22. Lucky

22

LUCKY

“ S hit, Luck. This thing weighs two tons,” Mark huffs his way slowly up the staircase. “Please remind me again why Leo’s bed wasn’t good enough when the four of you have been using it for the last few weeks.”

“Wild sex acrobatics,” I deadpan. “We needed something sturdier.” I lift the end of the mattress to clear the railing as we enter what is now officially our bedroom. Our meaning the four of us like Mark said.

“Did you just say something about sex acrobatics?” Norm asks, adjusting the box spring and frame to my specifications before the mattress goes down. He glances out the window at Leo standing on the balcony smoking, a smile curving his lips as he most likely thinks about this morning.

Acrobatics might not be the word for it, but the shit we’ve been getting up to is definitely part of why we finally agreed on a new bed. We’ve known it was a necessity for a while but my OCD has struggled with not only picking one out that actually felt right but also parting with the mattress I first saw Leo naked on.

Because my OCD is a sentimental bastard.

Falling out of bed three times last week, however, was enough to get things moving and eventually expedite the process. Especially since those falls had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with trying to sleep four people deep, three of whom are over six feet tall, in a full size bed.

Eyeing Mark from across the adjustable memory foam—we aren’t young bucks anymore, and pushing forty after living fast and hard for so long means we needed a bed we weren’t stiff getting out of—I lift a brow. “Don’t act like you aren’t going to benefit from this too, Markus. Nanny goes home tomorrow and you know exactly where you’re going to end up when she starts getting on your nerves.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he says with a roll of his eyes as we start to lower it on the box spring.

He’s smiling though, and I know it’s because Mark is secretly looking forward to the five of us sharing a bed again. We all got very used to it toward the end there, so much so we stopped getting separate rooms when we’d stay at hotels, and sleeping that way became a comfort none of us knew we needed. It’ll be a matter of time, probably hours, before Nanny Vee brings up something that pisses Markus off and when she does, he’ll happily hop into this brand new bed even if he pretends he doesn’t want to.

“You couldn’t have had the delivery guys bring it up here?”

I stop mid grunt and stare at Mark like he grew an extra head, my eyes shifting to Norm who’s looking at us with wide eyes and a slack jaw, then finally to Pete who drops the suitcases he’s moving around before raising his hands in surrender, then back to the big bear hopefully yanking my chain.

“Are you being serious right now?”

Mark smirks at me before dropping his side of the mattress. “Of course not. I know exactly who I’m talking to and how the thought alone has your skin crawling. Just thought I’d spice things up before I gave myself a hernia moving this shit.”

Ass .

He knows, just like everyone else in this loft, the idea of having strangers touching anything I’m going to sleep on makes me physically ill. I’m definitely that guy who gets to a hotel and strips the bed before getting settled in.

I’m also the guy who brings his own sheets and cleaning supplies so I can make sure any room I stay in is as clean as it could be, and I’m not sleeping on any foreign substances or materials. Playing all over the country multiple times also means touring its hotel rooms and needless to say, me and my OCD almost quit after I found what had to be jizz in the ice bucket at the very first one we hit.

Major fucking yuck.

This bed really is heavy as fuck, though. Totally worth the hard labor, my legs are going to be thrilled to have the option to stretch out without literally kicking Norm out of bed or hanging off the end while we sleep. And yeah, it’ll be good for our sexcapades, too.

After the special delivery that came in the form of a dismembered cat, things kind of came to a head. Again .

Leonor came downstairs, took one look at us, and she knew things were about to get messy. Which they did.

All hell broke loose honestly because even Mark couldn’t make things light or level enough to keep the peace, and my rational thoughts vacated once I realized the cat was leaking on the coffee table.

I demanded we all move in immediately for her safety, and man, it didn’t go as planned.

What’s crazy about all of it is the fact that none of us were completely on the same page.

Leonor was definitely in denial, fighting us tooth and nail over the severity of the situation and how it didn’t require any of us moving in with her. And while the four of us agreed it absolutely did, we couldn’t agree on some of the smaller details or specifics on things. Mainly because we all know how our girl is when it comes to telling her what to do and invading her bubble.

It actually got so bad that we had to take a break and head to our respective corners for a while.

Code for Leo got pissed and marched upstairs to lock herself in the bathroom, Pete went out on the balcony and smoked about thirty cigarettes. Mark left and drove around the surrounding neighborhood for about a half hour, and Norm just sat in the hallway outside the apartment pouting. I did what I always do, and waited for Leonor.

I parked my big ass on the floor up against the wall right outside the bathroom door and waited not so patiently for our girl to come out. Then I unintentionally scared the shit out of her when she did, which led to another explosion.

One where she got incredibly vulnerable about being scared after she calmed down.

Leo and I sat against her wall for a long time, talking through a lot of what she was feeling, a lot of what all of us were feeling, but somehow never circled back to the root of things. We hashed out our feelings about her isolation, talked about how it’s ok to be afraid as well as the differences in how we coped with it before versus how we can now.

My OCDs got completely out of hand for a while after the attack, and I started having small panic attacks but only for the first year or so, and reiterating that to Leo seemed to help her get more comfortable in the conversation. She even shared she had hundreds of notebooks hidden under the floorboards in her living room from the only strategy she felt like she could use to handle things.

Apparently one of her doctors suggested dream journaling early on but she didn’t just stop at dreams. Leo wrote down every thought, every feeling, every memory, and every nightmare that ran through her head right up until we showed up at her apartment almost two months ago. And she told me she’d been writing songs.

Which of course made me want to call the guys in for a family meeting and start laying tracks, but she’s definitely not ready for that. Leonor did agree that maybe we should all start going to therapy together since all of us do or did do it individually, but we never actually touched on why .

I’m convinced it’s because things will be too real if Leo says any of it out loud. She’s going to have to though, we all are because if we keep dancing around the fact that we each have trauma and baggage from that awful night, we are never going to heal or get through this new shit all in one piece. And there’s a good chance letting things go unspoken will bring on another explosion.

One we might not be able to come back from.

But the talk we had was good overall, really good when it comes to Leo starting to accept that she still deserves to be happy despite still feeling so much guilt for so many things. I’m glad we’re getting there but it’s clear that Leonor is one event away from succumbing to those dark feelings, and that’s why I’m so hellbent on making sure we get everything out in the open.

She needs to hear everything the four of us went through and why we were willing to do it, how we wouldn’t change one thing about it even if it’s been the hardest thing any of us experienced. And they need to hear Leo’s side of things for the same reason. It needs to happen, and I’m not going to rest until our life is as perfect as it was before the attack because this chapter, this new phase? It’s going to be so much fucking better as long as all five of us accept it, and facing every part of the reality we share is a huge factor in that.

After we were done talking about the heavy and realized the boys weren’t coming up to join us yet, we took a shower. A completely non-sexy shower that was probably more intimate than sex would have made it, then went down to wait for them.

And the conversation we had when they got back is how we wound up here a few days later.

The three of us moving the last of our shit into her loft, finally making it our loft a short while after Pete and I turned the keys to my condo into my realtor.

Things are coming together nicely, but all this weird shit going on has me starting to think like my boyfriend. Well, the skeptical brooding one, anyway.

I like having to differentiate between my boyfriends because I have two, and I really like how eagerly our sweet boy jumped at being with all of us. I liked it even more when I got to watch Norm fuck Leonor from behind while they watched Pete fuck me, our girl’s enthusiastic way of extending a warm welcome into our relationship.

It’s been really good ever since then. Leo’s new stalker has even given us a break from the morbid gifts, but I’m definitely channeling Pete because I’ve started waiting for shit to hit the fan at any second.

“Who is she talking to?” Mark asks as he stares out the window at Leo, running a hand over his face and beard.

I shrug one shoulder while adjusting the mattress and box spring by about a half inch. “I think she said it was Justine.”

“She’s getting mad,” he says, walking toward the French doors and drawing my attention his way. “She never gets mad at Justine.”

Thats true. “Maybe they’re talking about Lex,” I grunt. “He makes her mad.” That douchebag makes us all mad.

I’m counting down the days until Leonor decides to play music full time again because the second that happens, I’ll happily help her give that asshole her two week notice.

“I know Leonor is very pretty, and she’s scary as hell when she’s mad,” Pete says, finally getting Mark to pay attention to something other than her. “But we still have a bunch of shit down in our cars to bring up, and I’d really like to do it before I turn forty.”

“But you’re such a sexy silver fox.” I grin and wag my eyebrows as I walk over to where Pete is waiting for us. “Especially with those long silver dreads I can wrap around my fist and…”

Just as I go to show everyone what I’m talking about, the balcony door whips open and Leo’s cell phone comes sailing through the room before it collides with the bathroom door, basically exploding a mere foot away from my head.

“See?” Mark says as the three of us quickly start down the spiral staircase before Leo’s boots follow her phone. “Let’s go get the rest of your shit while Norm talks her down.”

“Motherfucking cock sucker,” Leo growls as she stomps back into the room and slams the door.

I can’t help but smile over my shoulder at our sweet boy, who is giving me the thanks a lot assholes look before putting his game face on. One that cracks the tiniest bit as I blow him a kiss, then falls almost completely when I lift my fingers to my lips, spread them, and flick my tongue between the index and middle.

It earns me a scowl and a blush but Norman doesn’t have anything to worry about. Leonor can’t stay mad around him and if she does, I’m sure she’d just make him take his pants off and work it out a different way.

He’ll be fine.