Chapter 4: Chapter 4

I look stunning in the lingerie. Truly like the present Grayson’s turned me into. While I kneel next to the Christmas tree, he putters around the living room, dimming the lights and building the fire back up. He’s wearing lounge pants and nothing else, and I lick my lips at how good he looks. He’s not actively training for a marathon right now—he’ll start another circuit after the holidays—but he’s in some of the best shape of his life. His muscles aren’t carved in stone or any of that nonsense but I know firsthand how much lean strength he has coiled in that body. More than enough to haul me around for some sexy manhandling.

I press my thighs together. “Come here.”

Grayson gives a dry laugh. “Not with that look on your face. I’ll smudge your lipstick.”

Lipstick a perfect red to match my lingerie. “Good. It’s not going to last the night.” Long-stay lip color has nothing on the things I hope we’re going to get up to.

“I’ll wait my turn.”

My body goes tight at the reminder of the game we’re playing. His .

Footsteps draw my attention to the hallway leading to the second bedroom. Derek is wearing lounge pants, too, nearly an identical pair to Grayson’s. He drags his hand through his hair and looks at us, all feigned innocence. “What’s this?”

Grayson’s lips curve into a slow smile. “We’ve been friends a long time. I thought we’d celebrate Christmas a little differently this year.”

Derek’s gaze tracks to me and the hunger in his eyes has me fighting not to squirm. It doesn’t seem to matter that he had his mouth all over my pussy an hour ago. He looks at me like he isn’t sure he can control himself. And then the power of his gaze is gone, turning to Grayson. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you’d wrapped up your wife as a present for me. She’s under the Christmas tree and everything.”

Grayson strides to me and digs his hand into my hair, tilting my head back a little and arching my back. “I’ve seen the way you watch her.”

“She’s beautiful.” He shrugs as if that’s excuse enough. “And funny and smart and dirty as fuck. I’d have to be dead not to want her.”

“Merry Christmas.”

If Derek had questions, they were asked on the ski slope, because he stalks toward us, expression intent. “That’s one hell of a gift, Grayson.”

“You can thank me later.”

Derek’s gaze doesn’t lose its heat as he looks at my husband. “Oh, I will.”

Grayson guides me to my feet, catching me under my elbows when my knees nearly buckle with anticipation. I’m standing between these two men, closer than we’ve ever been before. Soon we’re going to closer than we’ve ever been.

Grayson presses a kiss to the back of my neck and releases me. “Have fun.” And then he retreats, walking to the chair next to the fire and sinking into it. It gives him a full view of the room. Of us.

I don’t know what I expect, but Derek just studies me, his gaze tracing over me so slowly I think I might die from it. It doesn’t seem to matter that he saw me naked earlier. He’s looking at me like this is the first time.

He reaches out and slowly runs his fingers through my hair. He’s not touching me anywhere but I still feel the contact through my entire body. My breath escapes in a shudder and I have to fight not to lean into him.

I won’t touch him first. My pride refuses to allow it. Besides, I’m a gift and a gift doesn’t unwrap itself.

His hand drifts down to my shoulder. A relatively innocent thing, somewhere he’s touched me before, but the intention is so different. Derek presses his hand to my upper chest, his fingers brushing my collarbones. “I like how you’ve wrapped my gift, Grayson.”

I glance at my husband, watching us with so much heat in his gaze, I’m surprised the room hasn’t been engulfed in flames. He leans back in the chair, all studied relaxation. “I thought you might.”

Derek drags his fingers lightly down the straps that crisscross my chest, pausing between my breasts, which are barely covered in lace that showcases my nipples. He keeps going, tracing the straps creating a pattern down my stomach and over my hips, to the panties that tease at more than a glimpse of my pussy. The whole thing is complicated and took Grayson’s help to get into.

And it looks amazing.

He moves, circling to stand behind me. No doubt studying the way my ass is on display and bared completely of straps. I jump when he brushes me there. He chuckles. “Nervous?”

“No.” I’m a liar, but it’s the least of my sins right now.

Just like that, Derek stops the tentative teasing. He grabs my hips and pulls me back against his body, pressing himself to me tightly. I gasp at the feeling of his cock against my lower back, but I don’t have a chance to figure out what he’s doing before he bands one arm around my waist and turns us.

To face Grayson.

.

Derek backs up, taking me with him, to sit on the couch across from Grayson’s chair. He arranges me in his lap, guiding my legs to the outside of his and spreading us both. Putting me on display.

He slides his hands up my sides and then takes my wrists and moves my hands to either side of his hips. Baring me further. I’m not exactly helpless, not being held down, but the feeling is there all the same. Like I’m a toy for him to play with, a doll here only for his amusement and pleasure.

At the thought, desire lights me up like the lights on the Christmas tree.

“Do you know how jealous I was at your wedding?” Derek’s voice sounds perfectly normal despite the massive dick pressing against my ass, proving that he’s just as affected as I am. He brackets my hips with his big hands and coasts them up to brush his thumbs along the underside of my breasts. “Not the ceremony. Not even all the random shit at the reception.” He keeps up that steady motion, idly touching me in a way that was forbidden just a single day ago. “It was when I saw you fucking in the bridal suite.”

Grayson snorts. “Peeping in windows, were you?”

“I went for a cigarette. Not my fault you left the windows open and decided to fuck your bride right there where anyone could see you.” He moves his hands up slightly, stroking along the scalloped top of the lace bra cups, finally dipping in to drag the fragile fabric down and bare my nipples. “I stood there and watched and knew I’d never be allowed to touch.”

I know his words aren’t for . Not really. They’re for Grayson. I’m just the method of communication.

It doesn’t change the fact that I’m nearly panting with desire as he circles my nipples until they pebble to hard points. It doesn’t change the fact that my husband watching this only makes it a thousand times hotter.

Derek pinches my nipples and I jerk back against him, fighting down a moan. “Now it’s your turn to watch.”

Grayson raises his brows. His cock is creating a tent in the front of his lounge pants, but my husband manages to lock down the lust on his face, if only barely. “Tit for tat, is it?”

“Think she’ll scream my name when she comes or yours?” He cups my breasts fully now, his palms rasping against my increasingly sensitive nipples.

I bite my lip to keep from begging for more, but I can’t stop myself from rolling my hips a little, grinding against his erection. Derek releases one breast and lets his hand drop to cup my pussy. He hisses out a breath against my neck. “She’s so wet I can feel her through the lace.”

I draw in a shaking breath. “If you don’t start unwrapping this present, she’s going to unwrap herself.”

Derek laughs against my neck. “Impatient.”

“Only a little.” No point in denying it. Not when we’re poised on the brink of something. We’ve had seven years of teasing. Seven years of denial. Up until this point, I didn’t consider it a great trial to ignore my attraction to Derek. I didn’t magically become immune to desire just because I’m married, but that doesn’t mean I ever would have acted on it. Not with him. Not with anyone.

“All good things are worth the wait, isn’t that right, Grayson?”

I love that he keeps bringing my husband into this. I hate it, too. Tonight really isn’t about me. Oh, Derek wants me, but that’s not enough for him to be going through this slow tease.

That’s all about Grayson.

My husband shifts on his chair. “Yes.”

Right then and there, I make the decision to drag Grayson into this with us. Not yet. We have to work him into a frenzy before he’ll forget himself, forget the rules he’s built up in his head to make this work. No one has self-control better than my husband.

No one knows how to break it better than me.

Except maybe Derek.

I settle back against him, still rolling my hips a little. “Just a little touch, Derek.”

He ghosts the tips of his fingers up the center of my pussy. I’ve long since soaked the lace, and it feels good but I’m desperate for actual contact. So desperate, I toss out words designed to prod him into action. “Do you think it only works when we’re not supposed to?”

“Baby, we’re supposed to.” He reaches the top of my panties and dips his fingers in. “You’re married to that man over there. To have and to hold, one and only.” Slowly, oh so slowly, his fingers descend until he’s cupping my pussy, his entire hand wedged into my panties. “And yet it’s my hand in your panties right now.” His palm drags against my clit as he pushes two fingers into me. “My fingers fucking you right now.”

I look at Grayson. I can’t help it. I’m sure that Derek’s words will sting, but it’s not regret on my husband’s face. It’s pure lust as he watches his best friend’s hand move in my panties.

Derek presses an open-mouth kiss to my neck, keeping his pace agonizingly slow. “This pussy is just for him, but I’m playing with it right now. Can’t call that anything but wrong, can’t you?”

“No,” I whisper, spreading my legs wider.

“You get off on that as much as I do.” He laughs hoarsely. “Someone says we shouldn’t and it’s like waving a red flag in front of a bull.”

Pleasure builds in slow waves, each spiking a little hotter inside me. “I don’t want to want you.”

“But that doesn’t stop you from clenching around my fingers, does it?” He wedges a third inside me and I can’t quite stifle my moan. “It didn’t stop you from demanding I fuck you with my tongue earlier.”

“That’s not fair.” I’m bracing myself on the couch on either side of him now, trying to lift my hips to ride his fingers, to drive him deeper.

Derek bands his free arm around my waist and pins me down. “So fucking shameless. You’d ride my hand to orgasm right in front of him, wouldn’t you?”

His words feed something dark and hungry inside me. This is just a game. We have permission. But he’s right; it doesn’t make this feel any less wrong.

wrong.

“Maybe we should stop.” But as I say it, I take my hands off the couch and stroke them over his arm. I’m Derek. “In…just a minute.”

He withdraws his fingers. I have half a second to make a protesting noise and then Derek topples me onto the couch. The couch is wide enough for him to lie partially at my side and he wedges himself between me and the back of it.

Just like that, we’re kissably close, and this feels a whole lot more intimate than just sitting on his lap. His gaze drops to my lips. I half expect him to ask permission, but we’ve blown past that several times today already.

Derek kisses me like he has every right to. No hesitation. No reluctance. He takes my mouth like it was his all along, cupping my jaw to angle my head exactly where he wants it so he can plunge deep. He tastes like whiskey, and I’m suddenly afraid that I’m going to get drunk off him.

I shouldn’t be too eager.

should display some reluctance. But then, I’ve never been that skilled at being good, not when I can be bad.

I kiss him back with all the pent-up longing I haven’t allowed myself to feel. He’s nothing like Grayson. My husband is controlled in everything he does, even being wild. His kisses reflect that. Derek’s is consuming in a way I don’t know if I’ll survive. Like he’s snapped his leash and he’s not going to stop until he’s exhausted, which will take a hell of a long time.

I can’t wait.