Still Waters (Lover's Lake)

“S’up, Raffy? Maverick slapped my back hard enough to knock the wind out of me. “Introduce me to your friend,” he said as he yanked me into a gruff hug.

I was the smallest of the three Connor brothers, as well as the youngest, and neither of them would ever let me forget that fact.

“Gabriel, this is Tatum. Tatum, my oldest brother Gabe.”

“Nice to meet you, Tatum. Welcome to the family,” Mav said as he pulled her in for a quick hug. “This is Sophie, my girlfriend.”

“Nice to meet you both,” Tatum said as she gave them quick hugs. “Are you a white hat too, Maverick? Is that why you have two names?” Tate asked him innocently.

“Mav is Mav in his motorcycle gang. He’s just Gabe, the pain in the ass to us at home,” I told her. Tatum’s domain was hacking and I doubted she knew much about the MC world. Trudy on the other hand, had a ton of experience with Valor.

Sophie and Mav drilled Tatum about her work as Fio. They were both captivated by how such an unassuming looking young girl could have such an impressive bio.

“How’d you learn your way around such complicated machines?” Maverick asked her.

“I’m self-taught. I mean, I followed other hackers and that’s how I learned a lot of code.”

“It’s fucking impressive,” Maverick said as he cut into his steak. When he saw that Sophie’s glass was empty, he quickly ordered another bottle of wine from the waiter.

As I looked around the table, I couldn’t remember the last time we’d all sat down and eaten together as a family. Never, in a million years, would I have expected to see all three of us Connor brothers perfectly matched. My heart swelled in my chest, both with my love for Tatum, but also seeing my two brothers enjoy the kind of love they deserved. We’d lived through hell as kids and if someone would have ever asked, I’d believed back then, that our lives would always be fraught with struggle. But this was as close to perfection as you could get and I knew that we were blessed.

Soft jazz played by a quartet filled the dining room and Malik and Trudy left to dance. Maverick insisted on paying the bill, just like always, he couldn’t shake the familial role as our designated ‘dad.’

Tatum and I found our way to a leather couch by the roaring fire. We sipped our wine and basked in one another’s after-glow which was as brilliant as the fire. At one point, I couldn’t help myself and pulled her into my lap.

“Was that too much, upstairs? Too rough or not like how you’d imagined your first time?”

Tatum turned her head and looked me directly in the eyes.

“That was perfect. It was—” she shook her head as if in disbelief. “I didn’t know I could come that hard,” she said, cupping her hand to my ear and whispering the words.

“I want to make you come even harder. Tonight and tomorrow morning when you wake up. I want to fuck you on that deck and in the tub,” I told her. I could feel my cock growing hard again as I said the words. I’m sure she noticed it too as it was pressing into her ass.

She turned my chin to her and kissed me full on the lips in plain sight of the other diners and anyone else who might have cared.

“I want you to come in my mouth and I want to come on your beautiful tits and your ass. And Tatum, when you’re ready, I want to take your ass too.”

She slid her hand across my mouth and silenced my rant, I was probably talking too loud. Telling her all the ways I wanted to possess her when she’d only just lost her virginity to me half an hour ago.

“I’m sorry,” I said. I captured her mouth in a kiss.

“You’re so fucking intense, Rafa. Holy shit!”

“I’ll slow down, I’ll back off. Fuck, I’m moving too fast.” My posture changed, I recoiled like Tatum was confirming all of the horrible things I already thought about myself.

“No, Rafa, it’s not that. I love you as you are. I want you to be yourself. It’s just that I have that nagging voice in the back of my head—the one my mother implanted my whole life growing up. Things that start fast don’t end well. Don’t give up your body because he’ll take it and then leave. Don’t trust too soon. Don’t expect too much. And the list goes on and on. I guess she drilled it into my head to protect me, but it’s hard to make those voices stop.”

I wished I’d had a smart mother in my life who’d wanted to protect me as much as Tatum’s mother had. Her mother was right, but I still couldn’t fucking stop.