“I just… Wait… how do you know I love this movie?”
“You told us once,” Poe said. “When you were talking about your mom.”
Right. I’d mentioned it was one of my mom’s favorite movies, but it had been in passing. I’d never dreamed the Butchers would remember, let alone make a note of it.
“We don’t have to watch it though,” I said.
Hope Floatswas sweet and soft and sad. The Butchers gravitated toward blood and violence, toward chaos and carnage.
“We know we don’thaveto,” Remy said, spooning salsa onto the tacos on his plate. “We want to.”
I narrowed my eyes, trying to see the bullshit on his face, but either he was a really good liar or he meant it.
“If you’re sure.” I really did loveHope Floats, and it made me think of my mom, which was comforting.
I’d texted my parents to check in, but I’d made excuses for why I couldn’t come by for New Year’s. There wasn’t enough makeup in the world to cover what Ethan Todd had done to my face, and I didn’t want them to worry.
I finished piling my plate with a piece of pizza, two tacos, an enchilada, and a heaping portion of pad Thai, then scooted back against Poe’s headboard as the movie started.
I ate carefully at first, waiting for my stomach to rebel — I hadn’t been able to keep anything down other than toast, a little oatmeal, and sips of Remy’s smoothies — but the more I ate the better I felt, and my appetite came roaring back with a vengeance.
We plowed through the food while we watched the movie, passing takeout containers back and forth. The Butchers fed me from their plates and I gave them bites from my mine, like we were all high on some kind of food orgy.
The movie was half over when I finally reached my limit, and Remy took my plate and set it on the floor (we’d reluctantly shut the door to keep Ray out of the food).
For the first time since Christmas I felt truly warm and comfortable.
Truly safe.
I snuggled between Poe and Remy while Bram stretched out on the other side of Poe.
It wasn’t the first time the three of us had been together in domestic tranquility. We’d lounged around the day after Christmas before they’d gone after Ethan Todd.
But that had been mostly fucking. It had been new, the four of us all together, and I hadn’t exactly been thinking about the day-to-day rules of it all.
Were there rules?
I didn’t know. I’d never been with three guys at once before, and as complicated as that sounded when it came to sex, it was miles more complicated if it was going to be an actual relationship.
And I was starting to think it was.
But it all felt easy. Any jealousy was lighthearted, the Butchers jockeying for position close to me, flipping each other off with friendly grins when they didn’t get their way.
They moved together like one unit, and I was surprised to find I could move with them that way, like we’d been moving together forever.
Like we weremeantto move together.
By the time the credits rolled at the end of the movie, I was feeling something besides safe and warm.
I was feeling horny.
And could anyone blame me? My face still hurt but my stomach was full, my nervous system had finally powered down, and I was surrounded by three of the most virile men on the planet.
Poe still wasn’t wearing a shirt, and ink crawled over his muscled chest, mapping a path over the sculpted sinew of his body, and Remy's muscled thighs were tucked intimately next to my own.
Bram wasn’t close enough to touch, but looking at him was more than enough to spark a fire between my thighs. He met myeyes over Poe’s body and I knew he wanted me from the lust that flared in his gaze.
I also knew he wouldn’t do anything about it. None of the Butchers would, not with my face looking like a tenderized piece of meat and not so soon after I’d come home.
