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You're evil.
He grinned, and showed the exchange to Chris. Chris took the phone and typed another text, more slowly, since phones weren't fond of his bigger fingers. Chris here. We're having Jack's for lunch and dinner. Chocolate lava cakes for dessert. How's that hotel food?
You're just as evil as he is.
They exchanged a chuckle, sent her a couple more texts, and then she had to get back to work. She closed with several heart emoticons.
Take care of each other. Miss you.
That feeling was mutual. They returned to the game and played hard, until they were soaked in sweat. The guys invited them to come back anytime, because they had a standing game weekly. After hitting the drive-thru at Jack in the Box, getting a few burgers and tacos, as well as the dessert Chris had teased Sam about, they headed for home and chowed down on half of it before heading back into the garage and their project.
The physical exertion, talk and food had done the trick. They figured out the adjustments, put the bench together, and it was ready for staining. Chris put on the first coat while Geoff watched. Conversation was easy and comfortable again. When they broke for dinner, they finished up the Jack and some green bean casserole Sam had left them.
Daylight was slipping from late afternoon to evening as they sat in the living room. From the looks Chris was sliding his way when he thought Geoff wasn't looking, Geoff was pretty sure Chris was thinking about where this evening was going to end as much as he was. But this was Chris's show. No matter Geoff's natural desire to take the reins and get it started, he'd let him make the move. But as he picked up his beer and sat back on the couch, stretching his legs out on the coffee table, he had to say something, because Chris's regard was starting to get him worked up. Geoff cocked a brow at him. "Something on your mind? Or are you just admiring my masculine beauty?"
Chris rolled his eyes, but then he twisted his beer in his hand. "You know earlier, the belt thing?"
"Yeah?" Geoff said it as casually as possible.
"I don't see you as a dad. Definitely not as my dad."
"Thank God." After Chris's dad had left them, he'd moved around and eventually fallen off the map to escape child support payments. Chris's mom frequently wished him dead after prolonged torture in a serial killer's basement, but his absence had never stopped her from doing what was needed to raise her boy.
Chris's lips twisted. "I mean, do you think the belt, my reaction to it, is about a father-son thing?"
Geoff tilted his head left and right, an ambivalent answer. "Yes and no. Some Dom/sub relationships are the Daddy-little girl or Daddy-little boy thing. But I think what you felt was just an expression of feelings we all have. Things we have or crave from our parents as kids don't go away. They translate into more adult cravings. Safety and structure for the sub can come from punishment, as well as the desire to cuddle or control on the Dom side. Somehow it wraps up into the sex thing and gives it an extra charge." He pursed his lips. "You know how you feel when you're holding a bird in your hand?"
The absorption in Chris's face as he cradled injured wildlife, as the creature quieted under his touch, was something Geoff never tired of watching. "Yeah," Chris said. "It's a good feeling."
"What I feel when Sam surrenders to me, or when you give yourself to me like you did yesterday and today . . . It's that feeling. Like, despite how crazy and brutal the world can be, you realize for just that moment you can trust me completely. To protect you, to give you pleasure, to take both of us where we want to go. You weren't off base about what we were tapping," Geoff added quietly. "The feelings your dad left you to handle, because you were abandoned by the person who's supposed to love you enough to stand behind you your whole life . . . My feelings about my mom and dad . . . When we come together, you and me, Sam, we're reclaiming those lost connections, reestablishing them. It's scary as hell, because it feels just the way we know it should. In some ways, it's better and even more intense than an orgasm. So when an orgasm comes with it, it's pretty much paradise."
Geoff shifted so he could briefly press his foot against Chris's. Chris stared at their overlapped shoes. He gripped Geoff's thigh, a quick, rough squeeze. "Yeah. Okay." His voice sounded thick. "Um . . . I think I'm going to take a shower."
Geoff rose, gathering up their dishes and the taco wrappers. "I'll do it after you. I reek."
"I would have mentioned it, but I wasn't sure if the stench was you or me."
"Pretty sure it's both. Sam would throw us out back and make us hose off like dogs."
"Girls. They're so clean and pretty. It's nice." Chris grinned, restoring them to a nice equilibrium. A gentle one, with room to let the tender ground they'd exposed settle in and get used to the touch of light and air. As Geoff made himself move toward the kitchen, Chris rose and headed for the hallway, pulling off his shirt as he went. Geoff stopped to watch the play of muscle across his back, the tight ass beneath the camos he'd worn to the park. Geoff adjusted himself as his cock pushed up at the wrong angle inside his jeans. While he was tempted to invite Chris to take a shower with him, he was still trying to do the courtesy wait thing--no matter how his Dom side was starting to chafe over it--and Chris hadn't put out the vibe that h
e was looking for company.
Geoff didn't take it as a rejection. Neither shower was large. Two guys their size wouldn't have a lot of maneuvering room. He and Sam had enjoyed the space, but with someone Chris's size, they would end up being in each other's way more than anything.
Since it was never a good idea to start up both showers at the same time, because someone inevitably would lose out on the hot water, he had a few minutes to kill. Sam being up in the Asheville area made him think of Merry Childers, a college friend of his and Chris's. She ran a couple of rental properties up in Bat Cave, a tiny community just outside Chimney Rock.
One of Merry's cottages was new, with all the amenities. It stayed pretty heavily booked. The other was more rustic, a long rectangle built in the seventies, easily recognized as such since the interior had laminate cabinets and appliances all in the Harvest Gold color popular during that decade. The eclectic decorating was a deer and bear motif mixed with cherubs and lace, a tribute to the older couple who'd owned it before moving to an assisted living facility.
Chris had helped Merry landscape a couple of her real estate flips, and Geoff had updated her rental agreements, all in the past year. Geoff figured he could get a cheap rate for a weekend in trade, particularly since it wasn't quite high season yet. Sam had gone with Chris on his landscaping trip and he'd told Geoff she'd been enchanted with the seventies house, particularly the huge back porch that hung precariously over the scenic creek. There was a spacious private hot tub out there.
He thought of Sam and Chris in the hot tub. Sam would wear some tiny little bikini that clung to her curves. At least until they got it off of her. Private hot tub, after all, screened from the rental office next door by a nice big slab of lattice threaded with silk flowers.
Beads of water would roll over Chris's massive shoulders, slicking down the gleaming hair on his chest. Geoff would thread his fingers through it and tip his head back to set his teeth to his corded throat. Sam would twine her legs around him, her breasts pressing into his chest . . .
He typed out a text to Merry, asking if she had a couple of days' availability sooner than later, and what she'd charge. They were winding up one of Geoff's ongoing projects at work. If Merry's dates meshed with Chris and Sam's schedule, it would be a nice getaway for all of them.
So they could keep working on their own ongoing project.
