Page 96 of Levee

Because of all the improvement, she’d been dropping hints at the idea of having Uncle Will closer, so we could keep a closer eye on him.

While I would never want Uncle Will in my actual house, I was alright with the idea of him staying in the guest house. It would certainly make it easier to take care of him.

It wasn’t a big guest house. The real estate agent had referred to it as a “granny pod,” and said the previous owners had installed it for the same reason I would need it for. Taking care of an aging relative. It was basically one big room—living, kitchen, and bed all in one—with an oversized bathroom that was handicap equipped. It even had one of those no lip bathtubs, so you could roll a manual wheelchair right into, if necessary.

I was really fucking lucky to find this property. And then to win the nail-biting bidding war.

In the end, money talks, though. And I had more than enough of it, thanks to years of making a nice salary while having almost no living expenses.

“So, when are you going to tell her?” Seeley, at my other side, asked.

“Once we get it cleaned up,” I told them.

It was perfectly livable.

But Jade had been dreaming of this place for a long time. I wanted to get some of the overgrown weeds and shrubs cleaned up. Maybe fill the garden beds with some gorgeous, colorful flowers. Get the floors inside refinished because the tile was chipped enough in places that I was worried one of us might cut our feet if we went barefoot. Everything inside needed a freshcoat of primer. Then it would be ready for Jade to pick out paint colors.

Objectively, yeah, we were still kind of new, in the grand scheme of things. But we hadn’t spent a full twenty-four hours apart since that night I picked her up from Teddy’s place. And, frankly, I never wanted to. Having a home we could both move into that was close to the clubhouse was the easiest solution.

And the first step toward forever.

Jade - 5 months

“Where are you, doll?” Levee called, the screen door cracking against the frame as he spoke. “Gotta get that fixed,” he grumbled.

“Don’t you dare,” I called, looking over my shoulder as he walked into the dining room where I was painting a mural on the wall.

It was a big endeavor that stretched the whole room from just above the board and batten and to the ceiling. But it was a true labor of love. And it featured a bunch of little nods to our relationships, to the found family we both loved so much, to the hopes for our future.

“Don’t I dare what?” Levee asked, stepping into the rounded doorway looking as sexy as ever in a white t-shirt that was sticking to his skin underneath, thanks to the unexpected rainshower that had started to pelt at the windows a couple minutes before.

“Fix that door. I love that noise,” I told him, angling my head up for a kiss.

“You love all the broken things around here,” he said, reaching out to frame my face with both his hands, then kissing me long and sweet. Until I felt it in my toes.

“It’s what gives a home character. I knew exactly what steps in my childhood home creaked. Which came in handy when I was sneaking in after staying out too late. Or how to fiddle with that one tap that didn’t ever want to work right, but we never fixed. Or the chew marks in the molding from our childhood dog. It’s those things that make a house a home.”

“I’d like to come to think about it like that,” Levee said. “The ‘quirks’ my apartment had growing up weren’t the kind of things that would make me nostalgic.”

And I really wanted to be able to help him feel that way about our new home and all of its sweet imperfections.

After all he’d been through, and all he’d done for others without expecting anything in return, he deserved some magic, some joy, someone to try to take care of him for a change.

Which was why there was a hearty stew in the crockpot, even if the air conditioning was running at full-blast, and a surprise waiting for him in the bedroom.

“We have about two hours until dinner is done,” I told him, sticking my paintbrush into the water, deciding the mural was just going to have to wait. “And I have something fun in the bedroom.”

“Does this something fun vibrate?” he asked, smirking.

“After what you did to me with the remote control vibe panties? I think not,” I said, slapping him across the chest.

But we both knew that, as torturous as it had been to wear those vibrator panties to the clubhouse during a big, loud partywith the remote in his hand, I wouldn’t change the memory of him watching me hiding behind a tree, legs shaking as the orgasm ripped through my system, for anything.

“But your clothes do have to be off for this,” I told him, looking to the back of the house to make sure the curtains were drawn before I whipped off my shirt, leaving me bare from the waist up.

“I have no objections to that,” he said, peeling off his own drenched shirt as I moved past him, kicking out of my slides, then hooking my fingers into the waistband of my skirt.

I waited until I was in the doorway of the bedroom to push the skirt off, leaving me in nothing but a bright yellow thong that I knew his gaze was taking in greedily.

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