Page 113 of Holy Sinner

I drop my eyes, because I don’t know if I can take seeing how he might look at me now that he knows the secret I’ve carried. “Yeah.”

“Nobody missed him. Saw some shit about him on a few survivor blogs,” Rafe tells me softly. I’d never searched his name. I was too scared to even think about Mark, let alone put his name in a search engine.

“Really? I-I didn’t know that.”

“Guy was a predator, shy girl.”

“So am I,” I whisper and my eyes well up with tears. I don’t know why I’m crying or why I feel emotional. It feels like every part of the person I tried to be is gone now. When I was younger I used to pray to be someone else. I dreamed of the life I have now, so much so that I wrote pages and pages trying to create it. Now that I’m here, it’s scary.

No one tells you just how terrifying it is to get exactly what you want. How easy the urge to pull it down until there’s nothing left gnaws at you. Because you know what the past holds, you know who you’ve been and what to expect. There’s safety in that in comparison, in knowing that there are no limits on you. Not really.

“I don’t think I’m a good person.”

Both men go still and it’s a second later that they’re both in my space. “You are fucking perfect,” Grant growls, cupping my face in his hands.

“You’re the best person I know,” Rafe whispers in my ear and kisses my temple. I don’t know what that means, when he makes it a point not to know anyone.

“I-I-how can you love me? I killed Mark and I killed my mother.”

Grant tilts my head back to look up at him. “And they both deserved it. You did the world a favor and I’m fucking proud of you.”

“What?” He’s proud of me. Out of all the things I thought he might say, I never thought he would tell me he was proud of me.

“We’re proud of you,” he says again.

Rafe hums in agreement. “I knew you had fight in you, but I’m impressed you got rid of your mother and fuck that douche.”

Fuck that douche.

He says it so flippantly, like I just told him I threw my drink on a handsy date, not had him fall and break his neck and then bury him in the woods with my mother when I was sixteen. I swallow hard and a laugh bubbles up in me.

“I was scared you wouldn’t want me if you knew,” I confess. “That you’d think I was, I don’t know, tainted. Dirty. Wrong.” The words I’m using are the ones my mother gave to me. They’re not mine but they are how I thought of myself for so long. Rafe is the one to gather me close with a gentle sigh. He kisses my cheek and strokes my hair. Every touch makes another one of those fucked up words fall right off me and vanish. I don’t know how to explain it but having him be this tender with me, even though he knows my secret, makes me feel more in control of myself. Just because I’m overwhelmed by what a future with Grant and Rafe means, just because I don’t know the woman I’ll be a year from now, doesn’t mean that it’s not good.

It doesn’t mean that I’m not ready.

I swipe at the tears that have formed at the corner of my eyes and drop my head against his shoulder. “I love you,” I tell them.

“We love you.”

“We’re yours forever.”

I close my eyes and sit in their love. It feels solid and real, like I could take it in both hands and bring it close to keep me warm instead of the blanket over my shoulders. I open my eyes and look at them. Rafe has his eyes closed, he’s relaxed, his features soft right now. He looks like this a lot lately. I trace the curve of his lip while I watch Grant. He’s standing guard the way he normally is, eyes constantly scanning the area for threats, back straight, hands loose and ready at his sides.

Nothing would ever get past him to us. I know that brings him comfort.

Grant crosses his arms and stares out into the darkness. The breeze blows his hair back and I reach out to touch it. “Come here.”

He catches my hand and looks at me. “How do we ask, sweetheart?”

“Please,” I say immediately and smile at him. “I want you.”

Grant comes forward immediately. Rafe tosses the side of the blanket over his shoulder and Grant moves under the blanket with us. His skin is cool from the night air. I shiver and lean into him as tension I didn’t know I was holding onto melts out of my body with both of my men holding me. Rafe’s touch is hot on my skin as he gently slides a finger under my tank top and presses the palm of his hand to my flesh. That touch is all that’s needed to shift the energy between all three of us.

Grant kisses me and the kiss is sweet and gentle. He’s taking his time with me tonight. Rafe’s touch is slow, he trails a finger along the side of my neck and drops a kiss there. They’re both taking their time with me. I open my mouth to Grant and moan when he deepens the kiss. He pushes me back into Rafe’s arms and slowly lifts my shirt up and over my head. When he drops my shirt to the ground, the blanket goes with it.

I raise myself up on my tiptoes and wind my arms around both men’s necks to pull them in for a kiss. First Rafe, whose kiss ends with a stinging nip to my bottom lip and then back to Grant, who soothes my lip with a swipe of his tongue. Rafe’s hand moves to the waistband of the silk pajama pants that I’m wearing. They were a gift from them both when they went shopping in town earlier today. No one has ever bought me something this thoughtful before. Dresses and jewelry are one thing, but pajama pants?

That’s more of a promise of forever than even the bracelet I wear on my wrist. There will be countless nights like tonight between all three of us. They are capable of giving me what I want—that perfect happy ending I’ve always dreamed of. When Rafe pulls my pajama pants free, we all go down onto the fallen blanket and I settle between them.

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