Ours to Love Read online

  I thanked the good lord above I couldn’t hear both sides of that conversation.

  “Okay, Lulu, I’ll be there in five minutes. Don’t you dare start without me.” He made some kissy noises into the phone before he hung up. “Well, your uncle has come to his senses. I need to get home, but please think about what I said. Your man will be looking to the two of you for guidance and answers, so you need to get your shit figured out for him. If you’re serious about this, you need to show him.”

  Dammit. I hated when he was right about things. It went straight to his ego. “We will, uncle Marty. Thanks for the advice.” I stood and showed the man out the door. He had a giddy bounce in his step all the way to his car. He was obviously looking forward to making amends with Lulu.

  I walked back into the living room to see Logan settling down onto the couch with a notebook. “Sounds like we’ve got a lot of discussing to do,” he said, clicking his pen and turning to a blank page. The man was always so annoyingly organized. I guess in this instance, it was for both of our own good.

  “It’s gonna be a long night.” And probably a difficult discussion. It was okay, though. I could feel it in my bones; Ryan was worth it.

  Chapter Three

  Ryan

  I pulled into Romero’s Pizzeria a jumbled mess of nerves and excitement. Tonight was an important step in the relationship Logan, Will and I were building. I was excited to get answers but terrified the things I wanted wouldn’t match up to what they wanted. And if we all did want different things, would that be the end of us? My hands were cold but somehow still sweating. I parked my car and wiped my palms down the front of my jeans.

  I climbed out of my car and gave my back pocket a pat to make sure my list of questions was secure there. Not that I thought I’d need it; surely, I had the thing memorized by now. I’d agonized over making it and then re-read it a thousand times. I smoothed down the front of my loose olive-green sweater. It was my favorite; not only was it super soft and comfortable, I liked how it looked against my pale skin. I hoped Will and Logan liked it, too. I knew they wouldn’t judge my clothing, but I still wanted them to think I looked nice. Especially since they could wear trash bags and still look sexy.

  I turned to face the restaurant and saw my sexy men waiting for me at the entrance. I got a little thrill calling them mine, even if it was just in my own head. But they’d given me pet names, so they’d claimed me too, right? I was pretty sure that’s how this worked. I beamed and jogged to meet them.

  “Hey,” I said as I approached them. I threw an arm around each of them and they wrapped me up like they had in the gas station a couple of days ago. I managed to hold back my moan this time, and only a little whimper escaped.

  “Hey, beautiful,” Will crooned in my ear. Beautiful! He called me beautiful!

  “Mmm, I like this,” Logan said, feeling my sweater as he ran a hand down my back. “So soft; I may have trouble keeping my hands off of you.” He winked as he and his brother pulled back.

  “That’d be okay,” I answered quietly, causing him to laugh.

  “Ready to go in?” Will asked as he pulled open the front door for me.

  “Wow, a guy could get used to this,” I mused.

  Logan smiled. “This is only the beginning, baby.” I gleefully followed them to the hostess stand, where Will requested a booth in the back of the restaurant. We settled in with me on one side and the brothers on the other. It felt a bit like an interrogation this way, but I supposed that wasn’t far from the truth. However, I did appreciate the privacy of the table. I understood some people may take issue with the things we would be discussing.

  “Max will be taking care of you tonight, but may I take your drink orders?” the hostess asked.

  “Do you have Dr. Pepper?” Will asked with a smirk in my direction. It was a little thing, but I was touched he remembered.

  “We do,” she smiled.

  “Hmm…in that case, I’ll have a Pepsi since Dr. Pepper is kind of terrible,” he teased.

  “Me too,” Logan said with a chuckle.

  My jaw dropped open as I gasped. “Forgive them. They were deprived of taste as children. I’ll take the Dr. Pepper since I’m the only one at this table who know what’s good.” Will and Logan laughed harder, but the poor hostess looked lost. She smiled tightly and left to get our drinks. “She was disgusted with the two of you. I could tell.”

  Will snickered and shook his head. “If you say so. What kind of pizza are you feeling, sweetheart?”

  “Before we order, I need to say something about the ‘sweetheart’ and ‘baby’ thing.”

  “Is it too much?” Logan asked, looking worried. “Because we can cut it out.”

  “Don’t you dare!” I said, shaking my head. “I was just going to say I loved it. Nobody’s ever called me anything like that.” Well, except the old guy at the gas station who always called me cutie, but that didn’t count in my mind; that was just gross.

  “Well then, baby, you pick the pizza.” Even though he was teasing me, Logan still looked beyond pleased.

  “Hmm…” I scrunched my nose up as I looked over the menu. “How about pepperoni and ham? Ooh, and some breadsticks.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Max was the one to bring our drinks out and take our order. He looked curiously between the three of us but didn’t say anything. I’m sure we looked like an interesting trio, but I’m also sure I didn’t care what Max or anyone else thought. Our business was our own. I just had to find out exactly what our business was.

  “So, um…should we just get down to it, then?” I asked. It was a clumsy start to the conversation, but at least it was a start.

  “Right down to business, I like it,” Will winked.

  “Will and I had a long conversation about everything last night, so hopefully we can give you answers to everything you want to know. If not, we’ll figure it out together. Sound okay?”

  “Sounds perfect. And we’ve already agreed to complete honesty.”

  “Always,” Logan answered, and Will nodded. “You can ask us anything and we’ll answer truthfully. Don’t be embarrassed. Whenever you’re ready.”

  I let out a long breath. “Okay. My first question is; have you done this before? Like…is this a thing you do?” Again with the clumsiness. Apparently, that’s just how I was going to operate tonight.

  Logan peeked at Will and cringed a little before turning back to me. “Um…in the spirit of complete honesty, we have been with the same man in a sexual nature before, but that’s it.”

  “Oh.” A strange sensation settled in the pit of my stomach and I wasn’t sure how else to answer.

  “Is that a good ‘oh’ or a bad ‘oh’?” Will hedged.

  “I…I’m not sure.” My hands were growing colder and starting to tingle; they did that sometimes when I was stressed out. I folded them together and blew warm air between them before rubbing my palms together.

  “Are you okay?” Logan asked. “Do you need my jacket again?”

  “No, I’m fine.” What I needed was a moment to figure out my thoughts and why I felt like this. Surely, I hadn’t expected to be the first relationship they’d had like this. But somehow, that’s exactly what I thought. I finally realized the hard lump in my stomach was made of disappointment.

  I sighed. “To answer your question, I guess it was a good and bad ‘oh’. Good because maybe you’ll know from experience what to do in this situation because I sure don’t, but bad because…well, I thought what’s happening between us was special; different.” I sighed again. “That sounds really pathetic when I say it out loud.”

  “It’s not pathetic,” Logan assured as he reached across the table to grab my hand. He ran his thumb along the back of my hand as he explained, “We’ve never been in a relationship like this; we’ve never even been interested before. What we’ve done in the past was purely physical. It was a couple of occasions when we met a guy who was into that particular brand of kink. It meant nothing mo
re than a few minutes of fun. What we’re feeling for you is special.”

  “And this isn’t just a sex thing with me?” I had to be sure.

  “Absolutely not,” Will said, sounding stern.

  I gave them both a small smile. “That makes me feel better. I’m sorry if I sounded whiney, it’s just…this feels really special to me, and I guess I just wanted it to be for you guys, too.”

  “It is. I promise,” Logan said with a squeeze to my hand. He pulled his hand away to remove his jacket. “Your hands are freezing. Please put this on, baby.”

  I took it gratefully. Honestly, I’d wanted it from the beginning, but I was too focused on getting my head straight to worry about anything else. “Thank you.” I shrugged it on and smiled again. “Okay, so what you just told me gave me another question that’s not on my list.”

  “Hit us with it,” Will encouraged.

  “So, it sounds like you guys have a lot of…experience.” I was hoping they understood what I meant. “I’m not judging,” I added quickly, “And honestly, whatever you did before me is none of my business; I’d rather not know, actually. I only brought it up because I…well…don’t. Have experience, that is. Does that bother you?”

  “Did you miss the ‘possessive assholes’ part of our conversation last time?” Will asked seriously. I snorted, but Logan seemed less than impressed. “Of course, that’s not a problem. For me personally it’s hot as hell.”

  “It doesn’t bother me,” Logan chimed in. “But it wouldn’t have mattered if you did have a lot of experience either. I’m interested in you, not who you have or haven’t been with.”

  “Okay, good. I’m glad it’s not a problem because when I say I have none, I mean literally none. You guys would have all of my firsts. I may not know what I’m doing or may need explanations or guidance to know what you like. I want to do things that will make you happy and feel good and…what’s wrong?”

  “Sweetheart, if you keep talking like that, I’m going to need new pants,” Will warned. I’ll be darned if he didn’t look dead serious. Even Logan looked a little breathless. Oops.

  “Sorry,” I said softly. “Um…should I go on to the next question?” Both men nodded and took a sip of their sodas to cool down. It tickled me when they mimicked each other without realizing it. “So, I should have probably asked this one first…I probably should have asked it days ago, actually, but I was a little afraid of the answer. But the rest of my questions may not even apply depending on that answer.” I knew I was rambling. I took a deep breath to steady my nerves. “How is this going to work? Are all of our dates going to be like this? What I mean is; will I always go out with both of you, or will I sometimes be with you, Logan, and sometimes be with you, Will? Like, are we keeping things separate? Am I even making sense?”

  Logan smiled warmly at me. “You’re making perfect sense. And it’s an important question. Will and I talked about this a lot last night. We decided on what we would like to happen, but we want your opinion as well. All of us need to be happy for this to work.”

  I felt he was dodging. I was a little worried about giving my opinion; what if I looked greedy? Or creepy? I promised I would be honest, and I intended to – after them. “Um…can I hear your thoughts first?” Suddenly, the table in front of me was very interesting, so I gave it all of my attention.

  “Sneaky,” Will accused. I risked a peek at him to find he wasn’t upset. His smirk said he was kinda proud.

  “Well,” Logan cleared his throat before continuing, “We were thinking we’d like to always see you…together.” He started talking faster as he explained, “We thought it would help with jealousy issues between us if we could both be present; you know, never having to wonder what was happening and nobody feeling left out. Plus, we could both see that you were happy and taken care of, which is important to both of us.” He swallowed hard. “Is that okay? What were your thoughts?

  “My only thought right now is oh thank god,” I confessed. Logan gave a relieved laugh and Will smiled. “I was worried you would think it was weird that I wanted that. But honestly, the thought of going out with just one of you would feel like I was cheating on the other or going behind your backs or something. I like both of you and want to spend time with both of you.” Yes, it was a unique situation, but the only thing that mattered was that we were happy with it. “That does give me another question, though. What happens if say, Logan and I break up. Does that break Will and I up, too?” I had no idea how any of this stuff worked. Yeah, the questions were super awkward, but I wanted to know exactly what I was getting myself into.

  “I’m not dating you on the condition that you date my brother,” Logan explained. “If you and he would break up, that part of the relationship would be over, but it wouldn’t automatically end our relationship. The dynamics would change, and we’d have to discuss together at that point what we wanted.”

  Wow, they really have thought this through. “So, if I’m dating both of you, and spending time with you both together, I’m assuming other things would be together? When we get to that point, I mean?” Okay, things were getting even more awkward. My face was on fire discussing the sexual aspects of this relationship.

  “Does that make you uncomfortable?” Logan asked seriously.

  It did; in my pants. My dick was pressing into my zipper just thinking about it. “No, that’s what I want, but does it make you guys uncomfortable? I mean – would it bother you seeing your brother naked?” They said they’d had threesomes before, but never with anyone they actually cared about. Surely, that would make a difference, right?

  “I’ve lived with this guy all my life,” Will said. “I’ve seen him naked more times than I can count, so no, it’s not an issue. Besides, you’re going to be involved so I guarantee Logan is the last person who will have my attention at that point.”

  Okay, that made sense. But it did lead to yet another question. “I know I’m getting ahead of myself here, but I need to know. Say we’re doing…that…” my face burned even hotter, but I pressed on, “I wouldn’t want to do something wrong or offend someone, you know? So, who do I…I mean, what name do I…?” This was harder than I expected.

  Will shrugged. “Whoever’s dick is inside you at the time, I guess.”

  “Oh, sweet Jesus.” I breathed deeply and closed my eyes while listening to Logan scold Will. I wasn’t ready for that answer. Sure, I’d asked the question, but Will’s blunt nature would take some getting used to.

  “Here you go, guys.” I nearly jumped out of my skin when Max placed our pizza and bread on the table. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he said, touching my shoulder. “Did I scare you?”

  “A little,” I admitted. “It’s okay, though. My fault; I wasn’t paying attention.” He gave me a little smile and squeezed my shoulder. Will cleared his throat from across the table. I looked over to see him glaring daggers at the waiter.

  “Right,” Max said, quickly dropping his hand. “Do you need anything else?”

  “No, you can leave now,” Will snipped. Max gave a quick glance at me and a nervous smile before scurrying away. “Slimy bastard.”

  I snorted with laughter. “So, I got boyfriends and bodyguards in this deal?”

  “Damn straight,” Will said while Logan nodded. I liked that way more than I should have.

  I watched as Logan served a slice of pizza onto each of our plates. “Sorry if I’m kind of dominating the conversation, here. Do you guys have any questions for me?”

  “I do after watching the waiter flirt with you,” Logan said, not sounding very happy. I didn’t think the guy was flirting with me, but maybe I just wasn’t paying close enough attention. I could be oblivious sometimes. “Considering we were both ready to throttle him, I guess it’s important to know; are you wanting an open relationship?” From the corner of my eye, I saw Will’s hands clenching into fists, but he didn’t say anything. “If that’s what you’re looking for, we’ll need to bring it down a few…dozen notches.”
r />   More men? Is he serious? I was going to have my hands full with the two I had! Literally, I hoped. I pushed the naughty thought from my head. “No,” I said adamantly. “That’s not what I’m looking for. If that’s what you’re interested in, I’m sorry, but I just can’t do this.” It would break my heart, but not as much as staying through something like that.

  “Fuck no,” Will growled. Logan shook his head in agreement.

  “You’re sure you won’t want a relationship that’s just yours?” My stomach knotted up again at the thought.

  Logan gave another understanding smile. “Baby, this is our relationship as much as it is your and Will’s. Like I said, one isn’t contingent on the other. And I can speak for myself and Will when I say when we’re in a relationship, we’re committed. Maybe bordering on obsessive.”

  I didn’t like thinking of them in prior relationships. It was something I knew in the back of my mind was a possibility considering they were older than me and had a different upbringing, but actually dwelling on that fact was hard. Maybe I had a little bit of possessive bastard in me, too. I decided to shove the thought of them with anyone before me right out of my brain and pretend I’d never heard it. Probably not the healthiest route, but oh well. I’d focus instead on the here and now.

  A thought struck me. “Hey, you were ready to take out the gas station guy and then the waiter…how come you aren’t trying to rip out each other’s throats over me? Not that I want you to, obviously, but how are you keeping it together?”

  “I trust Logan,” Will said with a shrug. “I know he’s a good guy and that he’ll treat you right. He isn’t just some asshole…well, most of the time,” he added with a smirk.

  “Gee, thanks,” Logan said, rolling his eyes. “But I agree. I know Will’s intentions and I trust him. Plus, we’re going into this together. We couldn’t stand the thought of one of us being with you, or neither of us. We wanted to find a solution that worked for the three of us. Will and I understand the situation and each other. His happiness is important to me just as mine is to Will. And your happiness is important to both of us.”