Chapter 32 Avonna
thirty-two
Avonna
A Year Later
I never get tired of lazy Saturday mornings.
Waking up to the weight of Linus’s arm draped over my waist.
His breath warm on my nape.
He always finds me in his sleep. No matter how much we toss and turn, somehow by morning we’re fused together. His leg is hooked around mine, cock nudging my thigh.
His entire body knows I belong to him.
I love the drift from dream to touch. How the light filters through the slanted skylight above our bed. My eyes blink open and I glance over at my beautiful man. Full lips puffing out small breaths.
I never knew I could be so happy.
When I shift slightly, his palm instinctively slides over my belly to pull me closer, no words needed. I reach down and wrap my hand around the thick length of him. Drag my fist loosely up and down his shaft until he’s twitching with need.
His lips curl into a smile as he wakes up.
“Ah, love,” he says sleepily. “You know how to wake a man up, so you do.”
“My pussy misses you,” I tease.
“Well, we wouldn’t want her to go for more than a couple of hours without a visit.” He pulls me to him. “Come here.”
Linus hooks his arm under my leg to give his cock space to slip inside me.
His arms envelop me as he fucks me lazily.
Every inch of my skin awakens under his touch.
We’re one living, breathing body, in no hurry to do anything but remain linked for as long as humanly possible.
Eventually, I can’t hold back. My orgasm is quiet. Fluttery. He follows a heartbeat later.
He brushes my hair back from my forehead. “God, I love you.”
By the time we make it to the kitchen a couple hours later, we’re finally showered and dressed. He doesn’t complain when I steal his hoodie, which is soft from so many washes. I pad barefoot across the tile while he makes coffee, whistling to himself under his breath.
As he’s firing up his laptop at the table, my phone pings. It’s a Google alert. My debut single is number seventeen in Germany. Number five in Ireland.
I swallow. “Wow, It’s really happening.”
I glance over at Linus and cover my mouth with my hand.
“It’s been happenin’.” He leans back in his chair.
We were looking for a long-term rental when we found this house in the Liberties, Dublin’s arts district. It’s on a quiet lane with a brick front. Ivy climbs the walls and a yellow rose bush blooms wild. Even better, it’s only a five-minute walk to his new Isis Management office.
The price felt impossible. Now it’s home. My first real home.
The kitchen is light and warm, with creamy cabinets, brass fixtures, and our beloved espresso machine.
Most days we leave the back doors open to the tiny garden, where thyme grows in the cracks between stones.
The living room has pine floors and a working fireplace.
Upstairs, our bedroom window looks out over rooftops.
Our second bedroom has become my practice space where my guitars lean against the wall and I’ve set up a small desk for songwriting. Most weeks, I play gigs nearby in pubs, cafés, and galleries. It’s the perfect setup. I can’t believe I’m living my dream.
Almost.
I take a seat across from him at the table, sipping my coffee.
“I never imagined this.” I trace the rim of my cup.
He glances over. “Chartin’?”
“No.” I grin. “Waking up next to the person I love in our Dublin house drinking too much coffee while he handles my schedule.”
Linus chuckles. “I’m proud to be your humble assistant.”
“You’re my everything,” I say, and I mean it. I trust this man with everything.
Not long after we confessed to wanting a third, he asked me to marry him with his heart in his eyes.
I said yes without blinking. We filled out the paperwork together, went through the process and, except for Linus’s family, have kept it private.
Not exactly hidden, but we don’t go out of our way to advertise we’re married.
Not yet.
Mainly, the wedding was supposed to be practical, even if our commitment has always been real.
In order for me to stay in Ireland, we had to be married. On the flip side, we’re in the process of obtaining a US green card for Linus so he can, eventually, expand Isis Management to the States. My dear friend Marcella’s immigration colleague is helping us in this regard.
For now, he focuses on his three Irish bands and me. We’re not any closer to finding our third, but we’ve done a great job laying a foundation to make it happen.
Hopefully with the sexy Fireball guitar player.
A few hours later, we’re in the living room watching my favorite show, Strictly Come Dancing. I don’t have a gig tonight and none of Linus’s other bands do either. It’s a rare night and we’re both happy to continue our lazy day.
“I’ve been thinking about him again.” I crawl into his lap and nestle into the crook of his neck.
Linus raises a brow. “Liam?”
“Fireball’s playing a bunch of shows with LTZ this summer.” I kiss his cheek. “Do you think he’d be open to reconnecting with you?”
“I don’t know.” He pulls off my shirt and cups my breasts, thrumming my nipples into little bullets. “Let me guess. You’re in the mood to play three-way. Wanna tell me again how you fucked two men at the same time?”
I look into his eyes. There’s never any jealousy in our role-playing. Only heat. Curiosity. Hunger coiled behind restraint. My fingertip traces the inside of his thigh. Up, across his stomach. His abs twitch beneath the touch.
“It was like being lit from the inside,” I whisper into his ear. “Their hands never left me. One kissed my throat while the other sucked my clit. They took their time. I felt everything.”
I feel his cock rise against my hip.
“They opened me together. One slid his fingers in first, then the other followed. They made me ready. I was so wet I could hear it. I took both of their cocks. One of them in my pussy, the other in my ass. I was full to the point of breaking. My body didn’t know what to hold on to.”
I pull down his sweatpants. Stroke him as I speak. “Every thrust made me shatter and reform. They fucked me like I was precious.”
He curses softly, shaft twitching in my hand.
“I came all over them. I felt everything. My pussy, my ass, my whole body. I didn’t feel shame. I felt wanted. Worshipped.”
He groans, low in his chest and bucks into my hand.
“You want to be fucked by me and him, don’t you?”
“Aye. I think about it all the time.” He looks down at my fist. “Fuckin’ you while he fucks me. The other way around. Both of us inside your pussy. Or, one of us in your ass the other in your cunt. I want it all.”
His cock twitches in my hand.
I smile as I stroke him. “I want all of it too. I’d love to watch Liam fuck you, I can’t imagine how wet I’d be.”
“Tell me, baby, how did you know?”
I blink. “Know what?”
“You wanted two men? At the same time. Considering your upbringing, I’m curious how it even came up in therapy?”
It’s the first time he’s asked. Even though his cock is in my fist, I can tell the question isn’t about getting off. Well, not directly. He always wants to know me. All of me. I love him for it.
“You’ve never asked me about this.”
He slips his hand between us and circles my clit. “I’ve always wondered.”
“It started as a feeling,” I recall. “A memory I couldn’t stop circling. When I first escaped, I played a college party to earn money. I remember seeing two men in the kitchen. One had his hand on the other’s back and I couldn’t stop staring. I’d been taught two men loving each other was wrong.”
Linus’s chest quivers when I rub precum over his crown. He slips his fingers inside my pussy.
“From the living room where I was playing, I watched them in the kitchen across the hall. I remember it vividly. Big farmhouse basin. Old green tile. Fairy lights taped around the window.”
His fingers pause inside me.
“They were kissing. Not softly. Like they needed it.”
He stares at me now.
“I couldn’t look away. One had his hand in the other’s hair, holding his face like it meant everything.”
He closes his eyes. Swallows.
“When I saw them, I knew. What they were doing wasn’t sin. It was something holy.”
“Avonna,” he stammers. “Where were you? What city?”
I tilt my head. “Pullman. A tiny college town in Washington State.”
Suddenly, it dawns on me. Linus went to college at a place called Wazzu. As someone who didn’t really know what college was, I didn’t realize Wazzu was Washington State.
Until right at this moment. Could it be?
No.
The odds would be impossible.
“How long ago?”
I look up to the ceiling to calculate the time. “A little over nine years.”
“Baby, I think I was one of the boys.” He pulls his fingers out of me. “Liam was the other.”
My whole body goes still. Have our lives been fated for longer than I ever imagined?
Linus doesn’t blink. “You were there for our first kiss. I didn’t give a fuck who saw. Liam had me by the balls.”
“Ohmygod.” All the air leaves my body. “I was barely sixteen.”
“I remember the singer. A hippie chick playin’ Justin Timberlake.” He kisses my hair. “Looked scared as a rabbit.”
I flatten my hand against his chest. His heart is racing under it. “Guilty as charged. Are you as blown away as me right now?”
He nods. The silence and inevitability wraps around us.
“I’m more convinced than before. You should reach out.” I stroke the hair at the base of his neck. “Something tells me, he needs us. He belongs with us.”
If there’s one thing I know about my husband, it’s he doesn’t love lightly. When he gives his heart, it’s for good.
He’s never stopped loving Liam.
I see it in softness behind his eyes when his name comes up. For all our hopes and dreams about adding a third, part of me felt a tinge of jealousy at the thought of Linus and Liam starting up again.
Until today.
Now I realize, I didn’t see them in the kitchen by chance. I was meant to. Their image etched itself into my body before I knew them or had any understanding of my sexuality. It led me through therapy and taught me how to ask for what I desire.
Two men, and not any men.
Liam. Linus.
Not a fantasy. Our future.
One of them is already mine. Fully. Fiercely. Linus has my heart as much as I have his.
Liam’s still a question, but something in me already knows. If we can get through to him, the moment he opens himself, all of us are going to fall forever.
I want it. For Linus. For me. The life we’ve let ourselves imagine.
I take his hand and bring it back to my pussy. “The three of us could be something real.”
“I think we already are,” he replies, slipping his fingers back inside me.
“Can you imagine? All of us in a house near the sea. Sharing songs, fucking each other. Touring. Raising babies.
“Don’t forget, baby, it may not be easy to convince him. He walked away.” Linus shifts me in his lap. Guides his cock inside me.. “I’ve contacted him many times over the years. Now there’s so much more on the line.”
“Try again,” I whisper, rocking against him. “You love him. You always have. I think he still loves you. Maybe he’ll love me too.”
Linus surges up to meet me, kissing me so deep it cracks something open in my chest.
“I miss him so fuckin’ badly some days.” His thrusts grow sharper. “But you have to know. You and I are solid. No matter what goes down, we’re real.”
His fingers slide between us, circling my clit.
“Nnnnngggggg.” I clutch his shoulders.
“I’m not risking you for stupid mind games,” he whispers against my throat.
“Then we’ll show him.” My breath is ragged. “Not with words. Not at first. With songs. This summer. Let him see what you’ve built. The music I’m making. Let him decide for himself.”
“Then what?” Linus picks me up and sets me on the counter, never leaving my body.
“Then,” I wince with pleasure when he slams into me, “hopefully he’ll write our next verse.”
We come together, his moan buried in my mouth as he spills into me. My head rests on his chest, his palm traces lazy circles over my belly. Through the speakers, my new demo plays. A haunting ballad about how love can heal a painful past.
“You’re a fucking star,” Linus murmurs.
“I’m your star,” I breathe. “And, you’re mine.”
“Forever.” He kisses me.
“And always.” My fingers slide through his hair. “Even if our universe adds one more.”