Rule of Three (3 page)

She was ready. The casserole was ready. Chris and Dag still weren’t back. They must have gone out somewhere after the game. With another glance at her watch, she sighed. The casserole sat on the stove. It would keep.

Then she heard the key in the lock and hurried toward the door. Chris and Dag walked in, bringing the smell of fresh air and sunshine with them. Their eyes sparkled, their faces were tanned from sitting in the sun all afternoon at Wrigley Field and they looked like they’d been laughing.

“Hey, sweetheart, sorry we’re late,” Chris said, hugging her and kissing her mouth. He smelled like beer. Not obnoxiously, like he was drunk, just as if he’d had a few.

“It’s my fault,” Dag said from behind him, and she met his sexy dark eyes. Once again that little current of electricity jolted her as their eyes met and held. “These are for you.”

He held out a cellophane cone full of pale pink and fuchsia gerbera daisies, all bright and cheery. She’d been ready to be annoyed, but the sweet gesture softened her up, even though she totally recognized it as sucking up.

“Thank you.” She moved to take them from him. He opened his arms for a hug. She hesitated. For some reason she did not want to touch him. But she moved toward him anyway and gave him one of those superficial, barely touching hugs you give a near-stranger or an uncle you haven’t seen for years.

But that wasn’t good enough for him, and he pulled her in and gave her a quick squeeze that pressed her breasts into his chest and sent fire licking over her. It was over in a second but she had to swallow and clasp her hands tightly around the flowers. She focused on them instead of Dag.

“They’re beautiful,” she said. “I love them.”

Dag smiled, his dark eyes crinkling and warm. Both he and Chris were bright-eyed and suntanned and happy, and her heart swelled at seeing Chris so relaxed and cheerful. A surge of gratitude toward Dag rose inside her, gratitude for coming back to see his old friend, for bringing such a smile to his face and a sparkle to his eyes. Not that Chris had been miserable. She just knew this meant a lot to him. So she sent a warm smile Dag’s way, and once again their gazes hooked together and hung there, suspended, as if she couldn’t look away.

“Come on in,” Chris said, leading the way into the living room. Dag looked around and Kassidy moved to the kitchen to find a vase for the flowers, hands unsteady, stomach quivering.

She could not remember where she’d put the vases. Likely Hailey had unpacked them. She searched through cupboards, flustered—
Where are the vases, dammit?
—and listened to the guys talking about the condo.

“Nice,” Dag said. “Really nice.”

“Three bedrooms,” Chris said. “One’s going to be my home office eventually. Still have some work to do.”

She found a vase and arranged the flowers then carried them to the living room and set them on a side table. “Dinner’ll be ready in a few minutes,” she said. “I just have to cook the pasta and toss the salad.”

“How about another beer?” Chris offered Dag. They followed her into the kitchen. It seemed very confined in that small space with those two big guys moving around.

“Who won the game?” she asked, filling a pot with water.

“Phillies won, three to two.”

“Cubs kinda sucked,” Dag added.

“It’s early in the season,” Chris said. “Thanks for the game, man.” And he looped an arm around Dag’s neck and pulled him in for a brief squeeze.

She watched the hug then turned away to run water into the big pot for the pasta, the image of that brief embrace lingering in her head. Stuck there. Making her feel…she didn’t know what. And she didn’t know why. Maybe it was because she’d never seen Chris do that with any of his other friends. As she set the pot on the stove to boil, she kept thinking about it, even as they moved out of the kitchen with their drinks.

She liked seeing Chris do that. Once again, she wasn’t sure why. Maybe it was because of what had happened when Chris met her friend Steve. Steve had been one of her best friends in high school, part of the crowd she hung around with, and he was gay. He’d never “come out”—he just always was out. As far back as she could remember, everyone knew it and accepted it. He was a great guy. He had boyfriends, and so did she.

Then in the summer after graduation, he’d been attacked by some kind of sick homophobes after coming out of a gay bar downtown. He’d been close to dying, in the hospital for weeks with serious injuries. She and all her friends had spent hours at the hospital visiting him, sick with grief and rage over what had happened to him. He’d recovered, but after that he’d moved away. They still kept in touch, and when he’d come back for a visit last year, she’d been anxious for Chris to meet him and his new partner. It didn’t bother her at all, but Chris was cool, almost awkward around Steve and Ryan, and that troubled her a little.

She’d tried to talk to Chris about it after. He really didn’t even want to talk about it. Like many guys, she guessed, the idea of two guys together was—what was the word—distasteful? Repellent? She wasn’t sure. She remembered having those kinds of conversations with male friends over drinks in college, trying to get insight into the male perspective of why the idea of two girls together was a turn-on for them but not two guys. She’d even broached
that
idea to Chris, in an attempt to understand where he was coming from, but he had
not
wanted to talk about. Even the two-girls scenario.

Anyway. She didn’t think Chris was homophobic, but seeing him physically showing casual affection for a male friend made her feel good. She liked it.

After dinner, she didn’t have anything for dessert and Chris said, “I’ve got the perfect thing.” And he pulled the bottle of Limoncello out of the freezer.

So they poured icy-cold lemony shots of the liqueur and drank them, talking and laughing about all kinds of things, until about ten o’clock when Dag said, “Man. I can’t drive back to the hotel like this. What is that stuff? I’m plastered.”

Chris laughed and showed him the alcohol content. “You’d better crash here, buddy.”

“I can take a taxi, I guess. Come back tomorrow for my car.” It was the Memorial Day long weekend, so neither Chris nor Kassidy had to work in the morning.

“Nah. Just stay here. We have room.”

Chris looked at Kassidy. She had this vague idea that it might not be a good idea but was a little buzzed too from all the drinks, so she said, “Sure. I’ll just make the bed.”

“I’ll help,” Dag insisted, following her down the hall.

“This sofa bed is from my apartment,” she told him. “I just had a little studio apartment so this was all I had room for.”

“So this was your bed,” Dag murmured, and the sexy suggestive tone in his voice made her pulse leap.

“Um. Yeah.”

He helped her pull the bed out and she found sheets and pillowcases and pillows. They both laughed as they bumped into each other trying to stretch the fitted sheet over the mattress, but she was a tad tipsy and almost fell over. Dag caught her and pulled her against him to steady her.

Their eyes met.

“Thanks for letting me stay here,” Dag said, his voice a velvet stroke over her senses. “And thanks for letting me monopolize your boyfriend today. I know you two just moved in here and you probably wanted him home.”

“That’s okay,” she said, a little breathless. Her heart had picked up speed. The warmth of Dag’s body heated her. His sexy mouth curved into a smile, not far from her own, close enough for her to see the whiskers shadowing his square jaw. “He’s glad you’re here. Of course you should spend time together.”

He nodded, eyes searching hers. She felt something, like Dag’s thoughts floating beneath the surface, but didn’t know what they were. And then they moved apart and she picked up a pillow and began shaking it into a pillowcase. Dag did the same.

“There ya go,” she said, and moved to the door. “Help yourself to anything you need in the bathroom.”

“Yeah. Thanks, Kassidy.”

She caught his eye as she walked out the door, and for some reason she thought the look in his eyes was…loneliness.

Chapter Three

Where the hell was he?

Dag blinked at the strip of brightness around the edge of the blind on the window and peered around the dim room. Jesus. Chicago. Oh yeah, he was in Chris and Kassidy’s new place.

His head fell back on the pillow and he closed his eyes. Chris and Kassidy.

Why the hell had he come back here? Some kind of misguided idea that after all these years he could come back to Chicago, which he’d missed like hell, and see Chris again, who he’d also missed like hell, and it would all be okay.

He groaned and rolled over in the bed. They’d had such a great time yesterday at the Cubs game, almost like old times. They’d fallen back into easy conversation, laughing and joking like they always had.

Then they’d come home to Kassidy.

Sweet and sexy Kassidy, who was just as easy to talk to as Chris. They’d sat around drinking and talking, and hours had zipped by before he even realized it, along with the better part of a bottle of Limoncello.

Which accounted for the way his mouth felt dry as sand and his head ached faintly.

He rolled out of bed and reached for his watch on the small dresser. Nearly nine o’clock. Were Chris and Kassidy awake yet? Guess he’d find out. He dragged on his jeans before leaving the small bedroom to use the bathroom. The faint sound of a TV drifted down the short hall. Someone was up. Probably Chris. He’d never been one to sleep in or lie around in bed.

Of course, with a woman like Kassidy in bed with him, that could be a whole different story.

Dag found a toothbrush still in a cellophane package sitting on the vanity in the bathroom. Huh. That had to be from Kassidy. He ripped it open gratefully and brushed the sand out of his mouth then washed up.

He wandered out to the living room and found Chris sprawled on the couch watching TV, a cup of coffee clasped in both hands resting on his flat belly. Morning summer sunlight flooded in the arched window, glowing on the polished hardwood floors and turning Chris’s light brown hair gold. He glanced up. “Hey, you’re up.”

“Yeah. Morning.”

“Want some coffee?”

Dag made a face. Chris laughed. “Oh yeah, I forgot you hate the stuff.”

“Got any Coke?”

“Yeah, I think there might be a couple of cans in the fridge. Help yourself.”

“Chris.” Kassidy’s voice came from behind him, and Dag turned to face her. Hell, she looked just as good first thing in the morning, her face bare and pink-cheeked, hair loose around her shoulders. She shook her head at Chris. “He doesn’t know where anything is. You could get up off the couch and look after your guest.”

The two men just laughed, and Kassidy led Dag to the kitchen still shaking her head. She slanted him a glance as she opened the fridge door. “Coke? For breakfast?”

Dag grinned. “Yeah. Why not?” He watched her open the fridge, her movements graceful and smooth.

She glanced up at him through her eyelashes as she shrugged and reached inside for a can. “Seems weird.”

“It’s got sugar and caffeine. Same as a cup of coffee. Why not?

She handed him the can then a glass, her gaze skittering over his body. He hadn’t put a shirt on, in fact he literally wore nothing but his jeans and they weren’t even buttoned. He hadn’t thought before wandering out of the bedroom half naked. And Kassidy was clearly aware of his bare chest.

Like he was aware of her bare legs below the hem of the khaki shorts she wore, her feet small and pretty with rosy-pink polished toenails. He dragged his gaze up and away from her legs.

“Are you hungry?” she asked. “We just had toast…”

Dag shook his head. “Nah. I never eat much in the morning. Coke’s good, and then I’ll head back to the hotel.”

She nodded and picked up her mug of coffee then padded over to the couch where Chris sat. She curled up beside him and he absentmindedly slid his arm around her and pulled her closer, his hand going into her hair and playing with the silky dark strands.

Dag watched Chris’s long, tanned fingers caressing Kassidy’s hair, slowly rubbing a strand then dragging his fingers down the length of it. Something clenched inside him and he felt like he couldn’t take his eyes off the mesmerizing motion.

He lifted the glass and took a big swallow of nose-stinging fizzy Coke. He had to get out of there. Now.

He walked across the living room to the arched window overlooking the tree-lined street. Nice neighborhood. The sun lit up the fresh green leaves of the maple trees, the sky above a perfect clear blue. He turned back to the couple snuggled up on the couch together, Chris absorbed in the news show he was watching, Kassidy watching…Dag. Heat suffused him.

He guzzled down the rest of his Coke. “I’ll uh…get dressed,” he said. “And get out of your way. I’m sure you have a lot to do.”

“No rush, man,” Chris said. “What are you doing today, anyway?”

Dag paused in the hall. “I have some business stuff to go over. To get ready for my meetings later this week.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Dag returned to the bedroom where he’d slept, found the rest of his clothes and quickly dressed. He pulled the sheets and blankets off the bed, folded the mattress back up into the sofa frame and replaced the cushions. Then he gathered up the bedding in his arms and took it out to Kassidy.

“What should I do with this?” he asked her.

“Oh, thank you, Dag.” She rose from the couch and accepted the bundle of laundry with a smile. “You didn’t need to do that. I’ll just toss it in the washer right now.” And she disappeared into a small room off the kitchen.

“So I’ll call you later this week,” Chris said, standing too. He followed Dag to the door. “We’ll get things set up for Friday night. But hey, we can do lunch or something one day. If you have time.”

“Yeah, sure.”

Kassidy came to the door too, and Chris pulled her in front of him, slid his arms around her waist and rested his chin on her head. His forearms sat just below her breasts, plumping them up a bit, which made Dag notice they were braless beneath the soft cotton tank top she wore, her nipples hard little points. Another demonstration of the warm and sexy chemistry between the two of them.