Chapter 9
Curtis
“You should bring Finn and Jesse out,” Draco said, raising his voice to be heard over the music blaring through the outdoor speakers. “He doesn’t need his own dirt bike. The kids all take turns on the ones available. Everybody shares.”
“I’ll ask him,” Teddy replied. “He’s never ridden before, so it might take a little coaxing. Jesse will definitely be interested, though. That kid has never met a challenge they weren’t up for.”
She was curled up on my lap, her legs thrown over mine. When it started cooling off, I’d grabbed a flannel out of my saddlebag, and it covered her all the way to her thighs, which gave the impression that she didn’t have anything on underneath.
It was fucking with my head.
“We loved it when we were kids,” Kara said, making me laugh.
“We practically had to force you to come riding,” I argued.
“That’s not true!”
“She wanted to stay home and read books,” Draco informed Teddy.
“I could ride as well as the rest of you,” Kara said, shoving his shoulder.
“Didn’t say you couldn’t,” he replied, wrapping his arms around hers to hold them in place as he kissed her neck. “You just preferred not to.”
He laughed as Kara elbowed him in the gut. They wrestled around as Kara gasped with laughter.
“I used to love riding with my brothers,” Teddy told me, turning her face so that we were practically nose to nose. “The dirt bike we had was so tall, Royce had to start it and then help Cooper and me on. Once we were moving, it didn’t matter, though.”
“Until you had to stop,” I replied, smiling.
“Yeah. That part could get a little rough.” She wrinkled her nose. “But it was worth the ride.”
“Always is,” I agreed. She shifted in my lap, and I held back a groan.
“This has been fun,” she said with a sigh. “You’re sure the kids are good back at the house?”
“Dylan let me know when they got home,” I confirmed. “He and Jesse are nearly grown, plus Rose is with the girls right down the street. Didn’t you ever have Jess babysit Finn before?”
“Not really,” she replied. “I mean, once in a while, but not at night.”
“Why not?”
“I didn’t have anywhere to go,” she blurted, then laughed a little under her breath. “I wasn’t exactly out partying.”
“It’s fun, right?” I asked, gesturing to the people around us. The music shifted from an old rock song to a newer, slower love song, and Draco pulled Kara to her feet. He pulled her to the edge of the darkness and wrapped his arms around her, swaying to the music.
“They’re sweet,” Teddy said as we watched them. “They’ve been together a long time, huh?”
“Since we were kids,” I replied. “The five of us—Charlie, Kara, Rebel, Draco and me—were inseparable when we were young, but it shifted for Kara and Draco when we were teenagers.”
“You can tell that there’s a long history with all of you,” she said, laying her head on my shoulder. Her forehead fit perfectly in the crook of my neck, and I pulled her closer against my chest. She was quiet for a moment. “You’re cute with Rebel.”
“How so?”
“I don’t know…just sweet. You can tell that she adores you.”
“More than Draco?” I asked jokingly.
“Too close to call,” Teddy mused with mock seriousness.
“Lies.” I gave her a squeeze. “Rebel’s awesome.
The woman is kind to literally everyone she meets.
She was shy when we were younger, but she works at an old folks’ home, and she has to deal with a lot of new people all the time—visitors and shit—so she’s really come out of her shell.
She’s probably one of my favorite people on the planet. ”
“The feeling is mutual.”
“Yeah,” I nodded, sliding my hand up and down her thigh to generate some heat when she shivered. “It used to mess with me when we were kids.”
“What did?”
“Well, Rebel was just one of us, you know? We were the five musketeers. But when we hit our teens, it felt kind of like we were leaving her behind. She couldn’t do the same shit we could. We were learning to drive and goin’ on dates and shit, and because of the Down syndrome, Reb wasn’t there yet.”
“That’s rough,” Teddy replied quietly.
“My mom had to sit Draco and me down and talk it through with us, because while we knew she had Down syndrome, I don’t think either of us really understood what that meant.
Like, maybe she didn’t hit milestones at the same time as us, but she always caught up.
So when that gap started getting bigger, it freaked us out. ”
“Sweet boys,” she murmured.
“Nah, we were little shits. But we loved Reb. Still do.”
“And she caught up,” Teddy said with a smile. “I mean, she has a job and a husband, right? She’s a step ahead of me.”
“You shoulda seen her at the wedding.” I sighed, thinking of Rebel and Wes during their first dance. My throat tightened at the memory. “She wore this really flimsy veil, and it kind of floated out behind her as they danced. Fuck. Draco and I were bawlin’.”
Teddy’s smile grew. “No way.”
“Oh, fuck yeah. God, it gets me just thinkin’ about it.” I grinned back at her. “There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.”
“I love that,” she murmured.
“They’ve got a tiny house on her parents’ property, and Wes’s parents bought a place down the street.
She loves it, and Wes is cool. We’ll invite them both over soon so you can meet him.
They’ve been together almost as long as Kara and Draco, and he fuckin’ dotes on her. Couldn’t have picked better.”
“What are you two so serious about?” my dad asked as he led my mom toward the little circle of chairs we’d commandeered.
“I was tellin’ Teddy about Reb’s wedding.”
“Oh shit,” my mom groaned. “I’ve been drinking. Don’t get me started, or I’ll be a blubbering mess.”
“Curt said he was bawling,” Teddy replied, lifting her head.
“Christ,” my dad muttered. “I think we all were.”
He sat down in a chair and pulled my mom onto his lap, mirroring Teddy and me.
“This chair’s going to give out,” my mom warned, stiff as a board.
“Why the hell are you worried?” he asked with a laugh. “I’d break your fall.”
“And you’d break your ass,” she pointed out. “How would that be good for me?”
“Stop bitchin’.”
“I didn’t even think of that,” Teddy said, looking up at me with a grimace.
“Pfft,” my mom said, waving her off as Draco and Kara joined us again. “You’re much smaller than I am. Your chair’s fine.”
“I’ll break your fall,” I assured Teddy.
“And you’d break your ass,” she replied, mimicking my mom. “How would that be good for me?”
“You could rub it better for me,” I joked, making her scoff.
“I think that would be good for you, not me.”
“I’d make it good for both of us,” I countered quietly.
Her eyes widened in reproach. “Your parents are right there.”
“They can’t hear me.”
“I can hear you,” Draco announced, grinning happily.
“Stop eavesdroppin’,” I ordered. “Kara, put a muzzle on him, will you?”
“I’ve tried,” Kara said with a sigh. “It never works.”
“Hey, Teddy,” my dad called. “Before I forget, Grease wanted me to ask you to come in Monday morning.”
“Oh, okay,” Teddy replied, sitting a little straighter. “Do you know why?”
“Somethin’ to do with you lookin’ for a job, I think,” Dad said nonchalantly.
“Oh, what do you do, Teddy?” my mom asked.
The conversation flowed easily late into the night.
I was thankful to the brothers and their old ladies, because while most of them had said hello in the first couple of hours, after that they’d mostly left us alone so we could hang with the people I was closest to.
It gave Teddy and the kids a taste of the life without overwhelming them.
We rode home in the early hours of the morning, and unlike the first time when Teddy’d been reluctant to ride on the back of my bike, she seemed to revel in it on the way home.
Her thighs pressed against my hips, and her hands slipped under the hem of my T-shirt, pressing against the bare skin of my stomach.
Instead of sitting stiffly behind me, she pressed languidly against my back, like she didn’t have a care in the world.
The weather wasn’t supposed to turn until sometime next week, so I didn’t bother with the garage door and parked outside. Teddy climbed down and was holding my helmet out toward me by the time I’d swung off.
The kids had left the porch light on, but the house was dark when I led her inside. I quietly set the helmet down on the floor and locked up behind us, then made a quick check to make sure Dylan had secured all the doors and windows while Teddy grabbed a glass of water and downed it.
“I can’t believe we stayed out so late,” she whispered as she followed me toward the stairs. “I think the last time I was awake at three a.m., I was feeding Finn.”
“You have fun?” I asked, reaching for her hand as I tugged her upstairs.
“Actually, yeah.”
“That surprised you?”
“I guess not,” she said with a laugh. “But I also didn’t imagine we’d be drinking beer next to a bonfire with your parents and brother and sister-in-law all night.”
“That’s the best kind of night,” I informed her. “It’s even better when Charlie and Bishop have a sitter for the night. Once Jenna’s a little older, we’ll have to set somethin’ up.”
When we reached the top of the stairs, all the lights were off except the ones in the bonus room. We wandered that way, mostly because I wanted to turn off the light, but I wasn’t ready to let go of her hand yet, so I made her come with me.
We stopped in surprise just inside the large open space at the end of the hall.
Jesse, Finn, and Dylan were spread out across the floor, with Dylan on one end, Jesse on the other, and Finn diagonally between them. They’d dragged a kitchen chair upstairs and set Teddy’s TV on it. Underneath, on the carpet, was Jesse and Finn’s gaming system.
“That’s an accident waiting to happen,” Teddy muttered softly.
“No shit.” I crossed the room and moved the TV back onto the floor against the wall where it had been when we left the house that afternoon.
“You think we should wake them?” she whispered.
I looked down at the kids. Dylan was rolled up in the comforter from his bed, the top of his head and his feet from the ankle down the only parts of him visible.
Finn had flung open his sleeping bag and was sprawled out on top of it with his hands above his head, and Jesse was curled up on their side, completely passed out, a dingy baby blanket pressed between their pillow and cheek.
“Nah, I think they’re fine,” I said. “As long as you don’t care?”
Teddy thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, let’s leave them.”
I turned off the light and followed Teddy toward our room, blinking in surprise when she hit the hallway switch as we passed it.
“I don’t want Finn to freak if he wakes up in the dark,” she explained. “He’d probably be fine, but with his luck he’d fall down the stairs trying to find the bathroom.”
“I doubt they’ll wake up before morning,” I replied as we reached the bedroom. I closed the door behind me and pulled off my cut, tossing it on top of a box against the wall. “I wonder what time they passed out.”
“Probably pretty late if Jess didn’t bring Finn into bed,” she replied, kicking off her sandals. “She’s usually pretty good about that. But I guess since they’re upstairs, she wouldn’t think it was such a big deal.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, pulling off my shirt.
When there was no reply, I turned to look at her. She was staring at my chest.
“Teddy?” I called.
Her head jerked, and she looked away. “Well, we had a rule that the kids couldn’t sleep in the living room,” she explained. “If someone broke in the front door, I didn’t want them right there asleep on the couch.”
“Makes sense,” I agreed. It wasn’t something I’d ever thought about.
“Do you care if I use the bathroom first?” she asked, turning back toward me with a pile of clothes in her arms.
“Have at it,” I agreed.
I held myself perfectly still as she slid my flannel off her shoulders and laid it across the foot of the bed, the sight far more erotic than it should’ve been.
Shit, how long had it been since I’d had sex?
A month before I’d left Montana? Two? I’d spent about six months hooking up occasionally with a bartender friend.
It hadn’t been anything serious or defined, but she’d still been pissed when I’d told her I was moving.
That, in turn, had pissed me off. I couldn’t really say we’d parted on bad terms, but there sure as hell hadn’t been any goodbye sex.
After Teddy closed herself into the bathroom, I unbuttoned the top couple of buttons on my jeans and sat down on the bed to wait. I peeled off my socks and tossed them toward the dirty clothes pile in the corner of the room that was starting to get out of control.
I needed to do laundry. I also needed to get started on the yard, since I’d told Tommy I would.
Teddy and Jesse had been cooking most of our meals if we didn’t order in and cleaning up the kitchen afterward, so I should probably do the bathrooms. It was only fair.
I wondered what cleaning products Kara had stocked us up with and where she’d stored them.
Tomorrow, I’d pull them out and pitch in. Dylan could do some chores too.
The bathroom door opened, and I raised my head, the thoughts I’d been using to distract myself completely disappearing.
Teddy was wearing a pair of shorts and a loose tank top, her hair piled high on her head.
She may as well have been wearing lingerie with the way I instantly hardened.
“Uh, all yours,” she rasped, clearing her throat afterward.
I nodded, not trusting my voice. When I rose to my feet, she cursed.
“Seriously?” she asked with a laugh of disbelief.
I froze. “What?”
“Who looks like that?” she asked, frowning. “With the muscles and the tattoos and the buttons?”
“Buttons?” I asked in confusion.
“Oh, you did that on purpose,” she shot back, her lips twitching. She shimmied. “Just a couple undone. Not too many. Leave a little to the imagination.”
I looked down at my jeans and let out a bark of laughter. “Baby, we ate a lot of food tonight and followed that up with beer. They’re unbuttoned because I had to take my socks off, and I didn’t wanna get cut in half.”
Her expression moved from knowing amusement to surprise before she burst out laughing.
“But thanks,” I said, drawing out the word. “Didn’t know unbuttonin’ my jeans to make room for my gut was a turn-on.”
“To be fair,” she wheezed. “When you look like that, I don’t think it would take much to seduce someone.”
I grinned as I moved toward her, catching her by the arm as she tried to step past me.
“How drunk are you?” I asked, searching her face.
“Not at all,” she replied with a surprised shake of her head. “I only had three beers in the last ten hours. Why?”
“Because when I kiss you, I wanna know you’re sober when you kiss me back,” I murmured.
“You say that like you haven’t been kissing me all day,” she replied softly, tipping her head back.
“Nobody’s watching us now.”