Mastered By The Mavericks(45)

Frustration seared Rhett's chest. He'd shared sexual ecstasy with the  woman now embedded into his bone marrow, but barely knew a thing about  her life, especially her family. While the connection of this week was  hardly going to transfer back to their real lives, the incongruity still  felt wrong. "Wait." A memory blasted in. "Wasn't Brynn's mom at Shay  and Zoe's wedding? The funny little thing who sat on the hay bale all  night?"

Rebel's head jerked up. "Yeah," he said slowly. "Right. She was the  overgrown garden gnome crossed with Kathy Bates, circa Misery."

"Only she thought that corner was her little pulpit after a while. I  think she quoted every apostle in Jesus's posse, along with Paul and a  few guest stars from the Old Testament too,"

"Right." Reb snickered for a second. "Thank fuck Zoe wasn't showing with the bebette yet."

"Well, that clarifies Enya's choice. A little."

"A little." Rebel used the emphasis to drive in the opposite. There was  still a lot they didn't know about all this. "What the hell isn't adding  up?" He dragged a hand through his hair and turned his gaze out the  window, as if the towering cypress and oaks would magically give up the  answer. "What are we missing?"

"Or more accurately, what can't we find?"

Suddenly, Rebel swiveled his head back around. His eyes were brilliant as cut stones. "You mean what we can't find … legally."

Rhett returned the stare with rising comprehension. "Things like health  records … or sealed court documents." He tapped knuckles against his chin,  thinking deeper. "Or … a restraining order?"

"Perhaps." Rhett hedged. "But filed by whom? Look at Enya's posts again.  Her desperation adds the detail. She lists everything about her time  with Peter except goddamn bathroom breaks. There's length of their play  sessions, depth and intensity of the guy's discipline-"

"Toy types." Rhett's brows jabbed up. "Positions. Climax counts. Christ. This shit is juicy."

"And just as abundant after their breakup, only the information is  different. The little Jane Austen can spin the angst with the best of  them."

"Roger that." The material would've been a little comical, had the  heartache beneath not been so palpable. "‘Breathe in, breathe out, but I  only swallow glass … top of the world, but I'm sitting in trash … '"

"Wonder if she ever thought of selling to Nashville. Girl could stir  herself up a pile of gold." He held up both hands at Rhett's censuring  glance. "Just sayin', podna."

Rhett reveled in warmth from the man's casual endearment-for a moment.  He shoved it aside just as quickly to focus again on the monitors. "So  if Peter didn't file it, and she didn't-"

"We're still looking in the wrong place." Reb started the pencil drumbeat again.

"But still seeking something protected by the court."

The drumming stopped. As if drawn to the very lightbulb that seemed to  blaze to life inside it, Reb lifted his head. "Like psychiatric care?"

Rhett pivoted in his chair. Bam. There was his lightbulb too. "A  fifty-one fifty psych hold?" The words even felt right to say. "Or  something else? Or both?"

"Not sure it matters. But it sure as hell slides some things into  place." Rebel rose, braced hands to his hips then paced toward the  doorway leading to the other den, where the rumpled blankets on the  futon were a blatant reminder of what had gone down this morning for all  three of them. "A lot of things."

Rhett nodded. The circuits in his brain kept snapping into place, gears  hitting at high speed. "That was the reason for her meltdown, wasn't it?  It wasn't all just about Zoe."

It wasn't a shocker to him-nor to Rebel, judging by the guy's unchanged  posture. After a long moment, the sinews of his shoulders twined and  shifted as he reached for the door frame, noticeably clenching the dark  wood. "Taking on that kind of responsibility … es­pecially if her sister  had a significant breakdown … "

"Because of a Dom who took ‘wham, bam, thank you, subbie' to a whole new  level of ass wad." Rhett leaned forward, meshing his hands and dropping  his head. "Unbelievable."                       
       
           



       

"No wonder she's fighting so violently against her submissiveness."  Reb's hands glided downward, almost caressing the wood. "Though I've  never met a woman more perfectly created for it." He rocked back and  forth in the portal, embodying the rate at which both their brains now  churned. It all started to fit. The memories of what she'd said,  together with the facts they'd just learned, added to some damn  confident inferences on both their parts.

Rhett tilted his head up again. "Damn. A natural submissive who refuses to submit."

"Unless her brain is forcibly locked out of the situation."

Rhett chuffed. Another unarguable point from the "Look what we learned  in bed this morning" folder. The things Brynna had agreed to … the heights  they'd taken her desire, once she'd just given up, given in, and  surrendered to their full control …

"A situation we managed once." The argument needed to be voiced aloud.  "Fat bloody chance she'll allow it to happen again. In that gorgeous  head of hers, losing control doesn't just mean surrendering her body.  It's a matter of losing herself."

Rebel turned around, lifting his hold to the doorway's upper jamb in the process. "Just like her sister did."

Damn. Talk about losing oneself. Moon's stretched, burnished muscles  were an eyeful that made Rhett forget his own name for a second. He  readjusted his position in the chair, silently cursing the events of  this morning-for the thousandth time. And for the thousandth time,  taking them back. The revelations they'd known and all the new things  he'd seen in this man … he'd never forget any of it, and knew that in  time, when the recollections melded into the places of his mind reserved  for the most special moments of his life, that an image of Rebel's  passion-drenched face would be there, too.

In the end, he'd be damn glad it all happened.

He wasn't sure Brynn would be joining him in that boat.

Once more, he decided to finish his musing aloud. "But her tenacity  about the control … it's like clutching greased rope. The tighter she  holds on, the more her grip slips."

"Which we witnessed in full, sobbing Technicolor."

Rhett stood now, too. Stuffed both hands into his pockets while battling  the urge to reach out and just run his hands beneath Reb's tank. It  wouldn't be for any sexual thrill this time, though. He felt the  visceral need to put an outward display on the new things he felt for  the man. No, not even for the man. This was just about … the person. The  connection to him. The acceptance by him, for him. The better ways they  could already read each other, know each other. Their synchronicity on  missions, already legendary, was going to be off the fucking charts now.

But it wasn't possible. Couldn't be. If he touched just one place, he'd  want more. Then Reb would want more. Then a touch wouldn't be enough,  maybe not even a kiss. And it would be amazing. Conflagrating. A bonfire  for the ages.

A passion he'd never be able to recover from.

Working side-by-side with the man wouldn't be synchronicity anymore. It would be hell.

And then there was the matter of the beautiful redhead sleeping across  the house. The way he saw her haunting Rebel's eyes, the same way she  dogged so many of his own thoughts and longings. There was so much more  to uncover about her … and so few bricks remaining that could be loosened  from her walls, if at all. The woman who'd tumbled away from them this  morning had been spurred by one motivation alone. Fear. Her remaining  barriers would take patience and strategy and time, lots of it, to  scale.

Time they didn't have.

He said as much to Rebel by widening his stance and squaring his jaw.  Added a twist of his lips before venturing, "So what do we tell her we  know?"

Translation: How pissed do we risk the woman being, about prying into  her sister's personal shit and using it to analyze her issues about  submissiveness?

Rebel started with the human metronome thing in the doorway again. Pretty much expected.

"All of it," the guy gritted.

Okay, not expected. At all.

"All of-wait-whoa-Moon?" But he could've been stammering stanzas of  Three Little Pigs, since his friend wasn't listening. Clearly, the  decision had been made-for what reason he couldn't fathom, but Reb  blowing a gasket of common sense seemed like a damn good option right  now-especially now that Reb squeaked the floor from his bare-footed  turn, then started toward the bedroom wing with determined steps.