“Maybe you should have,” I tell him, and I know how fucked up it sounds. “Maybe we both should have.”
He shakes his head. “No, Jack. No fucking way. This is so fucking fucked up.”
I haven’t smoked in over a decade but I’m gagging for a cigarette right now.
“One of us is going to fuck her,” I say.
“And what about the other one?”
I shrug, because I have no fucking idea. We’re both in deep. Too fucking deep.
“Unless we don’t work out which one,” I think aloud. “Unless we just let it run its course.”
“Like it did tonight, you mean? With both of us on the edge of fucking the girl. I nearly got my fucking dick out when she was over your knee.”
“I nearly got mine out when she was over yours, what’s your point?”
His mouth flaps and I have the strangest urge to laugh at all this.
“My point is,” he says finally, “that we can’t do this. It’s wrong.”
“Probably,” I agree. “So what next? Ask her who she wants out of the pair of us?”
The thought of rejection scares me and I can tell a mile off it scares him too.
“She said she wants both of us,” he says, like I’m not perfectly aware of that. “She can’t be serious, and even if she were, that would never work. It’s insane.”
“Everything about this is insane,” I tell him. “Everything about this whole fucking spectacle is insane.”
His eyes widen as he stares at me. “Don’t tell me you’re even contemplating it.”
It surprises me to find that I am. It surprises me to find that if I had it my way, I’d drag her back downstairs and we’d take it in turns right here and now to fuck that tight little pussy.
She wants it.
We want it.
But the horror on Mike’s face tells me he’s not nearly so sure.
“I have to go,” he says. “I’ve got to think.”
I nod. “Sure.”
“I can’t believe I’m involved in this.”
I get to my feet. “I’m pretty sure none of us fucking can.”
I’ve the strangest urge to ruffle that scruffy hair of his, like I did when we were kids and he was getting stressed about some shit or other.
I’m two months older than Michael and it counted back then. I was always the daring one. Always the one who’d cross the rickety bridge first, just as I was today.
“It’s Saturday tomorrow,” I say. “We need some normality. How about you come over for some beers in the evening, we’ll try to wind this shit-storm back down to some kind of decency. A few drinks, maybe a film. Absolutely no spanking.” I laugh but he doesn’t laugh with me.
“I’ll let you know,” he says as he gets to the door.
“You can stay if you want,” I tell him. “You can take the sofa,” I add hastily, in case there was any confusion.
He’s already halfway down the drive when he raises his hand in a thanks but no thanks.
It appears he doesn’t want a ride home either.
He’s turned the corner before I’ve even found my keys.Chapter SeventeenMichaelI walk fast, head down and hands in my pockets, guilt rattling through me at the thought of how badly I’ve desecrated my professional judgement. This should never be. This thing with Carrie was bad enough, this craziness with Jack involved is nothing short of criminal.
But it’s not criminal.
It violates the moral code of my career, but it’s not criminal. Not on paper.
She’s of age and willing. Definitely willing.
And we mean her no harm, Jack and I. Quite the opposite.
But that matters not. I feel sick to my stomach at the thought of what nearly went down in there, and sicker still to know that my cock is still rock fucking hard, no matter how harshly I condemn myself.
I could have fucked her then handed her over to Jack to do the same. We could’ve taken turns all night long. I could still be there now, buried deep inside the only girl who’s ever made me lose my fucking mind.
Would I have still been hard as I watched him take her? Would I still have wanted her pretty little pussy in my face if he’d been inside her first?
Yes.
It sickens me, but it’s the truth of it.
Me and Jack are close, close enough to weather anything. But this? How can we possibly come through this unchanged if one of us ends up hooked up with the girl we’re both insane about?
And if we don’t come through it?
If we can’t?
It doesn’t bear thinking about. Neither does losing Carrie after coming this far.
The memory of searching for her day after day, night after night, is still terrifyingly vivid. The fear of never seeing her again still palpable.
The fear of watching her fall in love with my best friend should be a walk in the park after all that, but it isn’t.