Page 3

Chapter three

Jade

I feel like I’m walking on clouds as I step through the front door of the house. It’s a warm summer’s day, but now everything seems even brighter than when I left to go to the mall.

I need to tell my best friend everything that has happened before I explode.

I bounce up the stairs and along the corridor to Pink’s room, but he’s not there. I try downstairs, and hear the TV in the living room. The door is slightly ajar and I see Pink curled up on the sofa with his husband.

Silently, I back away. Monty is lovely, but the happy couple does not need me as a third wheel. I spent months on the run with Red and Brodie hiding me. I’ve had enough of being the third wheel for a lifetime.

Besides, Pink told me earlier about a potential lead in the search for Monty’s missing brother. He was excited and happy, but now all of that seems gone from his body language. I’m guessing it was another dead end. The last thing Pink and Monty need is my inane chatter.

As I stand in the hallway, like a lost soul, the sound of Ned playing with his kids drifts down to me.

I quickly scurry away. I was such an asshole to him when I was losing my mind.

I can’t believe he has truly forgiven me.

He has to just be saying that for the sake of peace and keeping our found family together .

I dart into the kitchen. Lello and Gray look up from their baking.

“I bumped into Flyn!” I blurt.

They both stare at me. The silence grows.

“The one you didn’t want me to kill?” says Gray as he cocks his head to the side.

Panic surges through me. “Yes! He was only flirting with me!”

I will never forget moaning to Lello and Ned about Flyn.

It seems like a lifetime ago. But time is strange.

It probably wasn’t as long as it feels. It was in this very kitchen.

Gray had been silently listening. Back then, the demon hadn’t been lucid for long, and to my shame, I kind of assumed he wasn’t following what I was talking about.

I’d only been bitching, pretending Flyn flirting with me was a hardship.

Thank heavens Gray had checked with me. I’ve had literal nightmares about him silently going off and murdering Flyn because he took my complaining too literally.

“Have you changed your mind?” asks Gray.

“No!” I exclaim a little too forcefully.

Gray blinks at me slowly, his impossibly dark eyes utterly unreadable. He drops his head and goes back to mixing ingredients in a large bowl.

“Thank you though,” I say quickly. “It’s very kind of you to offer.”

And it really is. I love that Gray wants to help me. I have no idea what I have done to deserve it. But it’s sweet. As well as very comforting. If anyone does give me grief, I have a demon to back me up. Not many people get to say that.

Gray glances back up at me and gives me a shy smile. I smile back at him. Then I turn to Lello, and yelp. The kelpie has moved closer to me. His elbows are propped on the table and his chin is resting on his hands. His eyes are large and extremely intense.

“Tell me everything!” he demands.

I swallow. Why did I start this? What was I thinking ?

“I…um… There is not much to tell,” I stammer.

Lello’s look turns deadly, and my heart pounds.

“I bumped into him and we had coffee and he helped me buy a new phone and we swapped numbers!” I babble frantically.

A huge, gleeful grin spreads across Lello’s face. “Are you going to see him again?”

Heat floods my cheeks. “I hope so.”

Lightening quick, Lello stands up. He claps his hands together, sending a cloud of flour up into the air.

“Another wedding!” he squeals. “I can be a flower boy again!”

My jaw drops open. I turn to Gray for support, but his eyes are gleaming too.

“Lello! We haven’t even been on a date yet!” I protest.

Oh goddess. Once Lello gets an idea into his head, there is no shaking it loose. He is going to start planning a ceremony soon, and bounding into my room at all hours with wedding magazines.

He pouts at me. “So? Love is in the air! Isn’t that right, Gray?”

I turn back to the demon. Hopefully he can save me. Lello might listen to him.

“You’ve not had sex since the harem,” says Gray.

The room falls completely motionless. I swear even the cloud of flour floating in the air pauses. Gray didn’t frame it as a question. He stated it. Like a fact. I guess it is something a sex demon would know.

And now it feels as if all my secrets are laid bare. I can hear my own heart pounding. So loudly that it is the only thing that I can hear. It’s the only sound in the room.

Lello’s eyes grow enormous. Then he gasps loudly. “Oh Jade, you poor thing! That’s terrible!”

My eyes close. If only the ground could open and swallow me up.

That would be great. Lello is never going to understand.

Neither is Gray. Gray is an incubus, he literally needs sex to live.

And Lello is… well, Lello. I swear he is actually a rabbit and not a kelpie.

I’ve never met anyone so enthusiastic about se x.

He even enjoyed it in the harem, as long as it was with Ritchie and not one of the asshole’s friends.

“Are you like Blue?” Gray asks solemnly.

I blink at him. “I don’t think so. I feel… attraction. Desire.”

Heavens, my cheeks are going to burst into flames.

I don’t think I’m like Blue. I enjoy hugs and touch.

But he has a mate now, and I have no one.

So maybe whatever is different about me is more intense?

I’ve never exactly had a deep and meaningful heart to heart with Blue about the way he feels things, so I don’t know for sure.

What I do know is that this conversation is the worst conversation to have ever happened in the history of the world.

“Are you scared?” Lello says gently, and the compassion in his eyes gets me right in the feels.

Okay, maybe this isn’t the worst conversation ever. These are my friends. My brothers in all but blood, and they care about me. I can be honest with them.

I clear my throat. “I’m ashamed, I guess. I can’t imagine how anyone would want me.”

And just like that, my ability to maintain eye contact is gone. My gaze drops to the floor, and my entire body squirms.

Lello makes a huffing sound. In the periphery of my vision, I see him begin to count on his fingers.

“Red, Pink, Ned, Blue, Gray and me were all in the harem with you. Do you think we are disgusting?”

My head snaps up. “Of course not!”

“Well, there you are!” Lello says with a toss of his head.

The oven beeps, and he hurries over to it. My gaze turns to Gray. Who is staring at me so intensely that it is giving me goosebumps.

“Sex is very different when it is something you choose.”

I lick my lips. “I’m sure it is.”

Okay. I can’t do any more of this. I’ve had enough. I mumble some hasty excuse and flee to my room as if the hounds of hell are on my heels.

I lock my door behind me and flop onto my bed with a sigh .

My friends are the worst, and the very best. Out of all the people in the world, they are going to understand. They were in the harem too, after all. They know exactly what I have been through.

But every single one of them has someone special now. They are all paired up and lovey dovey. Why am I the only one who cannot move on?

Brodie says there is no right or wrong length of time to heal. Everyone is different. But I still feel like the odd one out. Not that that’s the reason I like Flyn. I don’t want a relationship just so I fit in with my friends and I’m like everyone else.

I am genuinely lonely. I like the idea of a relationship. And Flyn is lovely.

I roll over, bury my face into my pillow, and let out a strangled scream. The poor man hasn’t even asked me out on a date and here I am, planning our future together, and thinking about sex.

Sex. Oh goddess.

I wonder if what Flyn said to me a million years ago is true? As I ponder that, the memory begins to play in my mind, as clear as day.

I was in the bathroom at work, washing my hands. I’d been having a bad day and was feeling frazzled.

Flyn sauntered in. He’d been flirting relentlessly, and I thought he followed me into the bathroom on purpose.

To my eternal shame, I snapped at him. “Give it a rest! I’m never going to bend over for you!”

His kind eyes had widened. “Oh man. I thought you were a top. Never been wrong before.”

I’d been too stunned to reply. I just stood there. Water dripping off of my hands and onto the floor. I’m pretty sure I didn’t even blink.

Flyn just smiled softly and left.

I take a deep breath and focus back on the here and now. In my bedroom. Lying on my back. Thinking about Flyn .

Is he right? Am I a top? I’ve never done that. Hell, I’ve never done anything consensually.

And if he thought I was a top, and he was pursuing me incessantly, does that mean he’s a bottom? Would he let me top him?

My imagination starts to go down a very filthy path. I rein it in firmly, but not before arousal floods my body.

Oh goddess. Now I’m really getting ahead of myself. We haven’t even been on a date yet. He said friends, for flips sake.

But he did say he was interested in more.

My phone pings and vibrates in my pocket. I jump so hard I nearly levitate. I pull it out and stare at the screen.

One notification. From Flyn. Three little words.

‘Dinner tomorrow night?’

Oh my goddess.