“Ma always said things happen for a reason.”
“I really want to meet your Ma one day.”
I could just picture it. Calix being forced into friendly conversation with my dad while Ma showed Otis and Toby how to cook her famous lasagna. Harvey trying to convince me to sneak off and fool around in my childhood bedroom before we had to set the table for dinner. Longing welled up inside me.
“You will. One day.” Once I’d built up the courage to tell Ma about Adam’s betrayal and the full extent of the fallout.
“Tatum.” Otis’s gentle voice pulled me out of my suddenly morose thoughts. “If I kissed you…”
“Please do.”
He leaned in, pressing smiling lips to mine. I sighed, feeling the world realign into something that felt right. Whole.
Without pulling away from him, I slipped out from under the sheets, straddling his lap as his hands explored my body from shoulder to ass. I moaned as he traced his fingers down my crack and brushed his knuckles across my swollen folds.
“Are you sore?” he asked, stroking me softly.
“Yes, but I don’t care.”
He pushed an experimental finger inside me, fucking me slowly until I grew impatient and started pulling at his clothes.
“Do you need something?” he asked with a chuckle as I slipped his shirt over his head.
“You. Always you.” I paused, a thought occurring to me. “Unless this is going to screw things up with you and Harvey? I told him you both have to consent.”
He pulled open the bedside drawer, and I made a mental note to buy more condoms at our next stop. At the rate we were going, we’d run out in a matter of days.
“We already spoke about it. As long as you’re happy, the relationship we’re exploring is separate from what we choose to do with you.”
That was a relief.
The whole conversation had left me feeling lighter. A part of me healed from an injury I didn’t know I’d sustained. Otis was a grounding force amongst these complicated men that I had made mine, even if it was only for now.
When he entered me a moment later, I knew that no matter what happened next, I’d be okay.
Because everything really did happen for a reason.
Chapter
Twenty-Six
Tobias
Openingnight in Lansing was insane.
Some time between the start of the tour and now, it seemed that our band had become the act to see. Crowds lined the streets as our tour bus pulled into the lot, and the line for admission had been growing steadily since we started sound check in the early afternoon.
There were the usual signs in the crowd offering sexual favors, but also new ones sporting the rainbow flag and messages echoing the statement we’d issued after Otis apparently decided to announce he liked men. Love is love.
I couldn’t agree more.
I wondered what they all would think if they knew about our arrangement with Tatum. Polyamory wasn’t exactly common, but it worked for us. My only concern was the way she occasionally implied it was a temporary arrangement.
No fucking way.
I liked to believe Calix would help, but it was always difficult to trust him to do what was in his best interest. I’d just have to keep showing him how perfect she was for us all.
Performing in front of a crowd sober was one of the biggest adjustments I’d had to make. No barrier. No filter between me and hundreds of screaming audience members. My kit felt like home, the beats second nature to me, but the noise was overwhelming.
