Chapter 30 Linus
thirty
Linus
One Month Later
The light in my bedroom is soft.
Honest.
Slanting across the jumbled mess we made last night. My sheets are half-off the bed. Avonna’s thigh is thrown over mine.
Our skin still sticky with sweat and sex.
She’s not asleep. I can tell by the way her breath holds when I shift. Lately, after sex, she stills. Almost like if she moves the spell will break.
It won’t.
Avonna.
Wild, dangerous, honest Avonna.
Except, not quite. There’s something weighing her down, like a secret between her teeth.
I have the same pressure in my own chest.
Last night was supposed to burn it out of us. As usual, I woke up needing more.
I slide my hand across her stomach. She shivers. I dip lower. She parts her thighs, breath catching, wet and ready.
Always.
“You didn’t get enough either.” My lips brush her ear.
She turns to face me, eyes dark, mouth already parted. I slip two fingers into her and her whole body arches.
“Fuck,” she cries out. “You’re gonna start something.”
“I’m gonna finish somethin’.”
I move down her body, no hesitation. I eat her like I’m starving.
My tongue deep in her pussy, fingers curling up, lapping at her clit like I own it.
She writhes, canting and writhing against my mouth, one hand in my hair and the other flat against mattress like she’s trying to keep herself grounded.
She’s a mess in minutes. Coating my chin. Whispering curses.
When I climb back up, she grabs my cock, strokes. Her thumb smears precum across the tip and I hiss.
“Need you inside me.” She bites her lip as she peers into my eyes.
“Turn over.”
Her eyes flare and she obeys.
She gets on all fours, ass up, glancing back at me like she knows exactly how good she looks. I guide my cock into her soaked entrance. Her pussy swallows me perfectly.
Avonna half growls, half trills in prayer.
I grab her hips and start to fuck her. The sound of skin on skin mingled together with wetness echoing between us. Her face is buried in the sheets, hands clawing at the mattress.
“Take it,” I growl. “Take my cock, Avonna.”
“Yes,” she warbles. “Fuck me like you mean it.”
I snap my hips, driving into her like she’s mine. She throws her head back, sweat dripping down her spine. I lean forward, one hand threaded in her hair, the other slapping her ass enough to leave a print.
“Tell me you love my cock.”
“I fucking love it,” she cries. “Your cock. God, Linus, you fuck me like no one ever has or ever will.”
She comes, trembling. I keep going, chasing my own release, and when I let go it’s with a guttural shout, buried balls-deep inside her, cock twitching as I fill her for the umpteenth time this month.
We collapse. Her chest against the bed. My body covering hers.
Sweat. Silence. Breath.
I can’t let it go any longer. If we’re going to make this any more than fucking, we’ve got to have a conversation.
“You’re hiding somethin’, baby.” I kiss her shoulder. “You can tell me anything. This is a safe place.”
She stills for a moment. Then exhales like she’s been holding her breath for years.
“Look, this isn’t something easy to talk about. I’ve told you about my extensive therapy.” Her voice is hoarse. “I’ve never shared the details and you have the right to know.”
I stay quiet. Let her speak.
“To heal from my past, I needed a special kind of counselor. To teach me how to get rid of the shame. The control they had over my mind and body.” She clutches the pillow.
“I needed to reclaim sex and I worked with a therapist who specialized in sexual trauma, and a sex surrogate. She provided the counseling. He taught me how to have sex. How to experience pleasure, give it—everything. All of my first sexual experiences were with him and I learned how to feel good in my own body. How to say yes and no without guilt.”
She turns onto her side, facing me now. Eyes shining with tears. She’s vulnerable, but not afraid.
“It was clinical but loving.” Avonna squeezes her eyes shut.
“Over the course of nearly a year, I lost all shame and developed skills to express what I want sexually. This might come as a shock to you, but I believe it’s my destiny to be loved by two men.
Sex. Commitment. Everything. At the end of my therapy, I determined this was a core desire and arranged to explore it with my surrogate and another man.
They took me together. In every way possible.
Afterward, I felt whole and knew it’s what I want for the long-term. ”
It’s all I can do to keep my mouth from dropping. Is this really happening?
I can’t believe my gut instinct about her was so spot on.
She pauses. “I realize this might be a shock and Linus, it’s not about not enjoying one-on-one. I do. I love it. With you, it’s…” She swallows. “It’s everything. I’ve fallen head over heels for you. Truthfully, I’m more confused than ever. I could be happy with you.”
I’m still speechless, so I wait for her to finish.
“I wanted to tell you.” Avonna looks away, almost bashful. “I’ve never felt safe enough to confide this to a lover. I wasn’t sure if you’d be mad or scandalized or…maybe open to exploring this with me.”
Fucking hell.
I touch her cheek and turn her face back toward me. “You have no idea how happy I am you felt safe enough to tell me. I’m glad you did.”
Then it’s my turn to confess what no one in Dublin knows.
“There was a man, back in the States. Liam.”
Her eyes widen out of utter intrigue and complete shock.
“We were in uni together. I managed his band, Fireball. He and I loved each other. I truly thought he was my forever, but I had to leave when my visa expired. He…struggled. With himself. With commitment. With us.”
I exhale.
“He’s bisexual. As am I. Always have been.
I’ve tried to shut it off, push it down.
Told myself I needed to find the right woman.
Or man.” I grasp her hand and bring it to my lips.
“Liam and I talked about what it would be like if we could find the right woman, but he didn’t believe she existed.
Avonna, for the first time, I can stop pretending. ”
Avonna doesn’t say a word. She reaches between us, grips my cock and guides me back into her like I never left.
God, the feel of her. Silken. Molten. Enveloping my shaft like she wants to keep me pulsing inside her forever. There’s nothing cleaner, nothing purer than raw truth between bodies.
“No more secrets,” I murmur into her neck, thrusting deeper. “Never any lies.”
She wraps her legs around my waist, feet clasped around my ass, pulling me deeper. Her words break apart against my mouth. “You’re my everything. We can have everything.”
I see her.
All of her.
An unspoken genuineness behind her eyes. A flicker of hunger beyond this room, this bed and me. I hold her wrists above her head, pinning her.
“Talk to me,” I beg.
“I was beginning to think I’d never find someone who’d understand why I wanted two men. Not only during sex. In the quiet too. In the after.” What comes out is raw truth. “I don’t care if this isn’t considered normal, do you?”
Her confession lands like a bell in my ribs. Part of me drifts, briefly, to my parents’ kitchen table. To conversations I’ve rehearsed, but never spoken aloud.
There are entire versions of myself I haven’t been able to explain, no matter how carefully I could try to choose my words. Someday, maybe. When there’s something solid to discuss. Until then, Avonna and my shared truth would fracture more than it would heal.
First things first.
Liam used to tell me he couldn’t commit to one or the other. Said no woman would ever accept a man who wanted both. No man would share. Believed desire like ours was a storm, not a home.
He was wrong. So wrong.
Avonna speaks her truth without shame. With perfect clarity.
“I don’t care a bit.” I kiss her cheek. Her lips. her throat. “You aren’t asking too much. You’re fuckin’ perfect.”
Her eyes close, tears clinging to the edges but refusing to fall.
She isn’t broken.
She’s prophecy.
So is he.
Two pieces of the same pull. Tugging on me from both sides. Inside my head, I see it clear as sunrise.
Avonna. Me. Liam.
We’re three pieces of the same goddamn whole.
I slam back into her, and she cries out, biting her lip to keep from screaming. I know I’m close.
“Let go, baby.” I hold her face between my hands. “I want to feel you come around my cock.”
She fucking explodes, head thrown back, pussy spasming around me. I follow, chanting her name like a confession.
We collapse in a heap.
She turns, voice hoarse from pleasure and confession. “Did I spoil everything or are we soulmates?”
I meet her gaze. My mouth opens. Closes.
She exhales something between a laugh and a sigh. “It’s okay. You can take a moment.”
Shaking my head, I smile and my fingers trace lazy, grounding circles on her skin.
“I don’t need one. I couldn’t have said it better. You don’t scare me, baby. You make me braver.” I snuggle her under my arm. “I never thought it would be possible. You’re goddamn right we’re soulmates. I’m so feckin’ in love with you, I can barely stand it.”
Her hand finds mine. Our fingers knot. Silence settles.
Truth is no longer trying to outrun itself.
“I love you too, Linus O’Donnell. If we found each other…” She pauses. “Then someone else is out there too. Do you think it’s him?”
I close my eyes.
Aye.
I see him as clearly as I see her. Dark eyes, callused fingers, a laugh filled with defiance, a heart too scared to stay open. The three of us, bent but not broken, fractured but never alone again.
He’s the piece we’re missing.
We’re not whole yet.
Someday, God willing, we will be.