Love Under Two Honchos (5 page)

The taste of them, combined, created a savory essence rich and dark and somehow forbidden, yet oh, so compelling. She clamped on him, moved with him, and surrendered to the power of the pinnacle she shared with him as she came and came and came.

Love Under Two Honchos

29

Chapter 4

Morning sun streamed across her face, and Penelope stirred, trying to escape the brightness that seemed to want to land right where her eyes were trying to sleep.

As she came to full wakefulness, she felt two solid walls of heat, front and back. Trapped on her side, images from the night before assailed her. Inhaling deeply, she took in the aroma of sex, and her hormones began to quiver.

Penelope’s eyes fluttered opened, and she realized that somehow, during the night, she’d become the female filling for a man sandwich.

She’d never had enough practice at having a morning after to become good at the morning-after routine, but she thought this one might be slightly more awkward than most.

She’d just spent the night having rip-roaring, rocking sex with two of sweet Grandma Kate’s favorite grandbabies, after having known said grandbabies less than a day!

“Good morning, Penelope.” Sleep-husky and incredibly sexy, Josh’s voice caressed her senses and her lips just before he leaned that little bit closer and kissed her.

Before she could fully respond to his greeting, she felt herself being eased onto her back, and Alex’s “Good morning” reverberated against her mouth with his kiss.

He eased back and stroked his thumb over her bottom lip. “If you want to grab a shower, we’ll have your suitcase up here for you before you’re out,” he said. “Bathroom’s across the hall.”

“We’ll have breakfast ready, too,” Josh said. “So when you’re ready, just come on downstairs.”

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Cara Covington

“Oh, um…” She really never got the chance to say anything because first Josh and then Alex kissed her again. This time their tongues reminded her of all the wonderful things they could do to her.

These kisses, long, hot, and arousing, nearly had her grabbing the nearest man and pulling him onto her wet and willing naked body.

Before she could do something she’d likely regret, the men practically leapt from the bed. She had one moment to admire their beautiful naked asses and luscious, engorged cocks, which were standing at more than half-mast.

“We’d both like nothing better than to pick up where we left off, as you can see,” Josh said.

“But we need to talk, sweetheart. So we’ll see you downstairs,”

Alex said.

And then they scooped up their boxers and trousers and
left
.

Penelope had lifted her head and chest from the bed, wanting to spend every second possible ogling their sexy male selves, wanting very much to pick up where they’d left off the night before, wanting to put off
thinking
for as long as humanly possible.

She plopped herself back down flat on the bed and sighed.
Well,
hell
. She guessed if she was going to have to eat and think and talk, she’d best take a nice, hot, bracing shower, first.

Mere minutes later, Penelope sighed in bliss. She opted instead for a bath and sank into the deep tub of hot, fragrant water. She’d almost given in to the hedonistic urge to indulge herself in the spa this fabulous bathroom held, but had changed her mind at the last moment and chosen this claw-foot tub instead.

This is just as good as the spa would have been
. At least she told herself it was, especially for soaking away the tenderness she felt between her thighs and in her hips from the unaccustomed sexual activity. She did have a lot to think about, and not really a lot of time to do so. Fortunately, her ability to sort and select, to ponder, weigh, and consider—in short, her ability to utilize reason and logic—had returned with the morning sun.

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31

What she needed to do, and needed to do immediately, was to decide how she wanted this episode of uncharacteristic libidinous excess to turn out. Did she want to simply write it off as one of those once-in-a-lifetime experiences that she would then tuck into a memory box? Or did she want more of the same?

Just thinking about more of the same had her juices flowing, her heart pounding, and her nipples standing at attention. “You be quiet, you randy hormones. You had your say last night. This morning, it’s the brain’s turn.” She said that aloud but quietly, and trusted in the integrity of the closed door—crap, which she’d forgotten to close!

Well, I’m not going to get out and close it now. What would be the
point?

Penelope sighed again and lay back against the cool, white porcelain. When she examined all the facts and data, she realized she could potentially have a serious problem.

So she soaked, and she relaxed, and let her gifted, organizational-loving brain work on the matter.

The scent of coffee and bacon drifted up the stairs. Her tummy rumbled, so she told her brain to make it snappy.

* * * *

Joshua looked up as his brother came back down the stairs. “I don’t hear the shower running,” he said.

“She’s having a bath.” Alex said the words softly.

“Oh, God, the hot tub?
Fuck
, envisioning Penelope in the hot tub is not doing my cock any favors, brother.”

“What you mean is, it’s doing your cock lots of favors, but this morning your brain has something to say about that fact.”

Josh laughed. “Yeah, that’s what I mean all right.” He turned the bacon in the frying pan, then added a half dozen sausages into it.

“Never in my wildest dreams did I ever imagine a night like last night could happen to us.”

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Cara Covington

“How could you have? How many women have we met, the two of us? I mean, Legacy Project aside. Just in the day-to-day scheme of things, ever since we figured out what those blessed little foil packages were for. How many, do you think? Fifty? Sixty?”

“Hey, we’re not man-sluts,” Josh protested.

“No, I didn’t ask how many we’ve had sex with, just how many we’ve
met
.”

“Just met? Hell, more than a hundred up to the end of university.

Has to be more like a few hundred, and yeah, I get your point. Going off like that, hot and horny, on first meet—in short, zooming from zero to Mach 2 in seconds flat, yeah, that’s one hell of an aberration, there.”

“Probably a one in a kajillion chance, hormonally speaking, that such a thing would ever happen to us,” Alex said.

“Yeah.” Josh exhaled heavily. The sound of movement upstairs alerted him that pretty Penelope was out of her bath and getting dressed. Blotting the water from that incredible body of hers with one of his sister’s big, fluffy towels…Josh shook his head and pulled his attention back to the conversation at hand.

“We have to handle this very carefully,” Alex said. “I don’t suppose you have any kind of prepared-ahead-of-time mental checklist for this sort of a situation?”

“Bro, I try to foresee most possibilities, but, hey, one in a kajillion? Not even
I
am that good.”

The sound of a light step on the stairs shut Josh’s mouth and turned his gaze back to the stove.

He took the bacon out, turned the sausages, then added the scrambled egg mixture to a second skillet.

“Good morning, gentlemen. Breakfast smells delicious,” Penelope said.

Josh looked over his shoulder, gave the woman a smile. “Good morning. Have a seat. It’s nearly ready.” So far, so good. That greeting could have been between two people who’d parted at the top
Love Under Two Honchos

33

of the stairs the night before, not two who’d been all over each other, and more than once. A vision flashed, his hot, hard cock sliding so sexily into her wet, waiting cunt.

Focus, Josh, focus
.

“I hope you like your eggs scrambled,” Alex said. He saw Penelope seated at the table and then poured her a cup of coffee.

“Because that’s the only way Josh cooks them. Ever.”

“Oh?” She looked at Josh, one eyebrow raised.

He turned his attention back to the stove to stir said eggs. “I read a report last year that said one in every seven hundred eggs is infected with the bacterium
Salmonella enteritidis
.”

“Rather long odds, if you ask me, but I suppose caution is reasonable,” Penelope said.

“Not just reasonable, but mathematically sound,” Josh said.

When she continued to smile at him, he took it as encouragement.

“I like eggs and would, in any given week, likely eat as many as eight of them. Over the course of a year, that’s four hundred and sixteen eggs. In a decade…well, you can see, odds of escaping unscathed are
not
in my favor. Hence, all the eggs I eat are thoroughly cooked.”

“Well, lucky for me, then, that I do like scrambled eggs. I especially like scrambled eggs if the cook sprinkles cheese on them.”

She sounded hopeful.

“I have some grated cheddar right here. We, um, didn’t know if you liked hot salsa with your eggs or not, so I haven’t added any.”

“I’ve never tried it. Perhaps I will, now that I’m in Texas.”

“Grandma Kate said you’re originally from England, but that you’ve been living in upstate New York since you were a kid,” Alex said. “I guess too many years here made you lose your accent, huh?”

Penelope laughed. Josh noted that sound had nearly the same effect on him this morning as it had the night before, sort of like a soft silk scarf being brushed over his naked flesh kind of effect.

“Actually,” she said, “I have learned to smooth it out, so to speak, and pardon the pun. However, if I set my mind to it—or when I’m
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Cara Covington

extremely angry—then you’d think by the sounds of me I’d just jumped off the boat.”

Amazing. Over the course of that one sentence, she’d let her voice change, just a subtle shift, and there was the most adorable English accent. Was it called a brogue? Josh made a note to look it up, later.

The food was ready, so Josh served it up onto a platter and brought it to the table. Alex added a pile of toast to the offerings, and both men sat, with Penelope between them.

“Good heavens, that is a lot of food,” Penelope said. “I usually only have some fruit and yogurt each morning.”

“Yogurt. That’s the not-quite-cheese product with live bacterium swimming about in it?” Josh couldn’t suppress his shudder. He’d been going to try the stuff once, until he heard about the “live cultures” in it.

Penelope laughed. “It is. And it’s quite good, and good for you, too.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” he said.

For the next few minutes, everyone focused on putting food on their plates and then in their mouths.

“Listen, Penelope. About last night.” Josh winced, because those words weren’t quite what he meant to say, and worse, they sounded like the beginning of a brush-off.

“Oh, oh. Is this the morning-after brush-off?” she asked.

“No! No,” Alex replied. Josh ducked in response to the scathing look his brother sent him. “No, it’s just…well, what happened last night…we’ve never done that before, and we didn’t want you to think that we’re a couple of…of man-sluts.”

“Come now, gentlemen.” Penelope frowned. “Or rather, don’t come. Not right now, at any rate, breakfast table and food and all.”

Josh and Alex both burst out laughing. Penelope simply smiled at them and waited for them to quiet down.

“What I mean to say is,” she continued, “you were both entirely too good at giving me pleasure last night to have been virgins.”

Love Under Two Honchos

35

“
Virgins?
Hell, no, we weren’t virgins!” Josh shook his head.

“What
we
meant to say was that we don’t usually have sex with a woman we’ve just met. And honestly, we
never
have sex with women who work for us.”

“I don’t actually work for you,” she said. “I work for your family.

I report to the Town Trust, in general,” she paused and gave them a brilliant smile, “and Grandma Kate, in particular.”

“Yeah, that’s the other thing,” Alex said softly. “We promised Grandma Kate we’d take good care of you.”

Penelope picked up her coffee cup—to drink, or to hide the fact that she looked like she wanted to laugh at them? Josh couldn’t say, but he did have his suspicions. He guessed he couldn’t blame her. He and his brother weren’t quite handling the situation in their most urbane, effective, or business-executive manner.

“If you like, I can write a testimonial to her on your behalf, with regard to how very well you
did
take care of me last night,” she said.

She gave Alex a sweet smile, and then she gave one to Josh.

Josh thought he could likely do anything in the world if, at the end of the day, he had one of her smiles as a reward.

“Let me put your minds at ease. I don’t think you’re man-sluts. I was a full participant in the fun and games last night. Something like that has never happened to me, either. Perhaps it was the full moon, or maybe an errant spell from a practicing witch in the vicinity. But no harm, no foul. As for our working together, that shouldn’t be a problem. I’m very good at compartmentalization, and since you’re both, as Grandma Kate calls you, the honchos of a major American corporation, I’m certain you are, too.”

Man, she used the word “compartmentalization.”
Josh could have sworn his heart gave an extra little thump. He mentally shook his head and gave his butt a metaphorical kick.

“So…we’re good, then?” Josh asked.

“I’d say you’re very good. Excellent, even. And we’re all on the same page, too,” she said.

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Cara Covington

He laughed, and met his brother’s gaze, but couldn’t deny the funny little something running around in his head, giving sharp jabs to his conscience.

After a fumbling start, they’d ended up, conversationally, exactly where they needed to be. In just a couple hours, they’d be back in Houston, back at work, and back working to refine the Legacy Project. Now they could go ahead with those plans, as well as see to it that Penelope Primrose got settled in and set up.