Nanny for the Army Rangers by Krista Wolf

 

Twenty-Five

 

 

DELILAH

So far my ‘surprise’ had included a large cardboard tub of extra-butter popcorn, two bottles of wine, and a fistful of Galaxy bars all handed to me by Liam. I’d also been presented with a gloriously large, unimaginably soft throw blanket made of genuine cashmere, which I absolutely adored.

“This is really mine?” I gasped.

“Of course,” said Julius.

“But it must’ve cost a fortune!”

The two men looked at each other and shook their heads. “Not where we picked it up.”

I was on the couch, in my ‘comfy clothes’ as instructed. I had my tired legs tucked up beneath me. I was sitting on my feet.

“And now,” said Liam, “the grand finale.”

He reached behind his back and pulled out something small and rectangular and very familiar to me, only not too recently.

“A DVD?” I squinted. “You rented a DVD?”

“Of course not!” Liam exclaimed. “No one rents DVDs anymore, they buy them. And this isn’t a DVD, it’s a Blu-Ray copy.”

“A copy of what?” I asked.

“Only the best Schwarzenegger movie you’ve never laid eyes on,” he said proudly. “Predator!”

Liam’s expression went from excited to crestfallen as I curled my knees into my chest and giggled. It wasn’t the reaction he was going for.

“What?” he complained. “Not a good surprise?”

“I guess so,” I shrugged. “I mean it’s cool and all, but wouldn’t it be easier to just stream it from Amazon?”

“Stream it from Amazon?” Liam gasped. He looked to Julius with a horrified expression. The other ranger only crossed his arms and shook his head.

“This is Blue-Ray,” he swore reverently. “The picture and sound are ten times sharper and better than anything we might—”

“Okay, okay,” I laughed. “Predator on Blue-Ray. With popcorn and candy and wine, plus a luxurious cashmere blanket from parts unknown.”

And two seriously hot guys in loose-fitting shorts and tight-fitting T-shirts.

“Alright, I’m sold!” I smiled back at them. Reaching down, I threw open my blanket and patted the couch cushions on either side of me. “Let’s do this.”

I was wearing a pair of cozy sweatpants that I’d cut the legs out of long ago. I’d cut them very high on the hip too, so they showed off an awful lot of thigh. I’d told myself I wore them to be comfortable but it occurred to me that my subconscious might have ulterior motives.

Likewise, the guys were similarly dressed to impress. Liam wore the kind of sleeveless black T-shirt where the arms were cut low on the sides. It showed off his incredible back and muscle-stacked ribcage as well as his powerful arms, while Julius had a threadbare shirt with so many holes in it I could count every one of his scrumptious abs.

None of this mattered so much a minute later, as they climbed beneath the blanket with me. The movie began playing the dreaded FBI warning. Dramatic music began playing as an alien spacecraft swooshed past, against the backdrop of outer space.

I snuggled in, munching on popcorn and trying to focus on the movie. For the first half-hour it wasn’t easy. With all the delicious exposed skin on either side of me I couldn’t help but steal glances whenever the blanket rode up. And there was another problem. A bigger one, that split my concentration even further:

Duncan.

God, I couldn’t get last night out of my mind! The whole thing had been so incredibly hot, so totally unlike anything I’d done before that it consumed just about every idle thought I had. I wished he hadn’t gone away so quickly. It made it difficult to gauge where he stood, and whether or not—

“Watch this,” Liam said, tapping me on the thigh beneath the blanket. His warm, calloused palm sent an instant shiver up my leg. “You’re gonna like this part.”

On screen, Arnold Schwarzenegger had finally finished plowing through the jungle with a giant machine gun. He threw a ridiculously giant knife hard enough to pin someone to a nearby pole, then uttered the phrase: ‘Stick around.’

“Ha ha,” I smiled, licking the butter from my fingers again. “Very cute.”

“Told you this is his best movie,” Liam winked.

It occurred to me all of a sudden that Arnold was running an independent mercenary group, maybe even similar to the one the guys had. I wondered if that’s why they liked this movie so much. It continued on, with the group getting hunted down and killed one by one, as the mysterious alien Predator picked them off.

Over the course of the movie things progressed under the blankets as well. To my surprise and delight, the guys weren’t shy about a little skin on skin. Although the blanket was big, we had to huddle together to share it. That meant Liam pressing against me on the left-hand side, and Julius scooting closer on the right.

At one point I’d turned sort of sideways, with my head against Julius’s shoulder. One of my legs accidentally hooked over Liam’s thigh, and when he didn’t protest I left it there.

This is nice.

It had been a long time since I’d Netflix’d and chilled. The softness of the cashmere blanket felt amazing all over, but it was the warmth and physical closeness of their strong, masculine bodies that reminded me just how much fun it could be to curl up on the couch with people you cared about.

I drank two glasses of wine, then politely refused a third. Somewhere between Liam lifting the glass from me and setting it down on the coffee table, Julius’s hand somehow found mine. Our fingers interlaced, and he squeezed me firmly. He was still staring at the screen though. As far as I knew, it was a friendly gesture.

Then Liam’s hand squeezed my thigh… and I groaned as a wave of pleasure stole over me.

“Don’t tease me,” I sighed.

“Feels good?”

“You have no idea,” I purred contentedly. “I’ve been walking all day.”

He continued without stopping, and I had to stifle my moans. His fingertips were like magic. Every muscle he touched responded immediately, then seemed to relax under his touch.

“Did you hear that man?” Liam murmured to Julius. “Her legs hurt.”

The shaggy-haired ranger said nothing as his hand left mine. A second later it joined in with Liam’s, gently flexing and releasing as it began working through the knots on my other leg.

Holy fuck.

I said nothing as their hands moved upward, working the tension out of my quadriceps. They worked the outsides first before moving to the inside, somehow without even communicating with each other.

My respiration increased, as I shifted my body backward and into the cushions. The movie became secondary. All I could think about was the two strong arms draped over my legs. The two warm hands gently kneading the muscles of my inner thighs as I reflexively spread them almost obscenely wide.

My eyes fluttered closed. My head lolled back slowly, as I sucked in my next breath through clenched teeth.

What are you going to do? I thought dreamily. How far are you willing—

There was a shifting on my left, and all of a sudden there was hot breath on my neck. A pair of sexy lips dropped downward to graze my skin, kissing me softly then wetly, causing the right side of my body to tingle all over.

Oh my GOD…

At the same time, a slow, deliberate finger tantalizingly brushed my sex.

It all happened wordlessly, innocuously, as the movie played on. Liam kept chewing my neck as Julius’s hand had worked itself through the open leg of my shorts and over my panty-covered slit. He was applying pressure there now, rubbing against my growing wetness as all three of us pretended to still be watching the movie.

Finally, a gentle hand turned my face in the direction of Liam’s lips. My half-lidded eyes found his, and I noticed they reflected my own irrepressible lust.

“You talked to Duncan,” I whispered. “Didn’t you?”

The fingers working between my legs pushed the slick lace fabric aside. I sighed as one of them sank into me, plunging all the way to the third knuckle.

“He must’ve told you we—”

Another finger slid upward, just between where our lips were about to touch. It pressed against mine in a universal shushing motion, as Liam’s mouth curled into a smile.

“Delilah?”

His breath was hot, his mouth so sweet I wanted nothing else but to drink from it. Down below, Julius was fingering me so beautifully I could barely keep my eyes uncrossed.

“Y-Yes?” I breathed.

“Now’s the part where you stop talking.”