Beyond Happily Ever After: Blank Canvas (Beyond #6.6) (2 page)

Cruz leaned forward to refill his glass. “We could take both of them with us, you know. There's room in the car.”

“Mmm, let's leave the Seurat.” Rachel grinned wickedly. “For next time.”

No one admitted aloud that there might not be a next time. Tensions with Eden grew daily, diminishing the chances for the three of them to slip away. Tonight, by silent agreement, they were living in a bubble. A glorious, art-filled bubble of wine and lazy smiles and slow touches and an inevitable naked tangle of bodies.

They weren't talking about the tablets they'd taken with their dinner, either. The third week in each blister pack, and any dose could count. The fertility drugs were their secret, just the three of them, because he and Rachel remembered the way people had watched Amira and Flash, the well-meaning but high-pressure attention that risked turning something joyful into potential failure.

Even though they weren't talking about it, it was
there
. Beneath every smile, every touch. A heat he hadn't expected, because babies had barely been a thing in his life until Hana and her adorable curly hair and her huge brown eyes and the way Rachel's face melted with yearning when Hana fell asleep in her arms.

Ace wanted a damn baby.
Their
baby, with his or Cruz's dark hair and Rachel's impossible-to-describe eyes, and they could spend years arguing over whether they were hazel or gray or blue or green. A baby who would grow up as safe and protected as Hana, with dozens of aunts and uncles who'd storm castles and wage wars to make sure
lost
and
orphan
and
unloved
were never words that applied.

Rachel met his gaze, and her throat worked as she swallowed. “What's that look for?”

Ace held out his glass of wine. “Thinking about how we're going to keep busy until sunrise.”

She unscrewed the cap from her bottle of water and gave him an arch look. “Maybe I'm the one with the big plans tonight. All sorts of things I could do to you two.”

Cruz dropped a hand to Ace's shoulder, his thumb rubbing up the back of Ace's neck, a reminder of all those unspoken, unfulfilled promises from earlier. “I have a few ideas...but I can be flexible.”

Like hell. Once Cruz got himself focused on something, nothing could sway him from his course. It was part of his charm. “He's lying, angel. We can have all the plans in the world and we're still gonna end up doing whatever he tells us to do.”

Her eyes gleamed. “You say that like it's a bad thing.”

“If I thought it was a
bad
thing I—”

Cruz gripped the back of his neck harder. “If you don't have anything filthy to say, do something more productive with your mouth.”

The delighted glee in Rachel's eyes matched Ace's own smug satisfaction. Cruz had taken his sweet time embracing all the demanding dominance inside him, but he'd become a star fucking pupil. No more shame, no more insecurity—just the easy give and take between three people who never got bored with unwrapping the many layers of each other's fantasies.

“You heard him, angel.” Ace set aside his glass and extended his hand, his own command softer. Absolute control might be Cruz's deal, not his, but he could still appreciate Rachel's sweet obedience. “Get over here so I can be filthy with my mouth.”

She crawled to him, her water bottle abandoned. Forgotten. She stopped in front of him, then wrapped her arms around his neck and slid into his lap. The first brush of her lips was like wildfire, raging through his mind and burning away thoughts of fertility drugs and precious art.

When Rachel or Cruz touched him, it didn't matter if they were alone in an art museum or in the middle of an already-in-progress raging orgy. For the first few moments it was just them. Nothing else, no one else.

Rachel and Ace and Cruz. The only miraculous work of art that would ever matter.

He wound his fingers into Rachel's hair and tilted his head, teasing her lips until she parted for him. Cruz's grip on his neck tightened, and warm breath brushed his cheek. Ace tried to pull back, to turn them both into a three-way kiss, but Cruz had other plans.

He seized Ace's mouth. Conquered it. A hot, deep kiss from a man who would never be ashamed again, and Ace was suddenly sure he knew what was coming next—so sure that his body tightened in sheer, wild lust.

Cruz pulled back, Ace's lower lip caught between his teeth for a heart-pounding moment before he kept going. To Rachel's jaw, to her ear, and Ace eased back just enough to watch her face as Cruz whispered, “Tonight, Rachel. Are you ready?”

Her eyes widened as a shudder wracked her. “Tonight?”

The anticipation in her eyes was only transcended by the yearning, and Ace couldn't blame her. She'd been begging Cruz for weeks, but he'd taken his time preparing her, progressing with implacable patience and an absolute refusal to rush. Some things Cruz would bend on, but being sure Rachel could handle what they were giving to her?

In that, he and Cruz would always be on the same fucking page.

“Tonight,” Cruz replied, his voice a low, seductive rumble that turned his next words into something straight up obscene. “Tonight, you can have both our cocks in your pussy at the same time. That's what you want, isn't it?”

Her breathing quickened, her chest rising and falling a little faster with each passing heartbeat. “I want everything you'll give me.”

Cruz tilted his head to look at him, and Ace knew what his job was. He gripped Rachel's chin and shook his head. “Our soldier-man is
precise
, Rae. Be a sweet girl and tell him what you want in your pussy.”

“I want your—” She licked her lips. “Your cocks. I want you to fuck me at the same time.”

Sweet
Jesus
, he would never get used this. How her cheeks flushed and her voice trembled when she put her fantasies into words. Her nervousness hadn't diminished, only shifted focus. In the earliest days she'd been uncertain, embarrassed of the things she wanted, unsure if they'd want them too.

Now she knew they'd give her anything she asked for. Her shaking was the good kind of nerves, all mixed up with anticipation and growing arousal. And when they got her burning hot enough, all those dirty words would spill effortlessly from her tongue.

That was always when Ace knew they had her.

Cruz slipped his hands under her shirt to guide it up. Ace released her and tore his own shirt over his head, barely having the presence of mind to toss it
away
from the candles. Cruz was more methodical, setting her shirt aside before smoothing her disheveled hair back into place. “Stand up, sweetheart.”

She was trembling when she rose. The candlelight cast her face into dark shadow even as it gleamed off her skin and glinted off the jeweled piercings in both of her nipples. Cruz began unlacing her boots, still the methodical man on a mission. But for a moment Ace could only stare, committing the moment to memory with feverish desperation. Because this was art, too. Her curves and dips, the way light and shadow played with each one. She was rising out of darkness and disappearing into it, as ethereal and otherworldly as the angel he'd tattooed on her skin.

Ace lifted his fingers, followed the outlines of the angel's fluttering dress and silvery wings, and remembered—how she'd writhed, screamed, how she had
come
for them. He'd had to finish the tattoo another day, because when Rachel got hot and trembly and needy, he'd would dive out of a moving car if it meant getting to her, getting
in
her.

“That was the first time,” Cruz murmured, his fingers brushing Ace's before moving to Rachel's zipper. “The first time we were both inside you.”

“I remember.” Her voice was shaking now too, the finest quiver of lust and longing. “It still didn't seem real, that I could reach for either of you and
touch
you instead of grabbing on to nothing.”

Ace kissed her side, tracing the tattoo with his tongue before rocking up to his knees. Her piercings beckoned, glittering in the candlelight, and he licked the tip of one nipple. “Grab on to us, angel.”

Cruz urged her pants down her legs, and she braced her hands on Ace's shoulders as she stepped free of the denim. Her head fell back as Cruz slid his hands back up her legs, and she was biting her lip by the time he hooked his fingers in her panties and peeled them off.

When she was naked, gloriously naked, Cruz rose and circled her, his fingertips dragging up her arm to linger on her elbow. That was all the prompting it took. Still breathing unsteadily, Rachel folded her arms behind her back, eagerly obedient to Cruz's smallest gesture.

Not that Ace blamed her.

Cruz tugged Rachel back against his body, trapping her there with one big hand splayed across her abdomen. He stroked the other hand up her body and stared at Ace over her shoulder. “Pants, Ace. Now.”

Ace had his belt unbuckled before the last word faded.

Rachel made a soft noise—of need, of pleasure, of supplication—as Cruz kissed her neck and teased her nipples. He tugged and twisted the metal rings that pierced the taut tips, toying with her until goosebumps rose on her bare flesh.

Ace fumbled his boots off as Cruz's voice twined around both of them. “Look at him. He wants to touch you so badly, he's shaking.”

“I know the feeling.” Rachel inhaled sharply. “Let me?”

“Soon,” Cruz promised, tilting her head up so he could kiss her.

Oh, that was distracting as hell, too. Another work of art, the sheer perfection of them melding together. The contrast of hard muscles against soft curves, the way Rachel's neck stretched into a vulnerable arc as Cruz held her chin and bent to kiss her. It would take Ace weeks to get the shape of his fingers just right, to capture the essence of Cruz—strong, firm, demanding. Tender, gentle, protective.

Ace kicked free of his jeans, his cock so hard it ached, his heart captivated.

Cruz broke the kiss with a groan and turned all that strong, firm
demand
toward him. “Lie down.”

Ace stretched out on the blankets, and he knew exactly where they were going now. He'd helped shape the filthier twists and turns of Cruz's mind, after all. He'd coaxed him down all those dark alleys, convinced him to embrace his desires. And it was fucking
fun
to sprawl back on the mattress and let it play out—

“Go,” Cruz murmured, urging Rachel down to her knees. “You can take him as deep as you want, just don't let him come.”

—
especially
when letting it play out meant Rachel crawling across the floor, her lips parted, her eyes sparking with mischief. “Jeez, Cruz. A Monet
and
a blowjob. Was I a very good boy?”

Cruz tried not to laugh, but Ace knew that growling sound meant victory. “Almost never.”

“You're something better.” Rachel edged slowly toward him. “You're Ace.” Her palms brushed his upper thighs. “You're
ours
.”

Two more words he'd never get over. He had scars on his side, proof of how close he'd come to being no one's. Nothing. But even before his brush with death, he'd still been too stupid to see what was standing in front of him. Two people—
two
—who loved him too much to let him go.

A hundred Monets had nothing on that.

Ace let himself reach for Rachel. Her hair was silk beneath his fingers, golden honey in the candlelight and so familiar curled around his fist. He loved the way she sucked in a quick breath when he tightened his grip. “I'm yours, angel. What are you going to do with me?”

“That's easy.” She wrapped her fingers around his cock, a gentle caress that turned into a firm squeeze as she reached the base. “I'm going to love you.”

“Cheater,” he whispered, tugging on her hair. “How am I supposed to chide you for not being filthy when you're saying shit like that?”

She dipped her head to hide a smile, then kept going until her lips grazed the head of his dick. “You're not,” she whispered, her warm breath feathering over him. “You just...take me the way that I am.”

The same way she took him, metaphorically and literally,
deliciously
, engulfing the first few inches of his cock in wetness and warmth. He let his head drop back to the cushions, only vaguely aware of Cruz as he moved around them, readying the next stages of a plan Ace couldn't bring himself to think too much about with Rachel sucking his dick.

Then she cried out around him, the sound vibrating through him as she squirmed and sucked harder.

He forced his eyes open and found Cruz kneeling behind Rachel, gripping her hip with one hand. Ace knew where the other was—inside her, those big, strong fingers working her into a frenzy. She'd be slick already, wet, but that wouldn't be enough for Cruz. Not tonight. He'd make sure his fingers were slippery with whatever lube he'd brought—probably their favorite, the kind that made everything warm and tingly and always left Rachel begging for it, even when she already had a cock in her ass and three fingers in her pussy.

Gripping the base of his dick, Ace dragged Rachel up until her lips could barely reach the head. “How do you want it tonight, Rae? Give or take?”

She arched with a moan, struggling against the grip they both had on her—but only in search of
more
. “Take it,” she pleaded. “Fuck my face, whatever you want. I need—” Her voice hitched, broke. “I need to make you feel this good.”

“Shh.” He tugged at her hair again, hard enough to trigger a moan. “You make me feel good just like this, baby. Desperate and begging, squirming on Cruz's fingers. Willing to take anything or nothing.” On any other night, he'd test them both, stretching his own patience to the breaking point because she
meant
it—whatever he wanted—and sometimes he wanted to be mean to them both so that nice tasted that much sweeter.

But not tonight. Tonight, he had no patience—and nothing would get her hotter than a taste of helplessness. So he forced her head down, just a few inches, easy enough to let her brace herself.

Then he thrust up into her mouth.

She took him readily, swallowing when she might have gagged or choked. She didn't pull back, and she didn't lunge for more. Not because she didn't want it—she touched his hand, silently encouraging—but because this was her gift to him.