Mistletoe Menage by Molly Ann Wishlade

and turned to him, his eyes filled with fire. “How would you know?
You’ve been with her on but a few occasions, you fool.”
    “Edward, please. There is no need
for anger. I love you…I want to understand.”
    “Guy, she took my heart when I
was but a young man and she made me love her. Then I returned to my family home
to seek approval for our marriage. I actually asked my father for his blessing,
even though it tore me apart to do it because I knew what a scoundrel he was
and how it would delight him to deny me what I wanted most in all the world. Even after I put myself through all of that
and she knew how hard it would be for me, I returned to find that the bitch had
married another man she barely knew. So you see, you don’t know her at all, Guy. Not at all!”
    Edward sank onto the bed and Guy
stared at his quivering shoulders. He had seen Edward angry before, seen him
sad, but not consumed by sorrow. Edward had really loved Anne Blackburn and she
had hurt him. But Guy found it hard to marry the idea of her as a cold
heartbreaker with the woman he had spent time with. Surely, there must be an
explanation for what had happened.
    As he pulled Edward back onto the
coverlet, then straddled him upside-down so that his face was above Edward’s
cock and his own shaft was free for Edward to suck, he determined to find out
Anne’s version of events. For if he could save Edward from such bitterness and
the darkness that would surely engulf him if he didn’t escape it, as well as
rescue sweet, curvaceous Anne from a public scandal, then he would do so. Guy knew what it was to be low, to be hurt both physically and
emotionally, and it was a fate he would not wish upon a dog, let alone the man
he loved and the woman he could not stop thinking about.

 
    Chapter Five
     
    The weeks leading up to Christmas
passed in a blur as Anne eagerly awaited Guy’s visits. The initial fears she’d
nursed about him being interested in her only as a source of income, as a
business opportunity, diminished each time he took her into his arms and kissed
her or lavished her needy body with affection. It was, she realized, as if she’d
been damaged, broken by her past, and Guy had the power to heal her and bring
her back to life.
    Each visit progressed much the
same way as the first one. Guy would sketch Anne while she was fully clothed,
then they’d move on to more intimate poses before allowing their mutual passion
to take over. But what Anne enjoyed even more than the physical element of
their relationship was the time they spent together talking. Guy had so many
stories to share and he made her laugh and cry with the tales he told.
    The saddest story he had shared
was the one about his own past. He had been reluctant to divulge details about
his youth at first but Anne had held his head to her breast and encouraged him
with soothing words and caresses, and he had soon surrendered and told her of
his youth.
    She played his words through her
head now as she lounged in her bath of fragrant water in front of the fireplace
in her bedroom.
    “I was a stowaway, Anne.”
    “You were?”
    He had nodded his head then
nuzzled into her breast as if afraid that his confession would repel her. All
it did was make her fonder of him.
    “Indeed. I had a dreadful
childhood. My father died when I was very young so my mother married again. We
lived in the outskirts of London in a small house, all squashed together. It
was unbearable because my stepfather resented my four brothers and me. We were
reminders of my mother’s life before his arrival.”
    Anne had stroked Guy’s blonde
hair gently. “I know it can be difficult for a man to accept such things but to
punish her children is abhorrent.”
    Guy had shivered. “Punish us he
did. Especially when my mother lost his child a few months
into her pregnancy. He blamed us for it, especially me because I was the
eldest and he said I was worrisome for her and that I was a selfish,