SWNOVELS HUGE X4: Chapter 3
The sand is slightly cold against my feet where the heat left by the afternoon sun has cooled under the moon. Liam takes hold of my hand, leading me across the wide expanse of beach until we’re further from the hotel and closer to the sea. Callum walks beside me; close enough that I can smell his cologne and feel his presence almost as physically as if he was touching me. It’s a perfect balmy evening and I’m so grateful to be away from that stupid dance floor and the pressure to blend in. Even though I’ve only known these men for a few hours, I feel calm and peaceful.
We get to a spot that’s away from the spread of the hotel and they stop, dropping my shoes to the ground. Liam pulls out his phone and starts fiddling with it.
“What are you doing?” I ask, still puzzled by their sudden change of heart and the idea they seem so confident about.
“I’m looking for something. Have some patience, woman.”
In the moonlight as they stand side by side, they look gorgeously ruffled and so tall I have to crane my neck to see the top of them. Callum watches his brother, smiling to himself, and then Liam looks up with a triumphant grin.
It’s then that I realize why.
The song starts with a ridiculous scraping sound and then moves into a frantic synthesizer intro before Simon Le Bon belts out the first lines of Rio. Liam rests the phone down in one of my shoes and takes my hand, pulling me against him. I’m so shocked that I must feel like a plank of wood in his arms, but then as he sways us slowly back and forth, I start to melt. I don’t want to be the uptight person I seem to keep morphing into. A flash of memory spins itself into my consciousness; Kerry’s hair fanning out behind her and my arms in the air as we danced our hearts out all those years ago.
I’m buried against Liam’s chest, swamped by the size of him, but I feel bigger than I have in so long. The alcohol is warm in my stomach, licking inside me to soften my hard edges. We dance for a little while before I feel another hand at my waist. With perfect synchronicity, Liam releases me into Callum’s waiting arms. Physically they are the same arms but it feels different. Liam is light and humor and Callum is something a little darker and more daring. Either way, I’m having so much fun dancing with them that I smile against Callum’s shoulder, nuzzling against his solidness. Then he grabs one of my hands and spins me out like a professional. I’m a puppet in his control, twirling with my hair coming loose and the skirt of my silk tea dress flaring like a lily’s trumpet.
He doesn’t have perfect rhythm and being so big he’s a little heavy on his feet, but he smiles like he doesn’t have a care in the world, watching me do the very thing I had imagined the day I left Brad. A cool breeze drifts across the beach, picking up loose tendrils of my hair until they whip over my face and I love it. I love it all.
Then he lets go of my hand.
There’s a moment where I think that Liam is going to step in. Then, when I realize he’s not going to, another second where I want to stop. I hear Brad’s voice in my head telling me I can’t do it, that I have two left feet and I’ll embarrass myself. Then I see Callum and Liam with their heads tipped to the sky, dancing euphorically and I want that too.
I let myself go, raising my hands up like I used to, spinning with sand between my toes, swaying my hips, and starting to sing along.
I hear their voices join mine, perfectly out of tune and it’s amazing. When the song comes to an end I look over at them grinning at me and I burst out laughing.
“You’re something else, Bethany,” Liam says with pride in his voice.
“Yeah, baby,” Callum says in agreement, and I feel like I might burst with joy.
“You’re something else, too,” I say, instinctively taking their hands in mine and squeezing. There’s a flash of something in their eyes as I look at them; a dark look of longing that I feel reflected in my heart. Before I know what’s happening Liam has tugged me into a bear hug. I can’t understand how I can feel so utterly content in the arms of a practical stranger. Then I feel Callum behind me, putting his hand on my waist and stroking my hair.
I feel the press of a kiss to the top of my head from behind, and Liam whispers into my left ear. “You remember something, Bethany. People might tell you things about yourself, but you choose to believe them. You choose to let them change how you live your life. Anyone you meet who wants to change you is not someone you should be wasting time on, okay. You’re perfect just being you. Remember that, okay.”
Tears spring to my eyes and I squeeze him tightly with one arm, and cover Callum’s hand with my other, wanting to convey how much it means to me that they’re with me at this moment because I can’t make the words come out of my mouth.
Liam tips my face to look up at his. “You decide how you want to live your life and the people you spend your time with. You choose, okay?”
“Okay.”
He lets me go and I turn to Callum, who pulls me in for a hug too. “You know, I hate to say this, but my brother’s right.”
I hear a grumbling sound from behind me and laugh, and as I do, another little piece of me seems to fall into place. I’ve missed laughing so much. The genuine bubbling laughter that comes from a place rooted in your soul.
I sense them both turning to look back towards the hotel where two of the most important people in our lives have become a unit, and I feel as though they’re going to suggest that we go back to the reception, but I don’t want to. It’s already so late, and anyway, I’m confident Kerry won’t mind. She’s happiest when the people she loves are happy.
“I don’t want to go back yet,” I say quietly.
Callum doesn’t say anything but looks down at me with serious eyes. “What do you want to do then, Bethany?”
“Stay here, just us.”
He nods and I go to pull back. “And do what?”
I blush, thinking about what it must sound like to them. What am I asking for? To hang out on the beach with two men who I suspect aren’t strangers to sharing a girl. I feel hot between my legs thinking about what it would feel like to let them kiss me, to let them touch me in ways no one has since Brad. They’re so much bigger that I can’t help but imagine how far I would have to open my legs to wrap them around them. I think back to the picture Callum painted at the bar. One of them behind, one in front. What would that feel like to be so surrounded by big strong men? They wait for me to answer, but with all this sliding through my head like syrup, I just can’t find the words.
“You remember what I told you, Bethany, about deciding. If you want something in life, you’ve got to learn to ask for it. No more hanging back, letting other people be in control,” Liam says.
“I want to…” I trail off with so much heat in my cheeks it’s a wonder I haven’t fainted.
“Tell us what you want,” Callum says in the lowest, sexiest voice I have ever heard. “Because I think we might just give you anything.”
I turn to face the sea, and I feel their eyes on me, waiting. Hoping maybe. The weight of their words presses against my heart. I wonder when it was that my voice became so muted. When did it become okay for me to silence my own thoughts and feelings; my desires? When did I become ashamed of being the person that I am, enough that I’d conform to the version of me that someone else wanted?
For the first time in a long while, I don’t feel sad about it. I feel angry. Angry that I lost myself for so long, and desperate to find myself again. These two men have found a way to free just a little bit of me. The girl that once danced on a beach without a care in the world. I felt her again, that me from the past and it’s intoxicating. If I could just get back some more pieces, maybe the nagging emptiness I’ve been feeling so long will leave me for good.
I want that so badly that my heart hurts.
I take a few steps towards the sea and let the cool water slip between my toes. The sea whispers in front of me, stretched out like a never-ending pool of obsidian ink. Behind me stand two men who feel like the key to something. But do I have the courage to ask for what I want?
In a few days we’re all going to leave this place; me back home and the twins back to Dubai. This time is like an interlude in my real life. A flash of time that stands away from reality. I could spend the rest of my time here plodding along, feeling the same, or I could be brave, and see if I’m right. If Liam and Callum, these men who I’ve been told are the best friends my brother-in-law could ever hope to have, could bring back some of the old me.
I turn slowly and find them standing like mirror images, hands in pockets, heads cocked to opposite sides. “I want…you to kiss me,” I say, looking down so I don’t have to see their reaction.
A gust of wind tugs my skirt closer around my legs and I can hear the rustling of their feet on the sand. Fingers lift my chin, holding my face gently. It’s Callum and he smiles lazily as our eyes meet, leaning in to press his lips against mine. Our first kiss is so sweet, sweeter than I ever would have imagined Callum would be. It’s a simple and soft hello that swells my heart, and the way he holds me gently, his big hands resting on my upper arms, has me melting. He moves against me so softly that when he pulls away I lean forward, following his mouth as it retreats.
Callum steps aside and Liam steps in, slipping his hand into my hair and drawing me towards him. His lips are hungrier, maybe because he already watched his brother do this exact same thing only seconds earlier. I can taste the cocktail on his lips and the passion in his grasp and I put my hand on his neck, drawing him closer. Then he too pulls back.
“What?” I say, not understanding why he’s stopped in the middle of something so amazing. Wondering if this is how it’s going to be, passed back and forth between them.
“What else, Bethany?”
The question takes me by surprise. “What do you mean what else? Why did you stop?”
“What else do you want? We need you to tell us so that we know that you’re sure of everything. We want you to feel in control of what happens next. You get to choose, baby, just you.” Liam strokes his palm over my hair, pushing back the wispy bits that are tickling my cheeks, but I can’t look at him. I feel too raw, too seen, and it feels amazing and terrifying all in one big bundle.
How can a person go from being steered in life to taking the wheel? Brad had been emotionally manipulative, subtle in his cruelty, pick-pick-picking away until I looked down at myself and saw nothing but holes. It had been four months since I walked away, but the holes were still there, wind blowing through and taking my courage with it.
It seemed that Liam and Callum could see the holes too and that was mortifying. That they wanted to help me fill them in with myself again was too glorious to comprehend. Dean had said his best men were the truest friends anyone could ever have and I thought he was waxing lyrical. Now I see exactly what my brother-in-law was talking about.
“Bethany…” Callum says, caressing my cheeks. “If you can’t tell us, show us, baby. Show us what you need and we’ll give it to you. We’ll give it all to you.”
My breath catches in my throat and a tear slips past my restraint. Before I have a chance to swipe it away, Callum kisses me where it fell. It’s that simple gesture that gives me resolve. “I want you,” I say, taking each of their hands in mine. “I want everything.”
Liam strokes my hair gently, as though I’m something precious and fragile, and then he says, “Then that’s exactly what we’ll give you.”