Gathered Up. Annabeth Albert

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СКАЧАТЬ Ev, the kiss started in a desperate place and only got more frantic.

      “That’s very…enthusiastic,” he said, pulling back for air. “But you can do better.”

      Oh fuck yes. Give me directions. I nipped at his lips, inviting him to do the same to me. I opened for his tongue and sucked hard until he started the sort of tongue fucking that had me arching against him, dick straining to get closer.

      Heck, enough of this and I could come, no problem. My hands clung to his shoulders, trying to pull him tighter. And it didn’t feel like simple relief and release either—it felt an awful lot like comfort despite the roughness of our actions, and I wanted to sink into it.

      A loud laugh from the other room—one of the girls—wormed its way into my head. My hands relaxed their hold and my lips slowed, sanity returning in sips and gulps.

      “Brady, come watch,” Jonas called.

      Fuck. I slumped against Ev, my forehead to his chin.

      “That was not just a taste—it was a meal,” Ev mused, his breath ruffling my hair.

      “No, it wasn’t.” I groaned. “Fuck, that was good, Ev. Let’s do that again sometime?”

      “Without an audience would be ideal.” He still hadn’t released me.

      “Six hours with a locked door is now item one on my life goals list.”

      “Mine too, and I might add tying you to the bed for half of it,” Ev said lightly.

      “You’re killing me, Ev. You really are.”

      He finally let go of me and removed two bowls from a nearby cupboard. “But right now, we have ice cream.”

      “That is absolutely no consolation,” I grumbled, but I accepted the serving he dished up and followed him into the living room, brain still foggy from the kissing. The kids had taken over the couch, so I took the floor in front of them. To my surprise, Ev took a seat next to me.

      As the movie progressed, our feet bumped. At first it was accidental, then more deliberate contact, little reminders of what we’d shared in the kitchen. We smiled at each other, the best kind of secret between us. Across from us, Mira dozed in her recliner, breathing slow and steady. It was…homey. Made me sleepy, so much niceness.

      The twins were starting to nod off, too…“Oh crap.” I nudged them with my foot. “We still need to ride back, sleepyheads.”

      “Do not worry,” Ev said. “Mira is resting peacefully. I can take you in her Subaru. We’ll put their bikes in back.”

      “Will you carry me?” Madison stretched her arms out like she was four, not seven.

      “Me too.” Morgan repeated the gesture.

      And so I ended up carrying one twin and Ev, the best sport in the whole world, took the other, Jonas trailing behind us. Mira’s Subaru was peppered with knitting-inspired bumper stickers and was at least ten years old, but I was profoundly grateful not to have to herd sleepy kids home.

      It was a short drive, but all three kids were asleep in the backseat when we pulled into the apartment complex. Ev spent a long time looking in the rearview mirror at them, contemplating.

      “Yes, we can risk it,” I said and leaned in for a quick kiss. I was careful not to ramp things up like in the kitchen, but even this quick contact felt full of promise, and it made me want all sorts of things I couldn’t have.

      Chapter 7

      Dear friends, I find I am obsessed with blue and brown combinations lately. And not just any blue—a crisp ocean blue, more turquoise than pastel. The brown is a deep, tweedy nut brown, shot through with reds and caramel hints. Thus was born my newest project on the needles…—Evren’s Yarnings

      We kissed in the car. We kissed on my front step as I walked him out after we deposited the kids in their beds. We snuck a quick kiss in the back hallway of People’s Cup after Knit Night. We were the kings of sneaky looks and weighted pauses and lightning-fast kisses in this…friendship that neither of us paused to redefine as something else. We were friends. Now we were friends who kissed, which clearly was outside the boundaries Ev had set for us, but I wasn’t about to remind him of that. He still didn’t date casually or date bisexuals; I still didn’t have time for serious. But kissing? Everyone had time for a bit of kissing.

      What we lacked was time for more than kissing.

      “I don’t have to be in until two tomorrow,” I said to Ev on the phone one night. “Weird short shift. But it’s Knit Night, so I’ll see you there right?”

      “Of course. Violet and Mira and the triplets would come after me if I didn’t show.” He’d picked up on my nicknames for a number of the knitters, which was cute. Similarly, I occasionally found myself doing his habit of phrasing statements as questions. We were rubbing off on each other. But not the kind of rubbing I really wanted.

      “Yeah, they would. All the ladies want to adopt you.”

      Ev made a dismissive noise. He didn’t believe me that he had a huge fan club—attendance numbers were up at Knit Night and despite what Ev thought, he was the primary reason. And with Knit Night getting even more popular, a trickle-over effect had started with knitters showing up in clumps on other nights of the week and coming by to grab their morning coffee from us. Business was up for the first time since Chris left, and that had Randy doling out more hours to me and me grateful to Knit Night for a whole variety of reasons.

      “But why not come here for lunch?” he asked. “I will take my lunch break and cook for you. Mira is having a good week—it’s a rest week from chemo, and she will be downstairs in the shop. I have moved a rocking chair there for her to sit and knit while Adele works the counter. Mira is too social to spend all day with the TV. She takes her energy from others—”

      “Back up. You mean we could be alone? Like alone-alone?” A hot spark chased its way up my spine.

      “I do believe that is what I said, yes. My bedroom, it is over the stockrooms. Very private,” he continued conversationally. “But tell me, are you a screamer? Because we may have to entice you to be quiet…”

      I swallowed hard. I loved the little bit of kinky, pushy edge Ev showed from time to time. “I can be quiet. Give me something to bite if I’m not. I’m not crazy about being gagged.”

      “Something to bite? Oh, Brady, we may need more than a lunch hour.”

      “Tell me about it.”

      Ev met me at the back entrance of Iplik, where we snuck upstairs like a couple of teenagers. He was older than me, twenty-eight to my twenty-three, but I liked how much more settled he was in his skin than most guys my age. Still, for all our comparable maturity, we laughed and pushed at each other on the stairs.

      I could have entered through the front of the store—I knew Ev had told Mira where he’d be and she was nothing if not supportive of Ev’s and my friendship, but something about having a secret lunch date had me kissing him before we even reached the top of the stairs.

      “Why do I feel like we’re getting away with something?” Ev mused as he broke away from the kiss to open the СКАЧАТЬ