Archive of Our Own ^beta

To Jack's credit, the suit he wore to the PTMC Spring Gala that looked like it belonged on an investment banker also looked like it was bought with an investment banker's salary. (Jack did not spend money — except when he very much did.) But it was, indeed, just a nice charcoal sweater under a black suit. However, the man looked damn good, which was kind of annoying. Even more annoying was that he wouldn't dance.

Of course, it's not like it was a real possibility. It wasn't smart to be seen publicly in the arms of either of his lovers, since both relationships were walking HR violations. Samira decided to remedy that by cutting out the middle man and asking Dennis Whitaker to dance with her. As it happened, she also had a plan.

(Okay, it wasn't so much a plan as an observation: when she found the two of them huddled in the corner of the ballroom and did a twirl in her sunflower-yellow dress, Whitaker looked almost as interested as Jack did. Since then, he kept stealing glances at her legs. She was in turn stealing glances at the way his slate gray suit sat on his hips, how it made him move differently.)

Jack had assured her that the guy was actually pretty assertive when he wasn't the least experienced person in the room, and sometimes even when he was. She'd been seeing that more and more. He was reserved — not prone to chatter for no reason or randomly inject levity into any situation — but he was friendly and warm and fairly open when he had a reason to speak or interact. She was beginning to see why Jack was kind of captivated.

Tonight, he'd taken more care than usual with his hair, making those dark blond locks kind of dashingly messy. He was keeping the cut a little longer lately, and it suited him. The shirt under the jacket was pale green, and that also suited him. 

Robby eventually dragged Jack away for some actual schmoozing, which left Whitaker alone. He'd wandered over to where she and Trinity were sitting demurely in chairs and making decidedly less demure catty remarks about everybody in the room, but he looked unhappy to be there as well. Far be it for her to criticize anyone for being too serious or prone to disappearing into their own head, but Whitaker should not be this forlorn right now.

So she said, "Come dance with me."

He gave her a sort of skeptical, considering face, but she could tell he was also trying not to blatantly stare at her, because of either the good beat she'd given her face or the fact that he probably hadn't seen her curls loose like this before. He was kind of awkwardly not looking at anything below the neck. 

"I don't bite," she said. "Usually. Although I'm open to requests."

It was a gamble. It was cheeky in a way meant to put him at ease — Whitaker generally handled flirtation like Robby did, that is to say, sheepishly but very obviously pleased to receive it — but the particular comment could also make him think a little too hard about how often he'd found bruises on Jack's chest or stomach, bruises that he hadn't made. (He'd left a mark once on the man's inner thigh. Could Samira be blamed if she needed to fit her mouth over that very spot and push just hard enough with her tongue to make Jack groan?)

"I'm not a very good dancer," he said with a frown.

"Me either," she said. "Which is why I picked a slow dance."

She held out her hand, and for some reason, he took it.

*

Whitaker was indeed not a dancer, but he had two things going for him: he had a pretty decent sense of rhythm and his feet were not especially clumsy. 

He also apparently knew just enough to take hold of her and lead.

"Did you help him get ready?" she asked.

She had been at work. Whitaker had arrived with Jack, and the two had been, if she were to guess, fooling around all afternoon. The man had that glow about him — Whitaker, too, once she knew what she was looking at. But the dead giveaway was that Jack's hair looked like someone else had settled those curls into place.

"He's a grown man," he said with an eyeroll.

"With a freshly shaved face and new shoes."

"If I dressed him, he wouldn't look like he was going to an expensive funeral."

"He looks hot," she said. "So do you."

"Thanks, I guess?" he replied, looking bewildered and cautious and maybe a little proud — all at once, somehow. 

She said, "Do you think we're making him jealous?"

At that, he let out a breath and smiled. "Probaby not. Not in a negative way."

He opened his mouth to speak again but closed it. One of the hands on her waist slipped around to her back and pulled her a little closer, although it then returned to where it had been. Now, he didn't clutch her tightly, but he wasn't scared to let his hands really mold to her shape, either.

Finally, he said, "I just don't think it's going to get us anywhere that we weren't already before."

"Not trying to get anywhere, babe," she said. 

"Bullshit," he replied. 

If he could be direct, she thought, so could she.

"Okay," she replied, "so I wouldn't mind if we joined forces for a bit."

"You mean…?"

"Yep."

Something hot passed over his expression as he looked at her for a long beat. 

He leaned in and said in her ear, "Who's the third wheel?"

She could smell his aftershave, now that they were cheek to cheek. Well, Jack's aftershave. Holy hell. She was now sort of transfixed by his neck and throat, and the pale skin disappearing under his shirt collar. 

“I mean, it’s your night," she replied. “If you want, I could just watch." 

She gave him a sly smile, and he laughed out loud and sort of pulled back from her without breaking their dancing hold. But his eyes were suddenly a lot more familiar as they searched her face and occasionally skimmed over her shoulders and arms. 

"I can't imagine you not being the center of attention in whatever situation you're in," he said with a soft smile. "I guess I'm glad you've got a reason to dance with me."

She almost sighed aloud. Confident, but obtuse.

"The reason being Jack?"

"Yeah."

"No. At this very moment, I'm interested in dancing with you, specifically. You're bi, right?"

The song was winding down, and when the music shifted to something more active, he pulled her by the hand off the dance floor. 

Sitting beside each other on the bench by the wall, suddenly bashful — irrationally, as they were more private here than a moment before — they spoke quietly toward the dancefloor rather than each other.

“To your question," he said, "Yes, I'm attracted to women. To you, more importantly. I've been making up for lost time lately, with guys, so I haven't… Anyway, that's not the point."

“First, yes it is," she said with a smile. "But my point was that it might be fun to make him the center of attention, between the two of us."

"He'd have to be into it."

"Of course. But would you be?"

He turned and reached out to cup her face in his hand. He looked like he was this close to kissing her but was suddenly mindful of how they were in a room with dozens of people, their colleagues sprinkled in — including their boyfriend, who had no fucking idea they were moving in this direction.

Potentially, she told herself. No firm plans. But she knew Jack. Whitaker had been the unknown quantity. 

He dropped his hand, now reaching for one of hers, which was in her lap, worrying at her dress. He held it without interlacing their fingers, caressing over it sweetly, soothingly. 

"No third wheels," he said firmly.

She nodded, and he let go of her hand and sat back against the bench, but now his thigh was pressed along hers.

Her pulse was racing now that she was actually pushing this thing into being. She felt a subtle wave of arousal hit her from having him so near. Kind of surprising, but exciting.

She said, "Then I'm glad we've just spent some time getting to know each other better"

The crowd had shifted a little closer to them.

He leaned back a little to speak near her ear: "You look beautiful tonight."

"Thanks," she replied. Reaching out to tap her fingers against his knee, she murmured, "You look like you could shove him up against a wall and kiss him until he makes that high-pitched whining noise in his throat."

At that, Whitaker did come over a little flustered, but he managed to say, "What about you?"

"What about me?"

Rather than use any words, he simply raised his eyebrows at looked at her, clear as day saying, Can I kiss you like that?

Despite being the instigator of all this, she found her face heating, not just at the implications but at the way he was looking at her. She reached for his hand and gave it a quick squeeze, nodding for him to follow her to a more private stretch of the wall nearby, so they could talk more openly.

"Okay," he said. "How do we do this?"

"Why don't you go see what he says about me joining you two when you leave. I think that would be better than a two-person ambush."

"Yeah."

"Make sure he knows it's fine if he doesn't want to, for whatever reason. It won't hurt my feelings."

Whitaker didn't move for a moment, then he said, "He's not gonna say no."

"You don't think so?"

"You wouldn't suggest it if you didn't have an inkling…"

"You don't?"

"I honestly hadn't thought about it," he replied with an apologetic grimace. "I mean, I wouldn't have thought you'd be…"

"I wasn't, but that was because for a long time I assumed you were gay."

He made a light little squawk of amusement, then he said, "Fair. Until you two got together, I thought the same thing. About you, I mean. He was obviously—"

"—the most indiscriminate flirt in the universe? But also the clumsiest."

"Pretty much. I don't mind."

"Neither do I. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it's the only reason we got together at all, because I am about as clueless as they come." 

He grinned. "I made the first move."

"Yeah?"

"Kissed him at work one night. Well, early morning. Sometimes he gets a little whiny and in need of direction long about 4 a.m."

She laughed so hard she almost fell off the bench. 

"I usually wait until he's sleepy to pounce."

He nodded. "Depends on what you're pouncing for, I guess."

Then he gave her a sly smile and set off across the ballroom.

*

She watched with interest as he drifted over to where Jack and Robby were in sightly tipsy conference. Robby pretty quickly parted from them, which answered her question about whether the man knew about Whitaker. (He definitely knew about her. It had been a thing when he found out, and he continued to vacillate between being Jack's emotionally constipated friend about it and being her boss not wanting to know even the small amount he actually did.)

She could tell when the conversation turned to their proposal because Jack looked straight at her across the room and then not again for several minutes. Finally, Whitaker leaned in and squeezed Jack's hand in lieu of kissing him and ducked out the side door, casting a smile in her general direction. She supposed that was about as much signal as she was going to get.

So she didn't wait long before she ambled over to where he was parked on a bench by the wall.

"Why do I get the feeling this was your idea?" he said by way of a greeting.

"Because it was," she replied. "So, you're in?"

"Oh yeah."

"Why haven’t you suggested it before, then?"

He grimaced. "You don't think I'm already greedy enough?"

"Unless you're super different with him in bed, I doubt it," she said, leaning down long enough to kiss him quick on the mouth.

He turned bright red at that, but she had a feeling it was mostly from the cocktails. 

"Wasn't sure you'd be into him, either."

She shrugged. "I like queer guys. Visibly, even."

"Tonight he's really leaning into that in a way he usually doesn't, but at the same time, it's making him bolder with you."

"Because he's being himself. I like it."

"Me, too. It just must be confusing to the uninitiated. You're super attractive, too, by the way. You worked a miracle getting him to dance."

"Where did he go?"

"To get my car."

She raised an eyebrow.

He just snorted and said, "You could drive it, too. Just ask.”

"So we're leaving now?"

"Well, me and him are leaving now. You join us whenever."

"I rode with Santos. I'm good to jump in with you if you want."

He reached out for her hand and, when he took it, pulled her toward him until she was standing between his open legs. 

"I want," he said. "You're fucking stunning tonight."

"Just tonight?"

He rolled his eyes and brought her hand to his lips, kissing it.

He said, "Every other woman that shines is just reflection off of you, my dear.”

His phone buzzed.

"He's waiting at the entrance. You need to run and tell Santos?"

"I'll text her when we get in the car. She won't be surprised."

He grimaced. "Really?"

"It's fine. She can keep a secret. She already has been. And she's aggressively not interested in knowing anything specific."

When he got up, it was clear his leg was bothering him a little, which must have been why he was sitting.

As they made a beeline for the exit (he gave Robby a little wave), he said, "Did you know she threatened me when me and him got together? One of those you hurt him and I'll hurt you speeches. It was halfway scary."

"Because she'd do it."

"In a heartbeat. I'm not interested in hurting him. Or you. You sure this is a good idea?"

They had passed into the lobby now, which was empty but echoey, making such a conversation even more absurd than in the privacy of the loud ballroom.

"I like him. If you're worried that I'm going to fall for him, don't. He's very sweet and pretty adorable, and I'm glad he's your boyfriend, but he's not my type."

"I'm not worried about that. I mean, if you two did drift together, I think I would be on board. But I don't see it happening. So what is this, then?"

"A good time with people I trust. But if you want to throw the emergency brake, you can."

"Nope."

They were outside now. Whitaker was waiting. Samira was a little surprised to see that he was staying put in the driver's seat as they came down the walkway. 

Jack opened the front passenger door and ushered her into that seat before he climbed into the back. 

"Hi again," she said to Whitaker.

"Hey," he said. 

The way he looked at her now that they were out of the ballroom wasn't different in kind from the way he looked at her earlier, but it was very different in degree. 

As Jack got settled, Whitaker leaned over the console and touched her face with his fingers to angle her for a kiss. It was soft but lingering. When his eyes drifted back to Jack's, she realized Whitaker had hesitated in kissing her before because he wasn't sure what Jack would think. Reasonable, she thought. Gentlemanly. 

But now there was very little hesitant in him. He reached back and made a motion for Jack to take his hand, and he gave it a squeeze, then he turned and ducked between the seats to get Jack to give him a kiss. 

She'd seen affection between them before, but never this kind of private gesture, filled with familiarity but promising passion. Their age difference seemed especially pronounced, but it didn't seem to matter any more than hers did with the man. The energy was easy and charged at the same time. 

After they broke apart, Jack groused to her, "Do I have to kiss you, now, too?" 

She laughed, reaching back to gesture for his hand just as Whitaker had, then she told Whitaker to drive.

*

She didn't have time to worry once they got into Jack's apartment. After they dumped their jackets and her purse over the back of the sofa, which was right there at the front door, Whitaker guided her back against the inside of the door and kissed her hard on the mouth. 

Jack just leaned back against the sofa and watched as Whitaker held her by both sides of the neck and angled her into a kissing him deep and slow, like they'd skipped a step somewhere. She didn't fucking care. This felt like exactly where they were supposed to be. 

Her body was already shifting to get closer to his. He was impossibly warm. She could still smell Jack's aftershave on him, but now she could take in the scent of his body and what she guessed was the soap or deodorant he used. His hands were steady and strong.

Once his mouth left hers and began trailing down her neck, lips dragging and teeth occasionally scraping, she locked eyes with Jack, whose pupils were blown. Whitaker kissed down over her shoulder, pausing to nip at the skin a little, then swept kisses down and over her collarbone and across to the other. His hands curved over her hips and settled. It made her groan softly, and Jack's breath caught in his throat.

She could tell he wanted to reach out and touch one or both of them, but, even more, he needed to watch Whitaker touch her. So she tipped her head back and let Whitaker keep exploring her neck and shoulders while her hands grabbed his waist for purchase and held on. His hips were close, close enough that she could feel how hard he already was, but he didn't grind. 

Jack adjusted himself in his pants, and she watched, fascinated, as his glazed eyes took them in. What did he see? Whitaker had a pretty great ass and surprisingly broad shoulders. Her dress was riding up pretty hard, but Whitaker's didn't make any moves to get under it, although his hand occasionally reached down and stroked the top of her thigh where it was bare, which made her more than a little crazy.

His mouth traveled down over the swell of her cleavage, and he peppered kisses across the tops of both of her breasts. She would've been happy for him to pull down the straps on the dress. Whether he fumbled with the closures of the strapless bra wouldn't have mattered. Surprisingly smooth or charmingly clumsy, he would have finally been able to take her breasts in his hands. Honestly, at this point, he could have just roughly pulled the cups down to get at them, to kiss and lick and suck at her nipples. That would've been hot. But Whitaker was clearly an expert tease, in the loveliest way. Just slowly building up the arousal. His fingers brushed her nipples through those layers of fabric, and he hummed to himself to feel how hard they were.

She heard Jack shift around, and then he murmured, "You two are fuckin' killing me."

She giggled and Whitaker looked up at her, also clearly amused.

Whitaker said, "Nobody told you you had to stand over there."

She put her mouth to Whitaker's ear and said, "Maybe you should give him some attention."

"Yeah?" he said aloud.

She whispered, "With your mouth, maybe?"

"Oh?" he said. 

His cheeks flushed a little at that, or maybe it was that his fingers were still tripping soft across the swell of her breast, dipping down under the neckline, dangerously close to her nipples but not close enough. She just nodded, feeling so much heat settle in her gut that she was a little reluctant to let him leave her arms.

It was clear that Jack hadn't been able to make out her words, because he looked more puzzled than expectant, but he figured it out soon enough when Whitaker turned to him and got on his knees.

As Whitaker unzipped his pants and drew his hard cock out of his boxer briefs, Samira kicked her heels off and leaned back against the door. Jack reached out a hand like he wanted her to come to him, too. Not quite yet, she thought.

Jack gripped the couch behind him as Whitaker swallowed him down. Not always a tease, then. The groan he gave at that made Samira's cunt feel tight. She gave a thought to touching herself, but she didn't want to distract either of them. 

To give her hands something to do, she stepped forward and threaded her right hand into Whitaker's shaggy blonde curls — not to push or guide, just to be a steady presence.

"He likes that," Jack said. "He likes it even more if you tell him how good he's doing."

"Well," she said, "I don't have first-hand information about that. But it does seem like he's making you lose your mind pretty fast."

"Always," he said. His hand cradled Whitaker's face. "So good, Denny."

She raked her nails against Whitaker’s scalp, and his shoulders drew up with pleasure. She'd never watched someone give a blowjob in person, just in porn, and it was pretty fucking hot. He wasn't taking Jack all the way down, just meeting the fist he had around the base. 

She said to Jack, "I like that you're pretending you're in charge here. We both know that's not true."

Jack giggled, then he gasped as Whitaker apparently did something wicked with his mouth. 

"Yeah, well, who's on their knees, Mohan?"

She scratched at Whitaker's scalp again, saying, "The man who shoved me up against your front door and kissed me like his life depended on getting me wet, Abbot."

Whitaker looked up at her, and she smiled and rubbed the nape of his neck as if to say, Oh yes, baby.

Finally, she slipped over to Jack's side. She had to take her hand off Whitaker's head so she could get Jack to lift his arms and let her pull off the sweater and undershirt. As soon as she did, Whitaker's hands crept up and pressed flat against Jack's taut stomach. Then he took him all the way down, making Jack cry out and drop his own hand to Whitaker's head.

But Jack's fingers nearer her were seeking out the hem of her dress. As she caught his mouth in a kiss, he lifted it up and up until he could slip his hand down between her legs. Even over her underwear, he could feel what this was doing to her. 

"Fuck, baby," he murmured against her mouth. Then he looked down at Whitaker, who was staring up at him through his eyelashes, and said, "You did real good, sweetheart."

Whitaker moaned softly around his dick. 

Jack rubbed along her slit over her underwear. She could smell her own arousal, so she was sure Whitaker could, too, there at eye level with her hips.

"I told you," she murmured. 

Jack's fingers slipped down under her panties then, seeking out the opening of her cunt and rubbing along her labia. He pulled those fingers out and used them to cup Whitaker's face. Pretty quickly, he pulled off Jack's cock and turned his head, reaching up and holding Jack's hand by the wrist as he took those fingers into his mouth, moaning a little around them to taste her.

Rather than return to the blowjob, he stroked Jack with his hand as he said:

"Can we stop messing around in the living room like there's not a bed down the hall?"

Jack laughed. "Samira, meet my slightly impatient boyfriend, Dennis."

"I get it, though," she said. "I really do."

Whitaker was now getting to his feet, leaving Jack to shove his dick back into his pants and do up his fly. His progress was impeded by how Whitaker kissed the taste of both of them into the man's mouth, hard and dirty. 

Eventually, though, the kiss slowly turned sweeter, the two of them insistently but gently licking into each other's mouths, in some ways surely a performance for her but also a lovely little moment of connection. It made her chest ache, especially when Jack reached out blindly for her hand so she wouldn't feel left out.

Finally, Whitaker pulled back and said against Jack's lips: "I wanna eat her out, then I want to watch her ride you."

Samira's eyes went wide, finally, and Jack laughed again. 

Whitaker turned to her and grinned. Then he got serious for a second: 

"We haven't talked about boundaries or whatever. Is all this…?"

"Yeah," she said with a vigorous nod. "Condoms, though."

"No question," Jack said.

She thought about his mouth on her, or both of them taking turns. That was going to be her not-so-subtle suggestion, when it came to it. It seemed like Whitaker's solution to the no-third-wheel problem was to put her in the middle, which she was not about to protest.

Whitaker said, "I really do wanna watch you two together, but you can do it however you want." He rolled his eyes at himself, adding, "Obviously."

With the open smile he was giving her now, his insistence was more charming than pushy and more than a little arousing. It was also a very good plan. It only needed a slight amendment.

She pulled his body flush with hers and kissed him breathless. Then she said:

"Him then you, maybe?"

He just nodded and pulled her toward the bedroom the same way she'd pulled him to the dance floor. This time, Jack was right behind them.