“Colin,” I gasp. “I love you so much. I’ve always loved you. I don’t think I ever stopped loving you. I have things I want to do to you too. Let me?”
He smiles, his eyes sparkling like he knows a secret. He watches me as I ever-so-slowly grasp his cock and stroke it up and down. His head drops back and he groans.
“Fuuuuck.”
I stroke him a few more times and then lick my palm before rubbing it on his cock again. He jerks in my hand and then moves, wedging a knee between my legs and stroking a finger up my center. It feels so good I nearly come off the bed.
“You’re going to have to wait to do those things,” he tells me. “I won’t last. I want you so much there’s no part of me that doesn’t ache.”
I let go of his cock and lift my hands over my head before I spread my legs wider and bend my knees. He gazes at my core like it’s a gourmet dinner and he hasn’t eaten for days. My heart races.
He strokes me again and then pushes two fingers inside me. I gasp, everything tightening in anticipation.
“Are you ready for me?” he asks, licking around my belly button as he pumps his long, strong fingers in and out, touching the perfect secret spot inside me.
“Oh God,” I cry out as I pulse around him, waves of pleasure throbbing again and again.
My muscles are still clenching in glorious spasms when he replaces his fingers with his cock, and it sends me further over the edge. He pulls out then thrusts back in, and my mind goes completely blank. The ecstasy is overwhelming. I don’t now my name or where I am. All I know is that Colin is part of me and it’s bliss. Pure, shining, glorious bliss.
Colin’s face is against my neck, and he thrusts into me twice more before he jerks hard and opens his mouth on my skin, gritting out his release.
“Fucking. Perfect.”
WE’RE SNUGGLING in Colin’s bed. His arm is around my waist, lightly stroking up and down my stomach. His face is buried in my hair, and his lips tickle the back of my neck as he speaks.
“Are you happy?” he murmurs after I’ve told him about my meeting with Jeff.
I sigh. “Ecstatic,” I answer.
“So you’re okay to move to Portland? I’ve got a purchase agreement on that house, but if you want to look around at others I can get out of that easily. The earnest money isn’t worth worrying about. I picked it because it’s near Mike and Jenny’s neighborhood and I thought you might like to have someone familiar around.”
I face him. “I haven’t looked at the photos closely, but what I saw was gorgeous. And you’re right, I’d love to have Jenny nearby. Maybe even Mike would be okay.”
Colin laughs and kisses me on the nose. “There’s something else I need to tell you.”
“Okay.”
“The stuff with the foundation?”
“Yeah?”
“Well, that’s only part of the deal. The band is back together, and we incorporated. We’re going to run our own production label, the foundation, and do all of our own tours and promotion. We’re all on the board along with our manager, Dave, and I’m the president of the board for the foundation.”
“I think that’s wonderful,” I tell him, running my palm along his stubbly cheek.
“It’s going to mean some travel for me—concerts out of town, visits to some of the programs that apply for foundation funding.”
He’s worried that’ll somehow be a deal breaker for me. “Colin. I love you. I love that you put so much thought into what our life together could look like. You’re giving me a home, a fresh start, a future, and a life I haven’t been able to even dream of. Don’t worry about traveling. I want you to be happy, and if playing concerts and working on foundation projects makes you happy, then that’s what I want you to do.”
“Will you come with me? I know you won’t be able to always with Sean in school and everything, but I was hoping you’d help with the foundation projects and we could tour in the summers—all of us—the band, our families, pets, whatever. It’ll be like a traveling circus.”
It’ll also be one-of-a-kind memories for Sean. Seeing places and experiencing things he would never have been able to otherwise.
I kiss Colin on the mouth. “Yes. Absolutely yes. I want to help with the foundation. I want to go on tour with you. I want to live my life with you.”
“Thank God. I was going to have a really hard time returning that ring,” he jokes. “But I want to hear what you want to do too. It’s all there for you, babe. You can work or not, go to school or not, have more babies or not. Anything you want. We have a home now, a family, and from there you can go anywhere, do anything.”
“I think I might want to go to school,” I tell him, possibilities swirling through my head. “But first, I want to take care of Sean and live in our new house and love you.”
“You got it,” he whispers. “You got it all.”
And he’s so right. I absolutely did.
Epilogue
Colin
IT’S A beautiful late summer day and I’m standing at the top of a huge set of granite stairs, Walsh on one side of me and Joss’s dad, Joseph Senior, on the other. We’re looking out at a vast lawn filled with white wood chairs, bunting, and ribbons floating around them. I find Marsha and Sean in the front row and give them a wink. Marsha smiles back at me, her eyes a perfect match for the blue silk dress that wraps around her body so perfectly.
I yank on my collar a bit, chafing at the tight buttons and tie I’ve been forced into.
“You screw that fancy knot up and Mrs. D. will have your head on a platter,” Walsh whispers to me.
“Shit,” I whisper back. “I can’t believe she hired someone to come tie our ties. What the hell? We all had to have a Hanover knot?” I subtly shake my head.
Walsh is trying really hard not to laugh, but he’s starting to lose the battle. Then we hear the opening chords to a beautiful old, Spanish flamenco song. Mike sits to one side of us, his acoustic guitar in hand. His fingers fly over the strings, and it’s truly amazing. He’s been testing out some flamenco for the last couple of years, but he didn’t get serious about it until Joss asked him to be in charge of the music for the wedding. Mike took the assignment to heart and has planned everything from this guitar solo at the ceremony to a modern take on a string quartet at dinner and a full dance band for the reception. He even has a little surprise planned for the guests.
As the guitar piece gathers momentum, the wings of a tent at the back of the seating area open up and Jenny walks out. Her long, blond hair is up in some sort of fancy style, and her dress is the color of raspberry sherbet. The dress has those tiny straps at the shoulders and no sleeves. It cuts down in a deep V at the top and is tight all the way down her legs until it flares out around her knees. I don’t know much about women’s fashion, but she looks freaking hot, and I swear Mike misses a note when he catches sight of her.
The men in the place have barely recovered from Jenny when Tammy walks out and also heads up the aisle toward us. She’s wearing the same dress but in a deep-purple color that makes her dark olive skin glow.
Walsh mutters, “Damn, baby” as she walks toward us, and I elbow him in the ribs to remind him that we’re not in his bedroom.
Mr. Jamison looks sideways at both Walsh and me and says, “Behave yourselves, you two.” Then he winks and grins at us.
Mike changes up the music a touch, and Mel emerges on her dad’s arm. I know they say that all brides are beautiful, but she truly is. I steal a look at Joss, and I don’t think I’ve ever seen him look at another human being the way he’s looking at Mel right now. He’s usually the guy in control, he doesn’t lose his cool over anything, but right now, every single thing he’s feeling is written all over his face.
The breeze shifts our way, and I can smell the roses that are clustered in a garden beyond the tent the girls came from. The sun is out, but there’s enough humidity in the air that the light is softened, like it has a giant filter to disperse it. It really is a perfec
t day for a wedding, so I have to agree with the minister when he notes it as he starts the ceremony.
Mrs. DiLorenzo is in the first row across the aisle from Marsha, and it looks like she’s not going to stop crying any time soon. Mel and Joss wrote their own vows, and I remember back to the vows Marsha and I said in front of the Justice of the Peace when we got married four months ago. We discussed it and decided that the whole big wedding thing wasn’t us. She doesn’t have any family to attend a wedding, and we wanted to get married as quickly as possible so that Sean could feel he had a stable family situation when we moved him to Portland. We took Leanne, Ronny, Sean, and Jimmy, and we had a quick ceremony at the JP’s office in Dallas. We went to Portland right afterwards for a few days and had a giant party in our new backyard with my family and friends to celebrate.
We waited until the school break in December to move officially so that Sean could finish up his semester in Texas. He started at the private school I found for him in January when we finally made it to Portland full time. He’s done great there, and in a few weeks he’ll start back for the new school year as a second grader.
There’ve been some adjustments for me learning to live with Marsha and Sean. Marsha and I have had to talk about expectations and discipline. She’s been a single mom for most of Sean’s life, and she’s had to get used to taking my views about raising him into consideration, but we’ve worked through it. He’s the best kid I could have ever hoped for, and a few weeks ago he asked me if he could call me dad. I was so honored I nearly broke down and cried. My Christmas present to him and Marsha is to give them papers for me to adopt him. Jeff signed his rights away, and I’m more than willing to fill that gap.
The minister pronounces Joss and Mel husband and wife, and Joss grabs her like she’s the last glass of water in the desert. The kiss is long and probably more than any of the five hundred guests want to see, but my buddy is as happy as I’ve ever seen him, so what the hell.
There are helicopters circling the property as we all sit down in tents spread across the vast lawns. Those of us at the head table are relieved to hear that the Lush security staff is handling the flying paparazzi. Within fifteen minutes the sounds of rotors beating the air above us disappear and everyone can relax and enjoy the meal.
If there’s one thing Mrs. D. knows, it’s food, and the food at Mel’s wedding is out of this world. There are seafood platters, all-organic meats, produce so fresh that they picked it yesterday to serve to us tonight. Marsha and Sean have slowly gotten used to living with money—eating at high-end restaurants, buying fresh seafood—and Sean is able to crack open a crab leg with the best of them. I know that someday I’ll need to trim back on the things I buy for him and make him work to earn extras, but for now I think it’s okay to spoil the kid a bit. Living his first six years in poverty didn’t do any permanent harm, but he deserves to enjoy life a little just like his mom.
“What are you thinking about so hard?” Marsha says as she leans over and kisses me on the cheek.
“How fucking lucky I am,” I tell her, holding out a bite of my polenta for her.
Her sweet lips wrap around the fork and her eyes blink closed as she relishes the delicate flavor of the corn and sage. My dick twitches when I watch her savor that bite, and I wish it were me she was savoring right now instead.
Her eyes pop open and she smiles at me, that little half smile that makes her eyes sparkle and tells me she knows exactly what I was thinking.
“Later,” she whispers in my ear.
“Dad,” Sean says from my other side.
“Yeah, dude?”
“Can me and Rita go sit at the table with Mrs. D.?”
Rita is one of Mel and Tammy’s many little Italian cousins. The DiLorenzo and Abbatelli clans have come from far and wide to watch their girl get married off to a rock star.
“Yes, you may,” I tell him. “But you stay right with Mrs. D. or you come straight back to me and Mom. Nowhere else, okay?”
“Yes!” He bounds off with little Rita a step ahead of him, and I watch until they get to Mrs. D., who grabs them both and kisses their cheeks before she sits them down next to her.
“Did I hear him call you ‘Dad’?” Walsh asks from across the table.
“Yeah, man. He started it a few weeks ago.” I shrug.
Walsh smiles at me and Tammy does too. Their son, Pax, is a few months old and Walsh is totally smitten with him. He can’t get enough of that kid.
“Congratulations,” Walsh says.
Marsha rests her head on my shoulder. “He earned it. He’s a really great dad.”
“Just like raising pups, isn’t it?” Mike asks, winking at me from his seat next to Walsh.
“Stop it,” Jenny chides. “What will people think if you compare our children to pets when we have them?”
Mike laughs and gives her a peck on the cheek. “They’ll think, ‘Well, that guy finally had the guts to say it like it is.’ Puppies, kids, whatever. Feed ’em, water ’em, tap ’em on the nose with a newspaper when they’re bad, and send ’em outside as much as possible. It’s all the same thing.”
“You know”—Joss tears himself away from Mel long enough to chime in—“he’s got a point.”
All the women at the table roll their eyes.
Mike chuckles. “Colin really does have a way with dogs though.”
“Have you seen Chet lately?” Marsha asks.
“No, not since the last time you brought him by the offices.”
“He’s completely attached to Sean. Sleeps next his bed all night, follows him everywhere, waits at the window all day for him to come home from school. It’s crazy. He’s the sweetest, most loyal dog I’ve ever seen.”
“Well, our boy Colin managed to tame a wild animal. Good job, bro.”
My face heats. It’s really about understanding the way dogs’ minds work. Not anything special. And even I didn’t know how things would work out with Chet, but honestly, at this point, I’d trust Sean’s life to him. I was tickling Sean before bed the other night and he was shrieking like a banshee. Chet came over and took my arm in his mouth. He didn’t bite down, but he gave me a very quiet warning growl. He will protect that kid even if it’s from me.
“May I have your attention please?”
We all look to the front of the tent where Dave is standing with a wireless microphone in his hand.
“If everyone would like to come to the ballroom we’ll serve the wedding cake and have some dancing.”
Joss, Mike, Walsh, and I look at each other.
“That’s our cue, gentlemen,” Joss says. “I’ll see you in a bit, baby,” he tells Mel.
Her brow furrows as she looks around the table at Tammy, Jenny, and Marsha, but none of them know what’s going on either. We made sure only five people in the world knew about this surprise—the four of us and Dave.
Thirty minutes later I’m standing on a darkened stage in my shirtsleeves, holding my bass. The energy of anticipation is almost stifling. But there’s also something comforting about the whole thing. I’ve been here, done this, so many times that it’s become part of who I am, and nothing makes me happier than to know that I can continue to do it for as long as I’m able.
“You ready, bro?” Mike asks next to me.
“As I’ll ever be,” Walsh answers.
“We going to do this?” Joss asks.
“We’ll do it and then some,” I answer.
The curtains in front of us part, the lights come up, and we face an audience for the first time in two years. There is a split second of silence as every one of those five hundred people processes what they’re seeing, then the whole place goes crazy, whistling, shrieking, cheering.
“Hi there,” Joss says. He clears his throat, but I’m sure it’s for effect, not because he’s nervous. I can feel the energy bouncing off of him. All four of us are about as on as we can get. “We’re Lush,” he continues. “Are you ready to rock?”
The noise that follows h
is question is so intense I’m afraid it might shake down the huge crystal chandeliers hanging overhead. But before I can finish that thought Walsh taps his drumsticks together and we launch into “As Lush As It Gets.” The music pumps through my veins, the rhythm punctuating my heartbeats. The lights are hot, and the room is loud, the acoustics really not set up for a sound as big as ours. But none of that matters, because I’m onstage with my brothers again, and everything is right. Every single thing.
I look behind me at Walsh, and he has his shirt unbuttoned, his arms flying as he beats the skins. He bobs his head, and when he glances up he’s grinning full wattage.
Mike sidles over to Joss for the chorus of the song and leans against him as they sing it. Joss licks the side of Mike’s face, and the women in the crowd go absolutely ballistic. Mike rolls his eyes and steps back in my direction. There’s an interlude in the song, and Joss announces, “Ladies and gentlemen, Mike Owens on the guitar.”
Mike rips out a short solo and everyone cheers themselves hoarse.
“And Colin Douglas on bass guitar,” Joss adds.
I pound out the bass line while Walsh taps the cymbals behind me. Everyone applauds, and I swear I can hear Marsha scream my name. I look up and there she is, her eyes shining, holding Sean on her hip while she sways to the song. She blows me a kiss and my night is complete. My baby’s seen me on stage.
“And may I introduce you to my new brother-in-law, the incomparable Walsh Clark?”
I definitely hear Tammy shriek this time, and I step out of the way so that Walsh is in the center of the stage, a spotlight shining on him as he does one of the most badass drum solos I’ve ever heard. He’s like lightning he’s so fast. When he’s done, he manages to keep the bass beat going with his foot so we can continue the song, but he also peels his shirt off. Joss grabs it before swinging it around his head and tossing it into the audience. I think a couple of women faint dead at that one.
We play through the final verse of the song and whip into the last chorus. “We walk the yellow-brick road, dock in the paradise port, fly the friendliest skies, ’cause we’re as Lush as it gets.”
A Lush Reunion Page 21