The Men with the Golden Cuffs (Masters and Mercenaries #2)(80)

How could she already miss them? They were sitting not five feet away, but they were lost to her as though they were gone, never to be seen again. She wouldn’t see them again. Not really. She would move through the days, but she wouldn’t really share them. Adam and Jake would be around, but more like accessories when before they had become essential. She’d come to rely on them far more in a week than she ever had her husband, and they had been married for years.

And someday soon, they would catch this guy. She knew they would. They would honor that promise. They would catch him and she would be safe, and they would move on. She would move on. Except she wouldn’t. She hadn’t moved in years, not emotionally. She’d worked on her career and put up barricades to everyone except her small group of friends. When Adam and Jake were gone, she wouldn’t move on. She would simply move deeper inside herself until the only emotion she ever felt was typed out of her soul and placed on the internet for all to see.

“Honey? Are you all right?” Chris asked, reaching out and covering her hand with his.

She shook her head. “Nope. But I don’t have another way to be right now.”

He eyed her for a moment. “Are you sure about that?”

“Chris, you weren’t there this morning. You didn’t hear some of the things he said to me, and Adam hasn’t said anything at all. Trust me. I know exactly where I stand with those two. I was a convenient lay.”

“I don’t know about that.” Chris sat back, his eyes trailing to the table beside them where Jake and Adam sat. Their food had come, but neither seemed to be digging in.

“Well, I do. Men are jerks.” Bridget leaned in as though ready to go off on one of her tirades.

“No. This is my turn.” Chris didn’t often use that sharp bark, but when he did, he meant business. Bridget sighed and nodded. Chris turned his gaze to Serena. “You know what Bridget is doing, right? She’s going to agree with everything you say because she thinks what you need right now is a completely supportive friend, but I think what you need is someone to actually talk to. What do you want, sweetheart? I can sit here and cuss out men with Bridge or I can ask you some very specific questions.”

She wanted to listen to Bridget wail because it would soothe her. She wanted them to simply tell her she was right about everything, but she simply couldn’t. “Ask away.”

“Serena, they don’t look like two men who are eager to get away from you.”

“Then you’re not looking close enough.” The words sounded stubborn coming out of her mouth.

“I’m watching them.” Chris had a good line of sight to the table. “They both keep looking over here.”

Well, she had the obvious answer to that one. “My life has been threatened numerous times. They’re bodyguards. They’re doing their jobs.”

“I don’t think so. They’re worried and not about your life. Look, honey, I’ve been around a lot longer than you have. I know men. I can spot a playboy from a mile away. Neither one of those men even glanced at Bridget’s cleavage, and she has the girls on full display.”

Bridget shrugged. “It’s true. I even opened another button when I found out they would be with you. No man can resist these double Ds. I hate to say it, but I think Chris might be right. They’re either crazy about you or gay. The boob test doesn’t lie.”

Serena stared down at her drink. “You don’t understand, guys. Think about it. They like to share a woman, and Jake is fairly hardcore when it comes to the whips and chains stuff. I’m completely open to both lifestyles. It’s just easy. They couldn’t really care about me and have acted the way they did this morning.”

“Yes, because love is always rational,” Chris said sadly. “I love my boyfriend, and we have said some of the most hurtful things in the world to each other. Sweetie, a man who is really passionate about you, who loves you to the core, can be deeply cruel when that love is threatened.”

“All I asked for when we started this thing was a little kindness.” It hadn’t been that much.

Chris sighed. “There’s nothing kind about passion. It can be, but you’re expecting love to be one way, and it’s not. It sure as hell isn’t going to be with two men. You have two men with two hearts and two pasts to deal with. Have their lives been all sunshine and roses? You know we react the way we do because of what life has taught us. Ask yourself the question. What has life taught those two men? Did that factor into the way they reacted to some spectacularly bad news? Was what they did really unforgivable?”

Unforgivable? What did that really mean? But even if Chris was right, maybe she was simply too damaged to ever make this work. He’d talked about the way the past informed how a person dealt with the present. Her past had taught her that she made very bad judgment calls. She couldn’t trust herself any more than she could trust them. She’d made the mistake of throwing herself into this when she’d known damn well it wouldn’t work out.

But then that was just what she did. Nothing worked out how she’d planned. Even her writing career. She’d had visions of being acclaimed and beloved, but mostly she’d gotten scorn and derision from anyone outside the erotic romance community. And now someone took such singular exception to her work that she required bodyguards. Everything she did seemed to isolate her, to push her further and further away from the white picket fence and kids. She just couldn’t see why her white picket fence couldn’t go around a dungeon. And why couldn’t there be two guys in her dream house?