"Chris?"
Chris looked up from the paperwork, noticed absently that he'd scattered it halfway around the room, and stretched. He couldn't wait until it was Buck's turn to tackle it, and wondered not for the first time why they'd started dragging all their month-end stuff back out to the house. "Yeah, Vin?"
"You mind if I ask you somethin'?"
He pushed his chair back, and swiveled it Vin's way.
"What's with the beard?"
He reached to rub at his chin--it had been a couple of lazy days--before he realized what Vin meant, and smiled. "Oh. Cops can't wear beards. Specially not rough ones, so Buck gets it in his head now and again to rebel even though he isn't a cop anymore." He watched Vin's absent frown. "You don't like it?" For himself, it depended on his mood, and the time of day, the softness or bristle of Buck's beard and how much sex they were having at the time. This new one of Buck's, with clean cheeks and stupid sideburns, he was kind of liking. Made Buck look dangerous, and sexy in a motorcycle-driving sort of way--and they were having a lot of sex lately, he realized.
"Don't know."
Damn. Chris tracked back to remember what he'd asked, a little embarrassed; they were having a lot of sex lately. He reached out and squeezed Vin's thigh, grinning. "Don't sweat it. He gets tired of em. And whenever he gets sick of the beard, he shaves clean. Totally clean. No beard, no mustache, no nothing. Keeps his face that way for a week or two before he feels naked and lets the mustache grow back in."
Vin looked poleaxed, blinking blankly, and Chris frowned. "Vin?"
"I just... I can't even picture him without that mustache. Sure as hell can't think how his mouth is gonna feel without it."
Chris thought back on photographs, trying to remember if he had one of Buck clean-shaven, but none came to mind. "Don't say anything," he suggested, "and you'll find out within the next few weeks."
Vin grinned at that. "And if I say something?"
"Then you'll make him think about it, and he'll skip the shave this time around." Chris grinned back, and glanced at his piles of bills again. To hell with it, he'd finish it later. Standing, stretching briefly to work the kink out of his back, he sidled over to his lover and stepped wide, straddling Vin's thighs. "Hey."
Vin smirked a little. "Hey."
Chris leaned in, rubbing his rough beard stubble along Vin's cheek, grinning at the tiny flinch, before he pressed their mouths together. Mostly smooth. Vin had shaved this morning, and the soft shift of textures between lip and face was subtly appealing. He drew back a little, sucked Vin's lower lip into his mouth, then the upper. Sweet. Soft.
"Hey," he said again, and drew back just enough to look into Vin's eyes. "You wanna go find Buck? Or slip across the hall into your room?" It wasn't a leading question--it rarely was. It was just a question, and Chris knew they'd find satisfaction in each other regardless of which Vin chose. Time alone together was rare, really, in part because Vin had some guilt trip about thinking he was cutting one of them out--didn't seem to think that when he and Buck got together, Chris had noticed, but then, both of them were more highly sexed. And Buck--well, Buck seemed able to sniff out foreplay, and often as not found his way to the party even if they didn't specifically invite him...
"I have to leave in the mornin'."
'Yeah." Vin was looking at another couple of days on the road, if he was lucky, and a week if he wasn't. JD was going out with him again, and Chris thanked the gods of internets that they didn't lose the kid's stronger skills set now just because JD liked adventures. But Vin liked the road, liked the travel and the seeing the country, even liked his interaction with people when he was out there. It had taken Chris a long while to realize that, to understand that Vin didn't take off so quickly because he was worried about his place here with Chris and Buck, but because he liked to move, to do, almost as if his work counterbalanced that extraordinary stillness he could embody when he stayed at home for any length of time.
And maybe Vin liked the solitude, too. JD didn't go out with him too often, and Vin was a very private man.
Chris's mouth tightened as he resisted a smile at the tiny frown lines forming between Vin's eyebrows. Man couldn't decide if he wanted a little two on one loving or something simpler. It was his choice, though, one Chris liked to give Vin the power to make. It was easy enough to hand over that power, because Vin was the new addition, and whether he actually was or not, still thought of himself as the outsider.
The frown faded, and the pupils dilated, eating up the paler blue of the irises, and Chris knew the answer before Vin breathed, "Let's go find Buck," and leaned in to kiss him again.
It was easy to get lost in Vin, in the quiet intensity of his body, and Chris felt hands settle low on his flanks, not even holding, as he slid his arms under the tee shirt, up and over the sharp definition of ribs, and around to the smooth skin of his upper back. Open mouths, open minds, tongues dallying and searching and playing a casual duel for dominance that both of them won, eventually led Chris's hands into Vin's hair and he regretted, not for the first time, that Buck never let his hair grow much past his collar.
Vin drew back just far enough that his face came into focus as Chris blinked open his eyes. "Damn, Chris."
Chris grinned. "Better find him fast, if we're gonna."
Buck was in the back yard, cutting the grass in sweeping figure-eights like a teenager might. Chris chuckled as he shared a look with Vin; Buck rode the new 24-HP riding lawnmower like a kid would ride a go-cart, cutting the sharpest turns the thing would allow, gunning its engine and running it as fast as it would go--and having fun doing it, by the look of him. Side by side they leaned on the deck rail and waited for their lover to swing back into a view of the house. There...
Buck waved.
Chris straightened up and pulled his tee shirt over his head.
Vin did the same, and Chris worried for a second that Buck was just going to jump off the damned lawnmower and let it run itself into a fence.
But no. He just broke his pattern, lifted the blades, and rode right up to the edge of the deck before powering it down and pushing in the choke. "I need a shower," he started.
Chris drew in a breath to speak but it was Vin who answered, "No, you don't."
That kind of lovemaking, then--okay, hell, sex, a raunchy festival of sound and smell and sensation, of grunts and grinds.
Chris could live with that.
Buck, both his brain and his dick in complete denial that his fortieth birthday was behind him now, jumped up onto the deck and crowded Vin back against the rail to share sweat and saliva and sex-appeal with him, looking like he could live with it too. Chris grinned.
He'd never expected to have a sex life like this one, or lovers like these, or lovers plural, at all. And they looked so appealing together, the way Vin's muscles bunched as he twisted and pulled at Buck's tee-shirt, the way Buck's hands never slowed down, but never slighted any place they touched. Buck stepped back all of four inches and Vin pulled the tee shirt up and up, and the way he had to stretch up on his toes to fight Buck's lifted arms made the flat belly hollow out and his muscles tighten, and Buck--his skin glistened with heat and damp, and the jeans rode low, so low on slim hips, gaping just slightly in the front.
Chris's slid his fingers into that shadow before he knew what he was doing, and Vin stepped aside a little, letting him in.
"Hey," Buck smiled, then looked confused when both Chris and Vin cracked up.
"We need some new lines," Vin said, trying and failing to sound laconic, and Buck, whether he got the joke or flat-out didn't care, grabbed Chris's wrist and pushed his hand lower, further into the front of the jeans.
"What got you two goin'?" he asked, hunger and love and prurient interest sparkling in the deep blue eyes.
Chris shot a look at Vin and stepped close enough that he didn't feel like he was gonna break his arm, and slid his hand the rest of the way into the jeans. Buck's belly hollowed out, unintentionally offering more room to play; it was hot down there, damp, the rich, raw smell of sweat and man and Buck rising right up from his crotch. "You really want me to stop and answer your questions?"
"Yeah!" Buck shot back, but he was grinning, and when he flinched forward Chris didn't have to look to know that Vin's fingers would be meeting his own between Buck's legs any second now, but outside the denim.
"Yeah, right," Chris huffed out on a laugh. "Come here."
Calloused hands slid across the skin at his waist, and fingers kneaded before tugging him close. "Well," Buck teased, "you two takin' your shirts off like that, now that was about as subtle as shooting off a flare."
"Didn't want you to miss it." Vin's voice was sultry and already preoccupied, and Chris smiled a little as he heard the snuffling sounds from their partner. Vin got off on smell, was worse than a hound dog sometimes, and Buck twitched, ticklish, as Vin's nose ran over his shoulder and down behind his arm. Wasn't like they couldn't all appreciate a good shower, or just-after-shower sex when absolutely anything goes, but times like this were good too, raunchy in their way, waking up some animal part of Chris at least, and he suspected Buck too. Maybe that part was always awake in Vin.
Chris pulled his hand out of Buck's pants and pressed close.
The beard tickled his chin and the edges of his mouth, and Chris pressed harder, grinding their skin together to ease the itch. He knew Buck's body so much better than he knew his own, and ran his thumbs across the smooth cheeks just behind the beard. I love you, he wanted to say, but his mouth was full and he was saying it anyway, saying it as he pressed his pelvis forward to sandwich Buck between two rising cocks, saying it as he sucked and stroked and worried about beard burn showing in the office tomorrow. He was saying it in the way they lingered and clung together even as arousal hit the flash-point ahead of them. I love you.
Buck drew back, mouth damp and red now, eyes positively shining. "Wow."
Chris looked down to where Buck's hands had disappeared behind him, then grinned and glanced over Buck's shoulder to Vin's closed eyes and open mouth. He didn't have to guess what Buck's hands were doing back there.
Love you both, he amended, still inside the privacy of his own head. He waited until Vin's eyes drifted open to ask, "It okay if we get a mattress under us?" You never knew, when Vin got into this kind of a mood, if he wouldn't want to just do it in the grass and scare the horses. Buck always went along, the weirder the better. It was Chris’s self-appointed task to rein them in, not that either of them seemed to appreciate it, or care. Still, mattresses were good. Chris liked mattresses to counter the extra knees and elbows. Let Buck and Vin deal with tree bark and pebbles and God knew what else when they wanted to get wild in the woods without him.
"Sure," Vin said with a smile. "Let's get a move on."
Buck led the way to Vin's bedroom--change of pace, Chris figured--and by the time he nudged the door half-shut with his shoe, Buck and Vin had stripped each other bare. Chris hung back to watch, leaning against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest to resist the temptation to stroke himself. Vin wasn't like Buck, not really, but when those two got together for sex, he was hard-pressed to decide who was hornier, who wanted it more, who was more skilled or determined or artfully desirous. Buck had too much practice and the finesse that went with it, where Vin displayed a kind of a raw need. Both of them loved the act itself, the way it lit them up, and each man got off on turning his partners on.
In that, Chris counted himself lucky; for the most part, none of them was particularly selfish in bed.
Chris could see Buck settling into it, could tell just from these early moves that Buck was gearing up for a long game. Buck liked to draw things out until you almost wanted to go to sleep on him, now and again. Vin's stupid compliments that Buck had likely always needed an extra person to really get off weren't wasted on Chris, and while they weren't true either, it amused him every time, to see Vin be so wily, to watch Buck preen... just like it touched him to see that sweet, fine tension draw itself in such tight lines on Buck's face and body.
The pair of them just stood there kissing, Buck bending his knees out a little, Vin stretching up a touch, rubbing his cheeks back and forth against Buck's beard.
Chris's thighs itched and he knew where he'd end up, at least for a little bit, and that was all right.
He pondered letting the two of them have the first round, then diving in for the second. Hell, two partners probably were better for Buck, in some ways: wore him out more, and exhausted his overactive libido. Vin tended to go off quick and recover like a kid; Chris still wasn't sure if it was youth on his side (he wasn't that many years younger), or if he was just making up for lost time, like Buck said. But he'd rally, given time, while Chris always came somewhere in the middle. Watching the two of them... Buck was taller, Vin more solid and compact, each man smooth and hungry and knowing what he wanted. They were as beautiful to watch as to be a part of.
But Vin was leaving tomorrow, and as lurid as this could get or as sexy, Chris didn't want just to watch it. He stepped forward before either of them missed him--it was a challenge, sometimes, balancing three--until Buck's ripe smell hit him, and ran a hand down the very different curves of two bare asses. Spoiled for choice, he thought, but Vin was leaving so maybe both Chris and Buck would do him the favor of a fuck. His dick twitched in anticipation, and he huffed on a breath of laughter. Favor. Right.
"You see somethin' funny?" Buck mumbled, half-against Vin's wet lips.
"Oh, yeah," he said, shouldering his way in and turning until Buck was behind him, cut out of the action for the space of a second. Wouldn't take Buck long to find a new angle, a new piece of Vin or Chris or himself to play with--Chris flinched even as fingers jerked hard at the buttons of his fly, and felt Vin's breath puff into his open mouth.
"Don't have to punch me," Vin groused, pulling away enough to stare hard over Chris's shoulder.
One or two or all three of them was going to be mad or laughing like a lunatic, of someone didn't take control soon.
"How about we just tie you up, huh? Keep you still and do whatever we want?" Buck asked, all honey-voice rich with suggestion, like reading the phone book would be sexy enough. Chris felt the tickle of beard along the shell of his ear and the huff of breath, and watched the way Vin's glare melted into a half-lidded half-challenge, half-wanton... he was running out of adjectives, and no noun in sight.
"Hey." He cleared his throat. "Uh... get my pants off," he ordered, pushing one of Buck's hands further down his fly. He wanted to make it sound like an order, and was pretty sure he'd succeeded until,
"Get 'em off yourself," Buck said easily, and slid around him again to take over Vin and nudge the two of them over onto the bedcovers.
How the hell did that happen, he wondered, shucking off his jeans alone. Oh, yeah. Riding lawnmowers and the smell of sweat and fresh-mown grass, and him and Vin pulling off their shirts like fashion models in the sun. When he finally put a knee to the mattress, Buck had already hauled Vin up the bed, wrestled the drawer open, found condom and lube and slid home. Vin grunted, going with it, knees parted wide, and Chris was left watching after all. He worried at his lip, breathing slow, as one hand just trailed naturally up the back of Buck's leg and into the sweat-slick crease... he dallied, poking a finger where he wouldn't, most days, sucking in a breath when Buck froze for a long moment and muscle tightened around him.
Vin's eyes popped open and caught his. "You gonna hump him or just distract him?" Vin growled, and Chris laughed a little.
"Thought we might both hump you, loverboy," he said, getting his brains out of his balls. Or trying to. It got difficult, when Vin Tanner got that look on his face.
"Goin' away present," Buck added, reading Chris's mind and straight-arming up off the mattress, and Chris didn't miss the effect that move had on Vin, as Buck sank deep. He eased a few inches closer, to feel them both. Buck still smelled sweaty and ripe from working out in the sun, that smell so familiar and masculine that it could bring Chris's dick to attention all by itself. He himself was squeaky-clean and knew it, and Vin... Chris dipped his head into the satin hollow of his other lover's throat. Vin smelled like musk and tree bark, and Chris took a little tour with his nose, winding up on his belly and mostly, safely out of reach after both of them made plays for his dick. Octopuses, the pair of them.
"Wait for me," Chris breathed against Vin's hair. Vin just grunted, and his chin jerked high.
"Make him-- stop--"
Chris didn't wait for the rest, just reached gently, and pried Buck's hand off Vin's cock. "Share," he said, when Buck frowned at him, and laced their fingers together,
"Cheat," Buck muttered, but dutifully clasped Chris's right hand in his left, before duty gave way to rhythm, and rhythm to sexual tension. Chris edged in, trading apologetic kisses and remembering that tingle on his thighs as Buck's beard tickled his chin. Oh, yeah. "You wait too," he whispered when he drew away.
"Selfish cheat," Buck amended, and he sounded delighted.
Vin just growled in frustration, probably almost there. But when Buck pulled out and eased off to the edge of the bed to get rid of the rubber, Vin rolled, and the two of them tussled together for long enough that Chris almost forgot Buck was there until an extra hand came into the picture, right against his hip. Thank God Buck was better at this threesome stuff than he was.
Buck snickered and handed him a fresh condom, already opened. "Well get goin' if you're gonna, 'fore I get bored and finish all by myself."
Chris turned, to give Vin some breathing room, because Buck Wilmington never liked breathing room really, and because he really, really wanted to feel that beard on his thighs. "Got a little carried away."
"I could see that--shit, yes!" was about all Buck managed as Chris folded neatly over and sucked his lover deep, as deep as he could take him. Hot, manly, clean sweat--better than the left-over taste of latex for damned sure, Chris stayed only long enough to say hello before he leaned back against the headboard, slipped his fingers behind Buck's head and tugged him down, into the vee of his own legs. And Buck, hungry Buck, went happily.
Next thing Chris knew, he'd forgotten about Vin, forgotten about everything except love and Buck and wet and Buck and so deep and Buck, until instants, milliseconds, less-than-measurable moments before orgasm, he registered that the much-wanted suction was gone from his cock, and Buck's beard scratched hard on his thigh as the dark head thrashed. Chris growled deep in his throat, reaching for hair, ears, whatever it'd take to get Buck back to work, when he saw what the problem was: Buck was really, really distracted.
Oh. Damn. It.
Buck, on hands and knees, had presented too much temptation, and Vin had rolled to his back and wormed his way underneath, and started sucking Buck while Buck had toyed with Chris. Chris watched the tremors, like ocean waves, roll down Buck's back, and the way the dense muscles in Buck's ass clenched over and again, and he wanted to kill his lover--either one of 'em--whoever's fault it was that Buck wasn't finishing him off right now.
Even now, while Chris teetered on the edge, abandoned, and watched in numb disbelief, Buck found the presence of mind to look up and say, half-sarcastic, "Wait for him, Chris."
"Oh, you..."
Buck ignored him, rearing back to look down at Vin, big hands carding gently through tangled hair. And Chris couldn't even blame the guy. Later, after they'd had dinner, and sat together on the porch to watch the sun go down, and slept in the same bed--after Vin had tried to slip out in the dark pre-dawn without waking them and hopefully failed and they'd all gotten up to have an early breakfast together, then maybe he'd get Buck back. But for now, he had other things on his mind.
He let Vin wallow in the sucking, let Buck wallow in the attention, while he found the condom in the bedding and rolled it on, then kissed them apart, meeting Buck's eyes just to be sure: all smiles there, and controlled arousal. Yeah, Buck was proud of himself for that trick. Vin looked pretty self-satisfied too, so they eased back onto the bed, and into each other, and Chris made a point this time, of not forgetting, because Vin so rarely did, and Buck almost never did, and even though it was him and Vin fucking, it was all three of them there together.
Somehow.
He still couldn't say how it worked out so well, but he wasn't going to complain. Buck's hand slipped between them and Chris rose up to give him room, corkscrewing his hips and taking a kiss, grunting when Vin's slick ass clenched tight in orgasm. No trick that, no faking the look on Vin's face or the splash of cum between their bellies. He let go himself then, losing the rhythm, eyes shifting from Vin's lost face to Buck's attentive, rapt one, until orgasm caught him up and wrung him out.
A bit later, Chris had to crawl over Vin and Buck to get to the side of the bed with the trash can, and he smiled as he peeled off the rubber. Buck popped up like a jack-in-the-box. "Hey," Buck grinned.
Chris chuckled, low. "Idiot."
"Your idiot," Buck qualified contentedly and with far too much pre-orgasmic energy, dipping his shoulder a little when Chris tried to peer over it at Vin. "He alive back there?"
The quirk of full lips told Chris that Vin was listening in, awake, floating on the aftershocks, and just fine. Vin's fingers twitched, and eased immediately to the base of his cock, squeezing absently. "I reckon," Chris said.
"Then let's find something to entertain ourselves until the boy decides to join back in." The invitation was blatant and Vin wouldn't miss it, wouldn't miss that he'd put Buck into one of those moods either, a feel-it-all, want-it-all, needed the top of his head to come off mood.
Eventually.
Their kisses were slow, and Buck kept tilting Chris's head up so he could rub his beard the length of Chris's neck. The slight abrasion all around that silk tongue and hot breath tickled and thrilled the skin, and Chris sucked in air, slow, to steady himself. They'd been together for years, and sometimes that meant all they wanted of each other was the chance to come. Other times--this time, they'd draw it out, make it last, wait for Vin, and Chris would enjoy his afterglow while Buck just rode the anticipation a little higher.
Chris tucked his chin and found Buck's mouth, opening, sliding his tongue in against familiar taste and teeth, liquid passion in these kisses. He'd miss the feel of the beard when it was gone, but welcome smooth skin and that sweet little cleft above Buck's upper lip that he showed so rarely.
He pressed forward, and a second to sort out arms and legs left them interlocked like puzzle pieces, his soft dick pressed flush against Buck's hipbone, Buck's hard one riding his own thigh like a rocking horse at a playground.
Then Buck grunted, a hard breath of air exploding into Chris's mouth, and Chris drew away to look, to glance past Buck to where Vin had recovered a little.
Or a lot. Vin had scooted down in the bed and had his mouth pressed tight to Buck's ass. Vin's cheeks hollowed out as he sucked and licked a butt dimple, and Chris felt a little thrill run through him even as Buck groaned, "Aww, geez, Vin, that ain't fair. . . "
Chris eased Buck back, then tugged one long leg up to give Vin a little more room, and slid down the bed himself. Fair? This animal tried to talk in terms of fair? At sex? What a joke. What a sensual, decadent joke. He licked with the flat of his tongue over the dark, damp cockhead, loving it when Buck's hips flinched and then surged forward. Fuck fair.
Vin's hand, tanned against one of the few places Buck wasn't, slid along the resting inner thigh and squeezed. As Chris reached to tickle the hair on Buck's balls, Vin's hand turned inward to press at the firm flesh behind them, and Chris soaked it all in. They really were beautiful, both of them, in their wantonness as much as in any other way. They didn't care what they did in bed, nothing too strange if it pleased a partner, nothing too out there. Nothing too embarrassing, and in that way they were very, very different from him. He touched Vin's hand where it stroked Buck's perineum, tracing the knuckles, enjoying the pieces of Vin's body that he could see through the weird frame of Buck's upraised leg. Then he pushed, urging Vin's fingers forward, into his mouth, then back, into Buck's ass.
Buck grunted, but Chris didn't mistake the sound for pain.
Instead he rolled away just long enough, grabbed up the lube off the nightstand and leaned over to share a kiss with Vin. "What're you gonna do to him?" he asked, amused and, perversely, in no hurry now that he and Vin had gotten theirs.
Vin shrugged, and grinned. "Dunno. Some a' this."
Chris dropped his eyes, watching Vin's fingers just barely moving inside Buck, and squeezed a little lube around the seal between Buck and Vin. Vin slid his fingers in further, taking the slick with them, and Chris watched Buck's dense muscles clench and relax.
"That'll work," Chris grinned at Vin, sharing a joke whose punchline he didn't really know. Their partner growled beneath him.
"Don't you two do somethin' you'll regret," Buck muttered.
Chris capped the slick and dropped it behind him, and shared a parting smile with Vin before backing up and dropping, himself, to catch Buck's hard, aggressive, sex-laden glare. "Not a chance," he promised when he was sure he had his partner's attention. Then he slid back down until his face was level with Buck's heavy cock and started sucking. Just the head. Light, crazy-making touches, the kind that, if Buck did it to him, would force him to grab Buck's hair and start thrusting. Buck just groaned and shuddered and held himself still between them, only the careful thrust of Vin's fingers rocking him forward a bit.
Chris settled down to it, blissfully post-orgasmic, in that warm, slow place where lassitude and familiarity and the certain knowledge that he and Vin were gonna have Buck screaming warmed him, deep in his belly.
And the screaming came soon enough, not long before Buck did, sometime after Vin eased back up the bed, still finger-fucking, and started biting Buck's neck and shoulders, after Chris eased up even more on the sucking, and played gently with heavy, tight balls.
There it was, that little "ungh" that somehow amused Chris every time he heard it--it was so tiny and helpless out of such a big and definitely not-helpless man--followed by an "I'm gonna" that made him want to pull back and say, "Oh, really? Never would've guessed."
He widened his jaw and tightened his lips and sank down, and further down, to resist the temptation, filling his mouth and part of his throat, sucking hard then, and he got his screams, all right. And the thick load of cum and still, the leftover taste of latex and the strong, work scent of Buck's crotch. Eventually the long scream slowed, quieted, stopped.
Fingers in his hair eased Chris off Buck's dick and Chris crawled up the bed on command. Buck kissed him, sucking the flavors out of his mouth like meat off a chicken bone, before letting him go, bowling Vin over to thank him too, both of them laughing into that kiss.
"Mmm-mmm!" Buck said appreciatively, then rolled again and sprawled on the empty part of the bed, panting and grinning.
Chris grinned when Vin surreptitiously scratched his own cheek. "Coulda left him outside, Vin," Chris said casually, watching Buck as he eased up next to Vin. "Saved time and got the yard mowing finished too." He peered pointedly around the mussed covers and strewn clothes. "Made less mess as well."
"Nah," Vin said after pretending to think about it. He tucked in close to Chris. "He's a pain in the ass, but he always makes it interesting."
Buck didn't even dignify the teasing with a look, much less a reply. He just lolled there, dick slowly relaxing against the join of hip and thigh, breath evening out into what looked like sleep. Chris wasn't surprised. He pressed a little closer to Vin, sharing a look, and traced patterns over the cleft over Vin's breastbone. "You want to get up?" he whispered.
"Looks like Buck's got a good idea," Vin admitted, reaching to lace their fingers together.
Chris leaned down. Vin tilted his chin up. They shared lazy kisses, soft looks, occasional glances Buck's way, waiting for him to wake up, but first Vin dozed off, then Chris, before Buck came back to the world.
* * *
When Vin woke up the sun was still high but the bedcovers were cool on both sides of him. Damn, the room smelled rank.
He smiled and leapt out of bed, ass pleasantly sore and body thrumming as he headed for a shower before he found himself a way to pitch in. He didn't do too much around here, not near as much as Chris or Buck, simply because he was on the road so much and they weren't, but he liked to.
First things first. Get the mess off him, drag his jeans back on, see where they were and if either of them needed any help.
The house was empty, so he pushed open the screen door in back, following the sound of the lawn mower, and stopped.
Vin watched them from the door way, amused as hell that Buck seemed able to talk Chris into just about anything; Chris, stubborn, intractable, serious Chris, was riding double on the lawn mower, hands around Buck's waist, cheek pressed against Buck's shoulder as Buck tightened his figure-eight pattern and laughed at something, Vin couldn't tell what. Chris's baseball cap was twisted to one side to protect his face from the sun, but Buck was exposed, more now than before since he'd never put his tee shirt back on and had, against Chris's mild admonition Vin would bet, traded his work jeans and tennis shoes for flip-flops and Jammers before powering the lawnmower back up. He looked good that way, though, all skimpy and soaking up rays. Chris looked good, holding him.
They looked good together.
They were right for each other, and he felt it again, that warmth in his belly that could still scare him. He'd once thought that he might be a one-off for them, some kind of kinky thrill to spice up what was so obviously a long-term relationship. But he'd gotten past that, moved on to a point where he could admit to himself that he loved them, loved them both if in slightly different ways, and loved them both a lot. Then he'd moved past that to the place where he knew that they loved him too--and love, for people like Chris and Buck, meant commitments. The long haul. It meant arguing over who'd pay the electric bill, and blankets on the ground beside the hammock, so that whoever didn't get there first could still hang close by if he wanted. It meant fighting and yelling and trusting each other to be there afterwards, after stupid words or false accusations, and it meant making up.
The warmth in his belly spread a little, pooling down lower in his pelvis, a pelvis still sore and warm and tired from all the loving.
He'd had lovers like Chris before, quiet and intense, so connected to you and the moment that it was like they were crawling inside your head even as they pushed into your ass. But he'd never had a lover like Buck, a man so rowdy and playful but who somehow never sacrificed intimacy for it; Vin had never laughed until he hurt while holding someone's eyes and someone's dick, and felt that hilarity transmute into heat without ever stopping being funny.
He'd never had somebody so interested in finding ways to satisfy him, whose appetites rose at the least provocation, and being lovers with these two meant lots of the physical stuff, enough that Vin felt like he'd made up for lost time, for enforced celibacy, for fear.
He thought of sauntering out there and kicking one of them off the lawnmower, but he couldn't decide which one he'd be able to convince to go, and in the end he knew he didn't want to break them up even for the half-hour they'd putter around on that damned thing together.
He could, now, maybe. Break them up... Maybe. Somehow. He could try, anyway, if he were that kind of man.
But if he were that kind of man, they'd never have let him in in the first place. Buck didn't always pay much attention to people, but he paid attention to people who got close. And he had his mother's gift for measuring a man. He would have recognized guile in Vin and sent him the hell back to Wyoming, and that would've been that. If Chris hadn't shot him first for even thinking it.
He sighed, the warmth cooling. This thing between all three of them, it was fragile--Vin knew it even if they didn't. It was fragile and precious and deserved all the care he could give it, and it was strange to him that neither Chris nor Buck saw it that way. All this time, nearly a year now, and they just kept on keeping on, like everything was fine, like it was written in stone. And maybe that was why it worked for them. Maybe Vin ought to adopt that way of thinking… and maybe one day he would. Maybe that was what Buck kept trying to tell him with offers of property or interest in the business when Vin wanted no part of either. He didn't own land in Wyoming either, didn’t need tangible evidence like that, and wasn’t completely sure what he did need, but looking out at those two on the riding mower, smiling when it cut his way and both men raised a hand to wave, he laughed out loud, and waved back--and pushed off the doorframe and headed inside, passing through the kitchen and bypassing the living room, heading for the office in the front.
He never had to take a turn at paying bills or doing books, because he was on the road so much. His contribution, he liked to say, was giving them the time they'd wanted for years, but never had, to settle down and make this land more a home every day, for all of them. But his name was on a signature card at the bank, and a part of his money went into their joint checking account, and he could do it if he wanted.
He glared at the mess Chris had made of it, stacked and sorted household stuff from horse and stock stuff, from office stuff, and dug in.
He was almost done when he heard the back door slam, and heavy footsteps in the hall: Buck. Chris had a lighter tread.
"Vin," Buck greeted from the doorway, relaxed almost to bonelessness, it looked like, his skin dark and flushed from the sun. In the distance, the muted throb of the lawnmower continued. "Whatcha doin'?"
"Finishing the bills."
Buck just nodded. "Thought I might take the pickup over to the feed store, load up."
"Want some help?"
Buck shook his head. "Nah. Just wanted to let you know. It's been kind of busy this week. Thought you two might want a little time alone."
Vin frowned. "Quit it. I know how to cut him out of the herd if I want to."
"Yeah, I know," Buck said, "but you don't. And you two are good for each other."
They were all good for each other. Vin understood that better every day. And he and Chris got plenty of time alone, just talking time. Quiet time. Sitting around time while Buck did stuff like mow the lawn and play softball while he and Chris stayed home, or went and watched from the stands, or worked the horses. They got enough of the other kind of time too, and Vin wondered for a moment why Buck thought otherwise; nobody was shy in telling, that was for sure. Maybe not as much as him and Buck got, certainly not as much time as Chris and Buck shared alone, but that was right, that was like it ought to be. Vin had no complaints.
"How about we all go to the feed store by way of a steak house? I've worked up a hell of an appetite spending our money." He said it just to make that unconscious, spontaneous smile come out, the one where Buck flashed his teeth before he even knew something had made him feel good: our money. Vin grinned right back; the guy was so easy.
Buck stepped further into the room then bent to kiss him; the beard was starting to grow on Vin. "That thing makes you look rough, you know?" he asked, reaching a hand up to stroke it.
"Yeah," Buck grinned, "of course I know."
Vin snorted at that. Vain bastard, he was lucky it was mostly a joke--and that he was just as handsome as he liked to say--or nobody'd be able to put up with him.
