I exhale a heavy breath and take another sip of my drink.
He looks at me and gives me a crooked smile. “You okay?”
“Fine.”
His eyes stay on me a few seconds longer, and I know he’s got something to say. Then:
“We never talked about last week.”
Ah.
I suck in a breath.
Hellbent Night.
He’s right. We crossed lines Ineverthought we’d cross, and then none of us have said a word about it since.
“You want to debrief?” I ask.
Wyatt’s mouth twitches. He takes another sip, then sets his glass down with care. “Figured it could be good to clear the air about it. We should probably all…talk about it.”
I glance up at him.
“You’re the one,” he continues, “who’s always been territorial.”
I laugh.Territorial. Like I’m a fucking dog.
I rub a hand over my mouth, then drag it down my jaw. “I didn’t know I’d be okay with it.”
Wyatt’s gaze holds mine. “How did it feel?”
My laugh is short and humorless. “Jesus.”
I’ve thought about that night over and over almost every second since it happened. What it was like to watch Max and be with Max, the duality of it. Max as pornographic object, serving Jake and Damian and Wyatt. And then Max as all mine. God, I can barely keep my hand off my cock from thinking about it. I can feel myself getting hot even now. “Uh…it felt okay. Definitely okay. It was…hot.”
Why do I feel fucking awkward, as if I’m telling Wyatt I’m attracted tohim?It’s not that, not in a direct way. It’s about how hot it was to watch Max with other men, but for those men to be ones that I trust more than any others. Ones that feel closer to me than my own blood. A kind of safe sharing I didn’t even know I was wired for.
“Yeah,” he says, nodding. “It was.”
“It shouldn’t,” I add, still arguing with myself about it. “I should hate it. But with you and Jake and Damian, it didn’t feel like…I don’t know…like a competition. It felt like a ceremony, almost.”
Wyatt’s eyes flash up at me, comprehension in them. “That’s a good way to put it.”
We drink, floundering under the weight of not knowing what to say for the first time.
Wyatt’s gaze flicks toward the stairs again. “You love her.”
“It scares the shit out of me,” I say with a soft laugh.
“I know.”
“And you…?” I clear my throat.
Wyatt’s smile is faint. “Yeah.”
“I didn’t know this was in me,” I mutter. “I have no idea how this works.”
Wyatt’s gaze softens. I see him taking on the role before he says anything. The wise elder. Wyatt with insight. “We don’t have to figure it out, you know? We can let things evolveorganically, let Max take the lead. It’s her decision anyway. But we’ve never been, like, your average guys.”
