After dinner, the sun has set and the moon is out. We drop our leftover containers in the car, I leave my purse there, and the men pull off their shoes and socks and lock them in, too.
I was going to take my shoes off, but Nolan and Arlo conspire and Nolan carries me, piggyback, across the road and over the boardwalk through the dunes to the public beach. All three of us are laughing and giggling. Before Nolan lets me down, Arlo removes my shoes for me.
The sound of the waves gently lapping at the shore is the perfect background soundtrack. They both roll up the legs of their slacks, and with me holding the hem of my skirt up, and Arlo carrying my shoes, we walk hand-in-hand over the firm-packed sand at the surf line.
“Think we could get away with beach sex here?” Arlo asks.
Nolan laughs. “I wouldn’t want to risk it here. Too many nosy retirees.”
The water is beautifully warm as it licks at our feet and ankles. I’m holding Nolan’s left hand with my right, and I feel the ring on his finger.
“I keep wanting to think a shoe’s going to drop,” I admit.
“Something’s always going to happen,” Arlo says. “That’s life. The known factors we don’t have to worry about are Bill and Jerilyn.”
“I wonder if she ever left Bill,” Arlo muses.
“Not our circus, not our monkeys,” I lightly shoot back.
“I could always poke around on Facebook,” Nolan suggests.
I squeeze his hand. “Nope. Don’t even. That’s like drawing attention to us. Besides, it doesn’t matter, does it?”
“No, I guess not.”
“If you want to waste time doing something, help me sort out what’s going into the storage unit,” I add, laughing as both men groan.
We need one. We’re going to start packing to put the house on the market, and we need to ditch all the extra stuff cluttering up the place. It’s imperative we pare down our home’s contents for a good showing for prospective buyers. At least the home office once again holds the desk and some bookshelves that had been put in the dining room. Although the extra dresser in our bedroom, which holds Nolan’s clothes, does make it a tight fit.
We want to try to time selling the house with when our new house will be close to complete. We’re supposed to break ground on that in a few weeks. I haven’t even started picking out cabinets or tile or paint. The men told me to narrow it down and they’d chime in on my top choices before we decide.
I’m actually a little partial to a set of IKEA cabinets I saw in their Tampa store last weekend when I drove up there to buy some more bookshelves for Lucas’ and Katie’s rooms.
“Do you think the builder install an IKEA kitchen for us?”
They both stop and stare at me. “If we’re going with IKEA,” Nolan says, “we should handle that part of things ourselves.”
Arlo snorts.
“What?” Nolan asks.
“Spoken like the guy who nearly killed himself changing a tire,” Arlo teases.
“You’re never going to let me live that down, are you, Mr. Can’t-Dump-His-Browser-Cookies?”
Arlo’s grin widens. “Nope.”
“I helped you replace the cabinets in the master bathroom when you guys moved into that house,” he reminds him. “I didn’t say I’d take the lead on this. But maybe it’ll save us some money if we do things like that ourselves.” He pulls both of us in close. “You know. Our house.”
“I gotta say, I kinda like that idea,” I tell Arlo. “I mean, we’re doing this in stages anyway. We’re priced out to bare walls, electrical, and the bathroom stuff like tubs and toilets.” The builder is a good friend of Arlo’s boss and is treating us right on the house. Since we already own the property free and clear, and have a good deal of equity in the house, we were able to secure a good loan to start the building process.
All three of us.
Together.
“When are we supposed to find time to do this?” Arlo asks.
“Weekends,” Nolan and I say together before we start laughing.
“Caine and Lucas love helping you guys out. And think about what you could teach Katie to do. You said you wanted her to be a self-rescuing princess, right? Let her help, too. They’ll feel invested in the house.”
Arlo studies us with a look we both know damned well—slightly aggravated, but not seriously, and already knowing he’s outnumbered and won’t win this, so he should probably give in now.
“Fine, but we hire out the flooring,” he says. “And the backsplash and stuff, if we’re doing tile there. I’m not killing my knees for anything but giving either of you two head.”
Nolan and I burst out laughing.
We walk for a little longer before heading back. But instead of leaving the beach, we sit in the soft white sand past the high-tide line and stare out at the calm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, me in the middle.
I think we’re going to talk some more, but Nolan, then Arlo, kisses me. We’ve got the beach to ourselves right now. They both reach up under my skirt, push my panties to the side, and with their other arms around my shoulders, they make me come several times.
Yeah, I’m a happy girl.
I think maybe they’re going to let me get them off, too, but then Arlo carries me piggyback up to the public showers so we can hose our feet off before heading back to the car.
It’s not quite eleven when we return home. Caine and Lucas are sitting on either end of the couch and watching an anime while a snoring Katie is sprawled across the couch and them.
I immediately take a picture, because it’s fricking adorable.
Once they’re all in bed, we retire to our bedroom and lock the door behind us.
“Showers, my spouses,” Nolan says.
There, they pin me between them, Nolan behind me and Arlo in front of me, and make me come one more time before they each spill inside me, front and back.
I’m not always up for that particular permutation, but tonight it’s a special ending for the most special of nights. It means as I’m drifting to sleep between them a few minutes later, pleasantly aching in all sorts of good ways, I know I’m going to sleep damned good tonight.
And so will my husbands.
Chapter Sixteen
Nolan
“Kids, dinner’s ready. Go wash your hands.”
Tonight I’m trying a new recipe that Lucas found, a lemon chicken dish that, I have to admit, has the house smelling pretty dang good.
Tuesday nights are one of my cooking nights. If Katie wasn’t still working on homework, with Lucas and Caine helping her, she’d be in here helping me. She’s my little sous-chef. Three weeks into second grade, and we can already see she’s going to be an amazing student.
Her teachers talked to us—because obviously I looped Zoey and Arlo into the discussion—about having her skip second grade and putting her in third. We decided we didn’t want to do that this year. She’s already a little smaller than some of her classmates, and we don’t want her feeling out of place.
Arlo and Zoey emerge from our bedroom, where they were “taking a shower.”
Which is what we tell Katie we’re doing. Except we didn’t tell her that me and Zoey already “had a shower” earlier, which was why Arlo had picked her up from school today instead of me or Zoey.
Tomorrow, me and Arlo will probably sneak away for a “shower.”
Life’s gotten a little hectic with the new school year, but we’re quickly finding our groove. Over the past couple of weeks we’ve filled our storage unit, and the house no longer looks like a thrift store exploded in it. We’re not ready to put this house on the market just yet, but we’re getting close. Our new house has a foundation and frame walls and roofing trusses. When we went to take a look at it this weekend, Katie excitedly squealed as she ran around inside her room, despite it being nothing more than stud walls and a concrete floor.
Her excitement is contagious, though.
While she was doing that, we walked the path from that end
of the house, through the living room, dining room, and kitchen, down the hallway past the den and utility room, to where our bedrooms are.
With the secret out, we don’t have to fib about the extra bedroom, which will basically be our library area away from the kids.
Okay, so maybe it’ll also hold the big TV that me and Arlo want so we can play video games without Zoey griping that we’re keeping her awake.
I stand in the middle of what will be our master bathroom and look around. “Damn. This is huge.”
“Right?” Arlo said as he pulled me to him for a kiss.
I snap myself back to the present, where a smiling Zoey leans in for a kiss from me. “Thank you for cooking dinner, Daddy.”
“You’re welcome, Mommy.”
“Whippersnapper,” Arlo teases before he kisses me.
“Old geezer,” I playfully shoot back as I hand him a bowl of mashed potatoes to carry out to the dining room table. And we all laugh.
Damn it feels good to laugh all the time.
Caine’s here tonight because his parents went out of town for a week for a work conference for his dad, and his parents asked if we’d minded if he stayed with us. He could’ve stayed alone at home—and in fact will be stopping by there every day to check the mail and water plants—but he’s a fixture around here as much as Lucas is a fixture at their house.
At least they don’t have to hide their relationship from us.
The more I see them together, the more I’m convinced—we all are—that there’s probably a wedding in their future. They really are a modern me and Arlo, without the desperation and sneaking around.
Or fear.
We’re just sitting down to eat when the doorbell rings.
Damnit. That figures. “I’ve got it.” I’m about to put a No Soliciting sign on the front door. Usually, it’s religious people trying to convert us, but with the start of the school year we’ve already had two kids peddling magazines and one selling candy bars.
That’s why I don’t even look before I open the door.
Which is why I have difficulty processing that it’s Bill Motherfucking Webb standing on my front porch.
And it’s also why it takes me a moment to finally make my voice work. “What the fuck do you want?”
I don’t have to be nice to this asshole. We have a signed court order that basically equates to a “go fuck yourself” card.
He glares at me. “I want to see Lucas.”
I actually laugh in his face as I stand there with one hand on the door and one on the door frame, blocking his view inside the house behind me. “You haven’t tried to so much as call him in several months, after throwing him out, and you show up on my fucking doorstep wanting to see him? I don’t think so.”
“Your doorstep?” Bill asks.
I didn’t realize I had company behind me until I hear Zoey’s voice by my left ear. “Get out of here, Bill.”
“What do you want?” That’s Lucas, and he’s behind me on my other side. When I look, I see that Caine’s right behind him. I glance back to see Arlo’s corralled Katie and is carrying her down the hall.
Good, because I don’t want her to hear any of this, and I expect it’s going to get loud and…sweary.
I move my arm so Lucas can ease into the space next to me, but like hell am I letting him go out there.
Bill sees him standing there, and the blatantly fake smile the man suddenly dons makes me laugh again.
“Hey, buddy,” Bill says. “I wanted to stop by and see if I could take you out to dinner or something.”
Lucas studies him. “She left you, didn’t she?” he finally says.
When Bill rubs the back of his neck and starts to stammer, I realize my son absolutely has this asshole’s number.
“Look, can we talk? Alone?” Bill asks with glares shot at me and Zoey.
Lucas snorts. “Nope. I don’t have anything to say to you. And we were just sitting down to dinner before you interrupted us.”
I guess Bill wasn’t expecting this kind of reaction. He’s practically whining. “Come on, Lucas. I’m sorry. I just wasn’t expecting it. Kids go through phases, right? You’ll probably grow out of it and like girls once you’re able to drive.” He offers Lucas a smile. “I’ll teach you how to drive. Won’t that be fun?”
Lucas’ expression doesn’t change. His hand dips into his pocket, he withdraws his keys, and he hits the door lock button on his fob to make the Toyota’s horn chirp and the lights flash. “I have a car, Bill. I’m good, thanks. Anything else?” He drapes his arm around Caine’s shoulders and is looking right at his father when he kisses Caine.
Behind me, Zoey laughs.
We’re just back-up, at this point. Lucas has this well in hand.
Bill nervously swallows. “I’m sorry, Lucas. Why don’t you start coming over to my place on the weekends, huh? Just you and me.”
“Yeah, nooo. Hard pass. I’m good. We done here? Our dinner is getting cold.”
“Can I at least get your cell number? You blocked me on Facebook and won’t answer my e-mails. I’m your dad, and—”
“There’s a reason I won’t answer your e-mails, asshole!” Lucas screams, startling me. “Because you’re not my dad! Arlo and Nolan are my dads. You can go screw yourself! You threw me out and told me I was a pervert and a freak. I’m not good enough for you unless you’re alone and need someone to show off to. Screw you. You made your choice, and it wasn’t me.”
He angrily turns and heads back inside, Caine right behind him.
Zoey steps in beside me and drops her voice. “You’re going to die alone and miserable,” she tells Bill. “Unless you get your head out of your fucking ass and get some help. There’s a common denominator to all your relationship troubles, and that’s you. Oh, by the way? I showed Lucas the pictures and statement from when you hit me. He knows the truth. Also, when we moved his stuff out, he showed Mary pictures he took of some woman’s car parked in your driveway, and you getting a blowjob from her. Get your shit together, asshole. You’re forty-nine years old.”
She tugs on my arm to prompt me to close the door, making me sigh. “I’m never going to get to punch this motherfucker, am I?” I sadly ask as I close the door in his face and lock it.
“No,” Zoey tells me. Then she rises up onto her toes to kiss me. “Let’s eat.”
“Just a minute. Go on. I’ll be right there.” I watch through the viewfinder until Bill finally leaves. “All clear,” I call out as I follow them back to the table.
Arlo and Katie reappear in the dining room. “Well?” Arlo asks.
“He’s gone,” I say.
“Who was he?” Katie asks.
“He’s nobody I care about,” Lucas says.
“My ex-husband,” Zoey says.
Katie frowns. “Lucas’ father? The jerk?”
Me, Arlo, and Zoey all try to choke back our laughter, but Caine nods.
“Yeah, him,” Caine tells her, fist-bumping with her.
Caine is yet another big brother to her, and she follows both boys around like a puppy when they’re home.
Katie’s as protective of her big brothers as they are of her. Outrage fills her voice. “What’d he want?”
“Nothing we couldn’t take care of,” I assure her. “Let’s eat.”
* * * *
Zoey does a good job of hiding her feelings from the kids, but once the three of us are alone in our bedroom later that night, her mask drops and she’s seething.
“What the hell did that asshole think was going to happen?” she practically hisses.
Arlo and I exchange a knowing glance. We understand it’s a rhetorical rant, and she needs to get it out of her system.
“I mean, seriously? What did he think Lucas was going to do? Thank him for throwing him out? Buddy up to him? For fuck’s sake!”
Arlo and I quietly stand there, staying out of her way and letting her vent. She goes on for another five minutes or so before finally sitting on the end o
f the bed and staring up at us.
“Better?” I ask.
“No,” she grouses. “What right does he have to show up here like that after he threw Lucas out like garbage?”
“He’s an idiot,” Arlo says. “Which is why you traded up with us.”
Finally, the hint of a smile appears on her face. “Us?”
He hooks a thumb at me. “Yeah. Me and the whippersnapper here.” He grins.
I elbow him. “Shut up, you old geezer.”
She flops back onto the bed. “I do not want another round of legal bullshit with him. I wouldn’t put it past him to file for another modification.”
I snort. “Gonna be hard to do when the ‘child’ in question tells the judge he wants nothing to do with him. I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
“The narcissist can’t stand being ignored,” she says. “Never forget that.”
I step over to sit next to her, where I take her hands in mine and press them against my chest. “Sweetheart,” I gently say, “he’s not taking Lucas away from you again. Lucas saw through him.”
Arlo sits on her other side and stretches out next to her. “Logic this out, sweetheart. He admitted to us what happened the last time, how Bill played him. Plus, now he knows Bill played him. He also doesn’t want to be played again. He’s happy with us.”
She takes a deep breath, holds it, and lets it out. “I blocked Bill’s phone number on my cell after we got the order.”
“And?” I ask. “You have every right to do that. We have a home phone, and he’s got the number for it. He has our attorney’s contact info. He obviously knows where the house is. He could’ve written Lucas a letter. Lucas is a smart kid who learns from his mistakes.”
Lucas also still feels horrible about those two lost years. He talked to me about it last week when he went grocery shopping with me. I assured him we don’t hold it against him, because we know what kind of person Bill is, and how he manipulates people.
It’s guilt he’s working through, though.
No, there’s no chance of him falling for his father’s bullshit again.
Later, after we’ve gone to bed and Zoey and Arlo are both asleep, I lie awake and hope that, one day, if Katie is presented with the same kind of choice as Lucas was tonight, that she’s got the strength to remember how Lucas handled Bill and not fall prey to fake tears or a manufactured crisis.
Poly Page 16