He loved Devon.
And it was damn time he started telling Devon that more regularly. So he snagged his lover and yanked him close, giving him a kiss. “I love you so much.”
Devon blinked at him, his lips gone slack, his eyes wide once the blinking stopped. “I love you too.”
His heart expanded, and he felt like the Grinch. It grew three times its size, or something like that.
God.
He dropped another kiss on the end of Devon’s nose. “I’m going to go get more stuff. You make sure the cats don’t follow me out.”
“I will. I’ll make sure they don’t get out when you’re bringing it in, too. I’ll door-wrangle for you.”
“Thanks, babe.” All in all, this was going way better than he had expected. And he was grateful to Nick for helping out with everything and giving them this time alone. Laird grabbed his phone on the way out to the truck and called the Bad Badger Brewery, setting up a tab for Nick so that he could have food and drink on them. That was the least he could do.
And he had to remember that while his buddy wasn’t married, they still needed to hang out. Even if they became old, settled-in people who only saw other couples.
Chapter
Eleven
Devon sat cuddled up on the couch knitting a pair of socks and kind of wishing the weather would make up its mind. They were having a tiny warm stretch, and he didn’t want to be hot.
Not that he was going to be that far along in his pregnancy that it would be gross, but still, it made his clients unhappy, for sure.
Laird was outside, happily charcoaling some sort of meat on the grill with Nick, who was still such a love and an amazing cook. Ben was out there with them too, and every so often he would just take a sip of his beer and grunt or say, “Hmm,” as if that made some sort of difference.
Raven was working on some kind of bookbinding project at the kitchen table. He loved how they could sit and do crafts together, not really having to talk more than just a few words every couple of minutes. He peered over his needles at Raven, who was doing some sort of stitch binding. “How’s it going?”
“Good. I have to tell you that it’s so much easier when there’s no little ones around.”
While Devon adored Willow and Aspen, it was apparently one of their aunt’s or maybe the grandparents’ day to have the kids, which was fine because Nick was still a little worried about being around little ones and not knocking them down or something. Laird, they adored. All the little kids seemed to love Laird, which he thought boded well for their child.
He started turning his heel, humming softly. God, he was happy.
“You sound good, Dev. I’m happy for you,” Raven told him.
“It’s oddly pleasant, living with him.” They weren’t in each other’s pockets, really. They both worked a lot. But Laird was there at night when he slept, at least most of the time. Was there to have breakfast or supper or just to laze around and watch a movie.
They had a rhythm going—and he hoped Laird was as happy as he was.
“Laird seems really good too.” Raven glanced toward the kitchen doors. “Seriously.”
“I think so. I hope so. I want him to be. He’s way more open now that he’s moved in with me too. Way less guarded. So I think this has been a good thing all around.” Laird was a man who played things close to his chest, but Devon thought he was smiling more and talking about his feelings, some of which were huge and he was going to keep that going if he could.
“Hey, that’s great.” Raven grinned. “Sometimes the big manly alphas can be a little bit out of touch with their feelings.” He looked at the doors again, waggling his eyebrows when he looked back at Devon. “Ben can be less than aware of his feelings sometimes. He’s gotten way better at it, but he still wants to communicate primarily physically.”
“Well, he does own a gym. He does everything with his body.” Devon felt his cheeks flush a little bit, because maybe he shouldn’t be talking to his best friend about his best friend’s sex life, but he knew they had a varied and interesting one.
Devon was a little bit shocked at how good his sex life was with Laird. In fact, he’d never felt like it was a particularly important thing to him to have smoking hot, hammer and tongs sex. He’d always thought of himself as a gentle, snuggly kind of guy. But Laird brought that side of him out.
The door opened to the back and Nick came in carrying a platter of yummy-smelling stuff. He thought they were making some barbecue chicken, some hot dogs, and some hamburgers. He was really in the place when he wanted that barbecue chicken. It made his mouth water just having it in the house. Raven had brought coleslaw and cornbread, and he had made potato salad and beans. The beans had given him a little bit of trouble with nausea, but he had just soldiered on and ignored it.
He did know all the remedies, after all. “That smells amazing,” he told Nick. He was really trying to get to know his lover’s work partner.
“Yeah, that sauce Ben made up is really good.” Nick slid the platter on the counter. “Do I need to cover this up so the cats don’t get in it?”
“There’s a platter cover hanging on the wall just to the right of the refrigerator.” He had to admit he wanted his cats to be better behaved and to get off the counter and out of the food, but they weren’t going to do it. They were the Three Musketeers, after all, and no adventure was too big for them.
