Page 40 of The Unexpected

She elbows him, hard, but he just grins wider.

“I’m fine,” she says, but her voice wobbles on the last syllable.

Hunter looks at me. “She’s been taking my cock in her ass on a regular basis. I’m sorry you’re so achy, baby, but practice is what will make it better.”

Stella’s cheeks explode in color. She glares at him, but there’s laughter trembling at the corner of her mouth, as if she’s not sure whether to be furious or delighted. I find myself grinning, then laughing outright, and for a second, it’s the three of us, howling like idiots in a kitchen that hasn’t seen this much joy in its short, sterile existence.

I refill her glass, then Hunter’s, then my own.

The conversation shifts, but the energy is different now—looser, rawer, like a jazz set after midnight when the band is too drunk to pretend they’re not just playing for each other. Stella asks me if I believe in the devil, and I say only as a metaphor for human desire. Hunter asks if I’ve ever been tempted by a congregant, and I say temptation is just a proof of life. He stares hard for a moment because obviously, I didn’t give a straight answer. But he doesn’t call me out on it, and the conversation moves on.

Stella wants to know what I’d do if a parishioner confessed to something really bad—murder, or incest—and I say the only sin that matters is the one you can’t live with afterward.

Half the wine is gone, and the night is thick outside the window, the streetlights painting slow-moving bars across the concrete floor. I realize, with a jolt, that I want them to stay. Not just for the sex that will almost certainly follow, but for the way they fill up the space with something other than silence.

I gather the glasses, set them in the sink. When I turn, they’re both watching me: Stella with a look that’s sweet invitation and all sensuality; Hunter with a smile like he’s already won whatever game we’re playing.

I run a hand over the back of my neck, and Stella’s gaze follows the movement.

“So what happens now?” I ask, letting the words land between us.

Hunter grins. “I thought you’d never ask.”

But it’s Stella who speaks, her voice soft but sharp yet sensual at once. “I think you should decide, Pastor. You’re the only one here with a moral code. I think we’ve established that Hunter and I have none. Zero, despite your best efforts at counseling,” she giggles.

The challenge is real, and so is the desire. I feel it slide through me, electric and alive.

I consider the options, the risks, the consequences. I consider how much I want to taste her, and what it might cost me. I consider the promise I made to myself to be better than what the world expects from men like me.

But when Stella stands and crosses the room, the sway of her hips is too much, and my cock jerks. When Hunter gets up and blocks the door with the bulk of his body, and when the two of them close the distance, I know exactly what’s going to happen.

And I know I won’t regret it, not for a second.

14

DIAL THREE FOR A GOOD TIME

Hunter

I’ve never seen anyone eat risotto like Stella does, spoon in hand, hair falling wild down her shoulders, every second bite licked from her lower lip as if she’s just on the cusp of orgasm. Maybe it’s the wine—Montrachet, not cheap, the bottle nearly drained by now—or maybe it’s the strange friction of the three of us, alone and private in Lachlan O’Toole’s square white box of a church apartment, that makes her so unconsciously sensual. It’s not a big place, just one open room with a kitchen pass-through and a living area split by a low, dark coffee table. A crucifix in the corner, stark and plain, and nothing on the walls but the ghosts of old tenants. A single lamp throws amber light across the table, and the way it picks out the shine on Stella’s bare legs—fuck.

Who knew I’d be so into legs?

But when it comes to this gorgeous female, I’m into everything.

I sit at the end of the table, a position that feels both like king and referee. From here, I can watch everything: Stella directly across from O’Toole, her posture just shy of formal, the line of her back sharply curved, and oh so feminine, but the tilt of her chin determined. The blond man has rolled his sleeves up past the elbow, bared his scarred arms to the cold, and he pours us another round with a steady hand. The wine gurgles, the candle flickers in a slow pool of its own wax, and all the while I can feel the tension vibrating between us like a tripwire stretched across a church aisle.

“So.” O’Toole leans back, sets the bottle down with a soft click, and lets his gaze hang on Stella a second longer than necessary. “I think we’ve exhausted the safe topics. Are you ready to tell me what you actually want out of this?” He asks it in the voice of a man who’s never been afraid of an answer. There’s a little heat to it, but no judgment.

Stella doesn’t look away. She turns her glass in her hands, lets the surface tension of the wine swirl up the rim and then settle. For a minute, she says nothing, the little drama of the silence playing out on her lips and the edge of her jaw. Then she glances at me—not for permission, but to see if I’m really listening. I am.

“You mean outside the confines of what a pastor is supposed to hear?” she asks softly.

The Viking thinks for a moment.

“You’d be surprised at what I’ve heard,” he says in an even tone. “Although I’ve only officially been in this job for a year or so, I was the unofficial confessor for my unit in the Marines. There’s a ton of shit that goes down and I heard more than my share.”

Stella nods, weighing her words. She’s gorgeous in the dimness, the faint light turning her hair into a mass of heavy gold.