Page 17 of Bear’s House

One final, hard thrust, and Sawyer went rigid behind him. His forehead dropped to JJ’s shoulder blade, and I watched the shudder run through him from shoulders to hips, watched his hands go slack on JJ’s waist for one perfect second before he caught himself and held still.

JJ was shaking. His whole body was tensed, riding the edge, his fingers curled so tight around the rope I thought it might break. He was right there. Still bound, still shaking, his cock flushed dark and hard beneath him, slick with pre-come and straining. I wrapped my hand around him and felt the full-body jolt that ran through him at the contact — his hips bucking forward, his wrists pulling against the rope, a sound tearing out of him that was half sob and half my name.

“Easy,” I murmured. “Easy, baby. Daddy’s got you.”

I didn’t need to work him. He was already there, wound so tight that the first stroke drew a broken, desperate sound from somewhere deep in his chest. The second stroke made his thighs lock, his whole body going rigid against the table, and the third — just three, that was all it took — broke him open completely.

“Go ahead, baby,” I said.

He came, his body jerking against the table so hard the wood shifted, and for a long moment afterward he didn’t move — just lay there breathing, boneless and spent, his cheek pressed to the wood and his eyes closed.

I gave them both a minute. Let the room settle. The fire popped in the grate. Somewhere outside, a car passed on the street, its headlights sweeping across the ceiling and gone.

Then I moved to untie them.

I started with Mikey. His wrists first, working the knots loose with careful fingers, checking that his circulation was good, then rubbing the marks the rope had left and easing the stiffness from his wrists with my thumbs. He watched me with heavy-lidded eyes, his green irises almost black in the firelight, and when his hands came free he didn’t move them — just let them lie where they fell, palms up, like he was too tired to remember how his arms worked.

“Everything feel good?” I asked him.

He nodded. His voice, when he found it, was rough. “Yes, Daddy. Thank you, Daddy.”

“You're welcome, my sweet boy.”

I moved to JJ. His knots were tighter — he’d been pulling against them harder — and it took me longer to work them loose. His wrists were marked, the skin pink where the rope had pressed, and I rubbed each one between my palms, checking the warmth and color before working the stiffness from them. JJ didn’t open his eyes. He lay there letting me handle him, which was unusual enough that I checked his breathing twice to make sure he was still with me.

He was. Just quiet. The way he got sometimes.

“Good?” I asked him.

He nodded against the wood. “Good.”

I helped them both to their feet. Mikey swayed, and I caught him with an arm around his waist, feeling the boneless weight of him against my side. JJ stood on his own, but his legs were unsteady, and when I reached for him, he came into my other arm without a word.

Sawyer had stepped back. He stood with his arms at his sides, his breathing even, his face composed in that way that meant he was feeling more than he wanted to show. I caught his eye and nodded.

“Come here,” I said.

He came. Shoulder to shoulder with me. Then I herded them toward the sofa.

The deep cream cushions swallowed them. I pulled the soft blankets from the basket beside the fireplace, and draped one over JJ, one over Mikey, one around Sawyer’s shoulders even though he pretended he didn’t need it. JJ tucked himself against my right side, his head on my shoulder, his body warm and loose and unusually still. Mikey curled into the crook of my left arm and was half-asleep before his cheek hit my chest, his eyes already closing, his breathing slowing into the deep, even rhythm that meant he was seconds from dreaming. Sawyer sat close on JJ’s other side, his thigh pressed against JJ’s, and when I glanced at him, he was looking at the fireplace.

I let the quiet stretch. The fire crackled. Bola appeared from wherever he’d been hiding during the scene and leapt onto the arm of the sofa, settled into a loaf, and closed his eyes with the judgment of a cat who had seen everything and was not impressed.

“Mikey,” I said, quiet. His eyes fluttered open. “What do you want for your reward, baby? You were so good tonight. Name it.”

He didn’t hesitate. Didn’t even think about it.

“Hot chocolate,” he said, his voice thick with sleep. “And the Barbie movie.”

I smiled. “That sounds exactly right.”

I extracted myself from the tangle of limbs as carefully as I could — JJ grumbled, Mikey made a small sound of protest, Sawyer shifted to fill the space I’d left — and made my way to the kitchen. Four mugs. Milk warming on the stove. Cocoa powder, sugar, a dash of vanilla the way Mikey liked it. Whipped cream from the canister in the fridge. Marshmallows for JJ, because JJ would complain if there weren’t marshmallows.

From the living room, I could hear the opening credits of the Barbie movie playing — that pink font, that unmistakable soundtrack — and Mikey’s voice, already narrating the plot to no one in particular in the drowsy cadence he used when he was half-asleep.

“And then she goes to the real world, and everything is different, and she doesn’t like it at first but then she — JJ, stop laughing, I’m telling the story…”

“I’m not laughing, you’re laughing!”