VALENTINE
“You fucking assholes,” I said and flattened my palms on the table. I leaned in so only they could hear me. “Are you three really over here talking about sharing me like I’m some prize you pulled out of a fucking cereal box?”
I glared at each one, and they looked at each other.
“Now, Val,” Derek started but shut up just as Cam started to speak.
“It’s not what you think…,” Cameron, Mr. Thomas, said, but let his words trail off as I turned my eyes to him.
Then Diesel decided to have a go, “Val, you have to listen.”
“Do I?” I grabbed a chair from the table behind me and slid it over to their table, straddling it with my forearms across the top of the chair. “Tell me, brother dear, why do I have to listen?”
I batted my heavily mascaraed eyelashes at him, letting the long false lashes fan out across the delicate skin beneath my eyes each time. It may have been a submissive gesture, but the steely note of my gaze told him to tread carefully. They might all be tough as nails, bad boy bikers now, but I’d been raised around two of them. I didn’t take their shit easily.
“You need protection, Val,” Diesel stated with a steely voice, leaning closer to me to keep the information for my ears only.
“Do I?” I repeated skeptically, though his words touched something inside me. A fearful part where I’d been dealing with someone stalking me. But I also wasn’t going to play into their hands that easily until I fully understood what they were talking about. “Tell me if I’m wrong, but aren’t I a better shot than you? When we used to practice with Dad, wasn’t it me that always got better scores than you and Dad?”
“Well, yeah,” Diesel admitted, his face screwing up in annoyance. “But that’s not the point. Could you shoot someone if you needed to?”
“The gun under my pillow says I can,” I offered without even blinking. I didn’t know if I could pull a trigger on a human being if it came down to it, but did anybody really know the answer to that? A person might think they know, but they don’t. Not until the time comes.
“Wait, how did you know what we were talking about, Val?” Derek asked, and I felt my cheeks flame as I stared at him in horror, realizing I’d just revealed something I’d never told anyone before.
“I can lipread,” I said while staring at him, unable to look away at all from that pair of eyes that held me captive.
“You can lipread?” he asked, his brows furrowed and his forehead showing the beginnings of creases. Those creases matched the faint lines around his eyes and the few wisps of gray hair at his temples. The gray blended in with the blond for now, but it wouldn’t one day. Not that it mattered to me, the gray only made him sexier for some reason I couldn’t explain.
“Yeah,” I admitted, looking away at last, rolling my eyes as I did so. “When I was around eight, I developed this fear of going deaf. I don’t remember now if it was a movie I saw or something on TV, but I taught myself how to lipread and how to do American Sign Language, just in case. I practiced for a long time and I use it when I’m dancing sometimes on people on the audience. Especially after a few assholes have attacked me.”
All three men looked at me with surprise. I shrugged holding my hands up as I did so.
“I never knew that,” Diesel said, and I looked over at him with another eyeroll.
“Like you noticed anything beyond girls in skirts back then,” I answered, waving at him dismissively. “It doesn’t matter, anyway. What does is you three seem to have come to some kind of agreement that you want to hang out with me. Why?”
I’d gotten the gist of most of it, but it seemed like every time they’d discuss why they’d all come to this life-changing decision, the one speaking would turn their head away to where I couldn’t see them. I’d caught most of it throughout my act, and now, I wanted to know if they were serious.
When I realized what they were talking about, that it was me, and they were talking about all being with me, I’d been turned on. I’d had a hard time controlling myself on stage, and that little moment where I almost got myself up there? That had been me losing control for a moment as I imagined having all three interested in me for all the things I’ve craved from them.
I’d dressed as quickly as I could, which meant I had wrapped a robe around myself, and came out to confront them. I should have probably gone straight home, forgot the conversation they’d shared, and moved on, but I couldn’t do that. Not when they were talking about me.
“There’s some trouble that Diesel knows about,” Derek interrupted my thoughts to explain. “There’s a threat that he won’t tell us about, but he wants us to protect you.”
“Protect me? When have any of you wanted to protect me?” I shot back, glaring at them all. Well, Cam was new to my life, but the other two totally deserved it.
“Always, Val. I’ve always looked out for you,” Derek said with more meaning than I could understand.
“What do you mean?” I asked, wanting to know more about that statement, though I’d admit hearing his words had my pulse beating faster.
“Nothing, but I’ve always kept you out of trouble, when I could. I’ll keep you safe now too, and if declaring you’re mine does that, then so be it.”
“Declaring I’m yours?” I asked skeptically, not sure how that would keep me safe.
“Yes. I make you my official woman, and Cam and Diesel do the same, then you’ve got the protection of all three of us. And anyone who is wanting to harm you, would see you are already taken. That they have to deal with us three to get to you.”
“Wait, won’t that make you all look like you can’t keep a woman happy?” I laughed at the idea, playing it out in my head. “Won’t that make you a laughingstock?”
“No, it’s common enough in our world,” Derek said, but he looked away.
“Is it now?” I asked, but it came to me what he meant. “Oh, right. I’ll be the biker slut being traded by the club.”
“Not really,” Derek answered, but the tightness of his lips told me I’d hit the nail on the head. “Just the three of us would have you.”
“I see.” I inhaled, pulling my top lip in between my teeth as I did so. “And when you say sharing me, like how? In a sexual way?” I couldn’t help the heat crawling up and over my cheeks. I should be the last person to feel any kind of shyness, but these three men did things to me.
Derek continued to stare at me steadily, as did the other two.
“I would, Val. If that’s what you want?” Derek asked, his eyebrows lifted over his eyes in question. There was almost a mocking air to his look, a dare that went unspoken.
I felt prodded into action by that mocking look and took on a brave front that normally would have escaped me around him. I’d wanted the man most of my life, but I’d always turned into a mouse around him before. Not this time. “Are you serious?”
The air of shock at the table left me with a smirk on my face as I looked at each one, daring them to answer me. I lifted my left eyebrow flirtatiously, my lips pressed into a wicked smile. “Well?”
“What?” Cameron asked, the first to speak so I turned to him, giving him all of my attention, as if the other two weren’t there. I faced him fully, my fingers going to the spot just below the collar of his shirt. I kept walking my fingers up until my index finger was on his lip, his clear gray eyes going wider as I brought my eyes up from his lips.
“Oh, Mr. Thomas,” I said softly, almost breathless as I felt old desire stirring back to life. I was that teenage girl again for a second, my heart pounding out of my chest. “Is this what you’re imagining when it comes to protecting me? Do you think you could bend me over your desk and,” I paused, grinning a teenage temptress’s smile at him, “spank me?”
I bit my lip at the last word, inviting him to answer. I pushed him, slightly still shocked from their conversation about me in all honesty. Yeah, I nudged it more toward a sexual direction, which had everything to do with my feelings toward these three men, and my inability to control myself apparently.