Page 19 of Their Little House Tristan
But now that I had Bell in my life and a daddy who wanted us both, that dream had changed. I waited for jealousy to rear its ugly head when it came to the two men who were worming their way into my heart. It hadn’t and I suspected it never would. If anything, I liked the idea of them being together a bit too much and woke up hard after dreams of the two of them having naked fun. I wasn’t sure I would call myself poly because I suspected my desire for them both had more to do with the two of them than my actual longings in general, but I’d never been huge into labels, anyway.
“What do you think?” I stood in Bellamy’s doorway wearing what Bell called my “good-ass jeans” and a button-down shirt. It wasn’t fancy, but it didn’t look like I was dashing out on a dump run or heading to the hardware store.
“I…I don’t know.” He tilted his head. “I think you need to turn around slowly. I need all of the information before I decide.”
He looked at me like he already had his answer and it was a positive one. Still, I stepped inside and did as he asked, making sure to add an extra little wiggle when my ass was in his direction.
“Yeah, I think that’ll do.” He crossed over to me, grabbed me by my belt loops, and pulled me close. “Are you gonna think of me when you’re out?” He nipped my bottom lip.
“How could I not?” I kissed him back, the kiss getting pretty intense pretty fast, only breaking apart when we were both out of breath.
He brought his lips to my ear. “Be sure to tell Daddy all about this kiss during your date and how hard you made me.”
“You’re killing me, Bell.”
“But what a way to go.” He rubbed his cheek against mine then stepped back enough to turn me around and smack my ass. “Now go. Go have fun with Daddy. And if there’s any good stuff, maybe you could tell me about it when you get home.”
“Ugh. You’re a menace.”
“Live with it. Now go be a good boy for Daddy.”
After adjusting myself, I headed downstairs to wait for James. My timing was pretty good. He showed up a few minutes later, and we were off on our first official solo date.
I wasn’t sure where we were going, and honestly, I didn’t care. If he’d said he wanted to walk around a big-box store and look for clearance socks, I would’ve been excited about it—because it was with him. But of course, he had a better idea.
He took me to an old drive-in-theater-themed restaurant I’d never been to before. It was adorable. All the chairs were made from old car seats, each table complete with its own little TV where you could pick what old movie you wanted to watch. And by old, I didn’t mean from the early 2000s—these were oldie oldies. Only one of the movie choices was even in color.
“What do you think?” He set his menu down. “Do you know what you’re having?”
I looked at the menu again, the one I’d been holding for ten minutes, and realized not a single item had stuck in my brain. I was just too excited—about where we were, about who I was with—to focus.
“Maybe I’ll just ask the server to pick.”
He reached across the table and placed his hand over mine. “How about I pick for you?”
I like the sound of that. A lot. “Please.”
He rewarded me with a huge smile. If that was what I got for being good, he was never going to see brat behavior from me…ever.
When the server came, James ordered for both of us. I wasn’t even sure what I was getting—each menu item had the same name as one of the old movies playing. But it didn’t matter. He knew me well enough by now to avoid my major dislikes, and that was good enough for me.
We were starting to talk about which movie to watch when someone stopped by the table. I turned and was shocked to see one of my dad’s friends from church.
“Mr. Riley.” I’d always called him that. I was sure he had a real name, but that wasn’t how things worked in my family. “Nice to see you.”
It was the opposite of nice, but pleasantries it was.
“Nice to see you. Are your dates coming soon?”
Of course, he assumed we were on a double date. It was outside his grasp of reality that two men could be out for any other reason. At least not in a place like this.
“No, Mr. Riley. It’s just us.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. This was not a conversation I wanted to be having. Not because I was embarrassed by James—I wasn’t. Or that I was embarrassed by who I was—I definitely wasn’t. But because this would inevitably lead to judginess and mentions of the interaction to my father.
James didn’t need to deal with any of that.
“This is my first time here,” James said, sounding far more chipper than I was at the moment. “I heard the food is delicious. Did you want to join the two of us?”
Mr. Riley looked like he’d been drop-kicked. “Oh, no, no. I was just leaving. It was nice to see you both. I’ll be sure to tell your father I saw you.”
