Chapter 13 Teague
Teague
Cass has been unbearable for three days and it's the funniest thing I've ever seen.
He's sitting at the kitchen table with a cup of coffee he's not drinking, bouncing his knee hard enough to rattle the silverware, staring at the hallway that leads to our father's bedroom like he can see through walls if he concentrates hard enough.
Every time there's a sound from that direction, a door closing, the creak of floorboards, the muffled murmur of our father's voice, Cass goes completely still for about two seconds and then starts bouncing again.
"You're going to put a hole in the tile," I tell him from across the table.
"I'm fine."
"You're not fine. You're vibrating. Ledger, is he vibrating?"
Ledger is at the end of the table, picking at a piece of toast with the focused disinterest of a man who eats out of obligation rather than interest. He looks at Cass for about half a second. "He's vibrating."
"I'm not vibrating. I'm sitting." Cass picks up his coffee, takes a sip, puts it back down, and the knee starts again. "How long has he been in there?"
"Who, Dad?"
"No, the pope. Yes, Dad."
"About an hour. Maybe more." I lean back in my chair and take a long sip of my own coffee, which I'm enjoying immensely, both the coffee and the show of watching my youngest brother come apart at the seams. He's the only one of us who hasn't gotten Ash alone yet.
Ledger had his turn in the barn yesterday and came back carrying the man across the yard like a war prize.
I had my turn two days before that. Cass has been cooking breakfast and checking the fence and sitting across from Ash at dinner, getting absolutely nothing, and the restraint is visibly destroying him.
"You know," I say, "if you grip that mug any harder, it's going to shatter, and then you'll have a mess and an injury and still no alone time with Ash."
"Shut up, Teague."
"I'm just observing."
"Observe quieter."
Ledger takes a bite of toast, chews, and swallows. "He's right, though. You're going to break the mug."
Cass looks down at his hand and loosens his grip with visible effort. I'm about to make another comment when the water shuts off and a door opens down the hallway, our father appearing in the kitchen doorway, dressed in only pants, looking like a man who's had a productive morning.
"Where's Ash?" Cass asks immediately.
"Taking some time to himself." Boone crosses to the coffee pot and fills a mug with his usual unhurried calm. "Which gives us time to talk."
All three of us groan. That particular phrase from our father has preceded every lecture and come-to-Jesus moment of our collective lives, so the groan is earned.
Boone ignores it completely, pulls out a chair, sits, wraps both hands around his mug, and looks at us with the expression I recognize from cattle auctions and contract negotiations, the one that means he's about to lay terms and the terms are non-negotiable.
"Before you start," I say, "I want to state for the record that I've been very well-behaved."
"You have," Boone says, which is unexpected enough that I don't have a follow-up. He takes a sip and sets the mug down. "I’m not going to beat around the bush this morning. I’m sure some of you have noticed, but Ash drops.
During sex, sometimes after. His body lets go of everything, and he goes somewhere far away.
It's called subspace. It's not dangerous, but it requires attention and care and someone who knows what they're looking at. "
Cass has stopped bouncing his knee. He leans forward, elbows on the table, his coffee forgotten. Ledger sets his toast down and gives our father his full attention, which from Ledger is a rare thing.
"I know," Ledger pushes out. "He almost went under with me in the barn yesterday. I saw his eyes change and pulled him back."
Boone looks at Ledger and nods once, satisfied. "How far did he get?"
"Not far. I caught it early, said his name, kept contact, and kept him present." Ledger pushes his plate to the side. "But it was fast. He goes from fully there to drifting in about five to ten seconds. There's not a lot of warning."
"There isn't," Boone agrees. "The first night it happened, I wasn't expecting it. He'd never experienced it before, didn't even have language for it. I gave him the word and he knows it can happen now, but that awareness doesn't slow it down. His body decides before his brain does."
"What does it look like?" Cass asks, his voice shifting into something more serious than his usual eagerness. He's leaned so far forward his chest is nearly touching the table.
"His eyes go glassy, and his pupils dilate.
His body goes completely limp and his breathing shifts to something much more shallow.
He won't respond to his name right away.
There might be tears, but he's not crying, exactly; it's just his body releasing the breadth of his emotions.
" Boone wraps both hands around his mug again, and I can see him choosing his next words with the care he brings to everything that matters.
"When it happens, you hold him. You talk to him.
You tell him where he is, who you are, and that he's safe.
And you wait. It can take a few minutes or longer, but you do not rush it. "
I'm turning my own mug in my hands, processing this, thinking about when I had Ash in the barn and how eager he had been to suck me off, the sounds he made, and the way he shook afterward. "We've never had to be this careful with any of the others.”
The temperature in the kitchen drops. My father's eyes land on me, his voice going to that familiar register, the one that gets quieter instead of louder, the one that every person in this house knows means something very different from calm.
"We don't talk about others while we have someone in this house," he growls out. "And we especially don't talk about others in relation to Ash. He's not a comparison. He's not a category. He's the person who's here now, and he gets treated like the only person who's ever been here. Are we clear?"
"Clear," I mutter. "Sorry."
He holds the look for another second, then turns it on Ledger and Cass. "Are we clear?"
Both of my brothers nod, the temperature slowly returning to normal and I take a sip of coffee to cover the fact that my father just made me feel twelve years old with a look and a few sentences.
Cass is quiet for a moment, turning his mug in his hands, staring at the surface of his cold coffee. Then he looks up. "You're falling for him," he points out to our father.
Ledger and I freeze, braced for another reprimand.
As close as we are to our father, there are just some things we don’t point out and this feels like one of them.
Even if I’m curious as hell as to why he’s taken so fast to Ash.
The few other men we’ve shared, stayed with me and my brothers for nearly a week before our father ever expressed interest.
With Ash, the dynamic is completely flipped.
Boone looks at Cass, his guard dropping for half a second, just long enough to see something real behind it, before he answers carefully and honestly.
"I'm man enough to admit that Ash holds a more special place in my heart than I expected when I brought him here," he says.
"That doesn't change the deal I made with him, and it doesn't change how we handle this. "
I set my mug down and look at the window where the morning light is catching dust motes in the air. "I know we just started," I start, and I'm surprised to hear myself saying it, "but is it okay to say that I'm not really looking forward to the end of two weeks?"
The silence that fills the space has a weight to it that feels different from our usual silences, heavier, more honest.
"Be careful with him," Boone says, his voice warming back up but there's iron underneath it.
"Have fun. Push his limits. He wants to be pushed, he likes it, and part of what we're doing here is showing him what his body is capable of.
" He looks at each of us in turn, me, Ledger, Cass, holding each look long enough for the message to land.
"But if I find out that any one of you stepped over his boundaries or ignored his safe word, you won't just be having words with me. "
He stands, pushes his chair in, picks up his mug, and walks out of the kitchen and down the hallway. The three of us sit there holding our breath in a silence that lasts about fifteen seconds before we hear the bathroom door open and close and then the sound of water turning back on.
Another ten seconds. Then a soft moan, muffled by walls and a closed door but unmistakable in this house. Cass closes his eyes. His hands flatten on the table and he takes a very long, very deliberate breath in through his nose. "That's so fucking cruel.”
I'm already laughing. Ledger has something on his face that would be a smirk if it had more practice, and Cass is sitting there with his eyes closed breathing like a man talking himself back from a ledge while our father does exactly what he does best, which is taking care of Ash Dunne behind a closed door while his three sons sit at the kitchen table pretending they can't hear it.
"Cass," Ledger says. "Take several deep breaths before you do whatever you're thinking about doing."
"I'm not thinking about anything."
"Sure you're not," I say. "Just do us all a favor. When Ash ends up with splinters in his ass because you decided to fuck him against the fence, don't come to one of us for help. I refuse to be involved in that conversation."
Cass opens his eyes and looks at me and for a moment I think he's going to hit me. Then the corner of his mouth twitches and Ledger makes a sound that might be a laugh and the tension breaks all over again.