An Extended Family

by Austin Daniels

  Dexter was less eloquent. "Me too. This place is part of the magic. Maybe we could just make some changes. Then when our loans are paid off we can pay this place off."

  Over the next year we had the old plumbing and wiring replaced. The evaporative cooler was replaced with an air conditioning unit and a new heater. We updated the kitchen and opened it to the dining room. The back of the house was expanded to include an oversized walk-in closet and we built a deck overlooking the back yard which we'd newly landscaped.

  The old cellar had been long ignored. The final improvement involved hanging a ceiling to cover the vents and pipes which ran under the house. The floor was heavily padded, and a dark brown plush carpet was installed. When the work was done, I ordered the boys to stay out of the room for the next month.

  During the day, while the boys worked, I took delivery of different pieces of equipment which I arranged in the future playroom downstairs. Special low reflected lighting was installed. A sling and a padded table with mirrors sat against one wall and a bondage rack stood in the corner. A cabinet on the adjoining wall was filled with necessary equipment.

  The Incident

  After our meeting that day, we all prepared to head down to the club for our defense class. At this point, we were mainly going to keep in practice and help us stay fit. It was also a good way to stay in contact with our friends, not to mention the other regulars we'd come to know. Robert had joined the class shortly after he and Jake became an item. Alex coming with Leonard was a given.

  After the class, we all decided to stop at the bar and have a beer. It was unusual for us to do that and we were surprised to see that this time Leonard agreed to come with us. His weakness for alcohol was legendary, but with the rest of us around we didn't expect we'd have an issue. My old Dom was determined when he had a goal and avoiding temptation was a skill of his.

  Once inside, the guys headed toward the back of the bar and pulled together a couple of the tall round tables while I ordered a few beers and a diet cola. We sat around the tables to relax and enjoy each other's company.

  About an hour later, we heard motorcycles pull up outside. Many of the regular patrons drove motorcycles, but few could be heard from outside. A minute later, the door opened and a half dozen men we'd never seen before entered the bar. Because this was a well-known leather bar, it was not too common for people from the street to arrive in such large numbers. The possibility that this group didn't know where they were going concerned me. We knew most of the regulars, but there were always a few strange faces, just not so many in one group.

  We ignored the new men and continued our time together. After a while, Leonard began to look around the bar at nothing in particular. I recognized that as a 'tell,' his unconscious signal that it was time to get him out of there. When Leonard started looking away, it usually meant he was getting uncomfortable with the atmosphere or the smell of draft beer. It was now time to pursue other activities where Leonard wouldn't be tempted.

  As we rose to leave, there was a commotion at the bar. One of the men who'd just come with the motorcycle group had Spencer, one of the regulars, by the shirt. His fist was pulled back like he was ready to strike while one of his companions held Spencer's arms from behind.

  Seeing boys beating on another boy who was helpless because his arms were pinned was an image burned into my mind from my youth. Our favorite bar was not the kind of establishment where patrons just looked the other way while things like this panned out.

  Several of the guys rose to come to his aid, but four of the men from the strange group pulled together, forming a wall to stop them.

  The door to the exit was on the other side of the commotion. I looked at Leonard, who was already springing into action. He and Alex were walking toward the four men who'd walled off their friend. Turning his head back, he called out to the rest of us, "Well boys, this is what we've trained for."

  Gaining speed, we all pushed our way toward the commotion. Seeing our approach, one of the men from the human wall rushed toward Jake, the smallest of our group. "You just mind your own business," he ordered.

  Strangers giving Jake orders didn't sit well with Robert. With a sidestep, Robert filled the distance between the attacker and Jake and awaited his attack. He didn't have to wait long. The stranger pulled back his fist throwing a punch straight at Robert's face. Sidestepping the punch, Robert grabbed the man's wrist, spun around and pulled it. At the same time, he'd thrust his leg across the man's path. The man's own momentum, assisted by Robert, sent him down. Robert spun around and ordered the man to stay down. When he scrambled to his feet, Jake dropped him with a kick to the crotch.

  As he lay there screaming, the men who formed the now smaller wall stepped back into a tighter unit. We all continued forward, gaining speed. One of them ordered Leonard to keep out of it only to get a blow to the jaw he never saw coming. Imagining any man giving Leonard an order made me laugh.

  We still had two men guarding their friends.

  The man who'd been holding Spencer's arms let go and headed toward our group, abandoning his friend who was about to finish what he'd started.

  As I prepared to stop him, I was surprised to see Preston cut me off. Kicking a stool aside, the attacker headed right toward him.

  I felt an uncontrollable desire to kill, something I'd never felt before or since. If he so much as touches Preston, he's going to die, I thought.

  Before I could intervene, the attacker prepared to strike. Time seemed to slow down. I saw the man pull his arm back to smash his fist into the face of my Preston. Knowing he'd likely have a terrible black eye or broken nose infuriated me even more. I was ready to destroy the stranger. After seeing him pin Spencer at the bar, whose only crime was not giving up his spot, he was about to hurt my Preston.

  Before his fist was halfway to that beautiful face, Preston's hand came out of nowhere, catching the man's fist. Preston spun around. I saw him catch the man's arm and heard him stomping hard on his foot, but the rest was a blur. A second later, the man was lying on his back and Preston was still holding his arm.

  It was apparent the man had no training on how to take a fall. The maneuver took about a half second to complete. It was the very first throw Preston learned from Leonard. He was good at it. The stomping of his foot was his own creative twist. The bar, unlike the gym, did not have a mat. The floor was concrete, painted to make cleanup easier. One of the regulars at the bar, lifted his beer as if he was about to make a toast but poured it on the man's face instead.

  With beer running over his face he was infuriated. He jumped up looking for someone to hurt. With a wild expression fueled by rage and shame, he attacked, running for Preston.

  It looked like he planned to tackle him. A big man with speed could do a lot of damage to a young man with the frame of a swimmer. I stepped off to the side of the path between Preston and the large man barreling toward him, planning to stop him with a kick to the face. To my surprise, the man let out a gasp and once again hit the floor, this time at my feet. He was holding his side cursing. Jake had spun around and thrown a kick into his side.

  Reaching over the bar, I borrowed a draft beer from another regular and, stepping on the man's face just hard enough to pin him to the floor, said, "You move, and I'll crush your ugly face." Then very slowly, wishing he would struggle, I poured it over his face, already wet with beer. "You picked the wrong bar to stop at. You best not mess with us. Consider yourself lucky. If you'd hurt my boy I'd have killed you with my bare hands. You're getting away with injuries tonight. You have no idea how lucky you are."

  Cheers rang out from what was now our audience. Spencer was still at the bar, but now that his assailant was distracted, he punched him in the gut with everything he had, bending him in half. The two remaining men were turning back to back, as a defensive maneuver. Seeing three of their friends on the floor had them wondering if they'd bitten off more than they could chew.

  Without further word, I gestured to our group to h
ead toward the door, thinking our job was over and wanting to get my boys out.

  Leonard reached forward and stopped me. "We're not done. I'm not leaving any of this trash here with our friends."

  We turned and faced the two men who remained standing. They were looking around the bar with expressions of horror. They'd likely picked this bar thinking they could have a little fun at our expense. Now their belief in the helplessness of gay men had vanished, understanding that they were in grave danger instead.

  Dexter looked up at the remaining men who towered over him. His dominant side addressed the men who stood before him with terror on their faces. "You boys pick up your friends and get out of here before we go all 'Deliverance' on your asses."

  Picking their friends off the floor and pulling the original attacker with them, they headed toward the door. Several of the patrons delivered swift kicks to the ass of the man still bent over from the powerful punch to his gut.

  Chester, the bartender, held the door open so the men could help their disabled friends exit the bar. One was hopping on one leg with his arms around the shoulders of his friend. Another was walking very slowly trying to avoid the pain from Jake's powerful kick to his groin. The third held a napkin to his bleeding nose and mouth.

  Once outside, the men headed toward their motorcycles. The bartender had called the police early on and they were finally pulling into the parking lot. Seeing them get out of their cars, the rest of us, with the help of half a dozen of the other men from the bar, formed a circle around the group, persuading them to wait.

  Spencer closed the door to the bar and instructed the officers to arrest the group, gesturing toward the men now surrounded by patrons of the bar.

  Two of the officers cuffed the four men who could still walk. The rest went to the aid of the two injured men. While the officers put the four handcuffed men in the back of the cruisers, Leonard quietly instructed the group. "They're going to separate us so as long as you tell them exactly what happened, you can't get in trouble for defending yourself or others." After the men were safely locked away in the police cruisers, the officers began to question us, getting our identities and our version of the evening's events. It wasn't long before we were released to go home.

  We hopped in our cars, agreeing to meet at our house.

  Since I only had half a beer I drove our car and Leonard drove theirs. I was still trying to balance the image of Preston dropping a thug without a moment of fear and the boy who obediently dropped to his knees on my order. Still, Preston was a physician now. He'd always been tough. He fought his way through life, but up until recently he'd never been physical about it. He was a sub and being a sub is tricky. You have to trust yourself and know who you are. Having a strong self-image is practically required. You also have to trust. These are great qualities, but I'd never seen a connection to self-defense before.

  When I first met him, he'd told me not to bother calling him names because he already knew I could do nothing to harm his self-image. I also knew he had the strength to trust me with his will. That was my Preston. I thought Dexter would have it harder, needing to balance subbing to me while still being a Dom to Preston.

  I now knew that I didn't have to protect them, at least not physically. They had a different kind of confidence now. They'd never bow to any man in fear.

  When we parked the car, Alex hopped out. "Leonard and I are going home. I know you guys are going to want to party, and I don't think he's up for hanging around anymore guys drinking beer."

  Preston told him not to worry. "He can have coffee or something."

  "I know, but I don't want him to even see it. He's already had enough of that for one night. You guys have fun. We'll see you in next week's class."

  Confessions

  Kyle

  A few days later, I sat at my computer, knowing it was time to write the chapter I'd planned to title 'Confessions.' I had to stop there because while I could imagine what to write, the events had not yet happened. I knew the time had come and weighed my options. Surely my family and friends would read the book they'd starred in and know where every word came from. The possibility that my new novel might end up forever stored in the memory of my computer was very real.

  I felt justified in my secrecy, but that wouldn't last for long. If I'd told them up front, I feared that it would tarnish their actions. I also had no idea where the plot was going. The whole thing could have turned out kind of disjointed, but either way I had to have their permission to submit the manuscript.

  Sitting at my keyboard, bathed in the morning sunlight streaming through the window, I called Leonard. He was at work, so I had to be quick. When he picked up the phone, I told him I'd be dropping off a manuscript that I wanted him to read. "Why me? You've never asked me to do that before."

  Because of our past relationship, Leonard was the only man I could never be vague with. "Well… you are a character in the book. I'd like to submit it to my agent, but I'm going to ask all the participants to read it first. I changed all the names, but you'll know who's who."

  "You know how I feel about you telling anybody about what we do," he said with the volume turned up.

  Knowing he was verging on anger, I assured him that there was no reason that anyone, but our inner circle would recognize the characters. "Okay, I'll be home around six. Drop it by then. Gotta go."

  "Okay, I'll drop it by tonight. See you later."

  My boys would be home later in the day. I didn't expect them until about seven. I spent the next hour using the find function of my writing program to make sure none of the original names were still part of the manuscript. I'd checked before, but I owed it to everyone to make doubly sure.

  My printer was fast, but not super-fast. It took a while to print out each of the manuscripts. I bound them with heavy-duty clips and stacked them on the coffee table in the living room. I went back to my keyboard and wrote a portion of the 'Confessions' chapter. Once that was completed I hit the save button and suffered through the rest of the day. I was unable to write on my other projects but worked on edits instead. My creative genes were shot for the day.

  When the boys came home, they were later than I'd expected. Both of them arrived within a few minutes of one another. Preston was carrying a bag of take out. We'd grown used to this arrangement on days they worked later than normal. I let them decide since they were doing the cooking.

  Once the food was resting in the kitchen, I set them down for a talk. "Boys, you don't know this, but ever since I first met Preston I've kept detailed notes on his progression and then everything I knew about his friends. You two both play major roles. Jake and Robert and Leonard and Alex are in there too. I turned those notes into a novel all about us. Originally, I used our real names just to make it easier to write, but today I changed all of the names. I printed out manuscripts for you to read. Please read them when you can. Feel free to make notes on the pages to add things I might not have thought of, or delete things you feel are inappropriate. When everyone is done, I'll meet with you individually and get your input."

  Preston and Dexter looked at each other and each of them broke into laughter. "We know all about it," Dexter said. "We've known for a while."

  "How?"

  Preston blurted out, "You should have seen your face when Dexter told you we knew. Look, you leave your screen open all the time and sometimes we're curious. I don't usually stop and read, but it's hard not to miss the table of contents on the left. The chapter titles are a dead giveaway. Besides that, Jake heard about it today and gave us both a call."

  I'd been so nervous it hadn't occurred to me that I'd have been better off to tell my boys before Leonard. He told Alex and the rest was history.

  "You don't have to worry." I said. "I wrote it under a pen name. I won't have the advantage of selling to readers who already buy my other books, but I really wanted to keep this record for our sake. We might as well make some money on it. As long as I don't go telling everyone who we actually are there'
s no way they'll put it together." I had copies for each of them sitting on the dining room table.

  Dexter said he wanted to eat before he dove into it and we all headed to the kitchen.

  *~*~*

  Over the next few days, I was on pins and needles. I tried to keep it concealed because no Dom wants to appear nervous or weak to his subs.

  Leonard was the first to respond. "I come out looking pretty good in all this, so I don't have any issues. I made a few notes though and I'd like to give them to you tonight in class."

  The next day my boys finished the book after work. They had to read it in bursts because they had so little free time. Watching them read had been unnerving. If I knew they were reading, I just left the room. I had plenty to keep me busy, going through the edits that were already submitted to me by Leonard and Alex.

  When both of them were done, we all sat down. I'd planned to do this individually, but they insisted on doing this together. One by one they told me the things they wanted me to add, which I didn't expect. The prospect of adding things that I'd left out, thinking they'd object, excited me. I didn't want to embarrass anyone in our circle of friends, but now that I had their approval, I was glad to edit them in.

  I worked on edits for the next few days. In some cases, it was easy, but for some of them, whole sections needed to be rewritten. When the final document was ready I gave each of them another copy. When we got together in our self-defense class, the boys wasted no time teasing one another. They all had thick skin and I was fairly certain they'd already shared most of what I'd written about.

  Within a few days, I had my go ahead from everyone involved. I'd read the final copy for corrections and it was ready to go. I attached it to an email addressed to my agent, Glenn Bass, took a deep breath and hit the send button.