67. Dex

Ineed to sleep.

I need to curl into Darcy and bury my head between her breasts and drift off into an exhausted, sated slumber while Max curls up behind me, the protective shell I didn't know I needed. He'll stand guard over us, even in his sleep.

But I'm not allowed to sleep, not yet, because Max is in aftercare mode. Besides, I don't want to sleep, because he's rolled Darcy onto her back so we can bracket her and pet her and stroke her and kiss her and admire her and tell her what a clever, beautiful, amazing, miraculous girl she is.

I've never seen anything like her: all post-orgasm bliss and shining eyes, her gorgeous body loose-limbed. And I've never felt anything like this: the three of us, drunk on each other and on the chemical highs we coaxed from each other's bodies.

Max and I are up on one elbow, grinning stupidly at each other. The vision of him fucking Darcy's arse like that will be forever seared onto my brain. I've seen him come before. I've made him come. And each time it's raw, animalistic. But the bunched muscles and clenched teeth and fierce eyes as he took her just now was another level, a side of him it was a privilege to see.

And it makes me brave.

‘I want you to do that to me,' I tell him. ‘What you just did.' I want him angry and deranged and all-powerful around me, behind me, inside me. I want him to consume me, to eradicate every other thing in the world so there's only him.

His face kind of collapses, like he can barely handle the idea of it, and he leans over Darcy and yanks me towards him by the scruff of my neck.

‘Be very, very careful what you wish for, beautiful boy,' he tells me, and then he's biting down on my lip and kissing me, hard and without mercy, like I should take what he's capable of doing with his teeth and tongue as an ominous portent of the annihilation he's capable of wreaking on me with his dick.

‘As long as I can watch with popcorn,' Darcy slurs from beneath us, and our kisses turn to snorts of laughter.

Max turns his head to look down at her, his expression amused and adoring. ‘No popcorn for you. No view, either. He'll be inside your cunt when I take him.'

‘That works,' she says airily, and he drops down to kiss her. I pause for a fraction of a second before joining them, so we're a lazy jumble of skin and breath.

Eventually, Max pulls himself away. ‘You look after her—don't let her move. I'll run us all a bath. Darcy, I'm getting you some ibuprofen. Don't move.'

Our eyes follow him out of the room. His nakedness in no way detracts from that effortless aura of power he's cloaked in at all times. He's so… imposing. Imperial, even.

Also, he has a fine, fine arse.

I snuggle down with Darcy, nose to nose on our pillows, grinning conspiratorially at each other. ‘How do you feel, really?' I ask her, sliding my hand around her neck and stroking my thumb along her jawline.

‘Um.' She sighs. ‘Physically a bit… violated. Like, tender. I'm kind of afraid to move. But really, I'm just knocked sideways. You know?' Her face softens. ‘I'm so happy it's terrifying,' she whispers, and a wave of emotion hits me so hard it's like smacking into a cliff face.

‘Yeah.' I move my hand over her shoulder and down her body so I can tug her as close to me as possible, and I throw a leg over her. ‘I know exactly what you mean.'

I wish I could tell her it was just the post-multiple-orgasm endorphin rush, but I really don't think it is.

She's not the only one terrifyingly happy.

Max returnsand insists on carrying Darcy into the bathroom like a bride over the threshold of her forever home. He's lit a multitude of candles on the marble surfaces, and the enormous oval bath is full and fragrant with bubbly water. There are three pint glasses of water on the vanity with electrolyte tablets fizzing in them and a box of Nurofen. He sits her on the side and has me hold her while he climbs in. When he's settled, I help her in, and she nestles between his legs.

She sucks in a breath through her teeth as her abused undercarriage hits the water. ‘Ow. It stings.'

‘Poor baby,' he purrs. The way he raises his knees and wraps his arms around her to cage her in has my heart hurting and an odd, unwelcome burst of something between FOMO and jealousy flaring, sharp and bright, inside my abdomen.

He jerks his head at me. ‘Come on. Get in. Darcy and I want to enjoy the view. Don't we, sweetheart?'

I roll my eyes to conceal the pleased pang his words give me and clamber in, sitting so I'm at the far end, facing them. As soon as I'm down, Darcy stretches out her long legs and slides one between mine so we're alternating. Dark and hairy against slim and creamy.

The two of them, though. Fair and elegant and beautiful. I drink them in and wonder at this new me: the man who chooses his own pleasure, his own instincts, over everything he's ever been told he should want, or strive for. Who chooses the company and comfort of not one, but two extraordinary lovers.

I lie back against the generous lip of the huge marble bath and enjoy the view of Max soaping Darcy up, her head lolling against his chest. I take one of her feet in my hands—the one tantalisingly close to my dick—and use my thumbs to massage the arch of her foot until she's purring like a contented cat.

I smile at them, but I'm already grieving the bubble of wonderment we find ourselves in. Because bubbles are, by their very nature, beautiful, and fragile, and ephemeral as fuck.

And when their fleeting beauty bursts, they leave nothingness in their wake.