by Marla Monroe
After another twenty minutes, they stomped off their feet on the back porch and opened the door. Caleb walked through first and grinned as he hurried toward her with arms open wide.
“No! I just got out of the shower. Don’t you dare get horse on me.” Beverly ran around the kitchen table in an effort to avoid him.
Jeff walked in and laughed as Caleb chased her around the table again.
“Jeff. Don’t let him get me dirty. I just changed clothes.” Beverly was laughing so hard she had trouble talking.
Finally Caleb stopped and pouted in her direction. “Can’t even get any sugar from my wife when I’ve been out working my ass off.”
She grinned and cocked her head to one side. “I don’t know about that. Looks like you’ve got a nice round one to me.”
He lunged for her again, and she screeched as she ran into the living room. They followed her but continued on up the stairs.
“We’re going to clean up. Be down in a little while to eat, Bev,” Caleb said.
She drew in a deep breath to calm down and returned to what she had been doing when they walked inside. She had enjoyed that. If only everyday could be like that. Maybe they would be. They hadn’t been together a solid week yet. She needed to stop feeling so anxious. Caleb seemed to be happy with her now. She was sure over time they would all come to care and maybe even love each other. She glanced toward the door. At least she hoped so.
* * * *
“How long will it take you to be ready to leave, Bev?” Caleb asked after they had finished eating.
“Just give me twenty minutes to wipe everything down.” She quickly gathered up the plates and carried them to the sink.
They were only a fifteen-minute walk away and less than that by transport, but the men had taken longer than they had planned to clean up and dress. She was glad they were taking the transport since they might be late getting home. She didn’t much want to walk in the late afternoon when those mantis creatures might be out roaming around. Even though they hadn’t seen any sign of them since that first time, she wasn’t willing to take any chances.
Drying her hands on the dish towel, Beverly went in search of the men to tell them she was ready. They were sitting in the office discussing the horses.
“Ready, baby?” Jeff asked when she walked in.
“All ready. I can’t wait to meet them.”
Caleb pulled on her hair before wrapping an arm around her shoulders. Jeff swatted her on the butt and took the lead as they walked through the house to the back door. It was easier to go out the back and through the gate to get to the shed where they kept the transport than it was to walk all around the front to get to it. Plus, since they had parked by the barn to unload the horses, it would have been even farther from the front.
“Were our neighbors there picking up their horses when you were there?” she asked.
Jeff fastened her into the harness before fixing his own. “Yeah, they were loading up and getting ready to leave when we got there.”
Caleb started the buggy up and pulled away from the barn. Beverly looked around them as they drove in hopes of spotting any more stone berry bushes. They seemed to arrive before she even had time to settle in for the ride. Caleb pulled them up close to the porch then cut the motor. While Jeff unfastened their safety gear, Caleb jumped down from the transport and walked around to wait on them to climb down.
They had just walked up on the front porch when the door swung open and a tall man with tanned skin and shaggy, black hair stepped out on the porch. He looked to be a couple of inches over six feet and had dark eyes. Caleb climbed the steps and held out his hand.
“Hey, Nelson, how was the trip home with the horses?”
“Caleb.” He shook his hand. “No trouble at all. They seem to be settling in fine. Hey, Jeff.”
Jeff kept one hand at the small of her back as they stepped up on the porch. Nelson smiled and shook Jeff’s hand.
“This is our wife, Beverly. This is Nelson Jones.”
The other man nodded his head toward her. Beverly smiled.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.”
“Come on in. Sloan is inside with our wife, Faye. She’s been jumping up and down like a kid all excited about meeting you.” Nelson opened the door and ushered them inside.
Beverly saw right away that their houses were exactly the same except in the color schemes. She guessed it was easier to build a lot of them in a short amount of time if you only had to deal with one set of plans.
Her attention was drawn to the pretty, blonde-headed woman walking into the room from the direction of what she assumed was the kitchen. Another tall man with light-brown hair stood beside her. The woman had the prettiest blue eyes she had ever seen. She couldn’t have been more than five foot three, and she was almost as dark as Nelson.
“This is Faye and my partner, Sloan Hucklebee.” Nelson finished the introductions out.
“Why don’t we head to the kitchen? I have coffee ready, and we can take the men theirs in the office. I know they are planning to work.” Faye smiled and led the way to the kitchen. “Is it much of a trip between our places?” she asked.
Beverly shook her head. “No, I barely got settled in before we were here. I wouldn’t much like walking back and forth with the creatures we have out there, but it’s not far at all.”
“Have you seen any of them yet?” Faye asked.
“We saw one of the mantis things when we were driving to the house the first day, and then the next day when the men were coming in from working on the fence, there were several of them in the yard. It scared me to death until the men made it back inside.”
“We’ve had a couple show up right at dark, and we’ve had several run-ins with those dog like creatures they call dorries. Nasty things with a mouth full of teeth.” She filled the cups as they talked.
“I haven’t seen anything like that yet, thank goodness.”
“Let’s carry their coffee to them then we can come back and talk.” Faye led the way back to the office.
Once they had returned to the kitchen, they settled at the table. Beverly already liked Faye. She was a pleasant woman and seemed to be around her age. Despite her model good looks, the woman was friendly and didn’t seem the least bit snobbish.
“Have you gotten your garden in?” Beverly asked.
“Yes, thank goodness. It was a chore though. I’m a pretty good cook and can put up food without problems, but I have never worked a garden before other than some window boxes for herbs. I was a chef back on Earth.”
“Wow. I know your husbands are happy. You’ll probably come up with some really good meals using some of the native plants. You’ll have to teach me.”
Faye laughed. “I don’t know about that. We’ll see. I’ll be glad to share anything I make though.”
“I’ll help you with the garden when you have questions. I was raised on a farm, so I’ve always had one.”
“Boy would my guys like it if you had been here yesterday then.” She chuckled. “I think Sloan was ready to stuff my mouth with a rag by the end of the day. I had to ask a million questions. I should have paid better attention on the shuttle.”
Beverly laughed, and the two of them talked about everything from canning to how much they missed Earth.
“We’ll have to plan to talk to each other on the radio every day,” Faye suggested.
“I agree. I wonder how the men are going to schedule their workdays? They’ve been so busy that I haven’t even asked if someone has to work at night or not.”
Faye shook her head. “I think I remember Sloan and Nelson discussing it. They were saying that without fences to keep them in one general area, they might have to work some nights to keep them from scattering too much.”
“Maybe this first year they won’t have to since they won’t have more than six or seven hundred head to keep up with. Then, by the time the herd has grown, there should be more hands to help out.”
Beverly realized
she was getting sleepy. She checked the clock on the wall and noticed it was only seven. Why was she so tired? She struggled with a yawn, covering her mouth.
“Goodness. I don’t know why I’m so sleepy all of a sudden.” She yawned again.
Faye laughed. “If your men are anything like my men, you’re not getting a lot of sleep at night.”
Beverly felt her face heat up. No doubt her cheeks were red as a barn. The other woman laughed.
“Don’t tell me you’re shy. How can you be shy with two husbands?” she asked.
“I guess I’m just like that. I can’t help it.” She wanted to change the subject, but it looked like Faye was anything but shy.
“Don’t you just love having both of them paying attention to you at one time? I mean who would complain about having two mouths on your breasts at the same time?” She giggled.
Beverly smiled but didn’t say anything. She was afraid she would embarrass herself. She totally agreed with Faye, but talking about it was a little beyond her reach.
“What about when they both take you at the same time? I’ve nearly passed out every time, it’s so good.” Faye looked at her then cocked her head. “You haven’t had sex with both of them at the same time yet, have you?”
“Um, no. Not yet.” She wished the floor would open up and swallow her.
“Why not? It’s un-freaking-believable!” the other woman said.
“Well, they’ve been, um, waiting for me to, um, get used to the idea. I’ve never really had sex like that before.”
Faye frowned and looked at her. “Bev, it’s amazing. You have nothing to be scared of. They should prepare you some before you try it. Have they been doing that?”
Beverly knew her entire face and neck were solid red by now. She nodded her head.
“Well, good. That means they know what they are doing. You don’t have to be nervous about it. Just remember to relax and push out against his cock when he’s pushing in your ass. It may burn a little bit at first, but it stops after a few seconds, and once they get going, it’s wonderful, almost spiritual how close the three of you feel.”
Beverly couldn’t believe they were talking about sex—anal sex at that. She knew the guys wanted to do it, but she’d balked each time they got close to trying it. They’d prepared her a little almost every time they’d had sex. It sounded like she was denying them all something that was special. Now she felt selfish and cowardly for holding out.
“Hey, there’s nothing wrong with feeling a little unsure or nervous about it. It’s not exactly conventional. I’d had anal sex before back on Earth before all of this, so I wasn’t really worried about the two-on-one thing.”
“I guess I led a pretty sheltered life. I’ve really only had two boyfriends, and they weren’t very, um, adventurous.”
“Nothing wrong with that except that you were missing out on some major pleasure. I bet you wouldn’t want to go back to one-man missionary position now, would you?” Faye giggled and winked at her.
Beverly realized that Faye was absolutely right. Now that she’d experienced sex with Jeff and Caleb, she wasn’t in any hurry to let go of them. Maybe it was time she relaxed and tried sex with both of them at the same time. They’d been very patient and hadn’t pushed her when she’d resisted their efforts to get her to try it.
“What have you girls been discussing in here that has Beverly all red and embarrassed?” Caleb’s deep voice startled her.
Chapter Thirteen
Beverly hadn’t even heard them walk into the room. Looking up, the men all had amused expression on their faces. Faye frowned at them.
“None of your business. Did you want more coffee? I can make some real fast.” She got up and walked over to the counter.
“No, thanks, Faye. We better head out. It’s after eight now.” Jeff wrapped a hand around the back of Beverly’s neck and lightly squeezed. “We really appreciate y’all letting us drop in and visit for a while.”
“It was our pleasure,” Nelson said. “I’m glad we could work out the schedule so that it works for all of us.”
“We’ll see how things go and make a decision on if we need to make those changes we talked about sooner rather than later.” Caleb nodded at Sloan.
Beverly stood up and let Jeff draw her out of the kitchen into the living room toward the front door. The other two men followed them, each having an arm around Faye. It was obvious to her that they all got along fine. She was glad for them and hoped that she and her husbands continued to grow closer. Maybe if she tried sex with both of them it would help like Faye had hinted at.
When Jeff started to open the door, Sloan stepped forward and grabbed the gun from next to the office doorway.
“Let me walk you out. Like I said earlier, we’ve had several of those mantis things around the house at night.”
Caleb nodded, and they all walked out on the porch. The sun was just setting, and everything had an orangey ting to it. Caleb hurried over to the buggy and opened the passenger door before walking around to the other side to get in. Jeff helped her up into the transport while Sloan kept watch on the porch with the gun in his hands.
By the time they were buckled in and Caleb was ready to pull out, Sloan had disappeared back inside the house. When they turned around in front of the house to head back home, several creatures ran across in front of them but didn’t attack or try and follow them.
Beverly shivered at the sight of them. “I hope there aren’t any around our house waiting on us.”
Jeff squeezed her hand. “Don’t worry. We have the guns with us.”
Caleb looked over at her and smiled. “Did you have a good time?”
Beverly grinned back. “I really did. Faye is nice. Did you know she was a chef on Earth? She’s going to teach me some new recipes.”
“That sounds good, but there’s nothing wrong with your cooking, baby.” Jeff kissed her cheek.
“I’m more interested in what had you blushing so badly,” Caleb teased.
“None of your business, nosey.” She smiled then yawned and closed her eyes. She was so sleepy.
“Looks like someone is tired.” Jeff’s voice sounded like it was coming from a different room.
Why couldn’t she keep her eyes open? She hadn’t really done anything all day long other than the exercises before lunch. Maybe it was lack of sleep. They hadn’t slept much the night before. Even though they had gone to bed early, the guys had woken her up several times to play.
She knew she was drifting off, but she couldn’t seem to help herself. She couldn’t ever remember being this sleepy before. At some point she could have sworn the guys were trying to wake her up, but she couldn’t make her eyes open. What was wrong with her?
* * * *
“What in the hell is wrong with her?” Caleb opened the front door while still holding the gun and watching for creatures so Jeff could carry Beverly inside.
“I don’t know. I’ve never known anyone to sleep this deep before. She never has since we’ve been together.”
Caleb put the gun up after closing and locking the door. “Take her upstairs. We’ll try to wake her up again once we get her ready for bed.”
He didn’t like this one bit. Had she eaten something she was allergic to while they’d been at their neighbor’s house? He hadn’t seen anything sitting around like a cake or anything. He followed Jeff up and hurried over to pull back the covers on the bed so he could lay her down. They worked together to undress her.
“What is this?” Jeff held one of her sandals in his hand while holding her foot up.
“What?”
“See. This yellowish-green color on her ankle. I’ve never seen that on her before. I would have noticed.”
“Let’s get the rest of her clothes off then look at it.” Caleb quickly unbuttoned her blouse then pulled it off before unfastening her bra and removing it as well.
Jeff had her pants and underwear off and was examining the weird bumps on her skin.
�
�They look almost like blisters, but they’re yellow and green. It doesn’t make sense. What would cause that?”
Caleb shook his head. “Do you think this is why she’s not waking up?”
“It can’t be a coincidence. I don’t believe in them.”
“Me either. I’m going to call Sloan and Nelson on the radio and make sure she didn’t eat or drink anything while she was there that we didn’t. I’ll be right back.” Caleb hurried out the door and down to the office.
When he got hold of the other men, they checked with Faye and assured him that she hadn’t had anything other than the one cup of coffee like they’d had. Faye had told them that she’d started getting sleepy around seven though. She hadn’t complained of anything bothering her or mentioned the weird bumps on her ankle to Faye.
He thanked them and, after promising to let them know how she was doing, signed off and ran back up the stairs to check on her.
“There’s no change except that the bumps seem to be a little bigger, but I’m not sure,” Jeff said.
Caleb filled him in on what the others had said. “Do you think that maybe she was reacting to something when we thought she was blushing so badly?”
“I guess it’s possible. I don’t understand it. Surely if she’d gotten bitten or scratched by something she would have told us.” Jeff was sitting on the side of the bed watching her.
“Do you think whatever it is on her ankle is contagious for us if we touch it?” Caleb asked.
“Crap. I touched it.” Jeff looked at his hands, but they looked fine and weren’t bothering him or anything.
“We better cover it just to be safe. They look like little blisters. They might open up and drain at some point.”
Jeff nodded and left to locate their first aid supplies. Caleb felt her forehead but didn’t think she was running a temperature. Right now, she looked like Sleeping Beauty. Nothing else seemed wrong.
His partner returned with the first aid box and a towel. They covered the oddly colored bumps and agreed that they looked a little bigger than before. Jeff wrapped more gauze around the bandage to make sure it didn’t leak during the night.
