Three Hearts Beat as One (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting)

Three Hearts Beat as One

In Hell’s Delight at a Valentine’s Day charity auction, newly divorced Lacey Dvorak is won by two smoking hot—but unfortunately gay—merchants. She is pleasantly shocked to discover the bidding is no empty gesture. The men have been looking for a third woman to complete their union.

Rancher Devin Jonas and sex toy shop owner Chase Moran want Lacey in their bed to initiate her in the intricacies of their BDSM power plays. And Chase has an entire store full of toys they can play with—if they can learn to share. Testing each other’s limits and boundaries, each one wants the upper hand.

But when Lacey’s cheating ex gets wind of the new lovers’ arrangement, his wounded pride leads him to a hateful campaign of vengeance against Chase’s store, and the sleazy mayor uses his leverage to get his heart’s desire Devin to do his bidding.

Don’t they know? Cheaters never win, at least not in Hell’s Delight.

Genre:
BDSM, Ménage a Trois/Quatre, Western/Cowboys

Length:
51,276 words
 

Karen Mercury

MENAGE EVERLASTING

Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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IMPRINT: Ménage Everlasting

THREE HEARTS BEAT AS ONE

Copyright © 2013 by Karen Mercury

E-book ISBN: 978-1-62242-514-3

First E-book Publication: March 2013

Cover design by Les Byerley

All art and logo copyright © 2013 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

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Siren Publishing, Inc.

www.SirenPublishing.com

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Three Hearts Beat as One
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THREE HEARTS BEAT AS ONE

KAREN MERCURY

Copyright © 2013

Hell’s Delight, California

This was painfully agonizing. And Ben knew it. In fact, he was taking glee in it.

Why else would he come into Lacey’s hardware store pretending to look for duct tape? He could have purchased that at any grocery store. Same thing with the flashlight. He didn’t need to come into Delight Hardware pretending he needed a flashlight to keep in his car. Something was up. He must have another message to impart. Lacey knew Ben well enough by now, unfortunately.

True, the yogurt shop his father had set him up in was two blocks away down Jack London Street. Ben fancied himself a big fish in a little pond in their small town, and he liked to walk the downtown area waving to merchants, priding himself on the fact that he knew everyone.

That was how Lacey had met Ben, at one of the downtown merchants association meetings. Now that they were divorced, she was stuck seeing his face nearly every day. She had taken to looking both ways up and down the street before leaving the hardware store to make sure he wasn’t lurking. And he lurked a lot. The bar, the vitamin store, even the sex toy shop called Positive Vibrations. Yes, she’d seen Ben furtively—
or wait, perhaps not so furtively
—walking proud and tall from the vibrator store with a package under his arm. And that had been only a week after she’d moved out of the house they’d shared. Ben sure was a fast operator.

That was six months ago. Their divorce had been finalized a couple days ago, probably the reason for Ben’s visit, but it still stung. One didn’t just fall out of love overnight, even if the husband was a lame-ass douche bag.

She said feebly, “A flashlight, eh?” What else could she say? She wanted to get to the bottom of this, the
real
reason he was in her store. She knew it had to be something lowdown and hurtful.

“Yeah, you know,” Ben said conversationally, “I should really pick up a fan, too. This past week has been hot as a pistol out.” He began to strip off his light windbreaker, even though Lacey had the air conditioner on. Placing the jacket on the counter, he began fumbling with his wallet to pay her for the tape and flashlight. What was he trying to show her? That he’d been working out lifting weights, and was a new and improved man since she’d left? She doubted he was trying to win her back, so making her jealous was the only possible answer.

Apparently his wallet had been filled with glue, for it seemed impossible to take two twenties out. Ben shook the wallet and even held it upside down. Predictably, a big fistful of crap men keep in their wallets fanned out across Lacey’s counter, and it was up to her to pluck two bills from the pile of receipts, business cards, and a photo of a chirpy and fresh blonde bimbo in three-quarter profile.

A blonde bimbo
. Lacey felt as though a giant hand was squeezing her guts. Of course she didn’t touch the photo and even recoiled back from it, but Ben studied her with delight. His stupid fucking square head had never looked squarer, and Lacey could have sworn his forehead was getting smaller. He had the smallest forehead in the world, with his enormously thick hair starting two inches from his eyebrow. Goddamn Cro-Magnon man.

“Oh, gosh, sorry about that,” Ben said cheerfully. He could’ve said
nothing
about the picture, but
no
, he had to draw even more attention to it, as though it was killing Lacey to see it. “Didn’t mean to drop that out of my wallet.”

I will not react. I will not react.
Reacting would only give him satisfaction. “Whatever,” she said, and somehow that didn’t feel terribly satisfying either. She put his change on the counter and shoved it at him.

“Ben,” acknowledged Lacey’s stepbrother Calvin, scooting by on his squeaky high-topped sneakers. Of course, being Lacey’s stepbrother, Calvin was bitterly enraged with Ben for his lowbrow treatment of his stepsister. But he was a businessman, and needed to remain civil. “New tattoo?” he said absentmindedly.

Lacey could tell Cal was just trying to make lame conversation but it was exactly the opening Ben had been looking for, unfortunately. “Oh, yeah, my new tattoo!” he cried, as though that hadn’t been the reason he’d stripped off his jacket. He wanted Lacey to know he wasn’t pining around crying into his beer, that was for sure. He wanted to beat her over the head with how excellently his life had been going since Lacey had finally gotten fed up with him six months ago and had walked out.

No, Ben’s life was going so splendidly, in fact, he had found the time and enthusiasm to tattoo “I
Heart
Brittney” on his bicep.

Dear Lord
. Could things get any more stupid, painful, or just downright
mean
?

Lacey’s knees turned to liquid and she needed to sit on the stool. Ben gleamed proudly, of course. Lacey was sure it was obvious to everyone present that the photo and the tattoo had gotten to her. Cal had stepped right into Ben’s plot by mentioning the tattoo. Ben gloated. “Yeah, could use some polishing up, make it look more 3D, but I think the artist did a good job with the graphics, don’t you think?”

Apparently Cal couldn’t maintain civility now. He made a lip fart. “All right. You’ve got your damned duct tape. Lacey, don’t you have to go get ready for that date? I’ll cover for you. My dad will be in at seven.”

Lacey had never been more grateful to anyone in her life. “That’s right, I’d better shower,” she managed to say. She didn’t cast her ex-husband a single glance as she made her way out from behind the counter on rubbery legs.

I heart Brittney, my ass. He didn’t just meet that bimbo recently. You don’t just meet someone and suddenly tattoo their name on your arm.

You also didn’t suddenly start carrying someone’s photo in your wallet. No, he’d known Brittney way before Lacey had gotten up the gumption to walk out—to walk out on her house and she man she’d loved intensely for four years.

“Hey,” called Ben while she attempted to navigate around a display of cooking pans. “Are you still going to that London Street Valentine’s party?”

“Of course I am,” Lacey snapped, and the moron was out of her sight for good. For today, anyway. Who knew when she’d run into him again, what plot he’d invent to insinuate himself in her path. Ben’s ego simply could not take the fact that
she
had walked out on
him
. It was now imperative that he show the world, and mostly her, what a superior, successful, uncaring fellow he was. He needed to show he wasn’t affected that the wife he’d professed to love had walked out on him.

It had been the hardest thing Lacey had ever done. She had still loved Ben painfully the day she’d forced herself to walk out. The thing was, she knew he’d never change. One didn’t just stop loving someone because they stayed out all night long without calling. Love didn’t just vanish because a man couldn’t seem to remember what a cell phone was for. Lacey had never been able to fathom what sort of excitement lay in partying with his friends until four in the morning. She tried to do it herself a few times to retaliate and discover the joy in it, but she’d only been an exhausted basket case the next day. She had no interest in it.