Lev
Chapter twenty-five
Asoft moan pulls me out of my sleep. The dream in which I was reliving everything we did the night before.
I’m hard already, but when I open my eyes and see Mik and Tati moving together under the comforter, I close my eyes and groan.
I can’t see a damn thing, but I know they’re fucking.
Her eyes are screwed back in her skull, and he’s grunting softly in her ear.
They’re on their side, and he’s taking her from behind.
I open my eyes again to see Roman simply watching them. I look outside and see that the snow has stopped falling and that the horizon is just starting to pinken as the sun rises.
I rub my hands down my face, willing my body and head to wake up.
The fire is still smoldering, but the cabin has a chill in the air.
I shrug on my sweatpants and head to the kitchen.
Searching through cabinets, I find a metal French press and empty two bottles of water into it.
I nestle it onto the coals and slide into a pair of worn boots by the front door.
When I step outside, there’s maybe six inches of snow on the ground.
I scoop some into a Ziploc bag before stomping back inside, frustrated with myself, frustrated with Tatiana and Mikhail. Frustrated with Roman. Frustrated with the whole damn situation.
When I come back inside and stomp the snow off my boots, Tati and Mik must be done, because they’re whispering sweet nothings to each other. Both of them look up at me, concerned.
“Are you mad?” Tati asks, and I immediately understand what I’ve done. I’m frustrated, stomping around here like an ogre. I’m sure she’s worried about me being jealous. My shoulders slacken a little.
I toss the bag of snow at her. “You must be sore.”
I know they’ve been circling each other for over a decade, but Mik should know better.
She sits up a little on the mattress, and the comforter slips from her chest, revealing her pale skin, rosy, tight nipples on display.
I sit on the fireplace and check the water in the French press.
I know we need to talk, to open up and communicate and be vulnerable and all that shit that I hate, but I don’t want to. I’d literally rather do anything else.
But isn’t that what I’ve always done? Avoided anything real by hiding behind sarcasm and teasing?
But nothing’s really changed. Yes, I’ve tasted her, and felt her, and God, do I want more, but it’s not like any of us are under the delusion that this can survive her family.
But, maybe, if she’s trusting me with her body, I owe it to her to try to be vulnerable too.
I watch as she slides the bag of snow under the comforter and between her legs, wincing with a hiss. She breathes through the cold, but when her blue eyes find mine again, her face softens.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
“I think we need to establish some rules,” I find myself saying before I can think better of it. I’m not the dad of our little group - Roman is - but the heat in his eyes makes me think his logical brain isn’t quite on right now.
“Rules?” Tati replies, looking concerned again.
So I rush to reassure her, counting on my fingers.
“Your health and safety are number one,” I narrow my eyes at Mik, who at least has the decency to look reprimanded, even if his grin isn’t entirely guilty.
He presses a kiss to her shoulder in apology.
“... two, there can be no jealousy.” My eyes are still on Mik’s.
“No one owns her more than anyone else. If this isn’t working, we talk about it; we don’t let it fester.
” Now, I look at Roman. “If one of us needs to be reassigned, we ask for reassignment.”
He nods, understanding what I’m saying without me having to spell it out. If being with Tati distracts us too much from our job of keeping her safe, we remove ourselves from the situation. Her safety matters more than our comfort or desires.
“Do you have any rules, princess?” I ask, enjoying how her eyes narrow in response.
She thinks for a moment before responding. “If this is temporary, I want it all. I want to experience everything. I want to try on kinks and see if I like them. I want to go into a marriage knowing what I like and learning how to ask for it.”
Her mention of a future marriage causes something to burn low in my gut, even as I feel proud of her for speaking up and demanding what she wants. But I nod, walking over to the junk drawer in the kitchen and retrieve a notepad and marker I noticed earlier.
Walking back into the living room, the sun has risen enough that I can see my writing.
“Alright. Let’s make a list. We can check them off when you feel ready.”
She smiles eagerly. “Well, I’ve given my first blow job...”
“A+, by the way,” I tease, but this teasing feels good - like a good kind of teasing.
Her cheeks pinken as a beautifully shy smile creeps across her lips.
“I’ve read plenty...” she admits, even though it looks like she’s struggling to come up with ideas.
“Free use?” I ask helpfully.
Her smile turns wicked. “Yes. Submission? Daddy? Anal? Spanking? Being tied up?”
God, it’s like she’s listing out a menu of Christmas fucking morning for me. To be fair, there’s not much I wouldn’t do with her.
“I doubt we’ll find a tentacle dildo...” she says, looking around as if that’s the most normal sentence she’s ever said. Mik smiles into her shoulder while Roman chokes on a groan.
“Is that what you’ve been reading this whole time? Tentacle porn?” I tease and I realize, that this is what we do. We push each other and tease each other, and that’s not all bad. This teasing without the underlying anger I usually carry with me actually feels really good.
She sticks her tongue out at me. “I am an equal-opportunity porn reader, Lev. Don’t yuck my yum.”
I smile.
Without our phones, or television, or her school, boredom sets in quickly. I want to give her time to recover, and with Mik glued to her side, I guess that means I’m in charge of breakfast.
I toss out the Pop-Tarts I bought, thinking that they’re good cold, too.
Tati giggles as she opens hers, and it lights my chest that I could do something as stupid and simple as make her happy.
Is this why people get into relationships?
Because making the other person happy feels good?
I can see how addictive that might become.
Especially with someone as sweet as she is.
Which is a dangerous fucking thought, so naturally I shove it into a mental closet and kick a chair in front of it.
Tati breaks a corner off her first Pop-Tart and Mik leans over her shoulder and takes a bite, even though his remains on his lap, unopened.
I narrow my eyes at him for stealing food from her, but she acts like it was the most natural thing in the world and he replies with a shit-eating grin.
I hate myself for this, but I know it needs to be discussed before we can explore whatever this is.
“I think we need rules, too. Not just a kinky checklist.”
Tatiana sits up a little straighter, face serious. But it’s Roman who starts, and I love him for picking up what I’m too afraid to articulate.
“You say stop, we stop. You ask for space, you get space. You want one of us and not the others; that is your choice. You don’t owe us anything.”
Tati nods.
“Not just in bed,” he says. “Anywhere. Anything. If one of us is crowding you, pushing, asking too much, acting like an asshole—” He narrows his eyes at me, and I feign offense.
“Me? Never,” I tease, tossing my hand across my chest.
I hadn’t thought about that part. Not clearly. I’d been thinking about jealousy from our end, about Mik and me and Roman not turning into territorial idiots. But Roman’s right. She’s the one who could get trapped trying to make everything fair.
Trying to take care of us.
That thought makes me feel like I swallowed something sharp.
Tati looks down at the Pop-Tart in her hands. “What if I hurt someone’s feelings?”
“You will,” Roman says.
Her head jerks up.
He doesn’t soften the answer, but his voice changes. Just enough. “Not because you mean to. Because this is complicated. We’re grown men. We can survive disappointment without making it your responsibility.”
Mik nods, his face serious now. “He’s right. You don’t have to manage us, Tati.”
A long line of silence flows between them. He’s saying with his eyes everything his heart can’t say out loud. That they’ve waited long enough for this, that he’s willing to take whatever she wants to give him.
I draw a line across the center of the notebook that I listed her wishes on.
“No jealousy,” I say as I write the words. “No worrying about our feelings,” I add, knowing we’re all going to be worrying about her feelings. “Consent is king.”
I look up, offering the space for other suggestions.
Tati’s chewing on the corner of her lips. I can tell she wants to add something, but I sit and wait.
“When this ends, we have to go back to everything like it’s normal. It’ll be awkward as hell, but I don’t want to lose any of you.”
A sad smile pulls at my lips, because that’s exactly what I was thinking too. When I’m not being a dick, we’re a lot more alike than I thought.
I’m silent, but add ‘back to normal‘ to the list of rules.
When no one else has anything to add, I can’t help but fill the silence.
“So, assuming you need time to recover, what are we doing today?” I ask.
I’m not good at being bored. I saw a covered lean-to with wood that’s waiting to be split when I returned from town.
I could get out some of this restless energy on the other end of an axe.
But I want to make sure she’s taken care of first.
Tati smiles around a bite, then immediately presses the back of her hand to her mouth like she’s trying not to laugh with food in it.
Her hair is a mess around her shoulders, her cheeks still pink from sleep and sex, and I’m sure she’d be embarrassed that she’s not perfectly put together if she were to look in a mirror.
She looks soft. Rumpled. Happy in a way I don’t think I’ve seen before.
It’s the most beautiful she’s ever been. She’s not pretending or posturing or trying to be someone she’s not.
The French press starts to sputter faintly on the coals, steam pushing up around the lid. I grab a towel and lift it away before walking to the kitchen and filling four mugs.
I chuckle to myself. Tentacle porn talk, and all before coffee.
I pass the mugs around before returning to sit next to the fire. The silence is telling. None of us knows what to do.
“I packed you a couple of books,” I tell Tati. Roman’s the one most comfortable with silence and boredom. Tati and Mik can read.
I can chop wood.
We finish our Pop-Tarts, chatting about nothing of importance. Tati worries that Juliet is okay. Mik pulls on some sweatpants and brings Sparkles into his lap, scratching a finger along the bird’s soft feathers.
“I wouldn’t mind reading some. There’s also a chessboard over there...” Tati says, nodding toward a bookshelf, and sure enough, there’s a small table with a chessboard built into the top.
I can’t help but look over my shoulder at the snowy scene out of the window. The bright sun is high enough now that it’s reflecting on the snow top, creating a shimmering sea of white. It’s beautiful.
But something heavy sits in my chest, knowing that once the snow melts, once Niko finds the enemy, this has to go back to normal; to before.
And that might be the most depressing thought I’ve ever had. Even more so than not living past forty.