16. Love

CHAPTER 16

love

"Leo," I gasped, "what—" I'd barely reached consciousness before his hands were on me, tugging off my clothes, and then his thumbs were circling my nipples.

"I need you," he said, his tone urgent as he worked his way down to my morning wood. Looking up at me with hungry eyes, he was practically purring. "Can I?"

I nodded, a heady combination of groggy and turned on. The second my cock disappeared into his hot mouth, though, I was wide awake. He shifted between my legs, his broad shoulders nudging my thighs apart. A slick touch danced at my entrance, which was still relaxed from the night before.

"Fuck, yes," I grunted as he invaded me with two thick fingers.

We'd gotten a lot more comfortable with each other over the last couple of weeks, and we'd discovered that Leo's picky sexuality had nothing to do with his actual sex drive. He loved me, was comfortable with me, and he wanted me. Frequently.

I'd mentally prepared for less sex than I'd had in my previous relationship and would've been fine with that, but I wasn't going to complain about more naked time with this man. While he enjoyed getting off, his favorite thing was making me come. When he added a third finger and started petting that all-important bundle of nerves, it didn't take me long to start choking out his name as pleasure and pressure zipped through my body.

" Leo …"

Still taking me deep, he popped his eyebrows, pretty blue eyes fixed on mine. He loved making me come with his mouth, and he especially loved swallowing me down. He increased his suction with the next thrust of his fingers, and I was done for. I arched, light and free, as I came hard.

He crawled up next to me, laughing at my fucked-out expression and useless limbs. "How many more times can I make you come before we have to go to your parents' house?"

I grinned and we shared a sloppy kiss. "At least two more," I said, enjoying the taste of myself on his tongue. "But now it's your turn."

"So, Leo, what do you do for a living?"

We were in my parents' kitchen, chatting as we waited for my brothers and their spouses to show up for dinner.

I rolled my eyes, groaning. "Mom…"

"What?" she asked, her brilliant blue eyes flashing. "I'm just asking a question."

Leo ducked his chin, and I could see the move charmed my mother to no end. "I'm a plumber, ma'am. Just got my master's license this year, and I'm the head plumber for Everly Plumbing and Bathroom Renovation in Seguin."

"Wow. I hear plumbers make good money."

"I do okay, ma'am. I'm pretty good with the renovations, too."

"But you don't own your own house?"

"Mom!" I shot Dad a look, but he put up his hands. He knew better than to intervene when her kids' happiness was on the line.

Leo's eyes widened, but he persisted. "Not yet. My roommates are about to have another kid, so getting my own place is next on my list. I've been saving up for a decent down payment, and now I'm just hoping for lower interest rates in my lifetime."

"Hmm." She seemed a little discomfited that he had his shit together. "You don't expect Lovett to give up their veterinary practice here, do you?"

Red crept up Leo's cheeks, and he sent me a look. "I would never expect Love to give up their dreams."

"Even though you broke up with them when their vet-school workload interfered with your relationship?"

I buried my face in my hands. " Mom . That was years ago."

"I'm a mother, Lovett. My memory is long."

"I can't believe you're embarrassing me like this."

Dad snorted but wisely kept to the shadows.

"Sweetness, we live in small-town Texas, and two of my three children are queer. I want you to imagine what it's like to not have a moment's peace, because that is my life. We did what we could to raise you to be strong, to withstand other people's stares and comments, but that shit cannot be coming from inside the house."

"Mom…"

"Actually, Love, I don't blame your mom," Leo said, taking my hand. "Jules was married before—did you know that?"

I shook my head.

"It wasn't for long, but the woman she married didn't accept her. Didn't love her the way she should've been loved. Even though she'd known she was marrying a trans woman, she treated Jules like she was ‘less than' for being trans. And the more I got to know Jules, the madder it made me. Your mom's right: If you're to be safe anywhere, it has to be in your own damned house."

"Exactly," Mom said, then frowned because she was agreeing with Leo.

She never could stay mad. I knew I'd gotten it from somewhere.

Leo kissed the top of my head, then turned to her. "Mrs. Underwood, I don't know how much Love has shared with you, but I didn't have the best childhood, and that left scars. The time you're talking about, when Love suggested that we take a step back, they were trying to protect my feelings—but the way my therapist explained it to me, my emotions were like a live wire then, and I couldn't handle even the faintest hint that they didn't love me as much as I loved them."

"Lovett mentioned you'd chandeliered."

Leo tilted his head, as if visualizing what she meant. "My therapist calls it rejection sensitivity. Chandelier is a little fancy for my blood. I was definitely hitting that one bald light bulb a whole lot, though."

Dad choked back a laugh. Mom thinned her lips, but I could see the beginnings of a smile.

"See what I hafta deal with?" I complained with a grin.

" Anyway ," Leo continued, narrowing his twinkling eyes at me. "I loved Love so much—still do—that their suggestion to cool things down hurt as if they'd punched me in the gut. It was a massive overreaction, as well as a signal that I wasn't in the right headspace for a mature relationship."

"And now?" Dad asked, finally joining the conversation.

"I've spent a lot of time the last few years going to therapy, improving myself, trying to be the kind of man that someone like Love could love in return. That they're willing to give me a chance… It means more than you could ever know. More than they could ever know," he said, raising my knuckles to his soft lips for a kiss.

By the end of his speech, my mother had her hand to her chest, tears threatening to spill as my father put his arm around her shoulders. I swear, my man could charm a billy goat.

"Just as long as he treats you right," Junior said, walking into the kitchen with a tray of his delicious mini flan. "Because I will bust a can of whoop-ass on him if he so much as looks at you crosswise."

Leo rolled his eyes, then waited for Junior to set down the desserts before giving him a big, boisterous hug. Not many people made Junior look small, but Leo did.

Tanner, Junior's elven Goth husband, walked into the kitchen carrying a potted azalea, the explosion of flowers bigger than he was. He took in the scene with one of his wry grins.

"Tan, I told you I'd get that." Junior hustled to take the large pot from his husband's hands.

When they'd first gotten together, Tanner had been a skinny little thing, but as his landscape business grew, he put on muscles and got some sun. He still had a trim figure, but now it was far more powerful. Junior, however, had never stopped doting on him.

Mom looked between Junior fussing after Tanner, and Leo wrapping his arms around me, and a big smile broke across her face. Dad headed outside and returned a minute later with Peter, each of them carrying massive potted plants in a riot of colors.

Dad paused to drop a kiss on Mom's lips before Tanner led them out to the yard, where he was refreshing the flower garden he'd built for Mom.

Peter was the first back in the door, and he wiped the dirt off his hands before extending one to Leo. "I assume Mom has given you the third degree."

"You know it."

Justine, Peter's wife, came in from the living room, where she'd been resting. She was eight months pregnant and glowed when Peter placed his hand on her belly. "Oh, don't you worry about Momma Underwood. Her bark is worse than her bite. She's just real protective of her kids."

Mom preened at the compliment, and Justine sidled in close to us. She leaned toward Leo and whispered, "Just you wait. The second she sees you as family, she'll be just as protective of you as of anyone else."

Leo cleared his throat, shifting on his feet. "Well, I don't have any family, at least any I'd claim. So, uh, I don't mind working to win her approval."

A line appeared between Mom's brows, and she glared at me. "You didn't say he didn't have family."

"I don't think he knew his dad. And his mom…" I let my words drift off, unsure what Leo would want to share.

Leo kissed my temple, then went in. "My mom was a sex worker addicted to heroin. One of her cousins was her pimp, and another was her dealer. The dealer cousin started cutting the heroin with fentanyl and accidentally killed her. He went to jail, and the state put me with the pimp cousin. That didn't go well for me. But I'm better now."

I covered my mouth with my hand to stop myself from laughing. None of what he'd said was the slightest bit funny, of course. But Leo was being Leo, laying it all out there so people knew who he was, and it couldn't be used against him.

Mom blinked once, then twice, and then she pushed me aside. As I opened my mouth to object, she wrapped her arms around Leo's middle and pulled him in close. "That is the most awful thing I've ever heard, sweetie. I promise, if you ever need a mom to talk to, I'll always be here for you."

I lifted my hands. "What about protecting your baby? What about making sure he's good for me?"

Mom gave me a look , and I shook my head.

Justine coughed an "I told you so" into her fist. "You know it's all over for you, right, Leo?"

His sunny grin lit up the room. "If it is, then I'm the luckiest guy in the whole wide world."