Coming Back

by Lauren Dane

  Her hair was a wavy, nearly unruly mass of dark silk. But it wasn’t disheveled. It was unbelievably sexy. When he saw her he thought about Sundays in bed. All day. She moved with a sense of whimsy and wonder in a way he’d never seen in anyone else.

  “Don’t think I’m unaware of the shirt you thieved from my closet this morning,” Adam said.

  Jessi laughed. “It’s a great shirt. I’m going to wear it with a belt and jeans, I think. Otherwise I might just tailor it. Take it in at the sides.”

  “If you lived with me, you could borrow my shirts every day.”

  Mick would give that a solid eight as far as attempts to get Jessi back on topic went. But Mick had long ago realized Jessi put a lot more thought into what she did and said than most people.

  She was stronger willed and more deliberate than pretty much anyone he knew, and he knew some hardheaded motherfuckers. Jessi was just adorable when she did it, which led to most people being charmed by her, though a lot of people underestimated her.

  “I can borrow your shirts every day no matter where I live. Oooh, gnocchi!” Jessi smiled up at the server, who blushed as he set her plate down. “Thank you.”

  He stood, simply staring at her for a few seconds more before Adam cleared his throat and the guy snapped out of it and finished what he’d been doing.

  “I’ve missed watching you charm everyone, Jessi.” Mick bit into his po’ boy, glad they’d gotten past their tension.

  “You know what my mom says about manners and being gracious.”

  Indeed, Addie Franklin had very definite opinions about how to treat other people. Her heart was big and her ability to love seemingly infinite. He had a woman who’d given birth to him, but Addie had been his mother in more ways than he could count.

  “So, about finding a place,” Adam said again.

  “Why are you suddenly so interested?” Jessi turned her attention to Adam.

  “I’m always interested in your safety.”

  “We’ve already established there’s no real safety issue with my place. And you didn’t care about my safety three weeks ago. Or six months ago,” Jessi said.

  “Ouch. I did. But I had no right to say anything one way or another about it. You were with someone else six months ago.”

  “No I wasn’t. Anyway, what’s past is past and I don’t want you to feel awful. I just want you to explain why it is you get a say in where I live.”

  “I know what your neighborhood in Portland looked like. I know he has a good job and you seemed to be happy. If I couldn’t be with you every night to be sure the doors were locked, at least I could know you were with someone who would do it in my stead. Obviously not as well.” Adam sniffed and Jessi tried not to smile as she rolled her eyes.

  “We only just got back together yesterday. It’s foolhardy to jump into something.” Jessi frowned as she said it and Mick knew why. She was a terrible liar.

  “Bullshit. We’ve been together from the start. You know me. I can’t hide from you. You look miserable when you say that because you don’t believe it.” Adam’s voice was calm enough, but no less emphatic for it. He turned to Mick. “For that matter, you live in a garage apartment, for fuck’s sake. Both of you need to just give in and move in with me.”

  “He’s lived there since he came back to Seattle. He must like it. Unless he was just waiting for us.” Jessi looked up at Mick. “Which is it?”

  “I needed to get some shit straight. I’m still working on it. But maybe part of me was waiting for this. Hoping. My life is different now than it was before I went into the army. I’m different.” Adam’s house was sleek and modern, and while Mick liked it there, he wasn’t so sure they’d want him and all the rough-and-tumble that came along with him these days.

  “Like you breed goats in the kitchen? More tattoos won’t affect living with me.” Adam shrugged. “The garage floor has been treated, so if you want to work out there, there’s room. Make it yours. If it’s not right, you’re living with an architect, I think we could work out a design that would.”

  “I think goats are adorable.” Jessi finished her food and sat back with a sigh.

  “Of course you do, Jessilyn,” Adam said.

  Mick spoke. “I don’t breed goats anywhere. But I like to race cars. I like to box and brawl. I work late more often than not, which means I’m a night person, and you have an office job.”

  “I think I’d really like to watch you race cars,” Jessi said, her face flushed.

  Mick brushed the backs of his fingers down her throat and she sighed happily. “I think I’d like to race knowing you were watching me.”

  “I work from home several mornings a week, and even when I have to be at an early meeting, it’s not like I can’t go to bed before you get home. Look, I don’t want to control your lives. Just what we do in bed.” Adam paused as Mick and Jessi leaned in closer. “I like, very much, the idea of the three of us sharing a home. Having you two with me last night made me realize how big the place was. I want to be part of your life, Mick, and I understand it comes with new friends and experiences. And before either of you can retort that this is sudden or whatever, that’s crap. You both know it. You and Mick have been headed here for over two decades. My time away from you both helped me figure out a lot of stuff. Chiefly that I hadn’t been ready for what happened between us the first time. More important than that, I am now.”

  “I like the idea. In theory. But I work late too. Pretty much every night. I can’t be tussling with either of you over my comings and goings. Sometimes I’ll need to sleep over at the studio. When that happens I’m not having any sort of debate about it. I’m a grown-ass woman and I’m building a business.”

  “I’m sorry I mocked you earlier.” Adam took her hand briefly, turning it to kiss her wrist before letting go again.

  Mick watched their interplay, contenting himself with stroking his fingertip up and down the back of her neck, where it was oh-so-soft.

  Jessi kept quiet for a while as she considered everything that’d been said. Waiting for Adam to say more.

  “You’re also right that you’re a grown woman and you shouldn’t have to debate what you need to do to keep your business thriving. I want to control you when you’re naked and sweaty and aching for me to make you come. I don’t want to control your job.”

  Mick shifted, trying to get comfortable as his dick hardened at Adam’s words.

  “I’ve spent enough time without you, Jessi. I want you with me. I want to be with you and Mick in our house, even if that comes with racing and the sound of a sewing machine at one in the morning. I’d been thinking about adding guest quarters out back, but we could use that to make you a workshop. I’m not saying you have to give up your lease and where you are now, so don’t start to argue.”

  “I’ll argue when I want to argue,” she said, mouth stubborn, daring to be kissed.

  Adam must have agreed because he drew even closer, nearly touching his nose to Jessi’s. “I know.”

  Jessi laughed, quickly kissing Adam.

  “If you move in with me you can have animals,” Adam tempted.

  She perked up, as Mick knew she would. “Carey got the dog. I hated to leave her behind, but she loves that yard and the house and the dog park. He needed her more.”

  “No goats, though.” Adam might be a pushover for her, but he sounded pretty serious about the no-goats rule.

  Her nose scrunched up just a little and Mick tried not to laugh. One day they needed to buy some acreage and build so she could have her goats if she wanted them.

  “Your floors are pretty gorgeous for a man who just offered to let me have a pet.” Jessi raised a brow at Adam.

  “Does that mean you’re going to do it?” Adam asked.

  “Can I have two dogs? Small ones.”

  Adam knew resistance to her wishes was futile when he made the comment about her having animals at his place.

  Hell, he’d have agreed to goats if she’d actually wanted them.
Not that he’d say that out loud and give her ideas. He had to run from his car to her parents’ front door sometimes if those damned geese were lurking around.

  “No geese,” Mick said, reading Adam’s thoughts.

  “Believe me, I’m with you. Mom’s the only one they don’t terrorize.” Jessi shuddered.

  Adam had to force himself not to demand an answer right then. He knew it seemed sudden, but he wanted them both to see how they were meant to be together all along.

  He settled on “We can’t all fit in your bed, love.”

  “Or in mine, even if I wanted to fuck you both in a garage apartment at my brother’s house. Which I don’t,” Mick said.

  “Let’s start with spending nights together and go from there. You live alone. Your house is perfect. I’m not perfect, as you know. I don’t make my bed. I wear shoes in the house. I leave my stuff out on the counters. I’m a terrible mess.” Jessi looked quite pleased with herself, and Adam had to admit, she had some points.

  “I’m not saying it won’t take work. But I’d like you to give me a chance to do so.” Adam wanted the opportunity to prove to Jessilyn that she’d done the right thing.

  Jessi blinked back tears. “Okay. But I’m going to remind you of this when I get nail polish on something.”

  Adam scrubbed a hand over his face but remained grinning. “Can’t wait.” And he wasn’t lying. He didn’t give a fuck about his floors or unmade beds. He wanted to soak in everything about her. Wanted her bright, beautiful energy all around him. She made him feel like he was home.

  “Yeah? Can you wait until we tell my parents?”

  Both men stared at her. “What? Why now?” Adam asked as he grabbed the check to pay it and tried to figure out how he thought they’d react.

  “Because I tell them stuff. And they’re absolutely going to want to know what’s going on since last night. The only reason my mom wasn’t on my doorstep today is that she and my dad are up in Bellingham visiting a friend with a new baby.” Jessi allowed Adam to take her hand as they left.

  They’d had a bump and had worked through it. They’d both given in to him, Adam knew. Which made it even sweeter.

  “Well, let’s think about that tomorrow because I’m not going to have your mom in my head for what I plan to do to you next,” Adam said as they got outside.

  “Mick! Hold up!”

  They turned at the hail of his name and soon after, Mick realized who it was and resolved to speed this along. He put an arm around Jessi’s waist and Adam framed her other side, their hands still entwined.

  Retty looked Mick up and down with blatant sexual interest, but Mick greeted the others first. His night with Retty was regrettable in a few ways, chiefly because they were all in an extended community of friends, which meant Mick had to see the guy at least once every few months if not more and had no plans for a repeat of a drunken grapple and an unspectacular blow job.

  “Good to see you guys, but we’re off. Just had a fantastic dinner.” Mick wanted to keep this moving.

  “Why don’t you stay for a drink or two with us? If your friends are going and all,” Retty said and then gave Mick’s cock a good long look.

  Long enough that Jessi blinked at him, clearly annoyed. Retty didn’t really pay her any attention, though. But Mick knew better. She could be sweet and all, but once you pissed Jessi off for real, she could burn shit down.

  “Ah, no thanks. I have plans and they can’t be broken.” He leaned down to kiss the top of Jessi’s head, making a declaration as he propelled them down the sidewalk, away from the others. “See you at the track!”

  They kept walking until they got to Mick’s place. “Let me get some stuff and we’ll head to your house, Adam,” Mick said.

  “You didn’t introduce us,” Jessi said as they all went inside.

  “Not about you. About them. They’re assholes,” Mick told her.

  “One of them played doctor with you.” She walked around the tiny apartment as Mick began to toss things into a suitcase.

  “Played being the operative word. Past tense. It wasn’t that good anyway.”

  “I don’t expect you to pretend you didn’t enjoy sex with anyone who wasn’t me,” Jessi said as she picked up a framed photograph. “Look at how young we were!”

  “I’m not saying that I didn’t have any good sex. I’m saying he doesn’t know what to do with his teeth.”

  Everyone winced at that.

  “It is pretty big. Kind of hard to keep teeth out of the way with such a mouthful. I can see why he couldn’t remember his manners.” Jessi shrugged.

  Adam burst out laughing. Jesus, the stuff she said.

  “Nobody gives compliments like you.” Mick swooped close to hug her and, laughing, he continued to pack. “Anyway, he’s just someone I passed some time with.” And yet another encounter that had left him empty.

  Jessi shrugged. “It’s not like I thought you were both chaste after we broke up.”

  Mick zipped the suitcase and walked to her, dropping it so he could pull her into his arms. “You’re upset.”

  “I’m not. Not in the way you think.” She cupped his cheek and then petted his beard a moment.

  “So how are you upset then? I love you. I’ve loved you longer than I’ve loved anyone else. Fucking is just… fucking.” Mick searched her features as he cupped her throat, his thumbs brushing against her jaw, over the space below her ear. “You know what we have is different, right?”

  “I do, yes. I’m just sad at the loneliness in your eyes when you talk about your life before.”

  He took a deep breath, casting his gaze to Adam briefly. “I’ve known you forever, and it’s sort of crazy that you can still surprise me with how big your heart is.”

  “Look, I am bummed we had years apart. I want us to be honest about that. I never expected you to be pining for me. I’d be lying if I said I really wanted you to find someone else to love. But my heart hurts to know you were sad.”

  He hugged her one more time. “I’m not sad now.” In fact, he wanted to fuck her right that very moment.

  “I can sort of tell how happy part of you is,” she said against his chest.

  “It likes you.”

  Adam laughed as he got closer to them.

  “It likes you too,” Mick told Adam.

  “Good to know.”

  There was a brief knock at the door, and as they sprang away from one another like schoolkids, Mick’s oldest brother came in.

  “Hey, saw your… oh, I’m sorry!” John winced.

  “It’s okay.” Mick slid his arm around Jessi’s shoulders to keep her from backing away.

  “Jessilyn, it’s really good to see you,” John said with a crooked smile. “Adam, you too.”

  The oldest Roberts son wasn’t as closed-minded as the rest of their siblings when it came to Mick’s sexuality. He didn’t care, as long as Mick was happy. It hadn’t always been easy between them, but over the last year when Mick had been back in Seattle, he and his brother had been able to work through a lot of shit.

  It made a big difference, even if it was just one of his siblings.

  Jessi nodded with a wave. She wasn’t her usual bubbly, friendly self and Mick didn’t blame her. It’d be a while—if ever—before Jessilyn and his family would be comfortable around each other. Hell, he wasn’t entirely comfortable around his family, and he was born to them.

  “I was going to remind you about Kate’s birthday dinner later in the week. I’ll text you about it,” John said.

  “Great. I’ll be there.” Mick had long since given up hoping his family could be as open and welcoming as Jessi’s was. But they were his family nonetheless. Kate was his sister-in-law, and so of course he wouldn’t skip out on a birthday dinner for her.

  “I’ll take your stuff down to the car. Jess and I will see you at the house, okay?” Adam knew he’d probably want to talk with John alone.

  Jessi eyed John carefully and then turned to Mick. “You’re okay?�
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  He loved that she’d done it in full view of John. Mick wanted his brother to see what being with Jessi meant to him.

  “Yeah.” He kissed her forehead. “I’ll take my bike over if you can handle my suitcase, Adam.”

  They left after a good-bye to John.

  “Mom called. Said they’d been at your grand opening. She was worried about your soul.” John leaned a hip against the edge of the couch.

  “My soul is a lot happier when I’m with them.” Mick shrugged. “My whole life, when something big happened to me, good or bad, it was Jessi I turned to. Jessi has never rejected me for being who and what I am.”

  “You don’t have to defend her to me. I know she cares about you. Thinking back on it, I’m fairly sure I’ve always seen it. But you know how Mom and Dad feel about the Franklins. If you’re hanging around with them—or more—this whole business from four years ago is going to come back. You ready for that?”

  “Can’t say I’d ever be ready for it. But if and when it comes up, I’ll deal with it. I don’t know exactly all of it right now. Or even how to begin to describe it. It’s complicated, but pretty much the most right thing I’ve done in years. This time I’m not running.”

  John nodded. “I don’t pretend to understand your personal life. But you’re a big boy, and I figure your soul is your business, and I don’t much like seeing Mom and Dad being so mean-spirited. I probably should have stepped in between you and them more often.”

  Surprised, Mick found himself shrugging.

  “You’re not the only one who grew up over the last four years, Mick.” John clapped him on the shoulder. “When it comes up, as long as they’re good to you, I’m on your side. Okay?”

  Mick swallowed back emotion. “Yeah. Cool. Thanks.” He waved a hand around the room. “And for this.”

  “I’m your big brother. That’s what big brothers do.”

  They walked out together after Mick locked up. At his bike, he paused. “I’m going to be spending most of my nights away. Eventually we’ll be living together. We’re taking the moving-in part slow. I’ll see you Thursday night for dinner.”