Page 26 of The Devil's Pair

She turned to look at them as they wandered in, looking nothing but amazing in their worn jeans and tight t-shirts. She herself was a walking disaster area of dust and fluff, and paint and glue, but somehow they managed to look like they’d just stepped off a magazine cover. It was irritating, to be sure, but she had to admit that she loved looking at them. They were just so,sogorgeous.

“I really like it,” she said. “It brightens up the room even more, and it kind of brings the sky inside the house, doesn’t it?”

They nodded enthusiastically, looking thrilled that her dream abode was turning out even better than she’d anticipated. Dux looked at his cell phone, then started a bit.

“Hey, it’s almost five o’clock,” he said. “Where’d the afternoon go?”

“No kidding.” Briley stretched again, wincing a bit at the tugging in her lower back. “Argh.”

“What’s wrong?” Drake asked her immediately, as he and his brother crossed the room to her. “What hurts?”

“Just my back,” she said, moving gingerly. “I might have overreached a bit when I was painting.”

Right away, their eyes turned stormy blue-gray, and they scowled at her. She hid her smile at their matching glowering expressions, reminding herself that she had to look contrite, or else she’d never hear the end of it.

“What did we say about that?” Drake growled at her. “We said thatwe’ddo the parts up near the ceiling, for you to not overdo it. Didn’t we?”

“Yes,” she acknowledged. “But –”

“No ‘buts’, babe,” Dux said and she almost giggled; she’d really come to like when they got all bossy and snappy with her. “Why’d you do the exactoppositeof what we told you?”

“Because I don’t listen?” she said smartly. “And I’m stubborn? And I’m a nightmare? And I’m a pain in the ass?”

They blinked at her, realizing that she was just parroting their own words back at them, words that they’d said over and over for the whole of the past week. Every morning over breakfast, the three of them had planned the day’s work, with Dux and Drake telling Briley to not strain herself, or do too much, or try to lift anything too heavy.

They’d discovered, however, that the woman wasimpossibleto tell what to do. Every single day, they’d wandered into whatever room she was in, and she was more often than not smack in the middle of doing something that she’d solemnly sat at the kitchen table and sworn not to do. She was infuriating, in an adorable way, but still… they worried that she was actually going to hurt herself.

“Ummm. Yeah,” Drake said severely, even as the laugh bubbled up in his broad chest. “Allof those things.Jesus, woman, just do what you’re told sometimes, huh?”

“I’m sorry,” she said, going for sweet and docile, which always wrong-footed them. “How about this – I’ll order in dinner, on me. OK? We can eat here in the living room for the first time, try out the new table you guys assembled this morning. Sounds good?”

“Hmmmm,” Dux said, eyeing her suspiciously. “OK, babe. What are you hungry for?”

Unbidden, the words‘you two in my bed, between my thighs, if you don’t mind’popped into her head, again, some more. She wasalwaysthinking things like this about them, every single time they asked the most innocent and innocuous questions. Things like, ‘what are you in the mood for?’, and ‘what do you want to do now?’.

The truth was that as she’d come to know these two amazing, kind, sexy men better, she now bitterly regretted not taking them up on their offer back at the hotel, and she kicked herself daily about it. She’d made up her mind that if they broached the subject – no matter how vaguely or obliquely – she was going to say yes. But as it turned out, they were,most annoyingly, men of their word. They’d promised to never bring it up with her, not ever again, and sure enough, they hadn’t. They hadn’t hinted at it, joked about it, skirted around it… nothing.

Which meant that if Briley wanted them, then she had to be the one to make the first move.

How, though? Justhowdid she proposition them? Was it as simple as saying, ‘I’m sorry that I turned you down at the hotel, and I think about it and you differently now. I want you both’?

She had a sneaking suspicion that itwas, actually, that easy… but she somehow just couldn’t bring herself to utter the words. Shyness and insecurity were holding her back, and before now, she’d never really considered herself capable of feeling either of those things.

As she lay alone in her new, massive bed at night – with Dux and Drake down the hall in the guest room, on mattresses on the floor – she asked herselfexactlywhatshe was feeling so shy and insecure about. She stared at the ceiling, pondering it over and over. Finally, she had to face the truth: she was worried about not measuring up to the other women who’d been with them in bed. Women who knew what to do with two men, who could handle the situation (literally and figuratively) with grace and sex appeal, who were confident and instinctively knew what to do.

Her biggest fear, she’d come to understand, was that she was going to be clumsy and awkward and look stupid. If it was just one or the other of them, she’d know what to do, what to expect… but two men at once? And more than that,twins? Two men who looked the same, sounded the same, moved the same?

It was terrifying. It was exciting. It was the stuff of fantasies and (if it all went wrong, which it almost certainly would) of nightmares. Cringing, shriekingly humiliating nightmares for the rest of her life, and maybe even into her grave.

So here she stood in her living room, being asked a simple question about what she wanted to eat for dinner, and all shecould do was think horny, dirty things in response. Her whole body couldfeelDux and Drake again, and remember how good it had felt to be held between them in that dark corner, safe and protected – but also seconds away from being taken in a hotel room by the hottest, most dangerous men she’d ever known. If she’d just said yes.

Pull yourself together, Briley. Right. The fuck. Now.

“Ummm,” she managed. “Maybe Thai?”

“Agreed,” Dux said promptly. “Curries and noodles arealwaysbig wins with us, babe.”

“OK, perfect.” She was back in control of herself now, thank God. She picked up her phone, started tapping on the delivery app, looking for Thai restaurants. “Put in your orders, guys… the calorie-bomb is on me.”

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