Page 40 of Saving Sparrow (Slow Burns & Tragic Beginnings #2)

I laughed because I’d been about to say exactly that. “No one cares. Everyone’s either too drunk, too stoned, or too horny to be paying us any attention.”

He sighed. “Can I at least get something to drink?”

“I’ll get it.” I didn’t trust anyone not to spike it or to proposition him. He looked too fucking tempting in those skinny jeans.

The punch bowl was straight ahead, but I’d seen enough movies to know nothing good ever came from drinking the punch. With one more glance back at Miguel and Elliott, I headed for the kitchen.

Avoiding a puke-puddle and weaving through my drunken teammates at the keg-stand, I quickly grabbed two bottles of water from the fridge.

Darren shouted my name from the hall as soon as I cleared the kitchen. He was plastered, staggering over to me and clapping me on the back. “What up, man?”

“What’s up?” I craned my head around, trying to see past the dancing bodies to make sure Elliott and Miguel were where I’d left them.

They weren’t sitting anymore, but at least they were still near the loveseat.

One of Miguel’s favorite songs came on, and he two-stepped to the beat while Elliott took in the action on the dance floor.

“Great game tonight,” Darren slurred. “You keep that up and we’ll be playing at Wembly together next year.” A lot of our teammates had their sights set on the University of Wembly. The D1 school’s winning culture was unmatched. “We’ll be fucking Hawks, bro.”

“Thanks, man,” I said, meaning it. “But I’m already there. I’m just waiting for the offer to come through.”

“You’re such a cocky fucker.” The booze made him laugh harder than necessary.

Miguel’s two-step shifted to an all-out dance routine as the strobe lights seemed to highlight only him.

Routine might have been too tame a word.

He circled his hips and arched his back like my dick was inside of him.

He drew eyes, Elliott’s included. His stare, I didn’t mind.

He’d seen much worse. I wanted to flatten everyone else for looking, though.

In my mind, they all wanted him right then—girls and dudes included. To them, he wasn’t the quiet bookworm anymore. He was the tall, dark, Dominican sensation with moves like fucking Jagger. I didn’t like it. I fucking hated it.

I knew I shouldn’t have agreed to this.

“I gotta go,” I said to Darren, already stepping away when Troy—our right tackle—appeared out of nowhere.

“The star QB has arrived!” He slung an arm over my shoulder, taking a swig from his beer. “Can’t believe you actually showed up, McAllen.”

Troy followed my line of sight, pointing the butt of his bottle toward Elliott and Miguel. “So, uh, are the three of you like… you know… a thing?” He lifted a brow suggestively when I turned to him, confused.

“What? No,” I snapped, fisting the water bottles. The plastic creaked in my hands. “It’s just me and Miguel. Elliott’s our friend. He’s like family.”

Troy held his hands up. “Easy tiger. Can’t blame a man for being curious. You three are… close . And, well,” he added, throwing his arm over my shoulder again, “you and Miguel are technically like family too, aren’t you?”

“Elliott’s different.”

“Does he know that?” Darren asked from my other side, but his words were barely coherent. He nudged his chin in Elliott’s direction. I frowned, turning to see Elliott watching Miguel in a way that was somehow… different than usual.

“No,” I said distractedly, trying to read the look in Elliott’s eyes. “It isn’t like that.”

“If you say so.” Troy took another swig, the bottleneck barely hiding his grin.

“Fuck you, Sanders,” I gritted out.

“Fuck you, Sanders, fuck you, Daniels, fuck you, Connor…” Darren said, last-naming Troy, JT, and himself, the three guys on the team I was closest to. “When’re you ever gonna be nice to us?”

“How about at your funeral after your parents kill you for throwing this party?” I shrugged Troy’s arm off me.

“Fuck you, McAllen,” they both shouted, laughing as I worked my way back over to Elliott and Miguel.

“Ready?” The question came out hard and wasn’t really a question at all. We were leaving, whether they were ready or not. Miguel finally stopped gyrating his hips, and when he opened his fucking eyes, he looked pleased.

“Yeah, let’s go,” he said, brushing past me.

“You can’t seriously be jealous because I danced for two seconds.” Miguel stormed into our bedroom ahead of me and Elliott.

“It was more like one hundred and eighty seconds,” I shot back. “And who said I’m jealous?”

“No one,” Miguel said innocently.

Elliott fell onto the couch, smirking when I glanced over at him.

“What’s so funny?”

“You know you just proved his point, right?”

“Yeah, I know,” I grumbled, removing my shirt and tossing it on the floor.

“Hey”—Miguel grinned when I grabbed his wrist—“what are you doing?”

“ We’re taking a shower. I need to scrub that party off you.” I tugged him toward the bathroom.

“Can I shower with you?” Elliott’s timid whisper stopped us in our tracks.

Miguel and I stared open-mouthed at him. He’d never showered with us before. I’d asked him once, sort of jokingly when we’d first met, but never after that.

Miguel said it was important to let Elliott steer our friendship, so we never pressured him to do anything he wasn’t comfortable with. He’d said just because he and I had no boundaries, it didn’t mean Elliott wasn’t allowed to have some.

“S-sure.” Miguel snapped out of his shock sooner than I did. I followed him into the bathroom but left the door open behind us. No pressure.

Miguel and I had already soaped each other up and rinsed off by the time Elliott stepped into the bathroom. We’d thought he’d changed his mind, which would’ve been fine.

I saw his shadow through the foggy shower glass and went over to clear the condensation away.

He wore the shirt I’d tossed to the floor, but nothing else.

The hem reached the tops of his slender thighs.

It was like he’d gotten to the bathroom door, felt unsure, and grabbed the first thing he could to cover himself up.

I opened the door, then headed back under the showerheads with Miguel. I wanted Elliott to know he was invited, but I didn’t want to scare him away by staring at him.

A few minutes later, my shirt hit the floor, and Elliott stepped in. We’d never seen him completely naked before, but we played it cool, glancing over to smile encouragingly before getting back to pretending his being there wasn’t a big deal.

He was our friend, and to us this was normal. We wanted him to feel like it was normal too.

Did other friends shower together, sleep together, take cuddle naps on the couch in the middle of the afternoon or on the patio bed during rainstorms? Probably not, but maybe they were the weird ones.

Elliott stood just outside the water’s reach, holding his hands in front of his dick. He shook nervously.

“You don’t have to do this,” Miguel said softly.

“I know.” He hesitated before dropping his hands to his sides. “I want to.” With a deep breath, he moved under the unoccupied showerhead, closing his eyes as the water ran down his face and body. It soaked into his hair, the wet strands darkening.

Miguel lathered the extra bath sponge from the shelf. “Here.”

“Thanks,” Elliott said with a shy smile.

Miguel and I were clean, but we didn’t want to leave Elliott in here, so we washed up again, making small talk.

“Can you wash my hair?” Elliott asked. He was staring at me.

“Uh, yeah, for sure.”

Elliott crossed his arms, then lowered them, then crossed them again as I came up behind him with a handful of shampoo.

“Wanna wash mine while he washes yours?” Miguel asked, and I knew he wanted to give Elliott something to do besides standing there feeling awkward.

“Yeah,” Elliott said with a grateful sigh.

Miguel poured shampoo into Elliott’s palm before setting the bottle down and tilting his head back.

I massaged Elliott’s scalp as he massaged Miguel’s, the awkwardness of the situation fading away. Before I knew it, we’d jumped into a conversation about the game, which eventually led to Miguel’s scandalous dancing at the party.

“You are such an exaggerator.” Elliott chuckled as he finished rinsing his hair himself.

“Thank you, Elliott,” Miguel said as I backed him into the shower wall.

“It’s not an exaggeration. They wanted you.

Every single person in that room had their eyes on my ass.

” I squeezed his butt then, letting him know exactly which ass I was referring to.

“I thought we were going to have to fight our way out of there.” I kissed Miguel’s smiling mouth, and he wrapped his arms around my neck.

“Tell the truth, you did it to make me jealous.”

“Everything makes you jealous. You think Ballbuster wants me.”

“Duh, why else would he ask you to stay after school?”

“Uhh, to help the gazette team with a project? Why else would he be asking me to stay, you weirdo?”

I growled, lifting him at the hips so he could wrap his legs around me. “But you like it when I get jealous, don’t you?”

Miguel combed his fingers through my wet hair, staring deep into my eyes. “Not even a little. I hate seeing you that way.”

If he’d had clothes on, I would’ve torn them to shreds with my bare hands.

That was how hot and wild his answer made me.

I didn’t know why I needed him to pretend he hadn’t done it on purpose.

Probably because I liked when my crazy felt real, when it wasn’t based on something fake.

The sex was so much better when I had something to punish him for.

We kissed hard, and fast as I reached for the lube. We didn’t bother wasting time on the I-don’t-wanna-fuck game.

I’d already stretched him with three fingers before remembering Elliott. He’d gone deathly quiet, barely breathing as he watched us.

“Want to wait for us in the room, pretty girl?” My voice sounded wrecked.

“No, I’m fine.” He backed into a corner.

Elliott playing fly-on-the-wall felt weird in the beginning because we were nervous he couldn’t handle the way Miguel and I loved each other. We’d tried to keep shit soft, lovey-dovey. That all changed when Elliott gave us the okay to be ourselves.

“Don’t change for me.”

Still, we asked him every time, giving him the option to stay or leave. He always stayed.

If he was still awake afterward—because we could go on for hours—he’d have this look of fucking awe and admiration on his face.

There’d be an extra pep in his step the next day, and he smiled more often, too.

It was like he gained courage from watching us go at it, like watching us was therapeutic, and maybe it was fixing something broken inside of him.

Miguel thought watching us fuck and make out validated something for Elliott. Like maybe it was confirmation or a reminder that whatever he’d been taught was wrong.

“Quentin, apurate,” Miguel breathed impatiently. He kissed along my neck, swiveling his hips as he tightened his legs around me. “ Hurry. ”

I slapped his ass cheek, squeezing it while speaking to Elliott. “We’ll be quick, okay? Then we’ll go to bed.”

“O-okay.”

I set Miguel down, turning him to face the wall as I slid into him from behind. Our moans were loud, and the sound of our bodies clapping together echoed all around as I shoved into him with hard thrusts.

Elliott’s stare felt like a weight on me, and I found myself glancing over at him repeatedly. His tongue darted out to wet his lips, and his cheeks were redder than I’d ever seen them before. He looked fucking beautiful.

“Muy bien,” Miguel whispered.

“Fucking English, Guelly.”

“So g-good,” he moaned.

“Damn straight it is.” I’d known what it meant. Miguel screamed it a lot whenever my dick was inside of him. It never hurt to hear it twice, though.

I picked up the pace, too horny to stretch things out. “Beat your dick,” I ordered him.

Miguel continued to back into my thrusts, bracing himself on one hand and grabbing his cock with the other.

“Unngh,” he moaned, his body jerking as he pumped himself.

We came within minutes, my cum filling his ass while his jizz circled the drain.

I kept thrusting into him. I never stopped until I had to, not until my dick said enough was enough.

Panting, I looked over at Elliott again, this strange fucking pull making it impossible not to.

I blamed it on the first-time experience.

The first time he’d showered with us, and the first time we’d seen him naked.

His head rested against the glass wall as his chest heaved. My hips stuttered to a stop.

Miguel was still coming down from his orgasm, but my abrupt halt caught his attention. “What’s wrong?” he breathed, still bent over and grinding against me. He liked when I kept going after he came, and my dick was still semi-hard and stuffed inside of him.

He followed my stare over to Elliott, then slowly straightened. My cock slipped out, my cum dripping from his hole to the shower floor.

A red flush spread from Elliott’s cheeks to his neck as we stood there watching him.

“It’s okay,” Miguel whispered to him. “It’s normal.”

Elliott raised his hands, eyes widening as he opened his palms and watched the cum spilling from his trembling fingers.