Page 21 of The Reluctant Siren (Texas Sirens: Legacy #2)

Jensen closed the door on Harlow’s guests, hoping that Ruby didn’t actually know how to use that evil eye she’d given him. It was a powerful stink eye.

“She does not like me. She is never going to hire me.”

“You’ll work on her,”

Niall promised.

“You have some charm when you want to.”

Harlow looked so fucking pretty standing there in the yellow sundress she’d changed into after her shower. Her sister and friends had stayed for a late lunch and helped Harlow settle the bedroom the way she wanted it. Luckily, they hadn’t tossed him or Niall out. There was now a bathroom filled with all kinds of nice-smelling things like shampoo and conditioner and soaps he’d been told were for different parts of the body. He wasn’t sure. He only knew they smelled like Harlow. With the late afternoon light coming in, her hair looked vibrant and her skin practically glowed.

“Why would Ruby hire you?”

Niall sank down to the couch.

“We spent the day talking about the future. He’s going to need a job. I mean if we can keep him out of jail and alive. Alive is important.”

Strong arms crossed under her breasts, and she looked at Niall with a clear challenge in her gaze.

“You have a business. You hire him.”

Niall simply smiled at those bratty words.

“I think that’s how we’ll go at first, but he’s so much like you, princess. He needs more than a physical challenge. I think it would do him a world of good to help living people.”

Okay, that bit a little, but it was also true.

Harlow looked to him as though he was going to attack. Jensen simply shrugged.

“He’s not wrong. I liked helping your client get out. It made me feel…worthy.”

Harlow’s nose wrinkled.

“I don’t even know what to do with that. I have to think about it.”

Hey, she wasn’t kicking him out. He would take it.

Niall also looked like that was their best-case scenario.

“Did Ruby have any new information? I mean about the case. She has tons of new information about the three of us. The Hideout will be buzzing tonight.”

Having a partner did come with privileges. Like having him cover his ass when he said stupid things.

“Yeah, has she talked to Jack at all?”

Harlow’s eyes narrowed, but she took the seat across from the sofa. It was an old lounge chair that his mom had kept around because the men she dated tended to like it. She always said they shouldn’t sit on it because it was a chair for the man of the house.

He liked Harlow sitting there. But he also thought he should get the fuck rid of it and let her completely redo the place. If she wanted to. It was kind of nice out here. He’d sat outside and watched the cows in the distance and listened to the sound of the river that ran through the backyard. It was peaceful here. He could think, and that was weird. He thought coming back here would be awful. He thought every single step here would remind him of Tommy. And it did, but it wasn’t in a bad way.

This property was something he could offer. It wasn’t too far from Dallas. A couple of hours and they were in the country, away from everything. He might have thought Harlow wouldn’t fit in, but she seemed to relax. He’d heard her talking to Gigi about how pretty it was here. The field by the river was lush with wildflowers, and she liked seeing the horses and cattle in the distance.

“Jack is going to be in touch with Ruby if he hears anything. He hasn’t gone in to work since last night. He’s got a shift tonight, and he’s probably taking over Jensen’s position,”

she explained.

“He sent a report to her about what happened from his perspective last night so she could understand. I think he also sent it to Big Tag. He’ll be there if we need him.”

“He’s taking my job? Jack’s a bartender,”

Jensen complained. It had taken him years to get to dungeon monitor of a big club. It was rude.

“He’s also been in the lifestyle for years,”

Harlow explained.

“He’s a member of The Hideout, but he put his membership on hiatus for the last year. I think he was probably concentrating on his job, likely out of town for a lot of the time. I didn’t know what he was doing, obviously. But that’s why Niall never met him. So we should know more after tonight. How pissed off are you that she showed up?”

That question had been directed at him. Not Niall. Because Niall wasn’t the pissed-off one. Niall was the good one.

He had to stop thinking that way. He and Niall had spent much of the afternoon walking around what was left of the property. At one point they’d hauled out their old fishing gear and caught some catfish that Niall promised he could cook and talked about Harlow.

That was fucking nice, too. It was nice to be in it with someone else, someone he trusted.

“I was worried at first, but it’s clear to me that Ruby is a competent professional and if she says no one could have followed her, then I believe her.”

He parroted back what he and Niall had decided would be the best answer to the question they knew she would ask.

Niall nodded like he was proud.

Harlow looked at him with suspicion. She turned her head to take in Niall, who sat back, the smile leaving his face. He took a sip of his beer.

“I thought you two were fighting,”

she said, her gaze going back and forth between them.

“We’ve been friends since we were seven, so we almost never fight for long,”

Jensen assured her.

“Niall has been my brother for a long time. It would take a lot to break us. Though I almost managed it.”

“So a woman could never break you up. A woman is a bump in the road,”

she said softly.

Ah, the danger zone. Luckily, he knew the answer to that one.

“No, this particular woman is the end destination. I simply didn’t realize I would have a passenger for the long run. We settled this last night. You’re not something we fight over. You’re the woman we work together to take care of. And dominate. Why exactly are you wearing that dress? Your friends are gone. It’s late in the day. I think it’s play time.”

He needed them on the right footing. He needed her to think about pleasure and how well they could take care of her. She’d had time all day to vent her frustrations. Now it was time to fill that space with caring and attention and love.

Yep. He fucking loved her, and he was going to do this because he loved Niall, too.

Maybe he could start loving himself if he could change his mindset. For them. For himself. For his brother who couldn’t be here. Who would want him to have a good life with everything he missed.

Her eyes widened.

“I thought it was talk time.”

He let his lips curl up slowly.

“I can talk while you’re naked. Come on, Harlow. You know you like it. You spend most of your time naked.”

“She does? I mean I know she does in the club, but she’s worn PJs to bed with me,”

Niall said with a frown.

Ah, Jensen knew this one.

“Probably because you weren’t actually sleeping with her. I mean fucking her. You made her feel vulnerable so she wore clothes. She honestly feels way more confident if she’s had a good hard fuck.”

They could navigate her dangerous waters. Together. Like they had done with Algebra, except way better because he liked Harlow. And he’d never had hot sex with an integer.

“I want to say he’s wrong, but he’s not,”

Harlow admitted.

“And I’m still wearing the dress my sister so thoughtfully brought me because I’m worried about the dust in here.”

Niall stood up.

“I’m on it. I actually did intend to clean in here earlier, but it was taken over by a lovely group of women who spent all day complaining about me.”

“It wasn’t just you.”

Harlow had the most adorable pout on her face.

“We complained about a lot of things. Also, we need to figure out how to keep Gabe from kicking Niall out. He’s pissed.”

“Why would I get kicked out?”

For the first time Niall sounded like he wasn’t perfectly comfortable.

“I didn’t lie about anything. I was honest on my application. No one asked me if I was there to watch over someone.”

“I don’t think that’s going to matter to Gabe,”

Harlow admitted.

“He wants to call a board meeting to reevaluate your status. The good news for you is half the board members are off on some kind of international mission now. They left last night, too. So it’ll probably be a week or two before he can kick you out legally. We have bylaws and everything.”

Niall moved toward the back of the house.

“It’s good to know I have a little time.”

“He loves that club, you know.”

Jensen hated the fact that he might get his friend kicked out of the only place he’d felt at home in for years.

“Although I have to wonder if he’ll have friends there now.”

Harlow’s hands went to her hips.

“Am I supposed to go around telling everyone it’s okay for him to stalk me for months?”

“He wasn’t stalking you. He was watching after you.”

Jensen sighed.

“Although I’m sure you don’t see it that way. If your best friend asked you to watch after someone she loved, would you do it?”

She seemed to deflate slightly.

“I suppose I would. I probably wouldn’t try to date him though.”

“I can’t blame him. Well, I did, but having genuinely thought about it, I can’t. You’re quite easy to love,” he said.

“No, I’m not.”

She got a V over her eyes, a vexed expression.

“I’m difficult. I’m complex and irritable.”

“And you’re going to get a spanking because you might be those things, but there’s nothing wrong with them. Niall makes up for all of it. He’s simple and easy going and rarely causes trouble,”

Jensen pointed out.

“I can cause trouble,”

Niall argued as he returned with his kit and a big quilt he’d washed earlier in the day. He settled it across the lounger.

“I can also be difficult when I want to be. There, princess, take off your clothes and sit down and we can talk if you like. Or we can start to work on that pretty asshole of yours.”

“Excuse me? I did not say I wanted to do that,”

she replied, though her hands went to the hem of the dress and she pulled it over her head, showing off the fact that she wasn’t wearing any underwear.

“But you do.”

Of that he was certain. Harlow wanted them both. The question was what she would do with them after she got what she wanted.

“And that means we need to prepare you. Do you think I don’t remember talking about your fantasies?”

She carefully folded her dress.

“I remember, but I also told you I wasn’t looking for a long-term ménage.”

“Because you’ve seen how hard it is?”

Niall asked even as he was opening his kit and laying out what they would need.

“It’s hard on your mom?”

Her lips kicked up slightly.

“My mom is happy, and my dad wouldn’t be able to have a relationship that Papa wasn’t involved in because they’re weird twins who pretty much need each other to function. I mean Dad does. Papa would be far less adventurous. He would have taken whatever came his way. My dad made him wait for the right woman, so I suppose I’m glad they’re a threesome. Not suppose.”

She growled a little.

“I love my parents. I love them all and they work. I think maybe my assertion that I would never be involved in a permanent ménage is a strange form of rebellion. Do you know how hard it is to rebel against an artist and two dudes who share a woman?”

Thank the universe they had that out of the way. If he couldn’t get her to even agree it was a possibility, he didn’t see how they could move forward.

“I’m sure it was difficult on you.”

She cocked a hip, so comfortable in that gorgeous skin of hers.

“I have a rebellious soul, and when I told my mom I wanted to dye my hair at thirteen, she found some non-permanent dye and did it herself. She went to concerts with me. I got a long talking to when I got caught with alcohol at a dance, but it was all about how much they loved me and understood how tempting it was and how it could lead me to make bad decisions. No one yelled at me. Until…”

She grimaced.

“Shit. Until I decided to work as a PI, and not with my dads. Damn. Am I low key looking for that rebellion I didn’t get when I was a teen? Oh, that makes me sad. I kind of wish I didn’t know as much about psychology as I do because now I feel pathetic.”

He needed her to not feel pathetic.

“You want some discipline, baby. I think you should lean over and hold on to the arm of that chair. Niall, do you have anything to torture this gorgeous sub with? I think she needs a little something this evening.”

She leaned over and gripped the arm of the chair, her back flat and ass in a perfect position to spank.

“I’m only doing this because you’re right. I do need something. I hate self-reflection. It’s awful. Now I have to be nice to my dad.”

Yeah, Jensen was still worried about her dad. She might have had a revelation, but he suspected Chase Dawson wasn’t going to have one about him or Niall. It was a problem he would deal with later.

“Right now, all you have to worry about is being a sweet sub. I want you to stop thinking about anything but me and Niall. There’s no future right now. No past. Just two Doms who want you more than their next breath and a night where we take care of you. This is how tonight is going to go. We’re going to play for a while and then we’ll have dinner and watch whatever we can get on that old-ass TV of mine, and then we’ll go to bed and hold you and kiss and cuddle you and we’ll figure tomorrow out when it happens.”

A long sigh of relief came from her chest, and he watched as she visibly relaxed.

“I think I can do that, Sir.”

He wanted to do all the talking, needed to believe there was some kind of future for them, but he pushed it aside because this was what she needed. Niall brought out a small paddle and handed it over.

“How bratty were you today?”

Niall asked.

Her head came up.

“I thought we weren’t talking about the past.”

“Then give me another reason to spank you because you don’t take it for any reason. You like the play involved. You like to be disciplined,”

Niall pointed out.

“Is it going to hit the same way if he’s doing it because you like it?”

Her nose wrinkled.

“I don’t like how much you know about psychology either. You should never have taken all of Gabe’s Dom school classes.”

Niall grinned, a wholly happy expression.

“Oh, princess, I learned all of this from Leo Meyer’s classes.”

He was going to have to take classes. He was going to have to sink himself into this lifestyle, and damn but that didn’t sound so bad.

“You do like to be disciplined. Even though you know you didn’t do anything wrong, you like the idea of it. So tell me how bratty you were today. How much shit did you talk on us?”

“A whole lot, Sir,”

she replied.

“And you deserve to talk shit on us,”

he admitted.

“You also deserve this.”

He pulled back the paddle and slapped that gorgeous ass. Harlow’s ass was plump and round, and he loved getting his hands on it. But he also loved the way her whole body went tense and then released when he used a paddle on it. And he adored how pink her skin got. Perfectly rosy. He gave her a rapid ten and then pulled back.

“This is for talking about how difficult you are. Because you are not. You are a reasonable, lovely woman who knows what she wants and doesn’t shrink back from asking for it. That is not difficult.”

He loved the sounds she made when he spanked her. Those breathy moans went straight to his dick, tightening up his whole body in pure anticipation.

He gave her twenty this time, peppering the smacks all across her cheeks and thighs, making her moan and squirm, but she remained still. She held on, her chest moving with the force of her breaths. Her head fell forward.

He let his hand brush over the warm skin of her backside. She moaned slightly and opened her legs, obviously remembering how their sessions used to go. He would spank her and then slide his hand between her thighs so he could test how she was reacting.

She was wet. She always got so fucking wet for him. Her pussy was soft and ripe already. Her arousal coated his fingers, and he brought them to his lips, tasting how much she wanted. He loved her taste and smell and how he felt when they were close. Like the world made sense again.

He passed the paddle back to Niall.

“I think she’s ready to move on.”

He definitely was. The night was going to be a special one.