Chapter 31 #2
"Dad goes quiet. Which is worse than yelling. At least with yelling you know what you're dealing with. Quiet could mean anything. Quiet could mean he's processing or quiet could mean he's building a PowerPoint about the sanctity of marriage."
Reid snorts. "He does PowerPoints?"
"He's an engineer turned missionary. Everything is a PowerPoint."
Blake's thumb has stopped on my ankle. Just resting there. Steady.
"What if we told them in person?" Reid says slowly.
I look up at him. "What?"
"Not right away. But eventually. We all go visit them." He shrugs like he hasn't just suggested something enormous. "Where are they now?"
"Guatemala. Building a community center."
"So we go to Guatemala."
I stare at him. Then at Blake.
"All three of us," Blake adds. Like he and Reid rehearsed this. "They can meet us. See how it actually works instead of just imagining the worst."
"You want to..." I sit up slightly, blanket pooling around my waist. "You want to fly to Guatemala. To meet my missionary parents. And stand there while I explain our relationship."
"Yes," they say. At the same time.
I look between them.
They'd do that. They'd actually do that. Fly to Central America and sit at a folding table in a half-built community center and shake my father's hand and eat my mother's terrible rice and let my parents see that their daughter is loved. Thoroughly. By two men who would fly to Guatemala for her.
And that's when the tears start.
Oh great. Here we go.
Not sad tears. Overwhelmed tears. The kind that show up uninvited and refuse to leave.
"Hey, hey." Reid shifts so he can see my face. "What's—"
"Nothing." I'm laughing and crying at the same time, which is an extremely attractive look, I'm sure. "Nothing's wrong. I just—" I swipe at my cheeks. "I've never had people who show up like this. Who actually show up. And you two just casually suggested Guatemala like it's a day trip."
"It's just a plane ride," Blake says, like international travel to meet disapproving missionaries is no big deal.
Reid thumbs a tear off my cheek. "Good tears?"
"The best tears." I sniff. "Ignore me. I'm a mess."
"You're not a mess," Blake says.
"I'm crying on the couch in a blanket burrito with sour cream probably still on my face. I'm the definition of a mess."
"Still not a mess." But his mouth twitches. Almost a smile.
I settle back down. Laine Mitchell: emotionally compromised, physically sore, thoroughly loved. What a weekend.
On screen, something else explodes. I've lost complete track of the plot. I'm not sure there was one to begin with.
Reid's fingers find my hair again. Blake's thumb resumes its circles on my ankle. The rhythm settles over me like a second blanket.
I should probably think about the Guatemala thing more carefully. There are logistics. Timing. And do I tell them before we arrive? Because showing up with two boyfriends unannounced feels like an ambush. A loving ambush, but still.
I can't do that to them. They deserve to know the truth, and to have time to process. But every time I think about telling them, my stomach flips in a verge-of-puking way.
Stop planning. You just got done crying. Give yourself five minutes.
Blake's hand moves from my ankle. Up my calf. Behind my knee.
The touch shifts. Not dramatically — just enough. A little slower. A little more deliberate.
Oh.
His palm slides up to my thigh, and my brain, which was just doing a pretty good job of processing parental anxiety, completely changes channels.
"You're still tense," he says quietly.
"I'm fine."
"Liar." No heat in it. His hand keeps moving, kneading at the muscles of my lower leg, and okay, that does feel really good, but also his hand is moving north and I'm not wearing much under this blanket and—
"You've been in your head for twenty minutes." Blake's eyes are focused on me. That intensity that makes my whole body go warm. "I could see it."
Reid's fingers slow in my hair. He's caught on. Whatever signal these two share — some kind of military telepathy — he's received it.
"She does that," Reid murmurs above me. "Worries about everyone else until she forgets to let herself feel good."
"I don't—"
"You do." Blake's hand inches higher.
My breath catches.
Oh. my god. This is happening. I kind of hoped it would, eventually, but we're seriously knocking everything off my list this weekend? It's too much. But no way am I going to stop it.
My brain starts doing the thing:
Where do I put my hands? How does this work logistically? I'm sore. I'm definitely still sore. But also his hand is RIGHT THERE and Reid is looking at me like—
Stop thinking about logistics, Laine.
"You spent all day giving yourself to me," Blake says. Low. Rough. "Now let me give something back."
"I..." Brilliant start. Really articulate. "I'm sore."
"We know." Reid's voice is soft against my temple. "We're not going to hurt you. We're going to make you feel good." His thumb traces along my jaw. "You just have to say yes."
Blake's hand reaches the hem of my shirt. Pauses. Waiting.
I look up at Reid's face above me, steady and warm.
Then at Blake, all coiled intensity at the other end of the couch.
Both watching me. Both waiting. Patient in completely different ways — Reid with that open, easy patience that says take your time, I'm not going anywhere, Blake with that controlled stillness that says I will wait forever but I might vibrate out of my skin doing it.
I nod.
Blake moves. He shifts my legs, kneeling between my thighs. The sight of him there—focused entirely on me with that dark, consuming Blake look—sends heat flooding through every part of me that isn't sore. And a few parts that are.
"Pull her up a few inches," Blake murmurs.
Reid's hands slide under my arms and tug me up until my back is flush against his chest. "Got her."
They're talking to each other about me like I'm a project. I should have something to say about that. I absolutely do not have something to say about that because it's the hottest thing that's ever happened to me.
Reid tilts my chin up and kisses me, soft and deep, while Blake's fingers hook into my waistband and pull. I lift my hips to help and cool air hits my skin and Blake's hands wrap around my upper thighs, thumbs pressing in, holding me open.
"You good?" Blake asks. Not to me. To Reid.
"Set." Reid says it against my mouth. "Take care of her."
Blake's breath is warm against my inner thigh and then his mouth finds me and—
"Oh." The sound comes out before I can catch it. Eloquent, Mitchell.
"There she goes," Reid whispers. He's watching my face. Not kissing me anymore—just watching, his eyes tracking every twitch and breath like I'm the most interesting thing he's ever seen. "God, look at you."
I've never— this is— oh god.
My brain gives up on sentences. Finally.
Blake's tongue drags slow and deliberate and my whole body jerks. Reid's arms tighten around my shoulders, pulling me harder against his chest.
"Breathe, baby. You're holding it."
I suck in air I didn't realize I'd been hoarding. "I can't—it's—"
"You can. You're doing so good." His fingers push the hair off my face, tucking it behind my ear. "You have no idea what you look like right now, Laine. Seriously. No idea."
"Reid—"
"I'm just saying." His voice has gone raspy. "Blake."
Blake hums against me in response and the vibration makes my vision blur.
"She just made this sound," Reid tells him, like he's reporting breaking news. "This little—you missed it. Do that again."
He's narrating. He's actually narrating this to Blake while Blake is—
Blake's rhythm shifts. Slower. More deliberate. Every nerve ending I own lights up and my hips jerk off the cushion.
"Easy," Reid murmurs. Not to me. His hand slides under my shirt, his palm warm and broad against my breast. "Let her catch up."
"She's right there." Blake's voice vibrates against my skin. His fingers dig harder into my hips. "Tell me you're right there, Laine."
"She's right there," Reid confirms, watching my face. "I can see it. Her eyes just—yeah. Right there."
They're talking about me. Over me. Around me. Comparing notes. Running play-by-play commentary on my unraveling like it's a sport. And I'm just lying here melting into the couch like a human puddle and I have never been less in control of a situation in my entire life and I do not care.
My hands fist in Reid's shirt. I try to hold on to something—anything—but there's nothing solid left. Just heat and pressure and two voices that know exactly what they're doing.
"Please." I don't even know who I'm asking. Both of them. Either of them. The universe. "Please, I need—"
"We've got you." Reid's mouth is hot against my ear. "Let go, baby. We've got you."
"Give it to me," Blake says against me. His grip tightens on my hips. His rhythm changes—more insistent, more focused—
Reid's thumb rolls across my nipple and his lips brush my ear. "You're so beautiful. You know that? You're shaking and you're beautiful and I am so fucking in love with you—"
I shatter.
The orgasm tears through me so hard I forget where I am. I'm vaguely aware of sounds—mine—and my back arching off the couch, and Reid's arms holding me together while Blake works me through every wave.
"That's it," Reid's saying, his voice cracking. "That's it, baby, we've got you, you're okay—"
He doesn't stop talking. Blake doesn't stop moving. Neither of them lets go until I'm shaking and boneless and making a sound that's probably embarrassing but I'm too far gone to care.
When I come back to myself, I'm trembling. Wrung out. My hands are still fisted in Reid's shirt. I think I might have torn it.
Good. He has too many terrible shirts anyway.
Reid presses his face into my hair. "Holy shit," he breathes. "Holy shit, Laine."
"Stop talking," I mumble.
"I can't. That was—Blake, did you—"
"Yeah." Blake presses a kiss to my inner thigh—soft, almost careful—then looks up. His eyes find Reid's over my body. His chest is heaving. "I know."
"Because that was—"
"I know."
"Like, I've seen a lot of things in my life, and that was—"
"Reid." Blake's voice is wrecked but there's a flicker of amusement in it. "Shut up."
"Right. Shutting up. Absolutely. Shutting up right now." He presses another kiss into my hair. "You're incredible," he whispers. "Just so you know. Incredible."
He's not going to stop. He's never going to stop. I'm going to be hearing about this on my deathbed.
Something passes between them when their eyes meet. I can't read it exactly, but it's real. It's theirs. And instead of feeling left out of it, I feel held by it.
Blake crawls up the couch, kissing my knee, my hip, the hem of my shirt. Somehow we all rearrange until I'm sandwiched between them. Reid behind me, his chest warm against my back. Blake in front, his forehead touching mine.
"Okay?" Blake's voice is rough.
"More than okay." I can barely get the words out. "That was..."
"Yeah." He kisses my nose. "It was."
Reid's arm drapes over both of us, his hand finding Blake's shoulder and resting there. "So on a scale of one to ten—"
"Reid," Blake and I say together.
"Fine. But it was at least an eleven. And we need a bigger couch."