by Marla Monroe
“Oh. It’s beautiful, Scope.”
On his back he’d had a giant eagle with its wings spread tattooed all the way across. It had taken five trips for that one, but he loved it. It symbolized his belief in freedom no matter the cost. After talking with Gunner the other night though, he was beginning to question whose freedom they were fighting for.
“I love it, Scope. Does Gunner have tattoos, too?” Darla asked as he turned back around.
“Yep. You’ll have to ask him to show them to you the next time you’re alone with him,” he said with a teasing wink.
“Okay, sexy. Let me see you do your stuff,” she said, winking back.
“Do my stuff? Really, sweet pea? That’s the best you could do?” he asked with a laugh.
She scowled at him and popped him lightly on the arm. He loved the sparring with her. He was enjoying himself and hoped she was doing the same. This was what he wanted in their family, an easygoing relationship built on trust and love and fun.
He picked up the lotion and poured a generous amount in his hand, then capped it and dropped it on the bed again. Scope quickly spread the cooler-than-he-liked lotion on his aching cock and fisted his hand around the shaft near the base. He squeezed, groaning at the fleeting relief it gave him before resuming to throb.
“That doesn’t hurt?” Darla asked. “I mean you’re squeezing it so hard.”
He smiled and pumped his hand up and down a few times. “No, it doesn’t.”
She watched with her mouth slightly open as he stroked his dick from root to crown over and over, stopping periodically to squeeze the base. Then as he began to heat up, he used his other hand to roll his balls around, struggling to make it last just a little bit longer as he imagined Darla’s hot mouth sucking him. It was easy to do with her staring at his cock with her plump lips parted.
“Fuck! I’m going to come, Darla. Just a couple more strokes.” He squeezed his eyes shut as he lifted to his toes and came, shooting ribbons of pearly white cum across the towel.
His ass burned as the muscles there contracted. His balls felt as if they were turning inside out until he slowly stroked himself down from the best damn jack-off he’d ever had. When he opened his eyes, it was to see Darla take one of her fingers covered in his cum into her mouth and suck. If he hadn’t just come, Scope swore he’d have shot off at the sight.
“Mmm. You taste good, sort of salty.” She smiled shyly at him before ducking her head.
“Having you watch me really did it for me, sweetness. Know what I’d like to do sometime?” he asked, praying he wasn’t getting to risqué for her.
“What?” She lifted her head to look up at him.
“I’d like to watch you make yourself come sometime. Maybe we could masturbate together. It would be hot watching you play with your pretty pussy while I pump my cock. Do you think you’d like to try that sometime?” he asked.
Her mouth dropped open, and a look of shock rolled over her face before it was replaced with curiosity. He breathed a sigh of relief at that look. He’d taken a chance in telling her what he’d like to try.
“Maybe. I–I’ve never done that in front of someone before. Um, I really haven’t done it very much at all anyway. It never felt right with Tommy in the other room, you know?”
“Yeah. I know.” He smiled as he cleaned up his mess then tossed the towel in the clothes hamper and replaced the lotion in the bathroom.
When he returned, he sat next to her on the bed and pulled her back into his arms just to hold her close for a little bit. Gunner and Tommy would be home in the next hour, so he didn’t have long. He’d take what he could get though. Feeling her skin against his was amazing. He loved how she felt in his arms.
“Better get dressed, sweetness. Need some help with your bra?” he asked.
“I don’t think I’ll put it back on tonight. Can you help me get my underwear up? I can do it but it takes time and I’m tired by the time I finish,” she told him.
Once they’d both gotten dressed, Darla followed him back downstairs where he left her relaxing on the couch while he returned to the kitchen to finish dinner. He was feeling really good right then. When he’d started out to seduce her, he hadn’t expected to come as well. He really had planned to take care of himself later.
I hope she really was okay with that. God, don’t let me have screwed up.
Worry ate at him until Tommy and Gunner walked into the house talking about big rigs and baseball. He wasn’t sure how you combined the two, but somehow they’d done it. Tommy looked perfectly happy, and Gunner looked a lot more relaxed than he’d expected after spending the afternoon with the little man.
“Hey, you two. Have a good afternoon?” he asked.
“It was really cool! I’ll tell you about it but I want to tell Mom, too,” Tommy said. “Is she sleeping?”
“Nope. She’s in the living room on the couch. Let’s go see her and you can tell us both what all you did while dinner is warming up.” Scope ruffled the boy’s hair and looked up at Gunner. “Everything okay?”
“Fine. He’s a good kid and was really a lot of help, too. I just worry about him being around all those big rigs. Accidents happen and I don’t want anything to happen to him.” Gunner looked at his hands. “I need to wash up. I’ll be right back.”
Scope watched the other man take the stairs two at a time while Tommy talked a mile a minute to his mom. He thought Gunner looked better than he had a few days ago. He just hoped he was really letting the anger go and wasn’t holding on to it so that it simmered under the surface. That could be a disaster.
“So you’ve already learned all the names of the tools? Really?” Darla was asking Tommy.
“Yeah. I don’t know the big tools yet, but I’ll learn them next time. The smaller tools are easy. I wiped them down when they were finished and put them where they belonged. I wanted to hand them to Gunner when he needed one, but he said it was too dangerous for me to get too close to the trucks when they were on the rack or the big hood was hooked back.” He looked put out about that.
Scope had to hide a smile behind his hand. He acted so grown up and much too serious for a boy his age. If nothing else, he hoped they could give him more time to play and be a little boy. It wasn’t Darla’s fault at all, it was just how Tommy was wired. He conformed to what he needed to be to help his mom. Well, they were going to help Darla now so he could be a kid.
Gunner returned from upstairs with a new shirt and clean hands. He smiled at Darla and leaned down to give her a lingering kiss.
“Hi Gunner. Thank you for taking Tommy back with you from lunch today. It sounds like he had a great time. I bet he’s going to end up being a mechanic,” she said, looking at the big man.
Gunner frowned. “A mechanical engineer maybe, but not a diesel mechanic. He’s too smart for that.”
She laughed. “Well, Tommy, sounds like Gunner already has your college major picked out for you.
Tommy smiled and shrugged. “I can be anything I want and still fix trucks sometimes.”
“Wise young man,” Scope said. “You remember that when you get ready for college.”
Gunner didn’t say anything, but he looked thoughtful as Tommy continued to talk about his afternoon. It was obvious that he’d had a great time and wanted to go again. He’d talk to Gunner to be sure it was possible before he suggested it on one of his days.
“Dinner should be ready, guys. Come on, Tommy. You can help me put it on the table while Gunner helps your mom,” Scope said.
Tommy grinned and raced to the kitchen ahead of him. Shaking his head, Scope followed at slower pace. When he walked into the room he had to grin. Tommy was tying the apron around his waist, or attempting to. The ties wrapped around his little body three times.
“Need some help there?” he asked, bending down to fix the strings.
“I don’t want to mess up my clothes so I can wear them again. Mom has to do laundry a lot so I have something to wear. If I wear it more than on
ce, she doesn’t have so much work,” he said.
Scope struggled not to let the boy see how much that affected him. He already knew the child had very few clothes. He hadn’t thought about what that meant in terms of keeping them washed for him to wear. It really bothered him that Tommy even thought how he could cut down on his mom having to wash clothes. Boys his age didn’t worry about things like that. They wore a pair of jeans for half a day then changed clothes again by dinner time.
“Well you don’t have to worry about that at all here, Tommy. Your mom doesn’t have to do the laundry here. There are two of us to keep up with the laundry so it’s not a problem. Plus,” he said. “We’re going to get you some new clothes when we take your mom to the city for her appointment with the specialist.”
His eyes lit up. “Really?” Then he deflated like a balloon. “Maybe I can get a pair of shoes since mine are too small, but I don’t really need anything else right now.”
“Of course you do,” Scope said. “You need new jeans, new shirts, and at least two pair of new shoes. We’ll take care of it on Friday.”
“What about Mom? She needs clothes, too. I don’t think we have enough for both of us to get new clothes and she hasn’t had any the last two times I’ve gotten them. I keep outgrowing mine too fast.” Tommy frowned at that.
“I bet you’re sprouting up faster than a weed on steroids.” Scope hoped so anyway. “You need new clothes every few months when you’re growing like you are. Nothing wrong with that. Don’t worry about it anymore. That’s for Gunner and me to take care of. Remember? What’s your job?”
Tommy smiled. “To take care of Mom and make sure she’s happy.”
“Good boy. Now let’s get dinner on the table before Gunner and your mom get here and wonder what we’ve been doing in here all this time.”
They’d just gotten the plates on the table and where in the middle of setting the silverware out when Gunner walked in with Darla by his side. They both looked comfortable enough and Darla was smiling. That was a good sign.
“Hey, Mom,” Tommy said.
“What is it, hon?” Darla took a seat when Gunner held her chair.
“What is a ménage?” the little boy asked.
Chapter Seventeen
“Where did you hear that?” Gunner asked before anyone else could close their mouths when they had dropped open in shock.
“Two of the guys at the shop were talking about how it was a big thing in Perkins City and that they figured that was what you and Scope were aiming to have,” he said as he sat down next to his mom.
“Good grief,” Scope said.
Gunner would have a word with those guys the next time he was at work. They shouldn’t have talked like that with Tommy there. They’d been told to keep their language clean, but they probably didn’t think that talking about a ménage was off limits. Damn.
“It’s a type of relationship between adults, honey. It’s not something you need to know about right now,” Darla said.
Tommy’s face brightened with a slow grin. “That means it’s adult talk, and I wasn’t supposed to hear it. I get it. It must have something to do with sex then.”
“Tommy!” Darla’s face grew red now.
Gunner needed to regain control of the conversation before she ended up mortified and Tommy talked himself out of getting to go anywhere with them again. The kid was entirely too smart for his age.
“Tommy. We don’t talk about sex at the table when we’re about to eat. If you have questions, we can talk about them later, okay?” he asked.
The boy dropped the smile but didn’t look hurt. He just nodded and started talking about the tools and the huge tool chests they had at the shop. Thank goodness he was a good kid who minded.
When he looked up again, his eyes met Darla’s and she mouthed a thank you his way, followed by a smile. That felt good to see after he’d just lightly reprimanded her son without permission. He was going to have to remember that he wasn’t in charge anymore. This wasn’t the Marines and there were others with just as much power as he held. He hoped that would change soon, but until then, he had to remember to relax his rigid rules and expectations. Darla was all that mattered to him.
As they ate and exchanged stories about their day, he slowly relaxed again and enjoyed the way Darla had settled in a little more. From the expression on Scope’s face and the blushes that kept popping up on Darla’s skin, Gunner was pretty sure they’d fooled around at some point. That was great. It meant they were making progress with her.
How did he feel about that? He’d worried it would bother him for Scope to mess around with Darla without him, but it didn’t. All that mattered was that it meant they were closer to having her as their wife and Tommy as their son. He might have been wary of the idea at first, but now that his heart was involved, he was impatient to have things settled.
As soon as they’d finished eating, Scope took Tommy downstairs to watch TV for a while before bed. He cleaned the kitchen with Darla sitting at the table watching.
“Making sure I do a good job?” he asked as he rinsed the dishes before putting them in the dishwasher.
She laughed. The sound went straight to his dick, and he almost broke a plate.
“I’m sure you do a great job. I was just enjoying sitting here watching how your muscles move under that T-shirt.”
This time he did drop a glass back into the sink but luckily it didn’t break. Gunner slowly turned around to look at her. His cock throbbed, and the sight of her mouth slightly open as she stared back at him made the ache even sweeter.
“Do you want me to take it off?” he asked.
“I kind of like the tease of leaving it on right now. Maybe you can take it off tomorrow if you’re not going to work. Isn’t it Scope’s turn?” she asked with a smile.
Gunner cocked his head then turned back to finish the dishes. “Yeah. It is.”
* * * *
“Are you sure you don’t mind if Tommy comes over to play today?” Darla asked.
“Goodness, no! Jeremy has been asking if he could play with Tommy for the last few days. Besides, you’re the one who steered those two hunks of yours toward the garage. Joe’s been able to get a little more time off and that’s been wonderful.” Peggy didn’t sound the least bit bothered at the idea of letting Tommy play over there with her son.
“I really appreciate it. It will give him something to do besides hang around here or go up to the shop.”
“And it will give you some alone time with one of your men. Time well spent, if you ask me,” Peggy teased. “I’ll come get him if you’ll tell me where you are.”
“That would be wonderful, but I’m dying to get out for a few minutes. If it’s okay with you, we’ll bring him over.”
“No problem. I can definitely understand. Are you feeling better? I couldn’t believe it when Joe called me the other day and told me what had happened. You don’t need to work at a place like that, honey. It’s too dangerous,” Peggy told her.
“Don’t you start on me, too. Believe me, I’ve already heard it at least a dozen times now.” Darla couldn’t help but smile at the other woman’s concern.
It felt good to have her for a friend. Darla knew Tessa and Tayler were good friends, but she’d known Peggy almost all of her life. She knew what she’d gone through with raising Tommy on her own, and had been there when her parents had died. She really needed to try and spend some time with her. She’d make sure she returned the favor of having Jeremy over to give her a day free before she went back to work.
“Okay, girlfriend. I’ll see you in an hour.” Peggy hung up and Darla hit “end” on her cell.
“So did she say yes?” Tommy asked as he ran into the living room.
“Yes. She did. You can play a few hours with Jeremy. We’ll ask him over to play one day next week if it’s okay with Gunner and Scope.”
“It’s okay whatever it is,” Gunner said from the doorway leading down into the media room, as they’d named
it. “Uh, what is it?”
Tommy giggled. “You just said it was okay if we invited my friend Jeremy over one day next week. Did you mean it?”
Gunner’s face stretched into that half grin he was showing more and more often now. “Of course I did. Whoever’s home next week can throw the ball around with you two. How does that sound?”
“Super! Hear that, Mom? He said it’s okay.” Tommy grinned and surprised both her and Gunner when he raced over and wrapped his arms around the man’s thighs. “Thanks, Gunner!”
“No problem.” The big man patted Tommy on the head. “Go get that backpack I got you, and pack your glove and a change of clothes in case you get too dirty to go out and get something to eat afterwards.”
“Really? We’re going out to eat tonight?” Tommy’s face grew brighter, if that were even possible.
Darla couldn’t hide the smile at seeing her son so animated. Just a few days with the guys had opened her eyes to just how much of life both she and her son had been missing. Seeing him this happy and full of life was amazing for her. But it also made her feel a little less of a good mom at the same time. She’d somehow missed that Tommy hadn’t really been happy before. She’d thought him to be quiet and more interested in books and puzzles than anything else, when in fact, he had tried to be what she needed in order to work like she did. It shamed her.
“Hey, babe. What’s with the sad face?” Gunner frowned as he sat next to her.
“Thank you so much for everything you’re doing for us. Especially for Tommy. You and Scope have been wonderful for him. He’s acting like a child for the first time and it makes me sad to realize I hadn’t known how much he was missing.” She blinked back the tears that threatened to embarrass her.
“Darla. You’ve raised an amazing son. You worked hard to provide for him and because of that, you were seriously hurt. No one could ever fault anything you’ve done. Don’t be so hard on yourself. I’m completely impressed with how you’ve managed all this time alone,” Gunner told her.
“I had help at first. Mom and Dad did all they could. They were wonderful and loved Tommy so much. I wish they could have lived long enough to see just what a great kid he’s turned out to be. They would have been so proud.” She sniffed but managed to clear her eyes before Tommy returned and caught her crying.