Yes, Masters (Book 2 of Desire's Den)

Chapter 46 - Emma

"So..." I said, awkwardly breaking up the tension building between us. "Kevin's got his attention elsewhere, and he'd never fault me for dividing my attention either. He's only ever wanted the best for me, and as it turned out, the best was you guys."

Aaaand, the tension was back. Whoops.

"Was?" Mateo muttered, and I had a feeling he was voicing what the other two were thinking, given how Callan's and Gideon's stare intensified at his question.

I shifted in my seat, uncomfortable talking about my feelings with all their attention directed at me.

"Is," I corrected, my voice small and insecure. There was just something about admitting to your deepest feelings to others that left you feeling bare and fragile. "You guys are what's best for me." Because weren't they? If we put aside the incident of them withholding information from me, they'd singlehandedly managed to make me more comfortable in my own body, made me try new things, made me less anxious and more relaxed, they'd gotten me out of my monotone routine of a life and made me experience what it was like to live.

Happy. They had made me happy.

Finding life exciting was rare for an overthinker, and true happiness was even more so.

Mateo gave me the brightest smile, and it made me realize that I hadn't seen his dimples in far too long. This was the kind of smile you'd fall into and become addicted of; a smile that when you saw it after being without it for so long, you felt like your heart bled just a little because you had missed it more than you could've guessed.

While Callan he didn't smile like Mateo, there was an openness to his expression that showed just how much he'd hid himself from me while...Well, I guess while he didn't know where we stood. The blankness and muted feelings were gone. Now, now I saw both relief and happiness in his green eyes that almost had me want to promise him the moon so his eyes could keep shining.

And for once, Gideon's hands weren't in a fist, and his jaw weren't clenched. The ever so present anger was...gone. His face was all smoothed out; no tightness to be seen. His eyes—his dark, dark eyes—emitted the first light I had ever seen from him, and at this moment, his eyes didn't appear all that dark; more amber than black. They reminded me of fall, and I dearly loved fall.

Their reaction made me understand that these last weeks hadn't only been hard for me, but for them too. I guess I hadn't noticed that us breaking off whatever we had, hadn't only impacted me. Truthfully, no matter how much they'd tried to be open about their feelings towards me, and how they wanted me back, I'd been too insecure to believe they actually did want me—not just as a submissive, but as something more. But this, their expressions, and reactions, it was the validation I needed to know that my feelings weren't one-sided.

It hadn't been just words they'd told me.

They really did care about me.

Somehow, that realization hit me right in the chest, giving my heart a beat that was both old and new, both lighter and livelier than before, but faster too.

This was getting too real, too quickly. And from what I'd learned about myself since he entered my life, whenever I was afraid, I ran instead of staying and fight. And right now, I was afraid of having my feelings reciprocated. It was strange—stupid really, that that was something I was afraid of, but yet, there it was.

I'd never been in a real relationship with someone, and I'd definitely not been in love, and suddenly, possibly, having to face those two things was...frightening.

X weeks ago (How many weeks ago did they break up?), I'd found myself falling for three men. But instead of them breaking my fall and becoming my haven, I had crashed and burned.