Three Part Harmony (The Road to Rocktoberfest 2024)

6. Chapter Six

Chapter Six

Griffin

I took him to the Crab House right on the pier and asked the hostess to seat us in a private, outside corner overlooking the harbor. She smiled and grabbed two menus off the top of a pile before asking us to follow her out onto their deck. A moment later, we were seated across from each other at a table against the railing with an amazing view of the busy harbor and the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. We’d barely gotten comfortable when our waiter approached and took our drink orders. I went with ice water while Mike ordered an imported beer.

“Thank you for saving my life earlier. Who knew what kind of shenanigans those two kids had in mind when they were running in the general direction of us,” Mike said with a bright smile that didn’t come close to masking the sarcasm in his statement. I knew he was yanking my chain about the way I handled his safety but it didn’t bother me. What mattered was he wasn’t hurt.

“I don’t take chances with the people I’m hired to protect,” I explained. “I heard a commotion and my brain went into action to neutralize the threat. It’s what I’m trained to do. We only have seconds to assess and deescalate any given situation, so there’s no time to waste. If that had been an actual fan barreling at you like an angry lineman on a football field, you’d be thanking me for saving you from the scratch marks, bruises, ripped clothing, or potentially broken bones you possibly would have gotten.”

“I know, and I shouldn’t tease you about what you do,” Mike said. “It was actually pretty fucking cool to see you do that.” Mike rubbed the back of his head and neck like he was in pain and concern began to bubble in my gut.

“Shit, did I hurt you?” I asked him.

“You mean, hurt me when you shoved me up against the building like you were about to slap handcuffs around my wrists and arrest me? Truth be told, I loved it,” he clarified with a sexy half-grin and then he leaned closer. “It made my dick hard as hell.”

I nearly choked on my water I’d unfortunately chosen to drink right at that moment. “Jesus, do you have to say shit like that?” I asked.

“Why not? It was the truth,” he protested .

“Because—we shouldn’t—I mean, I shouldn’t… know that shit about you,” I said.

“Then consider that knowledge new material for your spank bank,” Mike said and grinned at me like a loon. “And now you also know I’m good with a little bit of the rough stuff.”

I made a tsking sound with my tongue but he was right. The visual of him getting aroused from me manhandling him would definitely be fodder for the fantasy I used next time I jerked off. It was too potent not to.

“What makes you think I have a spank bank?” I asked stupidly.

“Show me a man who doesn’t.”

“Point taken,” I relented.

“Speaking of blowing a load, did you enjoy your night off last night?” Mike asked. “Did you stay in and romance the bone with a fresh bottle of hand cream or did you find a willing partner to participate in your hunger games primal play?”

I looked at him and saw his lifted brow and heard the curiosity behind his words. Was he trying to get me to reveal the kinks I might be into? Would hearing that I’d jacked off in the shower to thoughts of him be enough to get him to stop digging? Probably not, so I went with a cleaned-up version of the truth.

“Room service and a movie that I fell asleep while watching,” I answered.

“Christ, that is lame, man,” Mike teased. “You sound like my grandpa or something. I would think with a night off you’d have gone out looking for a hook-up. ”

I shook my head at his suggestion. “I wanted to stay close by in case you needed me—in a security related capacity, of course. But as it turns out, your hands were too… full for you to get into any trouble. Made my life a whole lot easier and my night a whole lot more relaxing, so I thank you for that small miracle.”

Mike’s grin melted into a more serious expression and he turned to look at the water. In an instant the vibe at our table shifted to a more subdued one, like the temperature had dropped twenty degrees in just a few seconds. I wished like hell I knew where his mind went because I hated seeing him without levity relaxing his gorgeous face.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Nothing, really,” he answered, just as our waiter returned with our drinks. Mike took a hefty gulp from his mug of beer and I did the same with my water. “It’s just, I don’t know. I’m not sure I can explain it.”

“I’m guessing this has something to do with Oliver and Sebastian?” I asked.

Mike nodded and I fought the urge to roll my eyes at him. I thought he’d already figured out going after Oliver and Sebastian wasn’t going to pan out. Especially since they all worked within the same business and in the exact same genre of music, too. My opinion didn’t come from a place of jealousy. It was more about their unbalanced dynamic. From my end, I only saw Mike doing all the work with little reaching out to him from the other two, but maybe I was missing something. The professional side of our relationship told me to stay the hell out of it but the part of me who was Mike’s friend wanted to help.

“So, you’re still pursuing them as a triad?” I asked and almost wished I hadn’t. Did I really want to know the answer to that question? Who Mike slept with shouldn’t bother me at all and the fact that I could admit to being a little jealous—okay, a lot jealous—was an enormous red flag for me. But I’d said the words and there was no way to take them back now.

“Nah, I don’t think so,” he said.

“Threesomes aren’t your thing after all?” I questioned.

“It wasn’t that,” he replied and then his attention turned full-on to me. “You know how much I love a hot three-way.” Then he dropped his tone to a lower register. “Do you really want to hear this?”

“If you want to talk about it, I’ll listen,” I stated and hoped I wouldn’t regret it.

“I have no problem telling you the details, but sometimes I get the feeling you don’t want to know what I’m getting up to,” Mike said and his gaze flicked to the table as if to gather his thoughts. “Maybe you do it because you worry or maybe it’s just me not being able to read you enough to know how you’re feeling one way or the other.”

“You’re my responsibility and I don’t take that lightly,” I admitted. “And, yes, I also worry…but that’s just my nature. Truth is, I worry about a lot of things I probably shouldn’t, but I do. ”

Mike took another swig of his beer and set the mug onto the table. “I think they want to be a couple, instead of three,” he said softly, looking everywhere except at me.

Now things were clicking into place for me. “What makes you say that?” I asked. I was hopeful I’d soon have the answer to why Mike was knocking on my door so fucking early this morning.

Again, those long fingers of his plowed through his hair. “Okay, you’re asking for it,” he chuckled and set his elbows on the table. “Last night was… fuckkk , I don’t even know the right words to use, but it was phenomenal. The three of us nearly lit those fucking bed sheets on fire. It was an all-night fuck-and-suck-fest and…”

“Okay, I have the visual. Cum was flying everywhere, I get it,” I said to interrupt him. Christ, my upper lip was beginning to sweat. Were they running the damn heat outside on this deck? “What happened to give you the impression they want to be a couple without you?”

“You just did it again,” Mike chuckled and I scrunched my brows together in confusion. “You asked for details but when I started to give them you redirected the conversation so you didn’t have to hear them.”

“I just figure it’s information that I shouldn’t know about you, since I work for you,” I tried to explain but he looked just as unsure as he did a few seconds ago. It was the best I could offer without flat-out telling him hearing about two men getting him off made me want to drown myself in the San Francisco harbor.

“I’m okay with you knowing this kind of shit about me, Griffin,” he said. “I say that because beyond you working for me, I consider you to be a close friend and this is something I’d be discussing with a friend,” he explained.

“You’re right and I’m sorry. Please continue.”

“This morning when I woke up in bed, I was basically alone,” he said.

“Where the hell did they go?” I asked.

“Oh no, they were still in bed with me but on the opposite side,” he detailed, “and wrapped so tightly together I couldn’t tell which limb belonged to whom. Seeing them tangled like that, I don’t know. It was kind of a reality slap and it’s the only time I’ve felt like I was a third while with them.”

“You mean, like a third wheel?” I asked honestly.

Mike sat back in the booth seat and studied my face. “Yeah, sort of. It’s when an existing couple invites another person in to play with them,” he said. “Which is fine. I’ve done that, too, but that’s not what I thought we were. I mean, sure, in the beginning logistics forced us to hook up as twosomes a couple of times because it was difficult to get the three of us in the same place at the same time. But it flowed into being a throuple situation which is what I thought I wanted.”

“But you don’t want that anymore?”

Mike shrugged. “I’m not sure of anything,” he replied. “My head has been all over the place lately wanting shit I shouldn’t even be thinking about, never mind having it.”

“So, that’s why you were banging on my door before dawn?” I asked .

Mike rolled his eyes at me. “The sun was up and I wasn’t banging on the door. I knocked like an adult, just in case you’d fallen back to sleep.”

“I was definitely sleeping when you sent the text,” I pointed out.

“And I’m sorry about that, but I saw them tangled up like a pretzel and it brought shit into focus for me. I had to get the fuck out of there,” Mike detailed and then his attention settled on my eyes. “I’m sorry I woke you but you were the only option I had here, other than going outside for a walk by myself and I knew you wouldn’t want me to do that.”

“You’re correct,” I said. “Never take off by yourself without clearing it first with me or Fizzbo. And don’t worry about waking me up. I’ll catch some Zs when we’re on the flight back to LA.”

The waiter returned to take our food orders and I requested two seafood platters that came with a wide variety of shellfish like shrimp, crab, lobster, scallops, you name it, plus coleslaw and French fries topped off the mounded plate. It was the most popular entree they served. I knew that from being here one other time and it was delicious. I hoped Mike was hungry because this was going to be a feast.

“As for how you found them this morning, it could be as simple as they rolled over and ended up like that,” I offered after the waiter left our table.

“I suppose, but it went deeper than that. They looked too comfortable together, like they slept like that all the time and that made me wonder just how often they were sleeping together—without me,” Mike added. “I mean, I don’t really know how often they see each other, but maybe they’ve been hooking up a lot and I’m more of a side piece or something. But as I watched them locked together for a bit, I just felt empty inside, and I realized that’s not what I want. It was enough to push me out of that bed. And you know what? I was able to shower and get dressed in the room with them, and then leave without either of them noticing.”

I found myself reaching across the table to squeeze Mike’s wrist. “You shouldn’t have to settle for being someone’s afterthought. You should be their only thought.”

“Jesus, Griff. Sometimes the things you say blow me away,” he said in a breathy tone. “And you’re right, I don’t want to be someone’s third—not when it isn’t even an equal third.”

“I’m not sure I could keep two partners satisfied,” I said. “I mean, doing two people on a random night is fun but as a long-term relationship? It sounds like it’d be a lot of extra work.”

“You’re probably right,” Mike said. “But I also haven’t exactly had a lot of relationships to base an opinion on it one way or the other. What about you? Have you ever had a long-term relationship with a woman or a man?”

Mike’s question left me feeling off balance but I was saved from answering when our waiter appeared and left our two heaping platters in front of us. There was enough food on this table now to choke us but I’d do my best to eat as much as possible.

“Damn, this looks great,” Mike said with a huge grin on his face. “Good choice in ordering these for us. ”

I chuckled at his excitement to dig in and readied myself to do the same. But somehow I knew Mike would circle back around to the unanswered question he’d asked before our waiter arrived.

“So, no relationship history to share with the class?” Mike asked in between bites of his lunch.

“It’s been a long time since I’ve had a girlfriend,” I admitted. “I just don’t have the time.”

“Ever dated a guy?” he continued.

“No.”

“Am I getting too personal for you, Griff?” he asked. “You’re looking a little tense over there.”

I shook my head as I sipped from my water glass. “Nope, I’m fine.”

“Why no guys on your dating list?” Mike asked.

“I don’t know,” I said honestly. “It’s never played out like that for me. Besides the few three-ways I already mentioned, being with a man hasn’t been something I pursued. Not sure why, but I guess the opportunities never presented themselves or I just wasn’t interested enough to go after it.”

“A gorgeous guy like you could easily have any man or woman he wanted,” Mike said and flashed that grin that made my chest feel warm inside.

“Perhaps, but like I said before, I don’t have the time,” I said.

I was being very truthful with him but I was also holding on tight to the biggest bit of honesty I had, which was the fact that if the situation were different I’d have no problem pursuing a long-term relationship with Mike. The endless hours we spent together and me still wanting more time was a good indication we had the necessary chemistry for something real. The fact I almost kissed him outside when I had him up against the wall, and the want I saw in his eyes told me he wanted me to—it also proved we had a fierce sexual chemistry, in addition to how we clicked as friends.

I closed my eyes for a moment and sighed as I thought about how scorching it would be if I allowed myself to get lost in him and let the intensity of our heat curl over us like a hot asphalt roller. If Mike thought he and his two partners last night almost lit the bed sheets on fire, I knew for a fact we’d turn a bed into a smoldering pile of ash. It would simply incinerate itself beneath our sweaty bodies and probably give us third-degree burns in the process. I wasn’t sure I was strong enough to go through the recovery process that came along with something that powerful and maybe Mike wasn’t either. Last thing I’d want to do was hurt him and what if my job took me in a direction other than shadowing Mike?

You’re already too attached to him and that’s a big fucking problem.

“Are you okay?” Mike asked me. “Your face suddenly went pale.”

“Yeah, I’m good,” I said and went on to put a significant dent into the heaping mound of seafood in front of me while Mike did the same.