by Sophie Oak
She was sitting on the hospital bed, her hand wrapped in Seth’s. Since he’d come out of his surgery, neither one of them had left the hospital. Two days later and Georgia had managed to grease the wheels enough to get a double room converted into a nice big suite for all future Bliss patients, courtesy of the new Seth Stark wing of the hospital. Actually, she’d convinced them to make two since gunfights had become a regular occurrence in town. Her brother was quietly recovering in the suite next door. He was grumpy and caustic to the nurses. All of them except Naomi. When Naomi walked in, Logan had noticed that Win was suddenly on his best behavior.
“He seems like he’s trying to buy the whole town,” Stef grumbled.
“Hush, babe.” Jen Talbot had a smile on her face. She pretty much always did, as though the world amused her to no end. She settled her hand on her belly. She looked ready to pop, but someone had told Logan that she still had a little time left.
Would she find what he had to say next amusing?
“I think Stef here just likes to be the richest man in town.” Caleb snorted a little Stef’s way. “Not that he is. My bank account is way bigger.”
Stef rolled his gray eyes. “Yeah, well, you’re also the stingiest man in town.”
Caleb shrugged. “Hey, it’s how I keep being the richest man in town. I don’t go around buying a bunch of crap.”
“Except for the massive cabin, all the new medical equipment, and the brand-spanking-new ambulance,” Holly murmured.
“Do not to be forgetting the new bed. Yes, that was good purchase. That bed is not a California kingdom. It is much bigger. I swear this new bed is from Russia,” Alexei said with a smile and his patented bad English. “It is bed for Russian acrobats.”
Momma looked at the big Russian. “Are you going to start talking nasty around the young’uns, Markov?”
The ex-Russian mobster shook his head. “Oh, no. It is plain to see Miss Georgia here is very innocent.”
Georgia didn’t even blush. “Thank you. I am a delicate flower.”
Holly laughed. “Sorry about that. Neither one of them has a sense of decorum.” She stood up. “Seth, I’m glad to hear they’re letting you go tomorrow. I’m going to take my gorgeous monsters home. I look forward to the makeover party.”
“Oh, yes, we’re still having that. And Nell said she would bring a soothsayer along to bless the cabin after all the death and destruction,” Georgia said. “Hey, I bet someone who makes a living off of soothsaying probably needs a makeover, too.”
Georgia would make over the world if it would let her. She would make it beautiful and cover it in little rhinestones so it always shined. God, he hoped she still looked at him the same way. He closed his eyes and just fucking said the words he had been holding inside for a year.
“I was going to tell them.”
He opened his eyes. The whole room turned to him. His ma was holding hands with Momma, both of them watching and waiting. Standing by as they always had.
“What are you talking about?” Seth asked.
Holly seemed to understand. “Logan, you don’t have to do this.”
Alexei shook his head. “He does, Holly. He needs this. He needs to be a man. That was taken from him. He take back by talking and doing the right things and letting himself love.”
Logan felt a well of emotion. It had been blocked for so long. He’d shoved it down and ignored its existence, but he couldn’t now. “You’re wrong about one thing, Alexei. I wasn’t a man before. I was a kid, and maybe that would have changed on its own. Or maybe not. I lived this charmed life, and I didn’t have to see the sacrifices that were made for me. I didn’t have to see them as sacrifices at all. I just saw it as my due. My moms sacrificed. They could have gone somewhere where they would have been easily accepted, had friends like them, but they stayed here because of me. Because they thought this was the best thing for me. God, I can’t imagine what it was like all those years ago. It’s great now.”
“Logan,” Ma began, but Momma shook her head.
“You let him talk, Teeny. He’s finally doing what we asked him to do. He’s dealing with it,” Momma said. “And it wasn’t so bad, son.”
“She’s being Marie, Logan. They had tough times here. Stella talks about it. Sure, it’s good now. It’s great because of people of like Marie and Teeny,” Stef said. “Because they helped change the generation that came before. They were strong, and now the world is a little better.”
“I didn’t see the pain they endured. I was a child and the world revolved around me until one day it didn’t. The world revolved around my pain and my sacrifice and it was all bullshit because I broke. God, I broke.” He didn’t want to say the words. He hesitated and then felt a hand in his. Georgia. She threaded their fingers together, and he noticed that she reached for Seth, too. Their strength was his, an offering of love. This was what he’d had growing up. A family that held on, that gave each other strength to do the things that needed to be done.
He held his head up and looked Alexei in the eye. “I apologize. I would have done the same thing. And I would get on that table again myself if it meant saving my people.”
Alexei nodded. “This I know. You say you were child, but even then you had heart of a great man.”
“I didn’t. Did you not hear what I said? I broke. I wanted you and Holly and Stef and Jen here because I have to tell you that I was going to tell them everything I knew. It wasn’t much, but Luka had beaten me so badly. I just wanted it to stop. I was going to give you all up. I am so sorry.”
There it was. The heart of all his pain. His shame.
Seth sat up, moving slowly. “How many times, brother?”
Jamie came to stand beside him. “Yeah. I was just thinking the same thing.”
“What?” What were they talking about?
Noah shook his head. His three childhood friends stood together. “Damn, man. Don’t you remember? When we were kids, we would see how long we could stand things. Like how long we could run in place. Or how far we could swim. You had a ritual when we would do it.”
Jamie took over. “You would talk to yourself. You would say just one more minute and I’ll get to stop. And then the minute would be up and you would say it again. You were such a stubborn shit. He actually passed out once when we were trying to see who could go the longest without taking a breath. The sucker turned blue.”
Seth nodded. “So we’ll ask again. How many times did you say it?”
It came back to him in a great rush. God, how could he have forgotten? He hadn’t really. It had just been an incidental thing, something meaningless in the great nightmare that had been the day. Even as they’d pulled him into the office, he’d already been at it.
Ten minutes. I can take ten minutes and that’s all Alexei has.
Ten minutes had become an hour, until he counted the time in blows and lashes and bites of pain.
Two more and I can be done. Just two more.
“I don’t know. I lost count.”
Jen Talbot stepped in front of him, her gentle hands reaching for his face. “Logan Green, you never would have said a thing. You had every opportunity to stop it. You took that pain for me and Holly and, Logan, you didn’t know it then, but you took that pain for my baby and any babies we have later. This baby is going to live and breathe and grow because of what you did.”
“You never would have said it,” Stef agreed. “I saw some of it. That was not a boy on that desk. That was a man I was damn proud to know. That was a man I’m going to name my son after because I hope he has half your courage.”
Holly was surrounded by her men, their arms around her, somber looks on their faces as she cried freely. “I…we are so grateful to you, Logan. We love you.”
“I love you.” Georgia wrapped her arms around him. “I love you so much. I’m so proud to be your girl.”
Seth reached for his hand. “Hey, of course you are, baby. Logan Green is a big fucking deal. He’s my hero. Always has been.”
“You’re my boy. You’re our boy and we’re proud,” his momma vowed.
Logan let go. He’d held it for so long, but there was no need now. He cried. He let it out in a great yell that had the nurses rushing in, but he barely saw them because he was surrounded, protected. Arms came around him, hugging him, and familiar voices soothed him and somewhere in that great show of love he did the one thing he hadn’t managed to do.
He forgave himself.
Chapter Nineteen
Georgia walked into the dungeon prepared for just about anything. After all, this was her wedding night.
“What do you think?” Seth asked. He looked entirely perfect in his Armani tux. Prince Charming in the flesh. “I tried to get it right. I wanted it to be a perfect mix of romance and, well, whatever it is that Logan does to you.”
“Dude, I do dirty things to her. This place is sweet. What’s up with the flowers?” Logan walked into the dungeon, his hands already going to the buttons on his dress shirt. He’d dumped the tux coat the first chance he’d had. He turned and winked at her as he questioned the flowers.
“The flowers are romantic,” she countered.
“Baby, so are these handcuffs,” Logan said, holding up a shiny pair and giving her a wolfish leer.
Somehow everything was romantic with these two. “I love the handcuffs. And I love the flowers, too.” They were calla lilies, her favorite, of course. Seth would never get anything less.
They were so beautiful, her men. Logan was all alpha male hotness while Seth was the perfect modern male and somehow, someway, they fit perfectly together. She thanked the heavens for that day so long ago when two boys from different worlds had become friends because she hadn’t known it at the time, but her life had started in that moment.
“Hey, this is supposed to be a happy day.” Seth crowded her, reaching up to brush away tears she didn’t realize she was shedding.
Logan crowded her other side. “She is happy. She’s just Georgia. She’s always going to feel everything, and I love her for it.” He bent down and kissed her cheek. “And she should be happy I didn’t kill her brothers.”
She smiled brightly. It had been a hell of a wedding. She’d only had two weeks to plan it, but she’d discovered that Seth’s checkbook opened many doors. And the ones that had remained closed came open once they had been met with the one-two-three punch of Georgia, Nell, and Rachel. Nell and Rachel had done their good cop-bad cop routine and then Georgia had cried. Those poor florists hadn’t stood a chance. Georgia had argued that they needed at least a year, and Seth had negotiated her down to six months. Then super Dom laid down the law. He wanted to be married like right now. She’d thought Seth was the ruthless one, but Logan had it in spades when it came to making things legal. She was now legally married to Seth Stark, but she had signed a contract with Logan and the ceremony they’d just had hours ago might not have been perfectly legal, but it was binding to them.
She’d pulled off a gorgeous, intimate wedding, but Logan was right, her brothers had been a little obnoxious. “Sorry. I think Mark and Drew just wanted to make sure you were all right, you know.”
“Georgia, they jumped me at my bachelor party,” Logan shot back.
She winced a little, but then remembered what Logan had done. “You managed to take them both out.”
“Only because I had Jamie and Noah and Seth with me. Seth was the one who figured out it was an ambush, and Jamie is damn nasty in a fight. They turned my bachelor party into Fight Club.” Logan had a grin on his face. Despite his grumpy complaining, she knew he’d enjoyed the exercise. He totally fit into her crazy-ass family and so did Seth.
“Hey, Win is on board now.” Only because he and Logan had a man-to-man where she happened to know that Logan had promised to lay down his life for her and, more than that, he’d promised to help her find what she really wanted to do in life.
She’d been thinking a bit, and she really liked the kids of Bliss. They didn’t have a school to call their own. It might be fun. She knew damn well she could raise the funds. A private academy that the town would control, would decide on, would prepare their kids for the future in.
Her kids. One day, but not like now or anything. She was really young. It was her time to have fun, to explore, to see the world, and she got to do it with the loves of her life.
“Georgia, I like your brothers. I intend to get along with your brothers. But you need to understand one thing.” Logan’s eyes had narrowed in that sexy little look he gave her just before he tossed her over his knee and started in on her ass. “You belong to us now. This is our family, and I’m the head.”
Yeah, that look totally made her girl parts start to sing. We’re getting some tonight!
“You’re in charge of part,” Seth said, squaring off with Logan.
“I’m in charge of part.” Logan put a hand on Seth’s shoulder. “And you’re in charge of part. And she’s totally in charge of our dicks, so she’s the really big fucking deal.”
She was in charge of more than their dicks. They were guys. It was just the way they talked, but she was totally in charge of their hearts, and that did make her a big deal. “Are you two going to congratulate yourselves on being the tough guy and the rich guy? Because the last time I checked, the hot chick was still in her wedding dress.”
It was a gorgeous confection of silk and lace, a Monique Lhuillier she’d selected with Nat’s help. It was hard to believe that her whole family was under one roof and she was about to have crazy, whacked-out sex with her husbands. Luckily, Seth had promised her the dungeon was completely soundproofed. Earlier when she’d given her brothers a tour, she’d offered to show them the dungeon because they were all in the lifestyle, but Mark had turned green and Drew and Ben had shaken their heads. Only Chase had been willing to explain that no matter how high tech the dungeon was, he didn’t want to see where his little sister got her ass whipped.
They whipped so much more than her ass and she loved them for it, but it had been days and she was dying.
Seth sat back, looking at her, his eyes roaming. Logan stood beside him. Neither one said a thing, just stared, emotion plain on their faces.
“Guys, you’re going to give me a complex, and I already have like ten of those.” Why weren’t they attacking her?
“Give us a minute, baby,” Logan said. “Tell her what we’re doing. You’re better with words.”
“We’re memorizing you,” Seth explained. “We’ve been doing it all day. We just stare and make sure to take in every detail of the way you look and smell and feel in this moment because you’re the most beautiful thing either of us has ever seen, and when you’re ninety years old and we have great grandkids running all over the cabin, you should know that what we’ll be seeing is you, just the way you look today.”
Seth was really good with words. “I love you.”
And they would always be these men, young and strong and so beautiful it hurt to look at them. No matter what would happen in life, they would always be the way she’d seen them on their wedding day.
“Seth, would you please present our sub to me?” Logan asked as he shrugged out of his shirt and sank into one of two leather chairs she liked to think of as their thrones. There wasn’t one for her because, they’d explained, she was always to sit in their laps. She didn’t need a chair when she had her men.
Seth got up, striding across the gleaming dungeon like a panther who’d just scented prey. He walked straight up to her, but she knew the drill. She didn’t flinch when he got into her space. Presentation. Logan loved this part, seemed endlessly fascinated with Seth slowly peeling back the layers of her clothes and unveiling her to the Dom. Sex with her men could be hard and quick and satisfying at times, but she loved it most when they took their time, playing with her for hours, bonding the three of them together.
Seth gently pulled the pins out of her hair, letting the waves cascade over her shoulders, arranging them to his liking. He pushed the littl
e straps of the gown down, his hands caressing her shoulders. Ah, the warm-up, as she liked to call it. It could last for hours. Hours where they simply worshipped her skin, running their hands all over her, staring at her body like she was a work of art they were studying. It was guaranteed to have her begging before they took her.
He leaned over, softly rubbing his lips over hers, nibbling on her bottom lip and drawing it inside before planting soft kisses all over her face. “What part should I present first, boss?”
Logan was the boss in the bedroom. Seth made the financial decisions. And they had a mutual agreement that as they both learned the other’s roles, they would make the decisions together because they were a family.
“I want to see my sub’s breasts.”
Seth’s hand briefly toyed with the small platinum and diamond collar around her neck. Along with two wedding rings, she had taken their collar as well. Every time she touched it, she was reminded of how loved and protected she was.
She had her collar and they had their tats. Seth had a matching one to Logan’s, a gorgeous G on his chest proclaiming to all the world that he was taken. And Logan couldn’t ever claim again that it was for his last name because his last name wasn’t Green anymore.
Tears threatened when she remembered the moment. “I can’t believe Momma Marie actually cried.”
The sweetest smile came over Logan’s face. “It was a long time coming. I’m just glad Ma was able to keep the secret and Seth was able to push it through so fast. Marie Warner is the head of our family. It was long past time we took her name.”
At the anniversary party the night before, Logan and Teeny had given Marie a gift. Their change of name certificates. Logan and Teeny Warner. As it should always have been. Momma Marie, the toughest woman in Bliss, had broken down and cried because after all this time, her family shared her name.
And she’d told Georgia how pleased she was that she would be known as Georgia Stark-Warner. It was kind of the best name ever.
