Part 28 (1/2)
”d.a.m.n good thing. I love you, too.” He'd leaned close so that they were practically nose to nose, and for that heartbeat of time, for Emily Anne, no one in the world existed for her but her men.
She breathed in one lover while the heat of the other blanketed her back, and she was in her own version of heaven.
The moment likely didn't last as long as it felt but when she sat back, she blushed when Grace winked at her.
Each of her men had a bottle of beer in front of him, but Emily Anne didn't even concern herself with the thought that one or both of them would overindulge. They were men, not boys, and had no need to prove anything to anyone.
Luke Bryan's ”Crash My Party” had just finished playing. The DJ had been doing a good job of changing up the music and keeping the songs coming. Now however, a slight hush fell as everyone turned toward the DJ booth. Emily Anne looked to see what everyone was staring at.
Ethan stood just outside the booth with a microphone in his hand. ”This is Lucy's song,” he said.
The heavy guitar riff of Lenny Kravitz's ”American Woman” began to blast out of the sound system.
”Oh h.e.l.l, yeah, that's what I'm talking about!” Lucy jumped to her feet, shoving her chair back.
”Show us no mercy, sweetness,” Beck said. Then he tossed a wink toward Chloe, who just laughed.
”Well let's shake it!” Charity Connors also got up and laughed when her husband stroked his hand down her bottom as she left his side.
”Hey, Chloe!” Lucy held out her hand and signaled for the woman to come to her. ”Let's do it! We make a good team.”
”Come on, Emily Anne.” Summer was tugging at her hand. Looking toward the dance floor she saw that people had moved back, and into the void that suddenly appeared, the women who'd already left the table sauntered in as if they owned the world.
She realized that just that fast, she was the only woman at the table left sitting.
”This is one of those times when we women show our men just how lucky they are,” Summer said. ”You could call it a Divine tradition.”
A girls' dance! Emily Anne had never been invited up to dance with the girls at any of the parties she had ever attended-not even her own high school graduation dance.
She nearly refused. She wasn't a good dancer and she was on the heavy side. She opened her mouth and understood, at last-none of that mattered. She was with beautiful, confident women who were going to shake what their mommas gave them for the men they loved. And it was all just fine, because she was a beautiful, confident woman, and man, was she ever gonna shake it for the men she loved. It took her no time at all to stake out her own little piece of the dance floor.
She'd never danced before in front of anyone like this-though she had a few times, alone, in front of her mirror. Music was too much a part of her for her to have not done at least that much.
But never like this where others could see her. Not until now.
The beat of the song entered her blood stream and she longed to let herself go. She watched the others, wondering what to do...how to start...and then it hit her. Each woman cast a sultry gaze at her men as they moved closer to the dance floor to watch her. She moved for them alone. There were no correct or learned steps, just a woman's body following a sensual rhythm she instinctively knew her men would respond to.
The heavy drum beat and guitar riff throbbed through her body and she sighed with pleasure as the muscles in her hips finally loosened up. She felt positively wanton as the vocals began again and she became the uninhibited woman of the song.
She lifted her arms in the air and swung her hips back and forth with the beat and then let one hand slide down her side. She gloried in the moment as her earlier awkwardness gave way to the pleasure she took in dancing for Mel and Connor. The men-her men and the others who belonged to these beautiful, confident women she was with-stood at various positions near the dance floor so they could see the woman they loved, and to a one, their eyes were focused only on the one that was theirs.
Mel and Connor stood side by side, equal looks of pride and l.u.s.t on their faces and in their eyes. She brought her other hand up to match the first, and then moved them both slowly down her body, teasing her lovers as her fingers trailed near her b.r.e.a.s.t.s and then down toward her p.u.s.s.y.
She danced for them alone, giving them a picture of what the future was going to be like.
She danced as if her spirit had finally and at long last been set free. And she knew in that moment that it had been.
Their love of her and faith in her had liberated her.
Their role here outside of Divine was nearly done, but they both wanted to see it through. They'd been on the road for nearly two hours and were only a few minutes from their destination. As they'd promised Emily Anne they would, he and Connor had talked, of course they had. Mostly, they'd talked around the real issue-and he believed it was only one issue-that was making them both hang back from joining together to give her the kind of full commitment she wanted, and deserved.
It was time to stop p.u.s.s.yfooting around. Mel nearly laughed out loud at his unintentional mental pun.
”Our woman could have died yesterday.” That fear had played heavily on his mind since he'd learned that Baxter had grabbed her. He'd tried to approach that whole nightmare yesterday in professional cop mode and had failed, dismally. What had happened yesterday hadn't been about detached professionalism or police procedure. It had been about that rotten motherf.u.c.ker grabbing his woman. Their woman.
Connor exhaled as if he'd been waiting for Mel to speak. ”f.u.c.k, I know. Everything inside me went cold, and in an instant, I understood as I hadn't until that point, that Emily Anne is my world.” Connor flicked him a glance. ”Kind of underlined for us what's important, and what's not, didn't it?”
”It sure as h.e.l.l did.” Mel slid a look over to him. ”Being naked with you making love to our woman gets me hotter than I have ever been, and I have to admit...”
”That a part of you wonders if what's making it hotter is looking at my c.o.c.k.”
”Yeah, f.u.c.k. That's it.”
”And that's partly why I've been worried about the ultimate sharing experience with you. I'm worried that I'll feel your c.o.c.k inside her body, and that will be the big turn-on.”
”Yep, we're on the same page, all right.” Mel put the SUV's signal on and pulled off the road, shoved the s.h.i.+fter into ”park.” He unbuckled his seat belt so he could turn and face the man who was at that moment-and likely would be for the rest of his life-the most important man in his world.
Connor did the same. He clearly wanted to get this resolved as much as Mel did.
Mel inhaled deeply and plunged ahead. ”So here's a question for you. So what if it does? So what if seeing or feeling each other's c.o.c.ks adds to our arousal? I'm not turned on by you, alone.”
”Good to hear, because buddy, I ain't doing you.”
Mel burst out laughing. Connor's stoic, unsmiling delivery had been so spot on. So perfect for this moment. Connor grinned, and not for the first time, but perhaps for the most important time to date, it felt to Mel as if the other man really was his brother.
”I ain't doing you, either.” Then he thought for a moment. ”Now that I think back, when we spoke first to your friends, Dev and Drew, and then to the senior Benedicts...in both instances they completely dismissed the concern, remember? They said that they never even noticed that when they were with their wives.”
”Yeah, I do remember. That's what's sort of been hanging me up. Because despite what they'd said, I knew what I'd experienced in those moments so far.”
”So maybe it's an element of this relations.h.i.+p with our woman that is unique to us. Maybe, it is a small part of what we are, the three of us, together. Sort of like some added secret spice to the prize winning stew. So what? We both love Emily Anne. We each bring different things to her that she needs. Together, we will be her husbands. What happens in the marriage bed-I've always believed that should be special. Sacred, if you will.”
Connor nodded slowly. ”I've always felt the same way.” He exhaled. ”Yeah, so maybe a little shading of what we have and do with her is that.” He chuckled. ”But that doesn't mean we are or will become bis.e.xual.”
”Not that there would be anything wrong if we did. I, for one, don't feel I have the right to judge anyone for their personal lifestyle choices. I never have.”
”I feel the same way. There would be nothing wrong if we were, but we're just not.”
”No, we're not.” Mel fastened his seat belt and turned the key. He looked over at Connor. ”So, we're both okay with this now, right?”
”Yeah. I think we really are.”
Mel nodded, pulled out onto the mostly deserted country road, and continued the rest of the way to the outskirts of Divine.
Mel got out of the car and looked over at Connor. They'd seen Sheriff Stinson's car pull up just ahead of them, and knew he already had men in the house.
”You know, all the way over here, there was one other thing I was thinking about. We could probably leave things as they are. He's facing two charges of kidnapping, three of forcible confinement, and two of threatening death. I don't think he'll see the light of day anytime soon.”
”Yeah, we could leave things as they are,” Connor said. ”h.e.l.l, for all of that, the man is f.u.c.king crazy. I don't believe he'll be out of jail-or a mental inst.i.tution ever again.”