Unwrapped

“I love you too,” she said, curling her fingers over his speeding heart.

Chapter 12

Matt pulled off his jacket and dropped it on his desk chair, rolling his neck to get out the kinks. The quietness of the office surprised him. Though it was past midnight, he’d come in to find all the lights blazing downstairs and the smell of Manny’s pizza and blazing hot chicken wings—they never gave him a break—hanging in the air.

His stomach growled, and he sighed as he headed into the kitchenette. Even hot wings would be better than the stringy casserole he’d had foisted on him at Aunt Edna’s. At least Edna had convinced his mom to spend the night, so he wouldn’t have to stand around wondering when the other shoe would drop and she’d discover her son and his roommates were no longer platonically living together.

At the moment, no one could be more platonic than they were, but still.

He frowned at the bottle of beer foaming across the floor. Maybe they’d had a reconciliation dinner and forgotten to clean up? Weird. His lovers weren’t neatniks, but this went beyond.

A sound from upstairs caught his attention, and he stopped with his hand on the fridge. Female giggling. Either Tristan had a woman over or Cait had taken some happy pills.

Shoving aside his hunger for the moment, he headed upstairs, his stomach strangely tight. If Cait was giggling, that had to be a good sign, right?

He checked her section of the loft first and found it empty. But the giggling amplified, making him smile. He loved her laugh. So free and fun. It had been too long since he’d heard that sound.

Slowly, he approached Tris’s rooms. He didn’t know what he’d find. Didn’t know what he even wanted to find. If they’d made up, he’d have to face something—someone—he really wasn’t ready to. Mainly his mother. Or he’d have to convince Tris to put a lid on his desire to confess to the world.

Either way it was Christmas Eve, and he really didn’t want to deal with any of it tonight.

“Shit.” The expletive exploded from him when he caught sight of the scene on Tristan’s bed. So much for a reconciliation dinner. Tris had made a feast out of something else entirely.

Cait was lying with her butt flush to the headboard, her legs spread in a wide V against the wall. Tristan had his head between her legs and his dick in the giggling vixen’s mouth.

They didn’t hear him, unshockingly, so he pulled a Cait and lingered in the doorway, watching openly as Tristan brought her to a toe-curling orgasm. Her pink toenails dug into the wall, heels arching, muscles trembling in her long, shapely thighs. She dragged her mouth off Tris’s cock long enough to breathe, turning her head toward the doorway.

Her double take was almost comical. With Tristan’s powerful legs framing her smile, she stared at Matt and crooked a finger.

Matt released a long breath. God, they were so sexy together, these crazy people he loved. He stepped forward, stopped. Took another step and stopped again.

A journey of a thousand miles—or across the bedroom in this case—sometimes required a lot more to begin than a single step. It required him to man up.

He ran a hand over his hair and closed his eyes. “Look, I’m happy you made up. I really am. But my mom’s in town, and I can’t just hop into bed with you both. Especially if it’s only a temporary, while-it-lasts thing. So if you two want to—”

Hearing Tristan’s obvious sigh, Matt opened his eyes and absorbed his best friend’s patient grin.

“Not while it lasts,” Cait whispered, drawing his attention.

Tristan kissed Cait’s knee, his gaze lasered on Matt. “You in or out?”

Such a simple question. Such a complicated answer.

Matt dipped his hands in his pockets and fought to think with the part of him that wasn’t taut with need against the stiff material of his jeans. “You don’t really mean it,” he said, instead of addressing Tristan. “You’ll freak out and run home to mommy, and we’ll have to go through this again. I can’t do it, Cait. Dealing with him and you and my mom all at once is just too much.”

Before he said anything more, he turned on his heel and walked down the connecting hall to his own set of rooms. He went straight into the bedroom and stripped off his shirt. His jeans and boxers took a little more work considering his massive hard-on

, but he gritted his teeth and got it done. He’d just reached for the sleep pants he’d tossed on his pillow when soft footsteps crossed his hardwood living room floor.

Even without looking, he knew it was Cait.

“You hiding out in here?” she asked, padding inside his room. She sat on the edge of his bed directly in his line of sight. No avoiding her.

At least she’d pulled on some clothes. Or what passed for them anyway. The cuffs of Tris’s shirt dangled off her hands, making her seem even more fragile. Yet the expression she wore was fierce.

“Not hiding,” he said, pulling up the silky pants quickly in the hope of concealing his sizable erection. But from the smirk toying with her lips, she’d seen plenty. “I’m just not being sucked in again.”

“So what if I suck?”