Page 39 of Van Cort

BEFORE

WEST – AGE SEVENTEEN

Lately, West had seen something in Rhett’s eyes that he didn’t like.

He didn’t know why, but he was both angry about it and thankful for it.

But the booze Rhett was downing was getting bad now, and sometimes, even before the alcohol flowed, Rhett seemed more callous than usual. He was sullen, pissed, volatile.

Not today, though.

He smiled over at Rhett, as Lara shuffled into place in his own lap, and breathed in the forest air.

She’d been dancing around the fire minutes earlier, showing off her moves.

And damn, could she move. He chuckled to himself as she grimaced at her beer and knocked her head back into him. Perfect. Truly fucking perfect.

There weren’t any nerves between them all about who was with whom anymore.

It had settled itself somehow without any of them needing to discuss it.

Sometimes, she was West’s, and other times she was Rhett’s.

And on days like these, when it was early evening and the dark was slowly rolling in and summer was coming to an end, she was theirs, and they were hers.

West wondered, as they all sipped on their bottles of beer, whether it would be like this forever.

It should be. They were all they needed.

Every second of time spent with her, whether alone or not, somehow brought a balance that Rhett and West couldn’t find on their own.

He supposed that was the sex, because no matter how similar the brothers were, that was the one thing they couldn’t give each other. She could.

The trouble was, college would soon be upon them, and her grades weren’t good enough for Harvard.

Both he and Rhett knew it without even speaking about it.

They thought, though. And if West knew one thing about his brother, it was that he didn’t like losing anything.

He’d use everything he had to make sure he didn’t lose her.

Rhett raked over the fire, loosening it so he could throw more wood on. He stared, long and hard at the embers and flames, sinking the rest of his bottle without any conversation.

Until.

“How well do you think you know us, Lara?” he asked.

She nuzzled into West and chuckled quietly. “Very well. I should do after all this time.”

Rhett got up and reached for another bottle of beer. “No, you don’t. I bet you couldn’t tell which one of us was which if we tested you.”

“We’ve done that a few times. I always know. Besides, you’re wearing different clothes.” Rhett stared at her, a slight lift to the corner of his mouth. “What?” she asked.

He pulled his sweater off and started ripping at the arm of it, eventually straining the stitching so much that the arm peeled from the rest of it. He held it up.

“If you can’t see us, how would you know?”

West laughed quietly, as Lara stiffened a little. “That’s a good call. Let’s play.”

“You want to blindfold me?”

West squeezed her thigh. “Yes.”

“Take your clothes off,” Rhett said.

Lara looked between the two of them. “Out here?”

West shifted in his seat and got up, taking Lara with him until he was standing so he could put her down. “Yes.” He didn’t waste any time getting himself naked, and Rhett just stared at Lara until she got the hint and started removing her clothes.

Some parts of them stripping were full of giggles.

It’s not like they hadn’t skinny dipped before.

And they all knew each other naked well enough.

But West knew that wasn’t what was going through Rhett’s mind.

Lara could tell the difference between them.

She’d become astute regarding them. She knew the pressure they preferred, the way they kissed, the feel of force on her skin or none.

The only way she wouldn’t understand which one was which was by one of the brothers being different than normal.

West knew Rhett wouldn’t change a thing about himself – ever.

Which meant he’d have to. She was in for one hell of a fucking.

When both of them were naked, Rhett moved over to her, still in his jeans and boots, and tied the arm of his sweater around her head to cover her eyes.

She stood patiently, trusting that nothing the brothers did would harm her.

But when Rhett went to West’s sweater and ripped both arms off it and then tied them around her wrists and made a knot to fasten her to a tree, West wasn’t sure what was going on.

“It’s a bit tight,” she said, wrenching at her wrists to ease the bind.

Rhett didn’t reply.

West frowned, but the sight of her there, bound to a tree and helpless, made him smile, regardless. He thought back to that moment on the rock all those years ago, when that first kiss had meant everything to him and nothing to her. Maybe now was time for some payback.

Rhett lifted his chin at West, indicating that West should go first. He made a fist, squeezed his fingers tightly.

West knew what it meant. Pressure. It meant pressure, and more than West would usually apply.

He obliged with a smile on his face, interested in how far he’d be able to push Lara.

He’d never wanted to before. Sex was always about passion and adrenalin and making her feel as good as him, but he’d watched Rhett with her enough. It was nothing like that.

His fingers landed on her, and he bit them in a little too hard.

She smiled. “West.”

Rhett laughed behind him and started taking his clothes off. “We walk differently.”

“We do?” West replied.

Lara giggled. “Yes. You’re louder than he is.”

“Louder?”

“Stompy.”

“I am not stompy.”

“You so are.”

Rhett arrived by his side, while Lara carried on giggling, and took hold of her upper arm, harshly. She flinched, then relaxed.

“So, Rhett.”

He let go and nodded at her, offering West another opportunity.

West slapped her face.

She whipped it back to centre, but he could see the confusion on her brow despite the blindfold. She didn’t know who’d done it. So, he grabbed her chin and pushed her back to the tree, running his other hand down her skin until he was at the apex of her thighs.

“Who is it, Lara?” Rhett whispered, by her face.

She turned her face to look in Rhett’s direction, still confused. “You,” she said.

“Wrong.” Rhett put a hand on her ass and pinched into it, causing a yelp to leave her lips. “You think you know us, but what if what you think you know isn’t who we are? What if all this time, we’ve been playing you and who you thought you were with was the wrong one?”

She gasped as West widened her legs and drove his fingers inside her, but soon moaned when he took his lips to her neck.

“West,” she said.

It became apparent, after multiple tries, that West was crap at pretending to be Rhett.

He just couldn’t do it. Rhett laughed silently and pushed him away, and somehow, without any real thought or try on the matter, he was able to pretend he was West just fine.

He touched her softly and chose every point on her body that West would normally go for.

She moaned and groaned as he brought the first orgasm out of her, and she whispered words that she’d normally use for West alone.

There wasn’t any strain in her tone or desperation like she always used when Rhett fucked her.

“Who was it?” West asked, as Rhett backed away.

“You,” she said.

“Wrong,” Rhett quipped, laughing.

She panted and looked in his direction as he picked up his bottle to drink. “You?” she asked.

“Yes.” He drank some more. “I guess these hands are good liars. Or you don’t know me well enough at all.” Lara frowned beneath the blindfold. West could see the creases in her forehead as she thought. “Would you like me like that more often?”

She paused.

“No. Yes.” She shook her head. “No.”

“You like it rough?” West asked. “Be honest, Lara.”

She paused again and pulled her legs together. “With him, yes.”

“Not with me?”

“I wouldn’t know. You’ve never been rough with me.” West scowled at that. He had. On some occasions, he’d been rougher than usual. He’d pinned her and done things that should have made her hurt. They were the same kind of things that he thought of when he wasn’t thinking nicely.

He looked at Rhett, who was near smirking with the bottle to his lips.

They were different when it came to sex. West knew that. But her listing the differences, and then deciding she didn’t want West rough, made him green with envy. Yes, this was all fucking perfect. And yes, he wanted this for the rest of his life. He wasn’t good enough when he was rough, though? No.

Something inside him clicked into place, and he was all over her like a rash.

He abandoned thought.

He abandoned himself.

He became Rhett.

Before any of them knew what was happening, he was rutting into her without care.

His hands held her legs up, and his stubble raked across her chest and neck as he fucked.

He held her like Rhett would have, and he used every piece of himself to act in the way that Rhett would.

She heaved and groaned under the strain, muttering words more angrily, as if she was trying to survive the assault.

He was about to come when Rhett’s hand came in front of his face and pushed him backwards, almost ordering that he stop. His hips almost did on command, but his mind was too involved.

Rhett got his face between them, put a finger to his lips to tell West to stay quiet, and kissed Lara, making her turn sideways for him. West watched, both confused and excited.

It was the first time they’d done anything like this. Everything was usually separate.

They watched, yes, but they never touched while the other one was involved.

West slowed his hips instantly and pulled out, unsure what this was but too invested to care.

It took Rhett no time to bury himself inside her, from behind this time.

Her hands rested on the tree, and her ass stayed up and was held tightly in his hands.

West moved sideways to watch, silently padding so he didn’t stomp.

He saw her fingers whitening and then relaxing, as if she was trying to find another orgasm.

He couldn’t help but kiss her while she did, but he stayed away from the lightness he’d usually deliver, and he drove his tongue into her and sucked at hers.

His hands found her breasts, and he squeezed every time Rhett pushed inside her.

“Yes,” she murmured, panting. “More. Yes. More. I can’t…”

Rhett changed angle and pounded into her, this time rubbing the pad of his fingers over her clit.

He tipped her upwards until she was nearly standing tall, and leaned the side of her head onto the tree.

West still kissed her. He kissed her until she came, and he felt that shiver roll through her, but then he wanted to get back inside her, or make her suck him off.

He was desperate and had never felt so fucking needy in his life.

He broke from kissing her and looked at Rhett, pleading silently.

Rhett took the back of her hair in his hand and pushed her downwards again.

It was messy, and for a moment Lara froze as Rhett pulled out and West tried to get in without her knowing the difference.

It didn’t matter. The feeling of being inside her again was glorious, and he looked at the sky as Rhett took his place to kiss her.

He wanted to groan and call her a good girl, and he wanted to moan so fucking much, but noise gave the game away.

So instead, he stayed silent, even when he came on her back.

Backing off a step or two, he looked at her in the dark as he panted out his orgasm. The firelight crackled over her skin, causing a red hue over them all. It was a picture-perfect moment for West, and he seared it into his memory. They were all naked - all free.

Rhett grabbed her to him and rubbed himself off on her leg, just as silently.

It went everywhere, as did his hands. They roamed all over her body, taking his cum with them and smearing it into her skin.

West watched as he pinched her nipples and rubbed cum into them, and then watched as he pushed his cum covered hands up to her neck and swiped his fingers through her mouth.

She was a fucking goddess in West’s eyes - everything.

So trusting. And so full of joy and happiness in the middle of their strange world.

“Rhett,” she murmured.

She knew. Of course she knew.

West smiled to himself as she moaned and sucked at Rhett’s fingers. She even giggled as he whispered something to her.

“Yes, I did,” she said. “I liked it.”

For once, Rhett smiled too.

She was everything to them. They both knew it. She was the third part of a pair, and as long as they stayed together, everything would always be this faultless. No jealousy. No pain. Just trust and love and the rest of their lives.

West wasn’t resentful of a damn thing they did, or jealous, and he didn’t care that she worked out who was who in the end.

Maybe it was right that she knew them both so well.

Yes, he could have done what Rhett did. He could have pushed her more or become more perverse with his thoughts.

But in those final moments before he came, he was himself again.

He didn’t want to smear her with come like Rhett did, and he didn’t want to cause her pain either.

He loved her. He supposed Rhett did too.

But their versions of love clearly meant different things for them.

Moving back to her, he started to release the knots around her wrists.

She smiled and turned in his direction. “West.”

They kissed as Rhett walked away, and West’s fingers kept releasing the now-tight knots. Part of him wanted to talk about the differences she felt and find out how she knew who was who, but by the time she was free he was more bothered about getting her warm first.

He picked her up, took the blindfold off, and walked back to the fire.

Rhett was tossing more wood at it, opening up the embers to create more heat for her.

Even then, without speaking, they wanted the same thing for her.

Maybe they went about it in different ways, but she got every inch of goodness from them, despite the horrors their father inflicted and their life being full of rules and isolation. Anything they had left was for her.

It would always be for her.