Chapter 9

CHAPTER 9

ELENNA

"I think it’s a good idea." Aidan paced the living room like a caged lion. The Demons beat the Dingoes by a point, but he was more agitated than usual.

Finley and I told him every detail about our date and night together, but he was fixated on our run in with Nicholas and Celine. That hadn’t stopped him from waiting until Finley left before fucking me while I was still sticky with Finley’s cum. He’d called me his best slut and made me come even though my body was tired and sore.

"I agree," Finley said. He sat on one chair with his feet propped on another. "Sooner or later, they’ll work out who killed Oscar. The better Elenna can defend herself, the happier I’ll be."

"Not that either of us is going to let her out of our sight for the foreseeable future," Aidan said. He gave Finley an accusing look like the equipment manager might actually be suggesting that.

"You don’t have to fawn over me," I said. "I kept myself safe for twenty-six years, remember? I know how to run and hide. I know how to shoot a gun."

I glanced down at the potato I’d stopped peeling. I reminded myself my hands were covered in juice and not blood. Still, I finished peeling quickly and sliced the potatoes before tossing them into a pot and thoroughly washing my hands.

"You know how to hold a knife," Aidan said. "But you might need to work on convincing the other person you intend to use it."

"I might have to surrender my badass card." I opened a packet of sausages and placed them in a row in the frying pan.

I wasn’t much of a cook, but I could do sausages and mashed potatoes. I probably made too much, but I was used to cooking for one or two, not three.

Aidan invited Finley over for dinner the night after the game. I couldn’t disagree over the necessity of the conversation the three of us had to have. So far, we’d skirted around it, talking about everything else. Nicholas and Celine gave us the perfect distraction.

Aidan stepped over behind me. He placed his hands on my shoulders and started to massage lightly.

"Your badass card is safe." He worked out a knot in my left shoulder. "All we want is for you to be safe. I’ve tried my best to give you the skills to do that. If Orion can help, then I want you to let him."

"You could come with me," I suggested. "It might be a good way for you to work off some rage."

He leaned in to nibble the side of my neck. "I already have a way to work my rage out. Fucking you is the best stress relief there is."

"What he said," Finley agreed.

I lifted my chin and our gazes connected.

That seemed to be the in he was looking for. He cleared his throat.

"About the other night…"

"I know you both enjoyed yourselves," Aidan said when Finley trailed off expectantly. "So did I. Imagining you together. It was everything I thought it would be. More."

"We can do it again?" Finley asked.

Aidan’s hands went still on my shoulders. I thought he was angry until he spoke.

"What do you want, Elenna? Do you want to fuck Fin again?"

I licked my lips. "Yes." My voice was firm and unwavering, but I held my breath for his response. He was unpredictable. He was just as likely to be angry as he was aroused. And if he was angry, he knew where the knives and guns were. And how to use his words as a weapon. He could cut straight through anyone with his tongue.

His breath was hot on my neck. Silence hung in the air, heavy and tense.

"That’s what I want too," he said finally. "He can give you something I can’t. I don’t do praise well. That’s something you need, as much as you need what I can give you. I want you to get everything you crave. I know I’m a grumpy asshole sometimes?—"

Finley snorted.

"Don’t make me change my mind," Aidan growled. "This is about Elenna. Not you."

"It’s about him too," I said softly. "I’d like to have both of you in my life." I hesitated, my heart racing. "Equally. Not just as a fuck now and again. I care about Fin."

Aidan’s hands tightened on my shoulders. Hard enough to bring tears to my eyes, but not to tell him to stop.

"You care about her too?" he asked Finley.

"Very much." Finley nodded. He got to his feet and came around the island to us, slowly, carefully. Cautious of provoking Aidan. He also knew where the knives and guns were. Most of them anyway.

"She’s a special woman. One who deserves all the good things. All the hot things. All the orgasms." He smiled at me. "You can give her things I can’t. Between us, her needs would be better met. One man was never going to be enough. She needs a team."

He quickly added, "Not the whole team, but more than one."

"What if she needs more than two?" Aidan asked over the top of my head.

Finley held my gaze. "Then that’s what she gets. I’m a mere planet moving in her orbit. Held in place by her heat and light." He leaned in and kissed my mouth.

When Aidan didn’t go for a sharp implement, I deepened the kiss, my tongue sliding over his lips.

Aidan pressed himself into my back, his erection poking into my hip.

I startled when the sausages crackled in the pan.

"I should turn those." I reluctantly broke off the kiss and stepped away.

"We should set some boundaries," Finley said. "No one named Fiorelli."

Aidan grunted. "Obviously. Will you be moving in here?"

I glanced over to Finley before I picked up the tongs and turned the sausages one by one.

He grinned. "It would be my pleasure. That’s another boundary."

"You have your own room and we’ll work from there," Aidan said. Evidently he wasn’t in a hurry to share his bed.

"Deal," Finley said lightly. "I can help with the cooking. My mother was a chef. I don’t mind admitting I’m not too bad at it."

"It’s all yours," I said. "It’s a miracle we haven’t poisoned each other."

"My cooking isn’t that bad," Aidan protested.

"If you like ramen and baked beans." I shook the tongs at him.

"Which I do. I got by on those for years before we met." He checked the potatoes in the pot by stabbing them with a fork. That was another one of his few culinary skills.

"No wonder you’re grumpy all the time," Finley told him. He opened the fridge and searched around for some vegetables. "That shit has to be bad for your indigestion."

"You’re not going to put us on a diet of lentils and tofu are you?" Aidan looked disgusted. "Because there’s a pizza place down the street."

"Get away with ya," Finley retorted. "Do I look like the kind of guy who eats tofu?" He looked almost offended. He found a knife to slice the vegetables with, but before he started, he wielded it at Aidan. "I’ll make you a pizza that’ll make you forget the place down the road or anywhere else you ever ate it."

"Put that down before you hurt someone," Aidan told him. "Never, ever wave a knife around my wife."

"Our wife." Finley grabbed a cutting board and started slicing.

Aidan froze. "What the fuck did you just say?"

"You heard me," Finley said. "We agreed Elenna is ours. That makes her our wife, not just yours."

Aidan’s face turned pink. For a while, I thought he was going to grab the knife from Finley and drive it through his heart.

"Aidan," I said carefully.

For at least a full minute, he stood glaring at Finley.

Finley pretended like he was oblivious, but we all knew five percent of his attention was on the vegetables and ninety-five percent on Aidan. His survival instincts were too strong not to be alert for danger from a variety of angles. If Aidan made a move, Finley would be ready. This situation could turn very ugly in a heartbeat.

"Both of you," I said tentatively. "Please don’t."

"Don’t what?" Aidan asked. His eyes never left Finley. "What do you want me to do, Elenna? Do you want me to protect what’s mine?"

"Not if it means hurting Fin." I felt like I was walking on the edge of that knife, ready to topple off at any moment.

"Do you want him instead of me?" Aidan’s voice was low. Demanding honesty.

"Hell no," I replied immediately.

"Do you want Orion instead of either of us? I saw the way he was looking at you. He wants to own you and fuck you the way I do."

The only thing I could say to that was, "I know."

Aidan grabbed my upper arms and turned me to face him. "Do you want him?" he demanded.

"I don’t know," I admitted. "I’ve had one conversation with him. I agreed to let him teach me how to box. That’s all. I want you and I want Fin. Right now, that’s all I know. Don’t make me choose one over the other."

That would be difficult. My husband or my lover. If it was greedy to want both of them, I didn’t care. I didn’t want the whole frying pan full of sausages, just two of them.

Unless something developed between Orion and me. There was a distinct possibility nothing would grow between us. He seemed to have more anger issues than Aidan. Cold confidence and red-hot fury. Was it hot as fuck? Yes it was, but you can’t build a relationship on a single conversation and physical attraction.

Then there was the fact he was a year or two younger than me. Finley was five years older and Aidan was fifteen. A year shouldn’t be a big deal. Except Orion was the same age as my younger brother was when he was murdered. What would Ike have thought of this whole situation? He probably would have found it hilarious.

I looked up at Aidan and searched his face. He was difficult to read at the best of times. Always with anger and a biting remark bubbling just under the surface. Not directed at me. Never directed at me. But I was well aware that if I pushed him the wrong way, that could change.

"If I thought I’d put you in a position where you had to choose, I never would have let you anywhere near Fin," he said finally. "I’m not going to keep you from what you need. No matter what that is."

"Even if she fucks Orion?" Finley asked. He finished slicing vegetables and pulled the steamer out of the cupboard. He scooped up the slices in two hands and threw them in before placing the steamer on the stove.

"Even then," Aidan said. "If that happens, it doesn’t happen behind my back. Or behind Fin’s."

"Of course not," I said firmly. "This… All of this only works if we communicate."

"Agreed," Aidan said. "But if Orion thinks he’s getting any preferential treatment?—"

"It’s only because he’s good at his job," I finished for him. "Not because anything else happens."

"Half his problem is that he is good and he fucking knows it," Aidan said with a sigh. "Cocky prick."

I couldn’t argue with that. Orion would give Coast a run for his money in the cocky department. What would he think if he knew we were talking about him like this?

Right, it would inflate his ego even further.