The Long and Winding Road (The Seafare Chronicles 4)

“How the hell did we not know that was a thing?” he demands, carrying me toward the bed. He’s down the stairs quickly, and I am trying to unbuckle his belt so I can get my hands inside—

He drops me on the bed.

I glare up at him as I bounce.

He’s panting a little.

“Take off your clothes,” I snap up at him.

“You take off your clothes,” he retorts, but he’s unbuttoning his dress shirt frantically, practically choking himself on his tie.

But that’s okay, because I’m pretty much doing the same. I’m trying to get my own shirt unbuttoned, and I’m fumbling with it, and Otter groans above me before he leans down and just jerks it open, buttons flying, hitting the wall before they clack on the floor.

I gape up at him.

He looks just as shocked.

“That was so fucking hot,” I breathe. “I don’t even care that this was my favorite shirt. Get down here and sex me up, Otter Thompson. I swear to god.”

His shirt goes one way, his undershirt goes another. His pants are down around his ankles, and he’s kicking them off. A shoe flies against the window, bounces off, and lands on the floor. He’s wearing these ridiculously tight black briefs underneath, cut high up on the thigh, and I just stare.

He’s always been proud of his body, even if he tries to deny it. He’s always been big and strong, muscles cut in his chest and stomach, biceps large, legs thick. And he’s still that way, mostly. But now, for some reason I can’t quite explain, he’s better. Yes, his arms are still big and his thighs still chunky, but he’s gotten softer in his stomach, and maybe he’s got a little spare tire going on. And fuck me, it’s hot. His chest is hairy, and there are some grays mixed in, and maybe the hair on his head isn’t as thick as it used to be, but he’s gorgeous to me, better than he’s ever looked. I know he’s struggled with it a little, the whole idea of aging, but seeing him as he is now, tall and strong and real, his dick hard in his ridiculous underwear, I can’t help but think that this Otter is the best Otter there has ever been.

“Okay?” he asks, arching an eyebrow at me, but I can see he’s a little nervous, and it has been a long time since we’ve been like this, just the two of us, not worrying about what’s going on in the Green Monstrosity or what’s coming just a couple of months from now. We’re not building another set of drawers or buying another mobile. We’re not putting more decals on the wall of clouds. We’re just him and me. Bear and Otter.

“Better than okay,” I tell him. “I just—I’m pretty sure I could blow right now just watching you.”

He rolls his eyes, but I can tell he’s pleased by that. “Yeah?”

“Yeah. You look so good.”

“You’re just saying that.”

“Yeah, because that sounds like me.”

“A little.”

“Well. Not now. Can you sex me now? Please?”

And he grins at me, that crooked smile I know better than almost anything else. He reaches down and slides off my dress shoes one by one, dropping them to the floor. He pulls off my socks, tossing them over his shoulder as I laugh. My feet are ticklish, and he always tries to fuck with me about it. He lifts both my legs up and tugs on the bottom of my dress pants. I raise my hips and let him pull them off. I take off my shirt and toss it over the side of the bed.

And then he’s crawling on the bed, arms on either side of me, and he kisses my stomach, my hip, before he leans up and bites my nipples, first the right and then the left, the barest scrapes of his teeth that causes goose bumps to crawl along my chest and arms.

He’s above me now, and he’s looking down at me, like he’s studying my face. I wonder, sometimes, what he thinks about when he sees me, if I make his heart stutter or his breath catch in his chest like he does for me. I think I do.

“Such a good boy,” he says quietly, and fuck, I hate how that’s an apparent weakness of mine, and the sound that comes out of my mouth then is low and painful.

“You can’t keep doing that,” I growl at him.

“Oh? I think I can.”

“Okay, Daddy.”

He grimaces. “That’s… wow. That’s not good.”

And then he’s laughing, and I’m laughing, and it’s such a grand thing, being almost naked with my best friend who I also happen to be married to. It’s so good that we’ve gotten this far, that after everything, we’re here, we’re together, and we’re living. And it’s when his mouth is on me, cheeks hollowing, my eyes rolling back in my head that I send up a little quiet thank you to whoever or whatever might be listening that this is mine, that I get to have this. Because there was a time when that wasn’t a sure thing.

It’s when he’s hiking my legs up around his shoulders after having dug the lube out of his pocket, when he’s grunting as he fucks into me, his forehead sweating, whispering my name against my neck, almost bending me in half, that I know how close it could have been. My hands are running down his broad back as I call out his name, and they’re on his hips, and then his legs that are curled underneath him, and I trace along the jagged scar there, knowing there’s metal underneath. It was close. It was so close.