“Come for me, little sister,” I demand. I’m so fucking close, and I want her to go first. I want to see her face when it happens.
I feel it first; the muscles tightening around my cock, then her jaw slacks, nose wrinkling. Her eyes flutter open and hold mine. “I love you,” she says, gripping me behind the neck and pulling me forward. Her nails dig into the back of my neck and she shatters around me, stealing my breath with a kiss.
For the first time, I experience the whole of the moment. Not just the physical but the emotional. The words she says, the sensation of her pussy quivering around me, grip my heart as much as my balls, and I come, claim, my cock pulsing as it spills inside of her. She swallows the embarrassing, overwhelmed sound I make as I pump her full, crushing her into the mattress.
Sweaty and spent, I press my forehead to hers, my cock still sheathed in her warmth. Her ribbon’s still tied around my wrist, as secure and solid as the cuff wrapped around hers, and it’s easy now to speak the words.
They’re no longer impossible to hold on to.
“I love you, too.”
Rath is the first one through the door the next morning.
I run into him just as I’m coming down the stairs, dressed in the boxers and t-shirt I’d snatched from my dresser before coming down. I’m fully intending to grab coffee and something with more carbs than protein to haul back up to Story’s bedroom. It’s only eight. There’s still an opportunity for a third round.
But then Rath comes through the door, messy-haired and manic-looking. “Good, you’re up.” He shrugs out of his jacket, hair flopping into his eyes as he looks down to stomp the dirt from his shoes. “It was fucking art, bro. Wish you could have been there to see it.” When he glances up to flash me an impish grin, his gaze catches on my bruised knuckles—on the spot of blood staining the center of my crisp white teet—and he freezes, dread slacking his features. “Aw, shit. What happened?”
Scab opened a bit.
“Later,” I mutter, passing him to enter the dining room. Story told me everything that happened with Saul on the drive home last night, but it’s still too jumbled in my head to put into a coherent narrative.
Ms. Crane already has a few things sitting out. I go for the coffee first while Rath snatches up two slices of bacon and instantly pinches them between his teeth. Tristian walks in from the kitchen—he must have been parking in the garage—and comes right for me, slapping my shoulder hard enough to make my coffee slosh over the rim of my mug.
“Hey!” I growl, but he’s all grins.
“Let me start by saying thank you,” he says, dropping into his usual seat. “For allowing me to watch that outstanding display of game last night. You let her come first and didn’t even ask her to suck your dick afterward. You’ve grown, man, and I’m proud.”
There’s a part of me that wants to punch the smug grin off his face, but he’s right. I did my woman right last night and then she did me right later on. We work like that.
“You’re such a fuckin’ weirdo,” Rath says, taking his own seat at the table. He has circles beneath his eyes, like he didn’t get much sleep. I don’t know if it was from watching us all night, nerves from the job, or the cabin just being kind of shitty.
They wait until I take my seat at the head of the table to start briefing me.
“Like I was saying,” Rath extends a hand to Tristian. “Art.”
Tristian smirks. “Flames took that fucker so fast, it was already a lost cause by the time the dispatchers called it in.”
They spend a while going over the details as I sip my coffee, flexing my sore fist. Tristian and Rath both keep looking at it, waiting for my explanation, but before I can give it, Ms. Crane walks in with a plate of toast. She plops it in the center of the table and asks, “Where’s the fucktoy?”
“She’s still asleep, so keep it down.” Rath scowls, although it doesn’t stop him from snagging a slice of the toast. “And don’t call her that.”
“She doesn’t mind me calling her that.” She starts filling the three empty mugs with coffee, even the one for Story. “My police scanner was going off all night. Shit went down in South Side. Arson, four alarm.” Her eyebrow raises at Tristian. “You have anything to do with that?”
He lifts his mug of black coffee and takes a slow sip. “You need to mind your own business.”
She slams down the pot. “This is a delicate ecosystem, you little cunt-weasels. Any aberration, any ripple of unrest, and the whole house of turds starts to crumble. Do you get that?” She points at the ceiling. “You brought a deviation into this house. She was supposed to be disposable, but look at you three. So determined to keep her that you’re happy to burn this place to the ground. Don’t,” she snaps, thrusting an accusing finger at Tristian, “deny it. I’d know that fucking address anywhere.”