oh man, just wait till you do this. Fuck."
"Baby?" Caleb's voice penetrated the sexual fog enough to open her eyes and she gazed at him as his partner slid in and out of her ass. "You ready for me?" Beyond speech, Nadia could only nod and lean in for another kiss as Caleb shifted and began to sink into her from the front.
So full. So delicious. It was absolutely the most amazing sexual experience of her life. By the time Caleb was fully seated in her and began to move in time with Jonas, Nadia was coming with a force so strong she couldn't even move as it locked every muscle in her body in rapture.
It was only moments later when the tenderness gave way to rougher and rougher passion. Sweat was dripping off Caleb's brow and Nadia licked at the salty essence. He growled as she did and his grip turned to steel while he fucked hard and fast, pounding out his climax with relentless strength. Nadia cried out and arched in between them, pressing her backside harder into Jonas in reaction and he bit her shoulder with a guttural shout. Seconds later he started bucking as his own climax was upon him.
The three of them stayed locked together for long quiet moments after the passion had cooled. Nadia felt safe within their embrace. She had come to them in the first place asking that they guard her body, and now, miraculously, they would also be guarding her heart. While the waves lapped at the beach just beyond the window and the sun began its decen
t, the three of them drifted into a contented slumber. Nadia, with a smile on her face as her last thought was that this was way better than any book.
The End
About the Author
Lainey Reese lives in beautiful Washington state. She's the youngest of five and always wanted to be a writer. Her first novel -A Table for Three- was nominated for best debut novel of 2010 by the Romance Review and marked a dream come true for Lainey.
With her third published release -Damaged Goods- Lainey saw another of her dreams realized when she took a leap of faith to became a full time author and left the safety net of a day job behind.
Now she spends her days writing with her dog at her feet and a cat curled in her lap and asks herself a dozen times a day; how'd I ever get so lucky?
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