A Crafty Ever After [Suncoast Society] Read online

  Making sure Cali had health insurance hadn’t been at the top of his mental list.

  But it damn sure was now.

  Baxter finished peeing and turned to bury the clump.

  “Dude, really? I’m just going to scoop it out.”

  Baxter paused, looked up at him, and then continued to try to bury it.

  “Okay, quit digging to China. It’s buried.”

  Baxter paused, gave him a slow blink, and resumed burying it.

  “Now you’re just fucking with me. Move.”

  Baxter finally got out of the way and Sean scooped it. He was tying the bag closed as Baxter climbed back into the litter pan—

  —and proceeded to take a ginormous, stinky shit.

  “Oh, come on!”

  Baxter looked up at him from where he squatted. “Maow.”

  “Goddammit. Dude, light a fricking candle.” He untied the bag and waited, flipping the fart fan on to suck the smell out. “We only feed you kibble. How can your shit smell so foul?”

  “Maow.”

  Finally, Baxter finished doing that and Sean scooped it.

  Again.

  After carrying it out to the garbage bin in the garage, he washed his hands in the utility room sink and returned to the kitchen. “I swear, sometimes I think he fucks with me on purpose.”

  “What’d he do?” Max asked.

  “He waited until I was done scooping the pan to take a leak. I get that, but then while I’m tying the bag closed, he climbs back in to poop. Nearly ran me out of the bathroom, it smelled so foul.”

  Cali laughed. “Welcome to my world. He does that to me all the time.”

  “Sonofabitch.”

  The little sonofabitch in question strolled into the kitchen and started twining himself around Sean’s legs.

  “Maow.”

  Cali giggled. “I personally think he’s paying you back for startling him, which ultimately led to Mommy spending several days away from home. Meaning an interruption to his daily schedule.”

  Baxter primly sat, coiled his tail around him, and slow-blinked at Sean.

  S’up.

  “It wasn’t on purpose,” Sean muttered.

  Yeah, he felt guilty about that, all right, although he knew Cali wasn’t trying to lay a guilt-trip on him.

  He didn’t need her help doing it to himself.

  She set her coffee down and walked over to Sean, snuggling against him. “Love you, doofus.”

  He kissed the top of her head. “Love you, too, sweetheart. That mean you’re going to quit fighting us about taking it easy so your hand can heal?”

  “You were busy scooping cat crap and missed out on the part where Max already ultimatum-ed me again for the day.”

  He glanced over at Max. “Good. Because if he didn’t, I totally would.”

  “Meanies.”

  “How are you supposed to jerk us both off at the same time if you’re one-handed, huh? Think about us for a change, why don’t you?”

  The only thing better about her reaction would have been if he’d waited until she took a drink of coffee to say that and got a spit-take out of her. She leaned against him as she laughed.

  Laughter was a great sound to hear, something that had been missing from their house for too many damn days.

  Especially with them as worried as they’d been about her.

  He glanced over at Max, who dropped him a playful wink.

  Now if he could just get himself laid today before he was too exhausted to so much as think about sex, that’d be even better.

  Cali finally recovered and picked up her coffee. “I’m going to grab my tablet and read e-mail in bed.” She headed for the kitchen doorway and paused, looking back with a playful smile. “I’m not feeling in the mood, but if you two would like to have sexytime next to me, watching you wouldn’t bother me at all.”

  “Pitcher,” Max called out. “I’ll be along as soon as I refill my coffee.”

  “Maybe I wanted to pitch,” Sean said, planting his hands on his hips.

  Max arched an eyebrow at him and stared him down, Sean’s cock hardening and giving him away.

  “All right, fine, I’ll catch. Not fair using the eyebrow on me.”

  “At least I have two full ones.”

  “Fucker,” Sean muttered, flipping him off as Max grinned.

  She nodded toward Sean’s stiff cock. “It’s like you have a built-in lie detector for sex,” Cali teased before she headed down the hall.

  Max shrugged, wearing that sexy smile of his. “She’s right. You do.”

  Sean rolled his eyes and followed Cali.

  Chapter Two

  One of the worst things about being stuck in the hospital—besides almost dying and it costing her a metric crap-ton of money—had been the nights spent away from her men.

  Sleeping alone.

  There were few nights all three of them weren’t tangled together in their bed. Like when she recently attended a whip-making workshop in Arizona and the men had stayed behind because of work. At least that had been a willing choice and for business purposes.

  Even if she wasn’t in the mood to get frisky with her two men, she loved watching Sean and Max together. They were two sexy guys, and what made them sexy wasn’t their bodies, but how honest and raw they were with each other.

  How unapologetically in love with each other they were.

  No fake macho bullshit with them.

  Sometimes they acted like clueless, stupid guys, but they were never fake.

  Not with her, and not with each other.

  That’s what made them so goddamned hot and sexy to her.

  Sean wasn’t far behind her when she settled into bed on the far left side. Logistically, she might be better off on the right side, which would help prevent her arm from being accidentally bumped, but knowing her luck she’d take a header off the edge of the bed while trying to reach her coffee with her left.

  Coffee first. That meant left side of the bed, where she could set the mug on the nightstand next to her.

  Sean snuggled close and batted his crisp blue eyes at her. “Did you take your morning meds yet, babe?”

  “Aw, crap. No.” She started to get out of bed again, but he stopped her.

  “I’ll go get them for you.”

  “Thank you, sweetie.” She leaned in for a kiss from him, then he bounced out of bed, passing Max in the bedroom doorway.

  “Where are you going?” Max asked, pressing Sean back against the door frame with his body.

  “She forgot to take her morning meds. I’m fetching them for her.”

  “Ah.” Max stepped back, allowing him to continue. “Carry on, then.” He slipped off the boxers he’d been wearing and climbed into bed with her. “Hey, sweetheart.” Another kiss.

  “Hey, yourself.” Even if she had been in the mood, the fear of her hand getting bumped would prevent her from relaxing and fully enjoying it. Because she’d painfully learned it hurt like a motherfucker when she bumped it.

  Which was the main reason she wasn’t arguing too much with Max and Sean about not doing anything around the house. This was the bad kind of pain. Nonconsensual pain.

  Owie-that-really-fucking-hurts kind of pain.

  Not the kind of happy-funtime pain they usually dealt each other in their house.

  Max could almost spookily read her mind sometimes, it felt like. “How’s your pain levels this morning?”

  “Somewhere between yellow, and ow, you motherfucker.”

  “Ow, you motherfucker is not a safeword,” Sean called from the kitchen.

  Max smiled. “Lucky for me, or I wouldn’t have been able to do a fraction of the stuff I’ve done to him over the years.”

  She laughed. “True story.”

  Sean returned with her meds and a glass of water for her, walking around to her side of the bed to hand them to her and wait while she finished so he could take the glass from her and set it on the nightstand.

  At least his eyebrow was gro
wing back, bless his heart.

  Then Sean rounded the bed once more, ducked into the master bath for a brief moment, returned with a towel, lube, and condom, and climbed into bed next to Max.

  Oh, who the hell was she kidding? She’d be watching them and not reading her e-mail, because watching them was infinitely more fascinating than responding to yet another e-mail from someone who obviously didn’t bother to read their website, where their shipping charges and other commonly asked questions were already answered.

  At six-two, Max was only an inch taller than Sean, but he was built lean and lanky, her more quiet, broody man, with dark blond hair and expressive brown eyes she’d seen run the gamut from soft and needy while in the depths of his submission, to hard and angry when he talked about the hell their ex, Lydia, had put him and especially Sean through, and everything in between.

  Sean was naturally built a little stockier, not a gym rat, either one of them, and Sean’s dark brown hair showed a little grey around the temples. Combined with his blue eyes, Cali had seen many women—and more than a few men—look green with envy when they realized she and Max firmly held Sean’s heart and full attention. He was their talker, their sweet, lovable goofball, but she knew that was just a small fraction of who he really was. At the office he was all engineer, smart and sharp and good at what he did, a man who could unplug and play nearly as hard as he worked.

  Max stretched out on top of Sean, Sean’s legs hooking around the backs of Max’s knees. They kissed, a sweet, slow, teasing burn she knew was Max gently dropping Sean into a bottom headspace.

  She knew it because countless times she’d been on the receiving end of kisses just like that, and that was exactly the effect Max was going for.

  Sean’s hands came to rest on Max’s ass, kneading his pale flesh, using the hold to rock his hips against Max. Max deepened their kiss, slanting his mouth over Sean’s, slowly devouring him a breath at a time.

  Max paused their kiss. “Hands over your head.” His voice sounded deep and throaty and she knew if she could see a bit of space between them, she’d find his cock as hard as Sean’s and both of them leaking pre-cum all over each other.

  Sean softly moaned, but he released Max’s ass and complied. Max resumed kissing him and reached under Sean’s shoulders to grip and hold the other man by the wrists.

  A sensuous ripple washed through her, raising gooseflesh along her skin as Sean moaned again. Need filled Sean’s expression, pure and raw and building like a tropical system in the Gulf.

  Gone, man. Those blue eyes were lost to Max’s hunger and Top energy right now. She knew Max could ask anything of Sean at that moment, and he’d do it without question.

  She eased her right foot over to them and used her toes to caress the back of Max’s calf, where Sean’s foot pressed.

  Max cast a sultry wink her way before refocusing on Sean. He rose up a little without releasing Sean’s wrists and nipped his way down the man’s throat, to his left nipple. Sean’s back arched when Max took the sensitive pink nub of flesh between his teeth and lightly tugged before wrapping his lips around it and sucking hard. Now Sean was actively trying to hump his hips against Max.

  Every whimper and moan escaping Sean’s lips seemed to run straight to her clit, which was throbbing. Yeah, her hand still hurt, but dammit, she was missing sexytime with her men. When Max switched to Sean’s right nipple, Sean turned his head to look at her but she wasn’t even sure if he was really seeing her right then.

  She couldn’t help it. She carefully leaned in for a kiss from him, loving how he desperately sucked on her tongue, her lips, looking for an outlet and temporarily helpless to Max’s control.

  But she didn’t want to stifle them, either, knowing Max would hold back if he thought they were at risk of bumping her hand, so she ended their kiss and leaned against the headboard again, smiling as Sean made playfully pitiful fish lips at her.

  Max lifted his head, saw it, and then smiled at her. “I think our boy has achieved subspace.”

  “I think you’re right,” she said. “You’re not going to torture him this morning, are you? He worked his ass off yesterday. And he did clean the cat pan.”

  “No, I’m not going to torture him. I’m too fucking horny.”

  Max released Sean’s hands and sat up. “Hands stay there.”

  Sean obeyed.

  Max made quick work of lubing Sean’s ass and rolling the condom down his own cock. He wiped his hands on the towel and then grabbed the tops of Sean’s thighs and hauled him a little farther down the bed.

  Both men let out a sexy, needy groan as Max easily buried his cock inside Sean’s ass.

  Reaching under Sean’s knees, Max hiked his legs up to his chest and then slid his hands under Sean’s shoulders again so he could grab his wrists once more.

  With Sean now immobilized like a sexy pretzel, Max sucked on Sean’s bottom lip. “Come if you can. If you can’t, I’ll jerk you off after I come.” He slanted his lips over Sean’s again, swallowing the other man’s moans.

  She watched the way the muscles in Max’s ass and thighs bunched and flexed as he fucked Sean, mesmerized and now feeling really fucking horny.

  Maybe I can ask them to get me off when they’re done.

  She wouldn’t interrupt them, though. Not now. They were too fucking sexy to watch to derail their fun.

  Max knew his guy’s body almost as well as he knew his own. He alternated slow, deep strokes with short, jabby ones, fast, pounding thrusts and lazy long-stroking, all designed to prolong his own pleasure and make Sean work even harder for his own. The only sound filling the room was flesh slapping, their heavy, ragged breaths, and sexy, low moans.

  Now she wished she had chosen the other side of the bed, because at least then it would have been easy for her to sneak a hand between them and give Sean some relief.

  Before life with these two men, she hadn’t realized sex could be so much damn fun or feel so mind-blowingly good.

  Life without them wasn’t something she even wanted to contemplate. Not when they were still relatively young and had a lot of great years ahead of them.

  Max lifted his mouth from Sean’s. “I’m getting close, buddy. You gonna give it to me like this?”

  “Please fuck me harder and bite me. I’m so goddamned close.”

  “You got it.” Max plowed him, cocking his head so he could bite the top of Sean’s right shoulder, below where his work shirts would cover it.

  Sean’s eyes squeezed closed, his head tipping back and body tensing, back arching. He cried out, which only made her clit throb harder.

  A deep, throbbing growl rumbled from Max as he finished off with several hard, pounding strokes before falling still. Max released his bite and kissed Sean again, this time tenderly, slow and sweet, before his eyes fell closed and he pressed his forehead against Sean’s.

  She didn’t break the silence.

  She didn’t want to.

  She hung on their every breath, every rise and fall of their bodies as their breathing slowed and deepened.

  “Love you, you bitey bastard,” Sean whispered.

  A smile curved Max’s lips, but he didn’t open his eyes. “Love you, too, buddy.”

  They finally untangled and headed to the bathroom and Cali realized she’d been holding her breath. Too late she wished she’d thought to film them like that with her tablet, or at least take a picture of them in post-coital bliss, the gentle calm that always fell over them like that.

  She listened to them in the bathroom, Max chuckling over something Sean said that she couldn’t hear over the water running in the sink. She could imagine Sean had looked at the mark on his shoulder now, just one of countless ones he’d worn over the years, and he probably made a comment to Max about it, which would have prompted Max’s proud, amused laughter.

  Just like she loved to look first thing to see what marks she had after undergoing a round with them.

  When they emerged from the bathroom a few minutes lat
er, Max had bent to retrieve his boxers from the floor, but then froze as he met her gaze.

  “You all right, sweetie?”

  She nodded.

  Sean stood there, still naked, but his hands on his hips. “Why the pouty lip?”

  Had it been pouty? She sucked it in and shook her head. “Not pouty.”

  “That was a pouty look.” Sean exchanged a knowing glance with Max and walked around the bed to sit on the edge next to her while Max climbed in on the right side.

  “What’s wrong?” Max asked.

  She wasn’t expecting to burst into tears and felt utterly stupid for doing so. “My stupid fucking hand. That was hotter than hell, and now I’m horny as hell, and my hand fucking hurts like hell.”

  Max glanced at Sean. “Well, sweetheart, we can take care of the horny part for you, if you want. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to leave you out. I thought you weren’t in the mood.”

  “I wasn’t in the mood, until I watched you two being delicious together.”

  Sean grinned. “We’re delicious, huh?”

  She reached up to touch the new mark on his shoulder. “Yeah. Totally yum.”

  Max nuzzled noses with her. “Then you tell us what you want, baby, and we’ll take care of you. I don’t want to hurt you in the bad way. You want us to go down on you—”

  “Dibs!” Sean called out with a smile.

  Max playfully rolled his eyes, but he wasn’t fooling her. “Or do you want us to get the Hitachi or nail driver out and use one of them?”

  She wasn’t sure she was up for the nail driver today. The older model vibrator, which was actually designed for someone to use on their own back and shoulders, sounded like a piece of industrial equipment, hence its nickname.

  And it damn sure could drive her over the edge.

  “Sean,” she said.

  Max sat against the headboard and cradled her against his body while Sean lifted the T-shirt’s hem and buried his face between her legs. Both of them sported morning stubble, Sean a little more so because he hadn’t shaved yesterday, and it felt deliciously scratchy against her thighs.

  Max’s warm breath washed over her ear. “Bet he’s burying that sweet tongue of his inside you, isn’t he?”