Page 38 of Embracing Desire

Work-rough hands cupped her chin, lifting it.When had she lowered her head?She wanted to hide, but they weren’t going to let her.

“Nothing you can say will change anything between us, Katie.”Ry feathered his fingers from her temple to her neck.

“Except if you ask us to leave you alone.But based on what has happened already, you want us,” Jed said.

“Yes, I want you both.”That wasn’t hard to admit because she did want them both.Unnatural.The word filtered through her brain and tension seeped back into her bones.

“What happened, Kitty Kat?”Jed whispered in her ear.

She shook her head and bolted off the sofa, away from their touch.“I can’t.”Katie wrapped her arms around herself.Why couldn’t she tell them?They needed to know why she left and why she came back.

Maybe because she blamed herself for her own stupidity in listening to people who wanted nothing more than to use her.Even after she had all the evidence in hand, she still wanted to believe in her father, but as the cliché went, there is one straw that broke the camel’s back.That straw came in a form she was still having issues comprehending.

But they were right.She needed to explain what happened, even if it made her look foolish.“The night of my eighteenth birthday was magical.”The words spilled from her lips without conscious thought.“You two made sure of it.”She paced the floor, trying to contain her nervousness.“We made love that night, the three of us.Oh, maybe not the way you wanted to.”Her lips flitted upward.“But it was still us three.”

A shiver climbed up her spine as she remembered that night.From the time she was fourteen, she’d had a crush on Ry and Jed.Of course she’d been too young to fully understand the family dynamic.When she turned seventeen, they hung out at her gran’s tea shop when she was working.The girls in her high school would hang out there as well, and Katie would overhear them gossiping.

She ignored most of it, especially when they started discussing sex.Then her eighteenth birthday had arrived.

The men had shown up at her party, looking delicious.She’d flirted with them.Then the next night, they snuck into her bedroom.She’d known then she wanted these two.Gran always told her to follow her heart, and her heart had led her to Ry and Jed.

Jed had held her close as Ry took her virginity, and then Ry caressed her as Jed made love to her.They’d been more than gentle with her, and to this day, she still trembled with pleasure.

“The next day you were gone,” Ry said, his tone rough.

“Yes.”Katie sighed.“I’m not proud of what I did.”Hell, she should have faced them and told them the truth.Instead, she had run.She’d let fear of the unknown send her scrambling off with her father.

“Why did you leave?”Jed asked, his voice quiet, almost serene.

“I’d heard the rumors about you two.”She shook her head to displace her father’s voice.“About how you shared women.I was frightened.”

“Of us?”They asked together.

“No.Of myself.”She stopped her pacing and faced them.Hopefully they would understand.“I was eighteen; you two had made love to me just as I’d dreamed about, and then my father showed up with promises of a life with him, in New York City, that I’d only dreamed of.”

Ry and Jed moved to stand, and she raised her hands to stop them.She needed them to stay seated and not touch her, or she’d never get this out.“I let my father convince me that I could have a better life at his side.And somehow he knew about you two.”And the words he’d used scared her at that time.Now she knew it was just a way to control her.

“What did he say?”Ry’s fingers curled into fists.

“That it was unnatural, and that was no way to live.”Tears blurred her vision.“Your parents being so close, and how Ry’s mom had sex with both Jed’s dad and Ry’s dad.It wasn’t normal.It wasn’t how men and women were supposed to be.”Now she could see what her father had been doing.She lost eight years because she was too young and naïve to understand.“I was so damned confused.I wanted to stay, and I wanted to go.And…” She took a shaky breath.

“And what?”Jed asked in a quiet voice.

“Peggy Morris.”Her voice trembled.Just saying the woman’s name made her stomach clench with dread.“My father brought her to talk to me.”

Both men swore, and in a way, Katie agreed.Peggy had dated both Ry and Jed.She’d played them off one another, and when they caught on and dumped her, Peggy became quite a bitch.It didn’t matter they were all adults.

“She made you afraid,” Ry said as he rose and paced to the kitchen and back.

“Yes.”Katie raised her head.“Not of the two of you, but of how I felt.”She took a step closer to Ry before he paced to the kitchen once again.“I was confused.I wanted to be with you both.Wanted both of you as lovers, and she kept on and on about how it wasn’t right.And painful.”And her father hadn’t helped either.

“I don’t get it.”Ry raked his hand through his hair.“We would never hurt you.”

“Ry.”Katie placed her palm on his arm.“She made it sound like being with the two of you would be all pain and humiliation.That I’d never have a life.I would be a slave to the two of you.I would have no voice and would have to obey the two of you no matter what.She made it sound like Ry’s mother was a slave to your fathers.”

“Fuck, no.”Ry curled his arms around Katie, pulling her to him.

“Never.”Jed stood and hugged her from the back.

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