Page 61 of A Little More Forgiveness

Finally, they were cleaning me. Two sets of firm hands soaped my tired body. Their fingers danced along my flesh, burning me everywhere they touched, until my skin tingled all over. Only when I shivered with desire did Mitch place his big fingers around my cock, and with growing expertise, rapidly brought me to orgasm with a few skillful twists of his hands while Gabe massaged my prostate the way Mitch had done to him.

Completely sated, we shut off the water, then dragging ourselves out of the shower, roughly dried off before falling into Mitch’s massive bed. We hadn’t talked about the sleeping arrangements for tonight, but as we tumbled exhausted onto the sheets, me on one side, Mitch in the middle and Gabe closest to the bathroom, our positions had never felt more natural. Both Gabe and I snuggled into Mitch, who let out a relaxed and contented sigh as we wrapped around him. I drifted off to sleep almost immediately, more contented than I’d ever been.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Gabe

The cool morning air settled over my exposed skin in the frigid room.

Exposed?

Eyes closed, I took a second or two to work out the reason why. The covers, which the previous night had been tucked around me, were gone. I forced my eyelids open and squinted, disorientated, not quite sure of my surroundings. The familiar living room fireplace I’d woken to the last few mornings was no longer there. Instead, I lay on the edge of a bed, facing an open bathroom door—the one in Mitch’s bedroom.

Lifting my head and peering behind me, I vaguely made out Mitch in the dark shadows of the early morning light. He faced away from me and slept all the way over on the other side of the king-size bed. His big body curled snugly around Leo, and the image they portrayed, of how together they were—the two of them—caused the blood to ice up and my heart to thump heavy behind my ribs.

So peaceful and comfortably entwined around each other, as if they’d been sleeping the same way for years, not just a single night. I felt like an intruder stumbling into their lives, one who had no right to witness their close intimacy.

It shouldn’t have affected me so much. After all, we were only fucking, right? Fine, I’ll admit it was the best fuck I’d ever had, and for how many times I’d been around the block, that said a whole hell of a lot. But as I stared at them, I tried and failed to rid myself of the nagging feeling that what we had went far deeper than a quick coupling, and reducing our intimacy to only sex didn’t do the connection between the three of us any sort of justice.

Flopping my head back onto the pillow, I stared blankly at the ceiling, eventually deciding on the futility of trying to analyze the situation. In the end, connection or not, I wasn’t capable of offering anything more, even if a small part of me yearned to do so.

I gave them another glance, my chest tightening as Mitch shifted closer to Leo, pulling him into the warmth and comfort of his embrace. From the way they were wrapped around each other, they appeared to have everything they needed, so what could I possibly offer that they didn’t already have? If I required any further proof I was out in the cold, I only had to look at the current distance separating us, with the two laying on one side of the bed and me on the other.

After my breakdown last night, I’d naively concluded they’d understood what I’d gone through and how I felt. Clearly, they’d only been mouthing platitudes, and the feelings of empathy I’d detected from them were nothing of the sort. Why keep so far away from me, even unconsciously while asleep, if it wasn’t the case?

Sitting up carefully, to avoid waking them, I slipped off the bed, my bare feet padding silently across the floor as I left the room. Closing the door was akin to shutting out a part of me, and I almost turned back, the need to be near to them so overwhelming, but I fought against the urge, pushing it down, burying it. They’d made their choice, and I’d made mine. For however long I had left here, we’d fuck, because hey, permanently horny, and the sex had been pretty amazing. No matter how close I might think I was getting to them, I needed to put a lid on my emotions, because sooner or later I’d be out of here and back in Manhattan.

I dug my borrowed wardrobe out from the pile of all our clothing and grabbed my phone; then, all muffled up, I clicked my fingers at the dogs, who scrambled from their beds by the fire, and the three of us headed outside. New York got freezing in winter, but the intense cold seeping into my bones here felt ten times worse. Stepping off the porch onto the hardened mud, I made my way over to one of the barns while Chuck and Norris loped off into the trees to check out the forest. I needed a bit of space between us for me to think things through to gain a better perspective on what we’d done. Plus, I should really speak to Mason to let him know I was still alive.

Dark gray clouds hung low and heavy in the sky above me as I crossed the yard, making the normally sparkly snow dull and flat. The promise of more bad weather meant I might be stranded here for even longer. If that were true, I’d have to shore up my defenses, build my walls thick and high as protection against any more delusions of what might occur if the three of us got any closer.

The barn was marginally less cold than the yard, and I sat on one of the bales of hay filling the interior, while leaning against the one behind. Pulling my phone out of my jacket pocket I dialed Mason’s number. It took a while for him to answer and after glancing at the time on my screen I registered the earliness of the hour, barely a minute after six.

“Gabe,” Mason greeted, his voice gravelly and full of sleep.

“Sorry, Mason. I didn’t realize the time.”

A sigh and a yawn sounded. “Give me a sec.”

He shuffled around, and I caught a snatch of muffled conversation. Probably Ash complaining about me calling so early in the morning, which made me smile. The man liked to be up at first light to walk along the beach, but probably not in the middle of winter, when daybreak had barely scraped away the night sky, and he’d prefer to be snuggled up in bed with his fiancé.

Next, I heard footsteps padding down the stairs and along the hallway. “What’s up?” Mason’s immediate concern provided a soothing balm to my bruised soul. No grumpiness or censure in his voice at being woken up at the ass crack of dawn. Mason was my rock, and having him fully in my life again after the horror of his assault and subsequent struggles to fight for his mental health made me extremely happy.

Thank God for Ash, as without him, I didn’t think Mason would have ever found his way back. I’d not played a big role in his recovery, but I like to think if I hadn’t offered my house in Melrose Bay for him to convalesce in, he’d never have met his future husband, who’d inherited the beach house next door, and become the happiest and most contented version of himself I’d ever known.

I wasn’t jealous at all. Well, not much anyway. Okay, a lot. I was jealous a lot.

I hesitated, trying to reassemble my thoughts, unsure where to begin answering his question, as my issues didn’t seem anywhere near as important when thinking about what he’d been through.

“Where are you anyway?” he continued. “And why aren’t you staying at your place next door?”

“I am. I mean, I was supposed to be.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

I explained what had happened, who I was with, and why I was still here.

“Is that why you hauled me out of bed, to tell me you’re stuck somewhere?”

---