“Let me do this first,” he said. “Then we’ll check on your finger. If it’s stopped bleeding and you’re feeling fine then no problem. Okay?”
Eventually she nodded.
“Good.”
Normally, Violet would have enjoyed the sight of two pretty men stretching and straining, with muscles flexing. But these were two of her bosses. Seeing them in any sort of appreciative sexual light was bad-girl behavior. Still, the big old leather lounge had to weigh a ton. Alex and Duncan grunted and heaved and maneuvered it along the hallway then down a set of stairs into the basement.
“Shit,” Alex panted. “Vi, can you please get the doors open?”
“Umm…” She hesitated, standing behind them and their load. There wasn’t a lot of clearance room between the men, the lounge and the wall.
“Move over a bit,” Alex said. “Give her some space.”
They did so. Damn it. Her hefty hips weren’t going to squeeze through easily. This wouldn’t be pretty.
“Come on,” said Alex.
“Right.” She pressed herself against the wall and did her best to slide herself along. Her boobs stuck out and her butt caught on stuff but she managed to reach the far end. Finally. Without meeting Alex’s gaze.
The storeroom had two big old wooden doors with a barrel bolt up top and another down the bottom. It took some serious wriggling to get those bastards unlocked. Dust and stale air greeted her as she pushed the doors open and got out of the guys’ way.
“Light, please.” Alex nodded to a cord hanging down from an old-style lighting fixture in the middle of the room. She tugged on the string and the place lit up.
The middle of the space was empty, but the rest was cluttered with junk. There were some other chairs and a line of shelving with bottles lined up neatly. Some old signage leaned against one wall. How fascinating. The Southern Cross Pub had to be almost a century old and this collection reflected that. Towers of boxes stood stacked in the corner along with a collection of dusty old paintings. Gorgeous old painted velvet pictures from the sixties of buxom girls in bikinis.
With a groan, Duncan lowered his end of the lounge and Alex carefully followed suit. The musculature in his arms moved in enticing ways. What she wouldn’t give to trace it with her tongue. Her * squeezed tight, sadly empty. Honestly, girl bits shouldn’t clench. It had to be bad for her health on some level. Looking at the bikini babes was much safer.
“These are great,” she said.
“Hmm?” Alex came up behind her, still breathing heavy from lugging the lounge about. “Huh. I haven’t seen those in years. Mum was mad about Elvis. She loved Blue Hawaii. Everything was coconut shells and leis for a while there.”
“Sounds cool.”
“It was interesting. Dad did his best to ignore it. He was more a footie and pie and peas kind of man.”
Beneath her silk dress, the skin on her back prickled in awareness. She couldn’t think straight with him that close. Her mind had officially checked out for the evening. She had nothing. “Yeah?”
“Yeah,” he said, and she could hear the smile in his voice at the memory. Marie had told her their parents had passed away a while back. What good people they’d been. Vi’s heart ached for him.
“How’s your hand?” he asked.
“Oh, it’s fine.”
Which was when she heard the scrape of the bottom of the door across the floor. Next came the noise of bolts being jammed back into their locks, first the top and then the bottom. She spun around, as did Alex. The doors were indeed closed. They were locked in.
“Duncan!” he yelled, running to the door and banging on it with both fists. “Open up! Duncan! God damn it, this is not funny!”
There was no reply.
Of course there was no reply. It’s not like locking them in could have been an accident.
The doors didn’t open, no matter how hard Alex pounded on them. And he did. But with the music still pumping above, no one would have heard him. Apparently this didn’t bother Alex, because he went on and on, trying to break the doors off their hinges. There seemed little point in joining in, the man ranted and raved enough for both of them.
She sat herself down on the lounge, bemused or bewildered. It was hard to tell which. For certain, she’d been involved in some nonsense in her time, but this felt like pure high school tomfoolery.
Alex just carried on.
Eventually, he stopped. His hands hung clenched at his sides and the veins in his arms stood out in stark relief. The muscles in his neck seemed to have thickened in rage. And yes, she was angry too, but did he have to mind quite so much? A stupid thought, but it was there nonetheless.
“Are you all right?” she asked politely.
He grunted some sort of reply.
Fine, if that’s the way he wanted to play it. No problemo. The music from the bar thudded through the floor, the noise muffled, as though they were listening to it underwater. She smoothed out the skirt of her dress and crossed her ankles.
Breathed.
Waited.
Alex kept his back firmly to her. God, he was behaving like a jerk. Why did she always sleep with the jerks? Why? She really needed to know.
He didn’t move, didn’t make a sound. Conversation was overrated, anyway. Pity she couldn’t keep herself quiet. Nervy situations did that to her.
“So, your brother locked us in here together,” she said, stating the obvious.
“So it would seem,” he ground out. The man turned, fisted hands propped on his hips and face starkly furious.
“Do you and your siblings normally get up to these sorts of hijinks?”
He gave her an even frownier face. It only spurred her on.
“You know, like locking people in a room together?” she asked. “Drawing up breast size flow charts? Those sorts of things?”
Alex wandered over, arms crossed. “What, like taking advantage of your inebriated boss? Demanding he jerk off in front of you? Those sorts of things? That what you mean, Vi?”