Chapter 17 #2
Tyler destroys the wrapping. The wooden train set spills out—tracks that build infinite ways.
"Yay!!! Can we build it NOW?"
We spend the next half hour on the rug, constructing elaborate tracks.
Logan keeps finding excuses to touch me—hand on my lower back when reaching for pieces, fingers in my hair while I read instructions, his thigh pressed against mine.
Each contact builds the tension, promise of “later.” Exquisite torture.
Tyler crashes trains together with sound effects while Logan assembles breakfast. When I stand to help, he corners me in the kitchen, Tyler safely occupied in the living room.
"You have no idea what you're doing to me," he says against my neck.
"Tyler's right there—"
"I know." But his hands are on my hips, thumbs stroking bare skin where the hoodie's ridden up. He quickly shoots his hand under it and rubs my braless chest. He says, "Tonight."
"Tonight," I agree, then slip away before we do something we can't take back with a three-year-old ten feet away.
By noon, Tyler's running on pure Christmas adrenaline and sugar. He builds increasingly elaborate train disasters while Logan and I steal charged glances over his head. During his brief couch nap after lunch—maybe fifteen minutes—Logan pulls me into the hallway.
The kiss is desperate, hands under clothes, his mouth hot on my throat.
"God, I want—" he starts.
"I know. Me too."
Tyler stirs, and we jump apart, frustrated laughter bubbling up. The anticipation is killing me in the best way.
By afternoon, Tyler's showing signs of crashing. He's draped across Logan's lap, playing with his new dinosaurs while I read The Snowy Day for the fourth time. Logan's fingers play with my hair, seemingly innocent but each touch sends sparks.
"Can we do this EVERY Christmas?" Tyler asks suddenly. "With bonus mommy?"
Logan and I lock eyes over his head.
"Yeah, buddy," Logan says, voice thick. "Every year."
Tyler beams, burrows into my stomach, eyes closing.
The tree glows. I hold this moment, crystalline and perfect, Jessica's doubts feeling very far away.
By eight-thirty, Tyler's finally unconscious. He passed out mid-sentence about T-Rex teeth, still clutching his new dinosaur. Logan carried him to the guest room while I did dishes, trying to calm my pent up lust.
Now we stand in Tyler's doorway together, watching him sleep sprawled like a starfish, one arm flung wide.
Logan closes the door carefully. Takes my hand. Leads me to the stairs.
My heart pounds as we climb to the loft. The space is dim, just city lights through windows. Below, Christmas explosion—paper and toys and evidence of the perfect day.
"We did good," I say, looking down at our mess.
"We did." He turns me to face him, hands framing my face. "You did."
The kiss starts soft—gratitude and exhaustion. Then his hands slide into my hair and I am filled with unbearable longing. After this whole day of wanting, of stolen touches and loaded looks, we're finally alone.
"Bed," I manage.
We move away from the railing, throwing off our clothes with urgency we've been suppressing all day.
His mouth travels down from my lips, my neck, and finds my nipple. When he uses teeth, gentle but insistent, I gasp too loud.
"Shh," he whispers against my skin, grinning. Does it again deliberately, making me arch, bite my lip. "Quiet, remember?"
"You're evil—"
He cuts me off with his mouth, and I forget about volume control. My hand fists in his hair, trying to stay quiet, failing. The challenge makes everything sharper, more desperate.
When I flip him over, return the attention to his nipples, he's the one struggling. He’s making sounds I’ve never heard him make. His groan is deep, bitten off. Breathy.
"Your turn to be quiet," I tease him with my mouth on one nipple and my hand teasing the other. He’s gripping the sheets and arching his hips.
The forced silence intensifies everything. Each touch electric, each breath measured. We've been building to this all day—through gifts and trains and stolen kisses.
When we finally come together, it's desperate and tender at once. His hand covers my mouth at one point, because I’m unaware of the sounds I’m making. He giggles quietly, “Shhh.”
The danger of Tyler waking, the need to have this after a day of playing family for real.
Logan braces himself above me, and I'm caught by the intensity in his eyes—that intense hazel that goes almost black in the dim light. The city lights through the loft windows cast shadows across the defined muscles of his shoulders and chest, years of hockey carved into every line.
"Look at me," he whispers, and I do, holding his gaze as we move together, rocking with him fully inside me, the connection between us almost too much to bear.
His jaw clenches with restraint, that beautifully carved face I've memorized now vulnerable and open in a way he never lets anyone else see.
"Reese," he breathes against my mouth, and I can feel everything he's not saying yet in the way he says my name and we both start shaking with ab-crushing orgasms.
After, we lie tangled, my head on his chest, both catching our breath. The Christmas tree still glows below. The apartment holds all three of us.
"Every Christmas?" I whisper.
"Every Christmas," he confirms. "Every day between them too."
I drift toward sleep, the necklace cool against my skin, Tyler safe below, Logan's heartbeat steady under my ear.
This is what I want. Even with Jessica's warnings echoing. Even with the world waiting outside.
This—the three of us, chosen and choosing—this is home.