I stare at the empty space for a few minutes going over her words and finally shake my head. She’s fucking perfect and I’d do anything, including sharing her if it meant she could be mine.
I beat her to the pool so I wait beside it and steel myself for however she reacts to seeing my scars. The stump isn’t even the worst of it. The flesh on the outside of my leg running from the stump to my hip is a tangled mass of scar tissue and it’s not easy to look at. My board shorts cover a good portion of it but I know it’s there so it still makes me cringe that she might see it.
Avery comes in with Kanga following her and I can see right away that she’s back to being nervous. She’s wearing a very modest, navy-blue, one-piece suit but it still gives me a perfect view of her sweet curves and makes my mouth water for them. Her face is filled with a pretty pink blush and she’s twisting her fingers. I’m not having it. I want to hear her laugh again and I haven’t seen her wince in pain for the last few days so as soon as she gets close to me, I wiggle my eyebrows.
“Looking kind of hot there, Aves. You should probably cool off in the pool first.” And then I push her off the edge into the deep end of the pool.
Avery comes up sputtering and laughing. She slicks her hair back over her head and wipes the water from her eyes before spearing me with a glare of outrage just as Kanga jumps into the water next to her, splashing her all over again. When she finally clears the water from her eyes a second time, they are dancing with laughter.
“Oh, it is ON! Get in here or I’m coming to get you!”
I reach down and unstrap my prosthetic but don’t remove it yet. I put my hands on my hips and tilt my head at her.
“Nope, still waiting for my swear word. C’mon, any swear word will do.” I tease.
Avery floats up onto her back giving me a perfect view of…and she starts throwing out non-swearwords at me.
“What the fork! Son of a duckling! Cheese and rice! Frig, fridge, freak!”
I’m groaning so hard at her ridiculous curses that I kick off my prosthetic and cannonball next to her to get her to stop with the nonsense words. The wave that creates swamps her and turns her words into a squeal. The water fight that follows is one of the best times I’ve had since I can remember. It’s a close tie to the recently fought nerf gun battle. We chase each other around the pool for a good twenty minutes throwing a plastic ball for Kanga to swim after before she starts to tire. For me, being in the water makes it easy for me to forget what my body is missing and I can’t stop grinning.
I get close enough to splash her again and as she pushes through the water with her hands to get me back, I duck under and surge up right in front of her. I’m so close that her hands land on my chest and it’s the most natural thing in the world for me to scoop her against me. With her body pressed against mine, my cock goes marble hard in an instant. She’s still laughing as her legs float up and it’s an easy adjustment to have them wrap around my waist. I bob us in the water and the steel pipe in my shorts fits perfectly in the juncture of her legs.
Avery’s laugh chokes off and her eyes go big and wide as she freezes against me. Our gazes are locked as I wait to see how she’s going to react to this but then I have to bob again in the water to keep our heads above it.
The movement has my cock rubbing against her center. Her pupils blow out and a drawn-out, “Fuuuuuck” escapes from her mouth in a breathy way. It’s so fucking hot to hear coming from her that it snaps my good intentions and control and my mouth surges against hers. She breathes in a small gasp giving me the opening to slide my tongue in against hers. She has the sweetest damn mouth I’ve ever tasted and now that I’ve gotten a taste, the only thought in my head is…more.
I keep one arm banded around her hips and use the other to slide into her wet hair so I can anchor her head to deepen the kiss. I almost come right then and there when she lets out a soft moan and her tongue hesitantly meets mine. She digs her fingers into my shoulders so she can press against me, causing her pussy to grind against my aching cock and the only thing that stops me from pulling her suit aside and diving into her heat is the water that keeps dragging us down. I never want to stop the sweet torment that’s her lips and tongue but we will end up drowning if I don’t get us out of the deep end.
I wrench my lips from hers and she makes this tiny whine of need that almost makes me decide drowning is worth it after all but I hold myself back and steer us toward the shallow end. And then I’m cursing inside because that break is all the space Avery needs to come back to earth and freeze up on me. Her hands that were clutching at me seconds ago now push me away. Her legs let go of my waist and she uses the momentum from the push to swim away.
“Avery! Aves, baby, it’s okay…”
I try and tell her but she’s already climbing out of the pool. She dips down to snag a towel from the pile on the way to the door and disappears without a backward look.
I stand with my chest heaving and hands fisted in the water and swear a blue streak at myself for what I might have just ruined. And then I curse Ryker and East for making me think that I could have had a shot with her to begin with. Kanga paddles up next to me and whines in the direction of the door then hits me with a look that practically screams “Dumbass”. I sigh and send a wave of water at him because he’s right.
Avery
Ileave a trail of wet footprints through the house as I run to my room. There’s a hard ball of panic in my chest that makes it hard to breathe. What have I done? How could I be so stupid? I race through my room to the bathroom and hit the shower, turning it to hot. As the heated water blasts over my head, I sink to the tiles and drop my head into my hands as I try and think of a path forward that won’t jeopardize Chloe’s and my place here.
How could I be so stupid? I WORK for him! That was so incredibly inappropriate. I’m such an idiot. Zack has been so nice to me from the start that I started to see him as a friend more so than an employer. To kiss him like that? I groan in mortification. What must he think about me now? I’m a married woman, an employee! Just because he’s fun and flirty with me doesn’t mean he would want…Oh God, the way he felt between my thighs, the noises I made, it reminds me of what I felt after I was in the hot tub with Ryker and I vow to never get into the water with a man again.
I don’t know how to deal with this, navigate these waters. I’ve now had a…moment…with all three of them. First Ryker in the hot tub, then Easton while we were making pies and now, I’ve kissed Zack in the pool. This is destructive! Am I that starved for attention, affection, that I…okay, I am but I’m also not the kind of girl who would do something like this…no matter how good it felt to be kissed and held like that!
I’m ruining everything and I have to find a way to fix it. It doesn’t matter that I’m starting to develop feelings for all of them. It doesn’t matter that I’m desperate to feel what it would be like to be…touched…loved by men like them. Going down that road would lead to major complications. Complications I can’t afford. Not just with mine and Chloe’s place here with them. It would change the dynamic of the whole house and I don’t want that. I love it here, I love the way they all treat me and Chloe. The…the friendships that I’m starting to have with them all. I know I work for them, that I’m an employee but they are so kind to me, so understanding and…and…it’s been so long since I had a friend or friends that I don’t want to mess this up!
I heave myself up off the tiles and strip the new swimsuit off my body and do a quick wash and shampoo. I have to make this right with Zack, apologize for what happened, and draw a clear boundary line so nothing like that happens again…no matter how good it felt to be kissed and held like that.
Even though I know I have to do it, it takes me a while to build up the courage to face him so I spend the next few hours locked away in our rooms mostly pacing and trying to come up with the right words to say to him. My fingers ache from wringing them and my bottom lip feels shredded from how much I’ve chewed on it when there’s a soft knock on my door.
I jump and a small squeak falls from my mouth and that…that makes me mad. Dammit! I don’t want to go back to being so afraid all the time so I take a deep breath and force myself to stride to the door with a confidence I don’t feel. My fingers grip the knob and with one last steadying breath, I yank it open.
Zack is braced against the frame with his head down and a miserable expression on his face. When his head comes up and his eyes meet mine, I see sadness fill them and all my nerves disappear. We speak at the same time.
“I’m sorry!”
“I’m so sorry, Aves.”
