Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

Santiago Jones

It felt entirely wrong to say goodbye to Dean, but I’d tried my best, and my approach had been anything but smooth. I’d forced the discussion too soon for the sake of making Dean stay. Because I wanted him here. Because I wanted to take care of him too. He thought he could hide his loneliness…?

Unfortunately, the bastard was right. It was time to take a step back and do things the right way. I had to talk to Gael, tell him about the letter, and—

“Sir?”

I stopped before I reached the kitchen island and turned around.

“I have to do this before I chicken out,” Gael said. He was the picture of determination at war with frazzled nerves as he walked over to me, and there was no time to sort out my confusion before everything cleared up. The distance between us disappeared, and a wave of hunger washed over me when he fisted my shirt and pulled me down to him.

I cupped his face in my hands and kissed him firmly. A slow shudder swept heat through me, and he fused himself to my body.

God-fucking-damn.

At the first taste of his sweet tongue against mine, our “talk” was promptly scheduled for later. He tried to lock his arms around my neck, so I lowered my hands and spun him around, then backed him up against the island. Fucking hell, he felt perfect in my arms.

We deepened the kiss at the same time, and I couldn’t help it. I slipped my hands down to his cute butt and squeezed the cheeks, earning myself a needy little moan from him. His body drove me fucking crazy—he was the perfect blend of small and soft and sexy as sin. His big blue eyes… How could anyone resist a puppy-dog look from him? His kisses were full of desperation; it felt like he wanted everything at once, and it flooded me with satisfaction and desire. I slowed us down a bit, just so I could pick him up and position him on the island, and I stepped between his legs and loosened his hold on me. I wanted my hands back on his neck, his jaw, his cheeks.

With a steadying breath, I kissed his perfect lips a few times and savored the moment. Savored the happiness, the relief, the hope. This was a terrific start. I wanted so much more, and now I didn’t have to worry about mistaking the hints he’d sent my way all day.

“Beautiful boy.” I combed my fingers through his dark blond hair and pressed my lips to his cheeks.

He ducked his face and buried it against my neck. “I’ve wanted to do that all day.”

I squeezed him to me. “Me too.”

He shivered and glanced up at me a beat later. “So, um…” He dropped his gaze to my shirt and fidgeted with the top button. “You’re a Daddy Dom.”

I grinned. “I am.”

He nodded, cheeks flushed.

Fucking adorable.

I hooked a finger under his chin and snuck in for a quick kiss. “You wanna explore a dynamic like that with me?”

He nodded again—and kept avoiding my gaze. “Very much, Sir.”

We’d work on that shyness.

“Look me in the eye, sweet boy.” I planted my hands on the counter and waited till he glanced up. Even now, he was all worries and nervousness. “If you knew how much I wanted you, you wouldn’t be so afraid,” I murmured. “But I assume this is what Caleb did to you. He made you feel like shit. He pushed you down.”

“Yes, Sir.” He cleared his throat and struggled to maintain eye contact. “I have, um, body issues, I guess. Like…I don’t know. I guess I was lucky growing up, because it wasn’t until I met him that I started feeling bad.”

I felt for him. Too many people today were insecure about their appearance. Nobody was perfect in that objective sense, but everyone sure liked to pretend. We put pressure on ourselves and on others.

“Were you ever bullied in school?” I wondered.

He shook his head. “Not really. I mean, I knew I was chubby and that most guys wanted someone fit, but I had good friends and went through a couple firsts that made me feel like anybody else. My first kiss was with my best friend at the time, and he was kind of like me.” He made a face. “Then he moved to freaking Seattle, and we lost touch.”

I touched his cheek briefly. “You already know what I think about you. The question is what you think. Genuinely—not with Caleb’s abuse rattling around in your head.”

He scraped his teeth against his bottom lip and looked over at the window—or the kitchen table. That direction.

“I think I’m like my dad,” he said thoughtfully. “When I first broke up with Caleb, I told my dad everything. What Caleb had done to me—how he’d tried to shame me into losing weight and stuff like that. And it led to a long conversation about lifestyle choices.”

I tilted my head, listening, and trying my damnedest to push back my anger toward that fucking scum he called an ex.

“My dad doesn’t think about how he looks,” he went on. “He thinks about what he’s doing—and his body reflects that. His body is the result, and he’s fine with that. Like, we love to walk and do stuff like everyone else, but we prefer strolling over power walking. We hate stress. We see what it’s doing to Mom—she’s always working and sleeping restlessly. She can’t power down. She can’t sit down and read a good book. She has to do twenty things at the same time.”

I was familiar with that kind of stress. It sucked the life out of you.

“He gets stern with her sometimes.” He smiled a little to himself. “When she’s been stressing out too much, she gets forgetful and leaves her car keys in the fridge and the frying pan in the bathroom.”

I chuckled quietly.

“I think that’s why they work so great together—and why they’re still happy together after so many years. He slows her down when she really needs it, and she fine-tunes what Dad does around the house. Like, he cleans most of the time, and she adds the final touches with flowers and drapes and decorations.”

Sounded a lot like my own folks, only my mother did the cooking and cleaning. My old man brought home the flowers. Well, they were retired now, so he picked them from the garden, and he spent most of his days tinkering around in the garage.

Gael glanced back at me. “Physical appearance wasn’t a thing at home when I grew up. My mom would come home from work, hug me tightly, and ask if I was happy. When Dad came home from work, he’d ask if I’d done anything fun. Focus was never on fashion or trends or…whatever. Or maybe I just never cared.” He shrugged. “The important thing was happiness, and that comes from within—you know?”

I smiled, loving every word that came out of his mouth.

“So what would make you happy? Describe a perfect Saturday that leaves a big smile on your face.”

He chuckled softly and thought about it. “It can be a million different things. Like go to a history museum? Spend a whole day there? And, um…I don’t know. Sometimes, I just wanna stay on the couch and read all day.” A bit of a blush bled through on his cheeks. “Preferably with my Daddy next to me.”

Fuck me.

He was too quick to move on, so I couldn’t throw myself into that trap. “To get a little serious—as long as I can do all the things I want to do, I don’t care how I look. I used to think I was cute because I was always so happy. I loved to make people smile and stuff like that.”

Jesus Christ, he was a breath of fresh air.

“I mean, I have some limits,” he said. “Those are my preferences. I want to keep certain health risks in check, partly because we have high blood pressure in my family—but if my parents have taught me anything, it’s that health can look several different ways. My mom’s blood pressure is higher than Dad’s. Which he loves to remind her of when she’s running around with a million projects.”

I had to kiss him. I kept it brief, but I just had to. I loved hearing his unfiltered thoughts.

“You’re wonderful, Gael.” I gave him one more smooch. “I hope that happiness you felt when you were younger comes back. You deserve every ounce of it.”

He went back to fiddling with a button on my shirt, this time the second one because he’d undone the top. “I wanna make you happy too, Sir.”

“You started doing that the day I met you.” I rubbed my hands up and down his thighs in unhurried strokes. “I really liked what you said about inner happiness too. It’s a good focus, whether you’re a kid or an adult. The rest is secondary.”

He nodded. “It’s kinda nuts that the secondary gets all the attention.”

Because it was the exterior. The first thing people saw.

I’d gotten my own taste of bullying as a kid, though it had faded after a couple years.

“I was actually teased a lot in high school,” I mentioned.

The surprised look on Gael’s face was almost comical. “You? But you’re so stinking hot, Sir. I mean, objectively.”

I chuckled. Too cute.

“I started going gray when I was seventeen,” I admitted with a smirk. “Senior year, the whole football team called me Gramps.”

He made a noise. “People can be such dicks.” Then he reached up tentatively and swept his fingers through my hair. “I like the gray. It’s so sexy.”

Hopefully, that meant I could be honest too.

I leaned in and kissed him slowly, and I cupped his cheek with one hand and slipped my other hand up his stomach. “You know what I like?”

He sucked in a breath and shook his head.

“All of this.” I nipped at his bottom lip and brushed my thumb over his cheek. “It may be secondary, but it drives me crazy. Every bit of you that’s a little softer and rounder makes me wanna tie you to my bed.”

He clutched my shirt and tried to pull me closer. “C-can we do that, please? I’m super ready.”

I grinned faintly and flicked the tip of my tongue against his lips. “You want Daddy to fuck you?”

“Oh God—yes,” he breathed.

I hummed and grabbed his jaw, then kissed him hard as lust and possessiveness raged through me. It would be so goddamn easy to take him upstairs, strip off his pajamas, and fuck him stupid. Every part of me screamed for it. To finally see all of him, to feel his mouth on my cock, to see if he became shyer in bed or if a needy little slut boy emerged.

I could work with both.

If only I didn’t hear Dean’s pointed throat-clearing in my head…

Gael whimpered into the kiss and clung to me. “Can I call you that now, Sir? Can I call you Daddy?”

I shuddered and pushed my tongue against his, then forced myself to break the kiss. “Absolutely. But—that title comes with a responsibility.” Deep breaths. But my fucking God, he was irresistible. “We have to set some ground rules before we think about taking our clothes off.”

And I have to tell you about the fucking letter.

Damn you, Dean.

“Rules, schmules,” Gael whined. “I want you so much.”

Adorable. Maddeningly addictive. Gael was something else.

No matter how badly I wanted to postpone this step, I couldn’t. I’d just feel like an asshole afterward.

I took a calming breath and eased back, only to look down and notice he’d unbuttoned most of the buttons on my denim shirt. It made me chuckle, and he flushed when I looked at him.

“Oops?” He grinned sheepishly.

I shook my head in amusement and buttoned up again. “We’ll get to the fun part soon, I promise.” I patted the stool for him. “You can have a seat while I prepare the soup, and we’ll talk.”

The Little in him came out in full force with a long-suffering sigh and a playful scowl.

It made my heart happy. When Littles and Middles lost their filters, all was well in the world.

I returned to the other side of the island and sorted through my thoughts. The soup was going to simmer for a couple hours, so I only needed to get the ball rolling. The spices, the broth, the vegetables that took time to soften—all in the pot.

“I reckon the first thing we need to discuss are boundaries.” I ran a hand through my hair, then washed my hands so I could continue chopping vegetables. “I’m a big fan of group play and relationships with more than two men, but I’m monogamous in the way that I don’t enjoy play with others unless my partners are present, and I want our relationship closed.”

Considering Gael had listed four group-play-related kinks in his fetish list, I wasn’t worried that my preferences would rock anyone’s foundation, but nevertheless… For all the openness I enjoyed, I wanted several rules to erect a fence around that freedom.

“There’s a big difference between playtime and dating to me too,” Gael said. “And what you said, I wouldn’t want to play with others without my partner present. Which…” He exhaled a laugh and shook his head. “It’s bizarre to talk about this. I’m so new in kink—I’ve never reached the pre-play negotiation part.”

I smiled and threw a dish towel over my shoulder. “We’ll get through it together—and we’ll negotiate and renegotiate whenever someone needs it.”

He would need it far more than I would. When I’d been new in kink, I’d barely known left from right. One second, I’d been convinced I was monogamous and madly in love with whoever I was dating, and the next… Hell, at this point, I wasn’t sure it’d ever been true love. Either way, I’d dabbled in most kinds of relationships, from strict monogamy to open poly-houses.

“May I ask—do you like Dean, Sir?”

I looked at him, only half surprised he’d asked. But I supposed my attachment to Dean wasn’t invisible.

“He’s been in the back of my mind for as long as I’ve known him.” I turned on the water in the island sink and began breaking apart the broccoli. “I do like him—a lot—but we’ve never acted on the what-if between us. We’ve never been single at the same time—or I’ve been working too much, and then he moved across the country to teach at Stanford.” I paused. “I kissed him today, though. When I was waiting for you to come back from the bathroom.”

Gael’s cute smirk put me at ease. “Okay. Then I don’t have to feel crazy for wanting to see you two together.”

Well, hey.

“I want all of us together,” I replied and raised a brow. “How’s that for a goal?”

“Definitely crazy,” he snickered. “All this is. I’m still processing.”

He seemed to be doing fine to me. He was more relaxed, didn’t stammer as much…

Then he hesitated a little. “But you mean you want to date him too—and me?”

The last thing I wanted was to confuse Gael or, even worse, make him insecure about where he had me, so I spelled it out much like I had earlier today.

“I’mma shoot for the stars with both of you,” I admitted. “I want the three of us to date one another as a triad. No him and me, and you and me—all three of us.”

He nodded slowly and found my stack of grocery ads to fidget with. He rolled the corner of a coupon. “As dreamy as that sounds, Dean and I don’t know each other. I don’t know what he wants, what he’s into—”

“That’s why you date, querido. I don’t have a success-rate guarantee. I’m only saying I would love for us to give it a go.” I didn’t want him to feel any pressure. “But this is after your class ends,” I reminded him. “I may be impatient to get things started, but I have all the patience in the world for every step that comes after.”

He smiled impishly. “I kind of like the impatience. It makes me feel like you don’t want to wait.”

I smiled back. That was exactly how it was too. I didn’t wanna wait.

After dumping the broccoli into the pot, I rinsed my fingers and moved on to the cabbage.

“You used the word dreamy,” I noted. “Do you like the idea of a triad?”

The slow blush that crept forward—and how he squirmed in his seat—at least told me he enjoyed the thought of threesomes. My kind of boy.

“Yeah… I really like what Kit has with Colt and Lucas.”

They were a great example of what I wanted too, even more so since I’d heard they were exploring a closed playtime dynamic with Greer and his partners. That was my brand of boundaries, which I did my best to explain to Gael. Viewing kinksters as a free-for-all buffet of playtime was something I’d liked in the past when I hadn’t been interested in more meaningful relationships.

What I believed would make me happy today was a triad much like the one Colt had with Kit and Luke, and then we’d have a few play partners we all agreed to have extra fun with from time to time. Together.

“I’ve had one or the other in the past, but never combined,” I continued. “That’s just me, though. You gotta be flexible as it is with a single partner, make sure as many needs as possible are met, and then you add another man…?” I grinned as he chuckled. “In the end, it boils down to chemistry. Time will tell what the best dynamic will look like—what fits us best. Neither of us can know precisely what we want beforehand. But I can tell you one thing right now…” I lifted a brow and pointed my knife at him, and he cracked up—exactly the reaction I wanted. He wasn’t that much of a scaredy-cat.

“I like it when you’re being silly,” he laughed. “Okay, I’m listening—what were you gonna say?”

I smiled and lowered the knife again. “Just that I don’t want us to be casual. I would like to go all in from the beginning with both kink and dating, and then we’ll work things out together as they come. How does that sound?”

He grinned and rested his chin in his hand. “Will you believe me if I say all that sounds perfect to me?”

“Every little thing I said?” I asked to make sure.

“I mean…” He sat up straighter, thinking about his response. “Yeah. Because I can’t think of a better way to explore dirty group play than with someone I belong to. And the last part is the most important to me. Playtime and events will come and go. The one—or two—I share my life with will hopefully put up with me for longer.”

Put up with him.

“I’ll do my best to put up with you,” I drawled. “For the record, that kind of talk will get you punished in the future. I’ll be patient because of your past—that goes without saying—but we’ll be working together to dig your self-esteem out from the ground.”

We were also going to talk endlessly about limits and appropriate approaches to infractions, though that could come later. I wanted to ease into things. I couldn’t get to know him properly if we had lists of protocol encasing his behavior.

“I’ll do my best, I promise.” He didn’t look too certain anymore, though.

“Remember what I said about patience earlier, sweetheart,” I murmured. “I have my beginning now. Now we can take it easy and do what feels natural. My number one priority is to earn your complete trust and to see you relax and be the boy you wanna be.”

That seemed to put him at ease, but it was a reminder to me—and one I needed. His trauma had conditioned him to be quiet and not to step on any toes. The result could be him agreeing to things he wasn’t ready for, so we both had to be mindful.

* * *

When the pot was on the stove, set to low heat, I figured it was time to rip off the Band-Aid. Armed with coffee and lemonade, I ushered Gael into the living room so we could talk about Caleb.

I also made a mental note to pick up Little-friendly snacks. I’d glimpsed juice boxes, milk, and Sprite Zero in Gael’s fridge earlier today, and I only had the milk. And the lemonade that expired in two days. Giving up TV dinners and filling my fridge with fresh foods was only the beginning of my plan to step it up.

“Can I ask something?” Gael asked.

“Always.” I sat down on the couch and left our beverages on the coffee table.

“Does Dean play with Walker too?”

I chuckled under my breath. “I’m not surprised you’re curious. Not many know this, so it’s Dean’s story to share, but you can say they have a past that dates back from before Walker and Macklin met.” I wasn’t one to judge either way, but considering Dean and Walker weren’t actually related, I didn’t see the taboo factor that some might. “I think whatever is happening between the three of them now, Macklin included, is very new.”

“I see! I hope I get to see them one day,” he admitted with a sheepish grin. Always with the sheepishness. It was cute as fuck. Then he yawned and sat a little closer to me, and he took a big gulp of his lemonade.

“You tired, little one?” I combed my fingers through his hair.

“Yeah.” He let out a breath and set down his glass before leaning back and getting comfortable. “I woke up at three this morning, so I started cleaning.”

I furrowed my brow. “That’s not good. You need your sleep.”

He shrugged and leaned against me. “It’s all this Caleb crap. I get restless when I don’t know where he is.”

Of-fucking-course. I should’ve seen this coming. A few days ago, I couldn’t have told him to call me if he couldn’t sleep on his own, but I sure could now.

“I have to tell you something about him,” I said reluctantly.

Just like that, Gael sat straighter and stared at me with fear clouding his eyes. “Have you seen him? Is he here? He’s here, isn’t he?”

I grabbed his hand in both of mine and shifted in my seat to face him better. “First of all, you’re safe. You hear me? I won’t let anything happen to you.”

“He’s here,” he whispered.

I suppressed a sigh and inclined my head. “When I brought in your mail today, I saw an envelope without a stamp on it. It made me suspicious, so I opened it.”

“Oh God.” He withdrew from me and palmed his face.

Goddammit, I didn’t want him to be scared. He had nothing to worry about. I’d fucking see to it.

“He asked if I missed him, didn’t he?” he groaned into his hands. “That’s what he does. And he reminds me that he was the best thing that could ever happen to me.”

In other words, no need to show him the letter.

“Fuck—I have to call the police again,” he said abruptly.

I grabbed on to his arm before he could get up from the couch, and he frowned at me, almost as if he’d forgotten I was there. But he wasn’t alone this time. I wanted to help him.

“What happened the other times you called the police?” I already knew, of course.

He huffed. “They slap him with a misdemeanor. He pays a fine, and that’s that.”

I nodded. “Despite that he’s a repeat offender by now.”

If there was one thing I knew, it was the law. Our legal system. How things could look great on paper and not work for shit when every big-city county was buried in cases. If the judge had deemed Caleb a non-threat for never having physically abused Gael, chances were they’d take the easy way out every time Caleb violated the restraining order. A fine here, thirty days in county jail there. It was bullshit, a slap on the wrist.

“What choice do I have?” Gael asked, exasperated.

“You can leave this to me, sweetheart,” I implored. “If I have to fly out to California and deliver the evidence in person, so be it—but they won’t be able to ignore this when I’m done.”

He knitted his brows together, wary and uncertain. “What are you going to do? What evidence?”

“For one, the letter.” I’d left it in a Ziploc bag when I’d come home. It was in the kitchen. “We gotta think bigger. Every time Caleb harasses you online or calls you, it falls under the same penal code—even when it shouldn’t—because there’s always bigger fish to fry. But delivering a letter…?” Which, even as I said it, didn’t necessarily mean much. It would take resources to prove it came from Caleb, resources the authorities didn’t allocate without some convincing. “It’s a start, at least. I want to rack up the offenses. Get him for stalking, definitely contempt, and maybe—”

“Contempt?”

“Contempt of court—he’s going against a court of law,” I explained. “I’m actually surprised they haven’t charged him with that yet.”

He chewed on the corner of his mouth. “Online harassment isn’t exactly a priority.”

True.

“You really know all this, don’t you?” It looked like he was seeing me with a new pair of eyes.

I smiled faintly. “It’s a long way from working in homicide, but I didn’t start there. I can ramble PCs in my sleep.”

“Oh! I know one—I saw it on a show. Did you get a lot of 148? That’s a code, right?”

I couldn’t help but chuckle, partly in relief because he was evidently easily distracted. “It’s difficult to resist arrest when you’re dead.” I tapped his nose.

“Oh, right.” He let out a strained laugh and settled down again.

The reality returned to him, and so did the worry and the sadness.

“I hate him so much. I just want him out of my life for good.”

“I know you do, little one.” I gave his leg a squeeze. “Will you let me take over?”

He brushed his fingers over my hand. “What’re you gonna do?”

“Find him. Make sure enough offenses stick that he’ll spend the next few years in prison.”

Hopefully more than a few, too.

“As long as you don’t get hurt,” he said decisively. Then he crawled up on my lap, and nobody was happier about that than me. “You’re not allowed to get hurt.”

“He won’t hurt me.” I pulled him closer to me and cupped his cheek. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you about the letter sooner. I just hate seeing you troubled.”

He scrunched his nose and rubbed it against mine. “It happened a few hours ago. It wasn’t like you hid it for weeks.”

Well. I was glad he saw it that way.

I kissed him quickly and squeezed him to me, feeling way too much tension in him. And he yawned against my neck, reminding me he hadn’t slept enough. So that settled it. He could watch TV or sit with me in the kitchen while I threw together a loaf of bread, and then we were gonna eat supper and cuddle the shit out of each other till he fell asleep.

No Little of mine was gonna go tired.

He mumbled something, ghosting his lips along my neck.

Tempting.

“What was that, baby?”

I felt him smile against my skin.

“I said, maybe we should distract each other from that fuckdweeb by going upstairs,” he whined.

I couldn’t lie, I liked the whining. It was cute and unfiltered.

I grinned and pressed a kiss to his shoulder. “The only thing we’ll be doing upstairs is sleeping.”

He gasped and inched away to look at me in utter horror.

I laughed. “It’s been a long day. My boy needs his rest.”

He couldn’t hold on to the dramatic disdain now, could he? Instead, he threw his arms around me again and peppered the side of my face with kisses.

“I’m your boy?”

“Damn fuckin’ right.” Warmth and sheer joy flooded me. This was exactly how I wanted him, happy and cuddly and carefree. “And what does that make me?”

He hummed and dragged those kissable lips to mine. “My Daddy,” he whispered.

Fuck yeah. His Daddy.