I’m fuckin’ happy.
I let Rowan in. He’s staying the night with my mom instead of his own. Make of that what you will. Whatever. My mom loves him, and it will make her day to wake up to him sleeping on her pull-out couch.
Rowan makes his way to the living room. Tanner and Jax are messily gathering themselves from the rug on the floor.
Molly and Joss are together, eyeing my brother with as much curiosity as he has for them. I expect his gaze to settle on Joss, but he stares at Molly instead, perhaps because she’s wearing a strawberry-print dress with a tulle skirt.
She flushes, obviously. Rowan is satanically good-looking. But I step between them beforethatcan escalate and tug Joss forward.
It’s a short introduction. They’ve spoken on FaceTime a hundred times by now. And Tanner, Jax, and Molly are leaving. Getting to know Rowan can wait.
Molly grabs her bag and starts forward. It’s a big bag. Mary Poppins-style. Lord knows what she’s got in it, and any other day I’d never find out. But today is turning out to be one of those magical days where the strangest things happen. Molly’s foot catches on the rug.
She trips, and a legitimatedildoflies from her open bag.
It plops penisly to the floor at my brother’s feet.
Molly’s face flames bright red, but before she can claim ownership, Joss springs forward and scoops the neon rubber cock from the rug. “Oops, that’s mine. Sorry. Can’t help flinging these mucky ornaments around.”
Rowan darts his gaze between my sweetest friend and the love of my life. I watch him dissect Joss’s cockney talk and figure it out for the bullshit it is. Then go for the gutter joke anyway. “Nice. Is my brother not giving you enough—”
“Don’t.” I jab a finger at him. “Or I’ll kick you back where you came from.”
Rowan grins. “Whoa, dude. Okay.”
I try not to return his smile, but it’s hard. BecauseI’m happy,and I don’t mind dick jokes any more than Joss does. I like them. I’m proud to be the subject of them. My only issue with Rowan’s is that his punchline is probably accurate.
Technically, I don’t give Joss any dick at all, but I’m hoping that’ll change tonight.God, I wanna fuck him so bad.Can’t say why it hasn’t happened yet. It’s not a conscious decision. But here we are. Something shifts between us every day, and now it’s all I can think about.
And he knows it. As Rowan takes a seat, Joss meets my gaze with a smirk and points a subtle finger at the clock. “Early night?” he mouths.
Fuck yeah.
Much,muchlater, we meander our full and tipsy selves back to my creek-side house. Like Tanner and Jax, V&V is still where we need to be most nights, but the country is home.
We fall into bed. Joss is an Ivy League expert in reading me. Some days he lets me do whatever the hell I like. Others, he shoves me down and shows me all the things I still have to learn.
Today, we’re somewhere in the middle. There’s a lot left in his arsenal, I can tell, but he knows what I wantright now.
We don’t use condoms anymore. Just lube. So much lube.
I do all the things to Joss that he does to me, blood heat rising and rising with every groan and shudder.
When he’s ready, I lie over him, his leg curved over my hip. “Ready?”
“For you?” He tips his head back and laughs. “Never.”
Me neither. I mean, I’ll never be entirely prepared for how much we love each other. How perfection can be so deeply flawed and wonderful. I’ve thought about wildfires a lot since I met him. About how he is one, a runaway blaze that blew through my life, scorching the earth. Then loving him came with the green shoots that grew after.
I push inside him. His body welcomes me in, holding me so fuckin’ tight I can’t breathe, and we start the ascent.
He’s already told me not to be gentle with him, but for a while, I have to be. Or I’ll explode and it will be over too soon.
So I fuck him slowly, drawing it out, letting heat and sweat andlovebuild until we’re both shakin’.
My hair is stuck to my head.
Joss pushes it back, his touch so intimate and sweet that moisture pricks my eyes, and I thank every deity I can think of for sending him to me.
