Loving Dark Men Read Online J.A. Huss

Categories Genre: Dark, M-M Romance, Romance, Suspense Tags Authors: J.A. Huss Advertisement

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I peek open one eye, not really wanting to see anything. It’s more habit.

Locke is getting dressed across the room and he is talking to Mercer in a hushed tone. “What the fuck was that?”

“Never mind,” Mercer mumbles. “You don’t have to leave in the middle of the night, Locke.”

“I do.”

Hmm. This is a new dynamic I haven’t seen before. Mercer wanting Locke to stay. Why? It seems out of character. Not that I’m any kind of expert in his character.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at the hall, right?”

“I said I’d be there.”

“You better.” Mercer’s response is very serious. Was that a threat? “Go then. Get out.”

Now that’s more like Mercer. Kicking people out is totally in his wheelhouse.

“Walk me down,” Locke says.

Mercer doesn’t respond, but he does look over my way. My eyes are mostly closed. Open just a sliver, really. So he must decide that I’m asleep. He walks out with Locke.

But they leave the door to the apartment open.

I haven’t been through the door yet. We came up the elevator both times.

And despite being weary, satiated, and feeling quite lazy, I get up anyway. And I follow them, my bare feet softly padding across the carpet, then a shock of cold as I step onto the hard marble tile.

There is a… foyer, or something. I guess it’s more like a landing, because it’s really just railing surrounding a set of stairs that wind down the center of the massive house.

Locke and Mercer are already two floors below me. Locke is going fast, his feet barely touching the stairs. Mercer is keeping up, and he’s still fully naked. Didn’t even pull on a pair of pants.

I’m naked as well.

I go over to the stairs, then quietly descend, trying to catch bits and pieces of their conversation. But it’s hopeless. They are too far away. And I don’t want to go down too far. I don’t want them to know I’m following them.

So I stop halfway between the third and fourth floors and just watch.

When they reach the bottom, they talk for a moment. Then Locke reaches for Mercer and they kiss. It’s long and slow. And there is a little pang of jealousy in my heart.

I’m not sure which one I’m jealous over, though.

Mercer?

Or Locke?

Or both?

I like this. What we’re all doing, it’s exciting.

But it’s dangerous. I know that. I’m not stupid. I understand that one man is hard enough. Two, though? And, if I add in Olsen, three? And these are not just any men. They are dark men.

We’re starting something new here.

But it’s not really new.

I’ve been here before. I’ve done this before.

And I already know how it ends.

Unhappily.

They will be my undoing.

But it will be worth it.

Mercer comes back to bed and he puts his arms around me the same way he did this afternoon. Like I am his long-lost lover. Like I am his dying soulmate.

And it occurs to me that he lied this afternoon. When he said he only sleeps with Locke.

But when I wake up in the morning and find myself alone, I figure maybe it’s not a lie if he leaves me like this.

Hanging.

Waiting.

Longing.

The journey back to the Institute is long now that I’m alone. It went by so fast when Mercer was across from me. When we were testing each other’s boundaries. When we were eager and ready to take dangerous chances.

There was a note on the pillow next to me when I woke up this morning. It said:

Dear Ryan,

I have a meeting to go to. But your trip home is taken care of. I will see you at work on Monday morning.

Mercer

First of all… now he wants to call me Ryan?

Now?

After what we did last night?

I’m not ashamed of it. Not any of it. I’m a grown woman. I can damn well have sex with two men at the same time whenever I want. So it’s not shame I’m feeling.

It’s something else. Something I can’t quite put my finger on.

I think about it the whole way back to New Hampshire, and still, I’m walking through the door of my cottage with this feeling hanging heavy over me.

My trip was taken care of. Someone buzzed the house at nine AM. It was a driver. I was taken to the airport, boarded the same private plane I was on yesterday, and then there was another car, and then the boat. I walked home from the marina.

I drop my bag at the door and I’m just turning to close it when Olsen opens his door across the sidewalk.

He lifts his chin at me. A gesture that sets him apart from both Mercer and Locke. It’s… street. Not posh. And this is the first time I really take stock of Olsen. He’s muscular. Like he works out seriously several times a week. And not an intellectual. He’s wearing a black t-shirt faded to gray with cracked and peeling white letters on the front that spell out the word ‘ANONYMOUS.’

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