“Hmm?” I kept playing, wiggling my fingers inside, feeling my cum and smearing it around.
“What’re you doing back there?”
I kissed his shoulder. “Just touching. You all right, baby?”
His soft sigh was all I needed to hear, but I was gratified when he whispered, “Yeah. That was exactly….it was everything.”
I pushed him over onto his back so I could kiss him properly, worship him with my mouth, and show him that I felt the same. But it was slow and easy too, solidifying our connection even more. Eventually, reality intruded on my brain, and I had to pull back. Oak could have the day off, given everything he’d been through earlier, but I couldn’t. Not only did I have to plow and salt the parking lot again, but my kids would be out of school very soon.
I cleaned him up, wiping off the lube and cum, and then found his briefs and handed them to him. He raised his brows in question and I leaned down to kiss him quickly.
“Stay here. Nap, because you need it. I’ll let Nic know you’re taking the rest of the day off, and we’ll cover anything that needs doing.” When he opened his mouth, maybe to protest, I cut him off with another quick peck. “Don’t argue with me. I want you resting here in my bed while I go be responsible, and if you’re ready, you can join us for dinner.”
Oak wiggled into his underwear before he spoke. “What are the kiddos going to think of me sleeping in your bed?”
I smoothed his hair out of his eyes. He was a little sweaty, which was no surprise, but not too bad. I smiled and sat down on the edge of the mattress. I took his hand and he latched on. “They’ll think you had a rough day and needed to sleep. Nothingmore, nothing less. Listen. I’m not going to keep this a secret from my kids, but there’s a time and place to tell them, and it’s not right now. They’ve been through a lot and I need to ease into the explanation. I hope you understand that.”
Oak’s eyes went soft. “Yeah. Yeah, I get it. I mean, I think it’d be different if you wanted to hide me from everyone. But I get that the kids need to get used to the idea after all the changes.”
I blew out a breath, relieved beyond measure. “Thank you.” I kissed him again, then stood, needing to get cleaned up and get back to work. “Sleep, okay? You need to recover.”
Oak’s smile was cheeky. “From the sex or the therapy mind fuck?”
I shook my head, not able to help the grin in response. “From both, you brat.”
Heading into the bathroom, I cleaned up quickly. By the time I made it back in search of my clothes, he was already sleeping, curled up on my pillow with the comforter up around his shoulders. I got dressed quickly but quietly, then kissed his cheek, loving the way he smiled in his sleep, before heading back out into the world.
This was the last thing I expected out of today, but I couldn’t be upset about it. In fact, I was just the opposite. When Oak needed someone, he’d called me. Not that long ago, it would have been his uncle or my brother. Maybe both. But it was me he’d turned to. And even though he’d been the one to say no strings originally, he was the one who was tethering himself to me. Did we still have things we needed to talk about and obstacles in our way? Definitely. But I wanted him, he wanted to be mine, and it would take time for us to both be in the same headspace and move forward. For the first time, I was looking forward to what came next between us.
I picked up the kids first, listening to their happy babble, before we stopped at Bark Avenue, where Ranger went to doggy daycare. He wasn’t like Cricket and Steve, able to wander the property at his leisure. He had great recall and was well behaved, but he wasn’t that type of dog. Some days, he spent the day with Uncle Charlie and Salem in the office, but most of the time, I paid the fee for him to be cared for and entertained by Landon Poirier and his crew. It would be easier to collect Ranger first, since it was on the way to Fairville Academy, but Marlie insisted since he was her dog, that she should be the one to pick him up.
Landon was impressed with Marlie’s responsibility for such a young age, and even though she was barely nine, he let her do the handover. I stayed in the car with the other two, watching through the glass door as they had their exchange. When my phone dinged a second later, I expected it to be the text Landon always sent, giving me the important info so that it wasn’t all on Marlie’s shoulders. If there was some sort of reason he needed to talk to me in person, he sent a text earlier in the day so I would know to come in to do handover with her. But when I glanced at my phone, it wasn’t Landon, but instead, a message from Charlie.
Teague and I are coming to dinner! We’ll bring pizza from Giacomo’s.
I couldn’t help the groan that escaped. Having my brother and his boyfriend to dinner wasn’t unusual. Charlie liked to spend as much time with the kids as he could, and that translated todinner together at least once a week. But we’d just had dinner the other night, so I knew there was an ulterior motive to this message.
“Dad? Why’re you doing the annoyed noise?” Harper asked. I glanced back at her and she had a crease between her brows.
“Uncle Charlie is being a nuisance.”
She gasped, affronted on her favorite uncle’s behalf. “Uncle Charlie is awesome! He’s never a nuisance.”
“What’s a noo-sans?” Tris asked, leaning forward as far as the straps of his seat would allow. He was almost too big for the five-point harness. Pretty soon, he’d be ready to move into a regular booster seat and I was weirdly sad about that fact. Like my baby was growing up too fast.
“He is when he’s insisting on bringing pizza for dinner,” I answered Harper. I would have explained to Tristan what a nuisance was, downplaying it so he didn’t actually think that I thought his uncle was one, but he broke out into his “pizza song” before I got the chance, forgetting entirely he’d asked a question.
“Peet-za! Peet-za, yeah yeah yeah. Yum, yum, in my tum, peeeeeeettttt-za!” he sang at the top of his voice, accentuating the letters that weren’t actually in the word.
“Inside voice, young man,” I chastised.
Tristan immediately lowered his voice, continuing to sing his song. Marlie and Ranger were exiting by then, and I hopped out to open the back where we had a travel crate for the dog. Marlie would have liked to have him in her lap, of course, but she’d also done tons of research about dogs, and since there wasn’t a spare seat for him to be clipped in to the belt with his harness, she’d acquiesced quickly when I told her he had to ride in the crate for everyone’s safety.
I opened the crate door, Marlie unclipped Ranger’s leash and said, “In!” and Ranger, who was a very good boy, jumped rightup and settled down. He let out a happy bark when Marlie praised him and I closed the crate door.
“Why’s Tris singing the pizza song?” she asked. A second later, her face lit up. “Are we getting pizza for dinner?”
“Why else would he be singing?” I asked with an exaggerated sigh and Marlie threw her arms up in a cheer. I shook my head, grinning. “Get in the car, you hooligan.”
