Page 95 of Replay
Fucked-up logic never made sense to anyone on the outside of it looking in, and all that mattered was that it had made sense to Spook in the moment.Having Xane inside him wasn’t a cure.It couldn’t vanquish the memories, or undo the horror he’d been through.Being fucked hadn’t magically healed him, but it had achieved something.It’d provided a positive experience to sit alongside the negative one, or something like that.Xane wasn’t sure he understood it himself.He only knew that it’d felt like the right thing to do at the time.It had helped.Spook had said so.“Just accept that it did.”
“Just accept it.Just accept it.I don’t feel I’m getting a lot of say in the matter.”Luthor’s jaw tensed.He opened his mouth as if to speak again, but seemed to think better of it and sighed.
“What are you thinking?”Xane eventually asked, after he’d watched Luthor pace around the central stove for several arduous minutes.
“That I can’t decide whether I’m mad at you, fucking mad, or just maddeningly confused.”Luthor flung himself onto the sofa, taking up three quarters of its length.Xane perched on the end beside him.“You do realise that Dani’s not going to understand?I don’t understand, but I concede you at least think you were doing the right thing.She’s just gonna freak.”Suddenly, he seized hold of Xane’s arm.His fingertips dug into the biceps, while a disquieting earnestness shadowed his eyes.“God help me for saying it, Xane, but maybe you shouldn’t tell her.”
Not tell her!God, he hadn’t even considered it.In any case, it was too late for that.“Luthor, I sent that text to both of you.”
“She hasn’t seen it,” Luthor blurted.“I deleted it.”
Wait!“What?”Xane leapt up from the sofa.He stumbled backwards into the fireguard, which made a horrific clang.“You did what?”
“I deleted it.”
“What the hell, Luthor!”
“A text message isn’t how she deserved to hear you’d cheated on her—again.”
Xane grasped the fireguard at his back, but let go of it immediately.“It wasn’t meant to be a confession.I was always going to talk to you both.”
Luthor got to his feet.“Explainingafter the factdoesn’t make it right, Xane.Also, what are you going to say to her?‘He needed me’ isn’t going to cut it.You’re not going to dish dirt, so you’re kind of stuck.”
“You’re willing to accept it,” he said optimistically.
Luthor snorted.“I’m not Dani.I’m not convinced my lover is going to run off with another man and abandon me.I just wish he was honest.That he’d talked to me properly beforehand.”He wrapped a hand around the back of Xane’s neck and dragged their brows together.“Dammit, Xane.I get that people can have multi-directional relationships and complex feelings for more than one person.Shit, I’d screw him!He’s hot as fuck, and fucking pretty.Who doesn’t want to fuck Spook Mortensen?”
He waited as if expecting to hear a crowd shout back, but there was only silence.“I’ll tell you who, shall I?Dani, that’s who doesn’t want to fuck Spook Mortensen.She’s not like us, Xane.She struggles with the whole concept of the three of us being in a committed relationship.You are never going to get her to understand why you might share yourself outside of that.”He sighed, while tugging at the sides of his hair.“If she finds out about you and Spook, the reasons why you ended up in bed together won’t matter.All she’ll see is betrayal.Everything will unravel.Everything.”He held Xane’s gaze, blue and green eyes flashing with a steely resolve that determinedly pushed that emphasis deep.“I don’t want that.I don’t think you want that.”
“I don’t,” Xane confirmed.Surely that went without saying.They’d all three of them fought hard for what they had.He meant to hold onto it.Still, the notion of not telling her didn’t sit right.“Lasting relationships require honesty.That’s the first rule, isn’t it?”
“Absolutely.”Luthor confirmed, frowning.His hands alighted upon Xane’s face.“But, you’ve got to be tactful about this.She can’t just find out.You shouldn’t tell her while he’s about either.Wait until the three of us can be alone somewhere.”
“Like when we’re in the middle of the North Sea again?”
“Yes.That’s a good one.It’s confined.We can reason with her.”
Xane sucked on his lip ring.“That was my plan.”It’d been his plan for both of them.Avoidance.It wasn’t working too well so far.He just had to hope that he could avoid seeing Dani for more than a minute or two between now and the performance.After the gig they could sit down together and he could hopefully explain in a way she’d understand, even if it still went down like a lump of lead.
Luthor’s thumbs stroked across his cheeks.“I’ll forgive you for fucking him, Xane.But not if you destroy us.What we have is too good to throw away.”
“I know.I’ll try not to.”
Luthor’s lips brushed his.Gently.Cautiously.Then, with a dash of desperation.
Xane kissed him back hard, so that their tongues clashed.
Abruptly, Luthor broke them apart.He covered the blackest mark on Xane’s neck with his mouth and sucked.It hurt.Fuck it hurt.However, the pain lanced straight down to Xane’s cock like there was a streamer of fire connecting the two points.“You belong to us, Xane.You’re mine.And you’re Dani’s.Spook can’t have you.And I’m not going to let your loyalty to him destroy what we have.”
