Page 108 of Five
Jesse’s okay. More than.
The thought is uppermost in my mind as we sit out at the pool several weeks later, the low-lights on and something summery playing on the speakers. He reclines on one of the chaise lounges in a pair of swim trunks and nothing else, his cerulean eyes brighter and happier than I’ve ever seen them. He seems lighter these days, or at least, that’s what the fanciful side of me thinks.
Free of whatever it was that haunted him so viciously when I first arrived.
Loose of the restraint that held him distant from me, led him to be angry and impatient and contemptuous of my presence.
It’s as if killing for me flipped a switch.
Lifting the bottle of beer in his hand, he salutes me with it, and then waggles his eyebrows. He’s been flirting with me since he came home from the hospital several days ago, determined, it seems, to apologize for his behavior without actually saying the words.
It’s a sea change, but one I’m happy with. I think I may even make a trip to his cottage tonight…see if he would like to spend some time with me. We haven’t had sex yet, both of us kind of tiptoeing around it.
Or maybe I should wait until he makes that move. Maybe I’m just imagining things, and he’s not interested in me that way. I chew on my bottom lip, torn.
“You look awfully deep in thought for a party night,” Cope says lightly, coming to sit down beside me. Remi had declared tonight—the first night Jesse was allowed to get in the pool—a celebration, a time for fun and being thankful for one another and the fact that we had brought the missing girl home.
For her kidnapper, whom the press had hailed as the infamous Lost Boys abductor from decades past, being dead.
If we wondered if there were other missing children, ones we didn’t know about, ones locked away somewhere still, we had a tacit agreement to be quiet on the subject. That was for the police to worry about.
As for us…
“I was just thinking about reopening the daycare after the weekend,” I answer Cope. “Getting back to normal.”
“As long as normal involves us,” Oscar says from his perch on the lip of the infinity pool. “And this island.” He looks up at me, his arms resting on the decking and water slicking back his already short hair, darkening its dirty blond. The words and tone are easygoing, but the expression in his eyes is anything but.
There’s a question there.
I glance around at the other guys spread out around the pool area—Remi by the table with its platters of fruit and vegetable kebabs and its pitchers of cocktails, and Oliver in the deep end of the pool, a frisbee in his hand. Every one of them watches me expectantly, waiting for an answer to an unspoken question I hadn’t expected to come quite so soon.
That’s okay, though. I know what I want.
“Yes,” I say now. “It absolutely involves you and this island. If you want me.” I can’t help looking over at Jesse when I say the last.
He reaches across the space between our chaises, placing his hand over my upper thigh. His pinky finger is dangerously close to the vee of my legs, and as I hold my breath, he flicks it ever so slightly against me with a wicked grin. “Don’t be an idiot. Of course, we want you.”
I close my eyes and release the breath I’m holding.
“Leave it to you to asshole the moment up,” Cope says, rising to lean across me and give Jesse’s good shoulder a playful shove.
I have a hundred questions. How are we going to do this? Will there be a schedule, or a kind of free for all? Who likes to share, and who prefers their sex to be one-on-one? What if I don’t feel like doing anything, like that time of the month. Will they pout and be childish, or do they truly want me here for more than just what my body can offer them?
I have to laugh, though, at the lighthearted byplay between Cope and Jesse, and put the questions aside for later. We can figure it all out in due time.
While I’m still laughing, Cope picks me up bridal style and carries me to the edge of the pool. I cling to his neck as he threatens to drop me, squealing, and finally he steps off the edge with me still in his arms, dunking us both beneath the surface of the water.
My squeals are abruptly silenced by the wash of cool water over both our heads. Cope’s mouth closes over mine beneath the water and clings, our lips still attached when we surface seconds later.
His hands skim my back beneath the surface of the water, and I feel my bikini top loosen. Dimly, I hear someone mutter a string of curses, and a splash as someone dives in. I’m focused purely on Cope, though, and the magic his hands are evoking. One curls around my thighs, lifting me until I wrap my legs around his waist. I can feel him, hard and thick, against my core, our bathing suits no real deterrent. The other works at my top, sending it floating away in seconds, and then tugs a nipple between two fingers.
Well. That escalated quickly.
The water adds a sensual element to our embrace, the sensation of his wet skin against mine sending shivers down my spine. I kiss him back with equal fervor, my hands roaming his muscular back as our bodies move in sync with the gentle slosh of the pool water.
One of Cope’s hands grips my hair, pulling my head back so he can trail his kisses along the column of my throat. Wait…Cope’s hands are on my breasts and my bottom…
That’s not Cope.
