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Dean pushed me against the wall, his lips crashing against mine moments later. His kiss burned through me just as hot as Carl's had been. I pressed my body against his, urging him on as his hand grazed across my stomach, the heat clear even through my clothing.
We broke apart a moment later, both of us gasping for breath.
He trailed a finger down my cheek, his eyes meeting mine. They were filled with something I wasn't sure I could put a name to. No. It wasn't that I couldn't. It was that I didn't want to. If I did, it could lead down a dangerous path I wasn't sure I was ready for, especially with Carl's earlier kiss.
"Carl..." I whispered, lifting my fingers and touching my lips softly. I'd well and truly fucked this up.
"That's Dean in front of you."
My head swivelled to the side at the sound of Carl's voice. At least he sounded bemused and not angry with me.
"I'm sorry, I'm not normally like this." The words came out softer than I expected them to, with an edge of guilt to them.
"You don't normally kiss people you're attracted to?" Samuel leaned against the wall, his white suit looking surprisingly good. It really shouldn't have.
"Well yes, but..."
"So you regret kissing Carl and Dean?"
"No," I answered instantly and without realising it. "I mean..."
"What's tripping you up, Katie?" Dean's voice whispered against my skin, sending shivers through me. It was only then that I realised I didn't feel at all uncomfortable having these conversations while I was caged in his arms.
"Is it that there's three of us?" Carl asked.
"I haven't kissed Samuel," I responded instantly.
"Should I be insulted?" The man in question pouted. Hopefully, he wasn't being too serious about it.
"No!" I protested. "It's not that I don't want to..."
"So you do want to kiss us all?" Carl raised an eyebrow.
I pushed out of Dean's arms and began to pace back and forth, my heels clicking against the floor and my dress swishing behind me.
"Katie..."
"Just give me a moment," I cut them off, not caring or even fully registering which one of them I'd stopped from speaking. "I'm not sure how I feel about any of this." And I knew this wasn't really the right place for us to be having this conversation. But it was too late for us to put the cat back in the bag. We were talking about it now and I had to get with the program, at least a little bit.
"We're all as surprised as you," Carl responded. "We promised we wouldn't be anything more than your friend..."
"So? What happened?" I looked at each of them in turn. Not that I expected them to give me an answer. Not when I didn't have one myself.
"We saw you in action and each of us started to take a liking to you. We didn't even realise until the other night when we talked about it," Dean admitted.
"And instead of talking to me about it, you decided to just wait until tonight and just kiss me at random?" My voice squeaked more than I intended to.
"It didn't exactly go to plan," Carl mumbled. "I wasn't meant to kiss you."
"And I wasn't meant to get jealous," Dean added.
"Am I really the only one who managed to keep to what I was supposed to do?" Samuel smirked, clearly showing that there were no hard feelings despite the other two breaking their apparent rules.
"And what am I supposed to even do with this?" I wanted to throw my hands up and surrender to whatever insane thing they were trying to hint at. If they were trying to hint at anything. Maybe I was misunderstanding what they were going on about.
"You can do whatever you want with it," Dean answered within seconds. "Even if that means we never see you again."
"That would be difficult considering we're in the middle of a job." I crossed my arms.
Dean stepped backwards, leaving me suddenly feeling very alone in front of them all.
"If it's what you want, we'll respect that." Carl nodded as he spoke, but didn't move other than that. It was actually starting to be a little disconcerting how still they were being.
"Of course, we hope you will stay." Samuel's eyes bored into me and I swallowed loudly.
"And if I stay?" I whispered.
"Then you still have a choice to make, but that choice is completely up to you," Dean said.
"Between you?"
"You can have none, one, or all," Carl supplied, looking at the other two men who gave their acknowledgement.
"But not two?" I asked despite myself.
Dean chuckled.
"I see I'm missing out again," Samuel quipped, the twinkle in his eye reassuring me he wasn't hurt by what I'd said.
"I just want to be sure I have complete choice," I responded.
"Yes, you have the complete choice between one and three," Carl reassured me.
"And how long will you give me to decide?" I looked between them, wondering which of them was going to crack first and tell me. I was only messing with them, but it was kind of fun to do that.
"How long do you need?" Samuel asked, his voice serious for once.
"To know that I'm staying as part of the team with the three of you? No time at all."
They all stared at me, expectation in their eyes.
"I'm not going to abandon working with you. Especially not in the middle of a job," I reassured them. "I need a little longer on the kissing front though." I thought I knew where I wanted that aspect to go, but I was somewhat reluctant to commit to it while under as much pressure as I was. It wasn't that they were making me feel like I needed to choose straight away either. More that my heart, and certain other parts of me, wanted to jump on their offer right this second, while the rest of me preferred to take the time to think about it. Matters of the heart should never be treated lightly. Especially when there was a slightly unconventional aspect about them.
Each of them relaxed their shoulders as the words sunk in. They'd actually been worried about the whole thing, which was both adorable and reassuring at the same time.
"Shall we get back to the more important task for the evening?" I asked them. We'd come here for a reason and I didn't want to be the reason we didn't get the mark we wanted after we were finished with Earl Andrew.
"You are important," Dean protested.
"I never said I wasn't. But we don't have the time for that right now. Let's focus on warming up the last mark." At least I assumed there was only one more for me to deal with, it seemed too risky to introduce me to yet more people. Maybe in the future, but not now.
"That'd be with me." Samuel held up his hand.
"I guessed. What have you got for me?"
The three of them exchanged glances. Whatever they said next, I was almost certain I wasn't going to like it.
"I need you to pretend to be a high priced call girl called Ines." Samuel shuffled from side to side, clearly not entirely comfortable with the situation.
I choked on my laughter. "So you don't just look like a pimp..."
"Yes, I'm acting the pimp too," he admitted sheepishly. "We're not going to expect you to actually sleep with someone," he started.
"I guessed. I take it this is a quick scam?"
"Not as quick as you think. It's actually one of our most successful plays," Dean assured me. "But still no sex. Not even any dating, really."
"Huh." I wanted to know more but knew it was probably a better idea to keep quiet for now. They'd tell me what I needed to know when I needed to know it, and I had to trust them about that. "Alright, let's get going."
I didn't wait for Samuel to respond and walked right up to him, hooking his arm with mine. We had another mark to secure, then we could go home and relax for a bit before our current job needed our attention.