Sirens in Bliss

Chapter Nine:

Stef and Jen

Jen stepped out onto the balcony and looked down at the gorgeously decorated party space below. The morning had flown by and now the afternoon was here and the party had begun. She’d done pretty well if she did say so herself. The backyard was elegantly decorated. The manicured lawn was filled with beautifully dressed people eating the best food and drinking the best wine she could afford. The mountains in the distance lent the scene a gauzy, soft feel, like the world was just one big well-painted landscape.

All the men were on the mountain at their party. She wondered if Stef was smiling and having a good time.

“Everything is so beautiful,” Shelley McNamara soon-to-be Meyer said as she looked around the balcony. The bride-to-be was wearing a pretty summer dress that set off her black hair. She had been out on the lawn talking to the guests who had come out to her small Bliss pre-wedding reception. She looked even prettier up close.

Jen felt a little like a watermelon around the radiant bride. Shelley McNamara had a lovely sense of style. With her raven black hair and stylish dress, she was rapidly making Jen feel like a big old cow.

“Thanks, I love throwing parties,” Jen murmured. She wished she could have a sip of wine, of tequila, of anything.

“Well, this is one I’ll remember for a long time. I just wanted to say thank you.” Shelley waved to someone on the lawn. “I’m going to go downstairs. I see my friends. Thank you again.”

She hurried along, her heels clacking along the floor. Jen couldn’t wear heels right now. She couldn’t fit into that svelte, sleek little dress Shelley was wearing.

“I know that look. I’ve had that look on my face many times.” Rachel shook her head as she looked over the crowd. “I hate her.”

Jen had to smile. Rachel was always ready to lend a hand. There was no one in the world more loyal than her friend Rachel. It had been a blessing to find her. “No, you don’t.”

“Yes, I do. I hate whoever you hate.”

Callie walked up, a margarita in her hand. “Who do we hate?”

They were her girls. Callie and Rach always had her back. Her dour mood began to lift and she couldn’t help but tease her friend. “Honey, we hate you because you’re the only one of us who can booze it up. I hired two bartenders for this pre-wedding reception and all I can ask for is a Shirley Temple.”

Callie put her drink down. “Well, I’m the only one who’s not pregnant. And I’m not going to be for a little while. I’m taking a break from gestating. There are four men living in my house. Can you imagine the mess when my babies get to be teenagers? My whole cabin is going to smell like feet. I totally need the tequila.”

Rachel was pregnant again, but she was barely showing. And she had to beat her husbands off her even when she was round as a beach ball. Just a few weeks before, Rachel and Max had gotten locked in a closet at the art gallery where they were sneaking away for some fun in the afternoon.

Stef wouldn’t touch her now. How did she talk to her friends about it when they seemed to never have problems tempting their husbands? Max and Rye were all over Rachel, and Nate and Zane liked to bring the babies over to the estate so they could spend some time in the guesthouse. Callie liked to talk about how sore she was.

Jen was perfectly unsore except for her back and her feet, and that was the baby’s fault. She really wanted some aches and pains that went along with remembered pleasure.

Stef rubbed her feet and her lower back and then he would turn out the lights because “she needed her rest.” She needed her husband, but it seemed like her husband didn’t need her.

“What’s going on, hon?” Rachel asked. “You look sad.”

Suddenly she just knew she couldn’t share this. It was stupid. She should be able to share anything with her friends. They loved her and she loved them and she just couldn’t tell them that her husband didn’t want her anymore. She still had some small amount of pride. What the hell was she going to do?

“I’m just tired,” Jen said, staring out over the lawn. Everyone seemed so happy and peaceful. She was a ball of anxiety when she wasn’t perfectly content. She swung from excitement about her son’s impending arrival to a deep worry that Stef wasn’t happy.

“Well, you should be.” Callie patted her back. “You’re breathing for two, eating for two, living for two.”

“Don’t be hard on yourself,” Rachel said. “It’s your first baby. You need to eat like there’s no tomorrow and sleep like you never will sleep again, because you won’t. I don’t care if Stef stays up with the baby, you’ll still get up because he’s your boy.”

Her baby might be her only boy now. She’d gone through a thousand scenarios—from Stef telling her he’d been joking all along, to their inevitable divorce where she ended up raising a baby over Stella’s in that little one bedroom apartment she’d first lived in when she’d come to Bliss.

“It’s all going to be better in a few months,” Callie offered. “The first couple are hard, but you’ll see it gets back to normal. Or you find a new normal. Stef will settle down.”

They all looked out over the lawn. In the distance, a single Jeep was flying down the drive.

“Oh, no. I think I see Cassidy coming up the drive.” Rachel’s eyes narrowed as she looked out over the estate’s long road. “I thought she was going into the bunker. She put it out over the radio earlier today.”

Callie took a long swallow of her margarita. “I heard she and Shelley are struggling about the whole alien queen thing. Shelley won’t eat beets. Something about the color of them apparently sets her off.”

“Or it could be that beets taste like ass,” Rachel murmured.

Jen wrinkled her nose. “I can’t blame her for that. Do you know how they can stain your teeth? Nell gave me a beet smoothie and I had purple teeth for days.”

It was supposed to lower blood pressure, but hers had only risen at the idea of purple teeth.

Rachel crossed her arms over her chest. “I don’t think Cassidy is going to care that Shelley doesn’t like the taste. She really believes that beets stave off the alien invasion. It looks like she’s pushing her point home. We should go and head that off.”

Rachel and Callie practically ran back down the stairs.

And Jen was left alone again. Why hadn’t she talked to them? They would talk to her. Callie reached out when she was struggling. And Rachel yelled for a while. Either one of them would listen to her and help her find a solution. So why did she feel so damn alone?

“Can I get you anything?” a masculine voice asked.

She turned and tried to place a name to the startlingly handsome face. She’d never met him but she’d seen those emerald green eyes on another face. “You’re Jack’s brother.”

The man smiled. “Lucas O’Malley. Jack and I are half brothers. If I hadn’t married Lexi and Aidan, I would have changed my name to Barnes. I’m afraid I’m not close to my father. Especially since he went to prison.”

“I’m so sorry,” Jen said.

A satisfied smile crossed Lucas’s face. “I’m not. It was the best gift he could have given me. I framed his mug shot. So, is there anything I can help with? I came with my wife, but she’s taking a phone call. I was going to kiss her good-bye and go and wait for my partner, but she’s busy.”

That was said with a hint of bitterness. Not all was right in the O’Malley household, but, then, everyone had their problems. Lucas looked out over the lawn where a black-haired woman was pacing as she spoke into her phone. Jen hadn’t met the woman. She hadn’t come to any of the gatherings before now. “Is everything all right?”

Lucas didn’t take his eyes off his wife. “Oh, I’ve been told everything is nearly perfect, at least as far as my wife’s career goes.”

Lexi O’Malley was a writer. From what Jen had heard, she was becoming very popular. A couple of women in Bliss read her works religiously—including Jen. Lexi was very prolific. She wrote books that combined BDSM and romance in a way Jen completely understood. “She works a lot, huh? I’m married to an artist. I know how they can get. It’s hard to get them to notice you’re alive when they’re really focused on the work.”

Jen was an artist, too, but somehow she never got lost the way Stef did. She could always pull herself away. It might have been different if she hadn’t married another artist, but she had and she needed to be the grounded one. It never bothered her when Stef was focusing on his work. She’d always known he would come back to her, but now she wondered.

Lucas stared back out at the woman pacing on Jen’s lawn, a hollow look on his face. “Yes, I suppose so.” He turned back and his face cleared. He was right back to being charming and handsome, without a hint of worry in the world. “I’m a big fan of your husband’s work.”

Jen gave him a smile. “And I have to admit, I’ve read all your wife’s books. So we’re both married to successful artists. Why do I have the feeling neither of us is very happy with them right now?”

Somehow what she couldn’t admit to her friends was easy to say to Lucas.

“I’m not good at hiding it anymore.” Lucas sighed a little. “I used to be quite good at hiding my dissatisfaction. Maybe because it didn’t mean as much.”

“I was always terrible at hiding anything at all. I think I might have been born without the patience to prevaricate.” It had gotten her in trouble on many occasions. “I’m afraid I can be a bit of a brat.”

Jack Barnes was firmly in the lifestyle. Lexi wrote lifestyle romance novels. It only made sense that Lucas was in the lifestyle, though she couldn’t figure out if he was a Dom or a sub. He didn’t seem to fit either title completely.

“A little brattiness never hurt anyone. Sometimes it’s the only way to get what you need.” His handsome face grew contemplative. “The question is what to do when the brat loses interest.”

A deep sympathy welled. She knew that feeling except it was her Dom who seemed to be losing interest. “It’s funny. I thought once I’d gotten that man to collar me and put a ring on my finger that the rest of it would be a breeze.”

“You too, huh? It must be something about the whole wedding thing. Watching someone else starting a life makes you think about the state of your own marriage. It makes me think about a lot of things. I watched my parents be utterly miserable for most of their lives. Oh, my father wasn’t unhappy. Marriage just made it easier for him to cheat. My father wouldn’t have been truly happy without someone to cheat on.”

Jen knew the feeling. “My mother kind of rambled through life. She wasn’t a bad mom. She just never settled down. We lived all over the place.”

“When the going got tough, she got going, huh?”

God, she didn’t want that life for this baby. She wouldn’t have it. She would do what she needed to do in order to make sure her baby had a stable home and family. And that meant Stef couldn’t pull away every time he got a little scared. Babies were scary. Kids were even scarier. Kids didn’t necessarily follow the plans their parents set out for them. Stef couldn’t always be in control. It was easier for Jen. She’d accepted that control wasn’t an option a long time ago. “Yeah, I don’t know that she really knew who my dad was. She always said he was a military man, but she never gave me a name. The father’s name on my birth certificate is mysteriously missing.”

She wasn’t sure why she was being so open with Lucas O’Malley, but he seemed very easy to talk to and to have many of the same problems. All around them people were happily talking and toasting the bride and she and Lucas were the only two who seemed to be standing apart. And she was the hostess.

Though Nell seemed to be doing a fine job. Her friends picked up the slack. While Rachel and Callie dealt with the chaos that tended to follow Cassidy around, Nell and Holly were making sure the guests all had what they needed. Holly was walking around the lawn talking to all the guests. She was wearing killer heels and a smile that went on for days. Nell was dealing with the caterers. God, Jen hoped she wasn’t convincing them to change her crab dip for tofu, but it was wonderful and it left Jen with a whole lot of time to think. And she thought way too much.

It felt good to talk.

“I know where you’re coming from. Not that I didn’t know who my dad was, but the rambling part.” Lucas seemed to relax as though he was happy to have someone to talk to as well. “I spent a lot of time in various boarding schools. I was very good at getting kicked out of them. It was all an attempt to get my parents’ attention. It didn’t work. They had a list of schools. I just got sent on to the next one. I didn’t stop trying though. I finally did something shitty enough to get someone to notice me.”

“Who?” She was curious. His story wasn’t so far from her own. She’d acted out trying to get Stef to notice her.

A little smile curved his mouth up. “Jack. I tried to blackmail Jack. He threatened to kill me and bury my remains all over the ranch and I very nearly crapped my pants.”

She shook her head, laughing a little. Lucas O’Malley was a brave man. “I can’t imagine anyone threatening Jack. I have to admit, Stef can be intimidating, but Julian and Jack are a one-two punch.”

“Oh, I threatened Julian, too,” Lucas admitted, his eyes soft with the memory. “Julian didn’t do anything so gauche as tell me how he was going to kill me. He would have simply had me brutally murdered by a well-paid contract killer so he wouldn’t have to get his suit dirty. Lucky for me, Jack likes a challenge.”

“He took you in?”

“Oh, yes. It was the first time my bad behavior got me the attention I wanted and it was pretty much the last time I behaved poorly. Jack’s been more like a father than a brother to me, though he’s not that much older. I learned everything I know about life and love and making a home from Jack Barnes. I married his stepdaughter.” He sighed a little. “She’s trying to make everyone proud. This was her dream, you know. Jack or Julian could have made it easy for her, but she wanted to do it the hard way. She wanted to earn it.”

“I can understand that. I paint, too. I’m not as ambitious as Stef, though. I really just do it for myself. I don’t care if the world knows I can paint. But Stef does. He won’t admit it, but art critics get to him. I can imagine it’s the same for reviewers with your wife.”

“Oh, Aidan ordered her to stop reading them a long time ago. She can have ten great reviews and one bad review and guess which one she remembers? No, I want her to have her career. I just wish she would take a breath every now and then.” The longing was right there in his eyes as he watched his wife.

“Do you ever feel like she doesn’t see you anymore?” It was how she felt about Stef.

“That’s a good way of putting it.” Lucas’s face settled into a grim mask. “And I spent so very much of my life trying to get someone to see me. I guess I never thought she would stop looking.”

“Lucas?” A tall, ruggedly handsome man with dark blond hair stood in the doorway, a concerned look on his face.

Lucas’s expression cleared and the sexiest smile crossed his face. “Hello, Master.”

God, she needed to visit Texas more often. All of the threesomes here were about the girl. Texans seemed to be a little more open in their sharing practices. Despite the fact that she loved her husband deeply, she couldn’t say that the idea of two hot guys going at it didn’t do a little something-something for her libido.

Lucas’s Master joined him, putting a familiar hand on his partner’s shoulder. “Do I even need to ask where our sub is?”

Switch. That answered her question. Aidan O’Malley was the Master and Lucas was the switch and Lexi was the well-topped sub.

“She’s busy. But it’s fine. Everything is fine. Aidan, please meet our hostess, Jennifer Talbot. She’s married to…”

“Stefan Talbot,” Aidan finished, offering a hand.

Jen shook it. “That’s my man. Are you staying out at the G?”

“Yes, my brother is Bo, Beth and Trev’s partner,” Aidan explained. “They’re hosting us. We’re ranch people so we’re certainly used to being around cows. It’s so nice to meet you. Thank you for throwing this party for Shelley. We’ve been more than pleased with the hospitality. But now we have to go to the men’s reception. It’s at someplace called Mountain and Valley. The invitation said it was clothing optional. That was a joke, right?”

Oh, what she wouldn’t do to be a fly on that particular wall. The men were having their pre-wedding party at the naturist community. “Nope. It’s a nudist resort. Expect to see a whole lot of man parts. Didn’t Mel organize it?”

Aidan nodded. “Yeah, uhm, is he a comedian or something? Because the invitation said no aliens allowed.”

“Oh, he’s serious about the aliens,” Jen replied. “Really, don’t even joke about them. Apparently he gets probed on a regular basis, and some of them aren’t very gentle, if you know what I mean.”

Aidan stared at her like he was trying to figure out if she was joking. Jen kept her face perfectly serious. Doms were so fun to fuck with.

Aidan shook his head and turned to Lucas. “All right then, let’s head get going.”

He said good-bye and stepped out.

Lucas bit back a laugh. “Doms are so fun to tease, aren’t they?”

Jen smiled. Lucas would be a great friend if he lived in Bliss. “I couldn’t help it. Though Mel really won’t take well to pro-alien talk. Just say you’re against them and you’ll be fine. And don’t drink the tonic. It’s really rotgut whiskey. Mel makes it himself. It’s been known to get a man shitfaced in three sips.”

Lucas sighed. “Thank god. Something’s going right today. I could use some shitfacedness.” He reached out a hand gallantly. “It was lovely to meet you, Jennifer. And if your husband isn’t paying attention to you, perhaps it’s time to turn the tables on him. If he won’t listen, make sure he has no choice except to. It’s certainly what he would do to you if he’s half the Dom I’ve heard he is.”

Lucas walked away as his words sank in.

Oh, she’d been thinking about talking to the wrong friends. All her friends would do was hold her hand and curse Stef’s name.

But Stef’s friends…they were another story all together. They could be complete bastards and that just might be what she needed.

After one quick phone call to Rye Harper, she knew she’d made her play. One way or another she and Stef would have it out today.

She took a deep breath, calming her nerves and looked out across the lawn. Lucas and Aidan were walking toward the drive. Lucas tried to get his wife’s attention, but she gave him a dismissive wave of her hand. Even from her place on the balcony, she could see the way Lucas’s shoulders slumped and anger flushed on Aidan’s face.

Lexi put her phone to her chest and said something to them. She took a few steps toward them and then looked back down at her phone.

Lucas walked away. Aidan said something and followed him.

Lexi brushed away tears, but she answered the phone anyway.

Lucas might have just solved her problem. Perhaps it was time she helped him. She caught a glimpse of metal as the light shone in just the right place to illuminate the party crashers who were hiding in her bushes, no doubt listening in on all kinds of interesting conversations with one of their ingenious and slightly evil inventions.

Yes, a little hint of devious genius was called for and the Farley brothers were always up to the task.

She marched right across the lawn, and sure enough, there they were. They were hidden in her barberry bushes. Bobby and Will were hunkered down, a computer in one’s lap. They were perfect twins, and Jen didn’t even try to tell them apart. They talked quietly, but they had a friend who didn’t know how to be quiet.

“If you want to know what people are saying, why don’t you just ask them?” Olivia Barnes-Fleetwood asked.

The one Jen thought of as Bobby hushed her. “Keep your voice down, kid. This is a secret mission. And adults never tell you the truth. When you ask what’s wrong, they always say nothing and it’s always a lie.”

“I’m not a kid,” Olivia shot back. “I’m eight. That’s practically a teenager and being a teenager is practically being an adult. I’ll be nine in four months so I can’t be a kid.”

Oh, dear. Jen knew that tone of voice. It was the tone of voice she’d used all through her childhood when she’d had a crush on someone and she was trying to get his attention. Hell, she’d used that sassy voice on Stef back before she’d gotten him to give in.

“Yeah, well, uhm, shouldn’t you be out at the party? Isn’t your mom looking for you?” Will asked in a soft tone. “We’re kind of working here. We’re getting paid to record conversations that may or may not reveal the presence of aliens.”

Poor Shelley. Jen wondered briefly what Cassidy was paying the boys, but they likely would have eavesdropped for free. It was kind of their hobby. They were the only kids their age for miles around. She was so happy her baby would have Paige and Charlie and Zander.

“I know all about aliens. I saw one once. It was at our ranch and it took a couple of our cows,” Olivia proclaimed.

Whatever Cassidy was paying them, Jen would pay more and she had a new job for the twins.

“All right, playtime’s over, boys.” She got a genuine thrill when the boys nearly jumped out of their skin. She was so going to love motherhood.

Bobby scrambled out, laptop in hand. “Sorry, Ms. Jen. Uhm, we didn’t know there was a party going on. We were working on a new science experiment.”

“In my barberries, Bobby?”

Olivia wormed her way out. She looked like her momma with auburn hair and green eyes. She was going to be gorgeous one day. “He’s Will.”

Will shrugged a little. “She can actually tell us apart. It’s kind of weird.”

Olivia shook her head. “It’s not hard. They’re very different. And they were performing an experiment about leaves for school. Do you want to make them flunk their science class? That’s awfully mean of you. I was helping them.”

Olivia would make a great accessory some day. It was a bold play that would have worked on a lesser woman. Jen had to give the kid credit.

Bobby crawled out. “She’s not going to buy it. She was probably listening. Look, Ms. Jen, if we didn’t do it, Cassidy was going to call the NSA, and we’ve already been in trouble with them over our very innocent hacking of their web site.”

Will grinned. “He bet me I couldn’t do it.”

“I was totally wrong,” Bobby admitted. “He did it really fast, and it made some people mad. And now our parents are really ticked because we’re apparently on some sort of watch list. When we tried to go to Tampa to see mom’s sister, we all got patted down and questioned. I think that was what Mel meant by probing except it wasn’t an ET. It was a really hairy dude from the TSA.”

Will shook his head. “Dad didn’t like his probing.”

Bobby shuddered a little. “Yeah, I could avoid it for the rest of my life. I’ll just stay here in Bliss. So we were kind of hoping to keep the whole town off the radar by helping Cassidy out. Here’s the good news—unless aliens are really into shoes, I think Leo and Wolf’s girl is okay. I heard aliens actually struggle with their arches. She’s wearing crazy heels, so I think she’s just a regular human girl.”

“With nice cans,” Will said with a grin.

God, they’d finally found girls. Olivia took a moment to thrust her completely flat chest out. It was good to know the younger generation was already well on their way to being a soap opera all on their own.

“Stop looking at my guests’ cans and put your thinking caps on. I have a mission for you.” Lexi was Olivia’s sister. Maybe she shouldn’t talk about her plans in front of her.

Olivia shook her head, and while it was easy to see she got her smile from her biological dad, Sam Fleetwood, it seemed she’d inherited Jack Barnes’s stubborn will via osmosis. “I am sorry, Ms. Jen. They’re going to work for me. I’m going to pay them my allowance to get them to cut off my sister’s cell phone. I tried to steal it, but she keeps it too close. Whatever job you have for them will have to wait because my sister is going to ruin her life and I have to save her.”

Jen smiled and held out a hand to the kid. She really hoped her son was as devious as this girl. “Oh, Miss Olivia, we’re going to get along just fine.”

Stef looked around the lawn and sighed. He wondered what Jen was doing. The women’s reception and the men’s gathering were scheduled for the same time in the day, but he hoped Jen was having more fun than he was.

This was supposed to be a fun day. He didn’t have any problem with the fact that everyone was naked. He preferred it. It wasn’t like he enjoyed watching a bunch of dudes walk around with their junk hanging out, but he actually didn’t have a problem with nudity. It felt nice. He’d started coming to Mountain and Valley when he was eighteen. He and Max and Rye had met a woman who lived there and been introduced to the whole nudist lifestyle.

He looked across the lawn and found the man who had introduced him to the whole BDSM lifestyle.

Julian Lodge wasn’t naked. He was wearing his customary three-piece suit and his hair was slicked back, not a piece out of place. At his side was a man with dark hair and a ready smile. He was naked, and every now and then Julian would stare down at him, pointing out the differences between Julian’s threesome and the ones Stef was surrounded by. Julian was deeply interested in Finn Taylor’s nudity while the Bliss partners sort of completely avoided looking at each other’s junk.

At least Julian was honest.

And he’d been through what Stef was going through.

He found himself crossing the space between them without really thinking it through. Julian had been his mentor. Stef had been going to The Club in Dallas from the time he’d been eligible to have a membership. Julian had taken him under his wing. He’d spent long hours discussing the philosophies and realities of D/s. Maybe it would be good to be around Julian when his whole damn life seemed out of control.

Julian held out a hand. “Stefan, it’s good to see you. I find it interesting that I’m staying at your house and you seem to manage to avoid all of us.”

Or maybe not. Julian was damn good at making him feel like a five-year-old who had fucked up. He shook the outstretched hand. “Sorry. I’m working on a project right now. It’s taking up a lot of my time.”

Julian’s head shook slightly. “Yes, I’m sure you’re always working on a project. Finn, love, would you mind grabbing me a cocktail while I talk to Stefan?”

Finn grinned up at his Dom. “Of course, Master. Would you like a beer or the stuff from the still?”

Julian shuddered lightly. “Are those my only choices?”

It might be fun to watch Julian attend a Mel-sponsored event. “The tonic is something Mel makes himself. It keeps away the aliens.”

“Yes, your people seem to be very distracted by aliens. I noticed that when I walked in and was frisked for alien technology. They seemed disturbed that I wouldn’t disrobe. I don’t disrobe unless I want to. You understand that, correct? I will not be talked out of my clothing because some insane person wants to make sure I don’t have extra parts.”

Dear god, he needed to get Julian together with Mel. “I think you’ll find Mel won’t care as long as you pass his tests.”

“I already swallowed a beet tablet. I took it because I can use the vitamins. This place is strange, and I’m not sure I like it.”

“Because you can’t control it.” Julian was used to being in control.

Finn was grinning as he looked up at his Dom. “I’m enjoying our vacation, Master.”

Julian’s lips tugged up in an intimate smile. “I’m sure you are, Finn. Don’t get used to it. We’ll be back in Dallas soon, and I’ll be in control again.”

The dark-haired man sighed, and there was no way to not notice how his cock twitched. But then, Finn was used to being naked at The Club, Stef mused. “I look forward to it, Julian. I’ll find you a beer. Preferably something imported. Be back soon.”

“And put on more sunscreen, pet!” Julian watched as Finn walked away. “He burns fairly easily, but I couldn’t convince him to not join the natives.”

“Convince? I didn’t think you convinced your submissives of anything. I thought you simply told them what to do.”

Julian snorted lightly. Somehow he turned it into an elegant sound. “Stefan, I thought you had been around long enough to know that complete control never works. I suppose it might for some, but I must confess I would find that perfectly dull. It was exactly what was wrong with my life before I met my Danielle and my Finn. I preferred to maintain perfect control because I didn’t love anyone enough to be bothered with their pesky little human flaws. That’s not entirely true. I maintained a few friendships that didn’t always go my way.”

“Jack Barnes?”

“Yes,” Julian admitted. “I was rather upset when he left The Club and took Samuel with him. I liked having them around. And Leo was always obnoxious, but I found his company oddly soothing. Now I am just laid back. I have to be or I would kill Chase on a regular basis. Though I do think about it. I can’t now. He has a wife, and for some reason, Natalie loves him.”

Stef wouldn’t exactly call Julian laid back, though he was certainly calmer than he used to be. “I heard you had a hand in that.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

From what Stef understood, Julian also had a hand in the wedding that was taking place tomorrow afternoon, but apparently he didn’t want to admit to playing matchmaker. And it wasn’t really what Stef was looking for anyway. “So how’s fatherhood treating you?”

“Ah, I wondered when you would go there.” A smug satisfaction took over Julian’s expression. “What happened with Jennifer?”

Damn. Julian never liked to play all the polite little games that might have spared Stef the embarrassment of admitting he had no fucking clue what he was doing. “We had a little scare a couple of months back. She was bleeding.”

Spotting is what Caleb had called it, but it was bleeding in Stef’s head. Sometimes he had nightmares that she bled and he couldn’t stop it.

“It’s a terrifying position to be in, I’m sure. Pregnancy is not something any Dom is going to handle well because of the absolute loss of control. It would be easier if we were the ones to deal with the pain that comes with it. Watching our submissives struggle is very difficult when we can do nothing to ease them. Danielle struggled with morning sickness in the beginning. Terrible nausea. It was very difficult for me to watch her go through that. I couldn’t control the situation. She would be so sick and I couldn’t help her. I definitely remember that feeling. I do not like being helpless.”

Jennifer had been pretty healthy through her pregnancy, but the one time she hadn’t been still haunted him. “I’m afraid of what’s going to happen in the delivery room. I won’t be in control of anything.”

He couldn’t stand the thought. Other people would control her fate, make decisions about her care.

“No, you won’t. It’s hard, but that is your submissive’s burden to bear, unfortunately. Danielle wouldn’t scream. She didn’t want to scare me. She tried to pretend it didn’t hurt, that she could take the pain. She fought me on the epidural and then she begged me for one. I was so happy to drug her up, Stefan. I rather thought about taking one myself. I swear, that was the longest day of my life. And then I saw my Chloe and I fell in love. But it was weeks before I felt settled again.”

Stef stared up at the perfect sky. There wasn’t a cloud marring the glorious blue. “Then why do we do it? God, I’ve been asking myself what I was thinking. Our life was good. Why are we messing it all up?”

Julian chuckled. “Because I believe our submissives would insist on it. I will admit, I wasn’t excited at the prospect of change. There was a part of me that wondered if I would even be capable as a father, but this is something that no one can prepare you for, Stefan. There is no book you can read or friend you can talk to that will make you ready for the moment when they place a seven-pound bundle of humanity in your arms and tell you to take care of it. If you think you feel out of control now, wait until that happens.”

“It’s going to change everything.” He wasn’t ready for it.

Julian put a hand on his shoulder. “Yes. Your son will change everything and there will be days when you wonder why you didn’t just remain the same. But I’ve discovered something, Stefan. My life would have been incomplete without Chloe. And when the time comes, and I know it will, I will grit my teeth and go through it all again.”

Stef looked at Julian. “Are you kidding me? You would give up control again?”

“Life is about more than control. I know. If you try to tell my wife I said that I will deny it, and I am an excellent liar. The best things that ever happened to me happened when I gave in to what life offered me. You can cocoon yourself and pray that nothing bad happens. You can mitigate the risks. You can hold on with both hands, and things will still go wrong. And then you’ll never learn the true joy of having a child.”

“And what’s that? Because I’m not seeing it.”

“Like I said, I can tell you, but you won’t understand now. The real joy of having children is seeing the world through their eyes. I’ve done just about everything deviant a human being can do, but I feel clean when I look in my daughter’s eyes. The world is fresh again.”

Stef couldn’t see it. Julian was right about that. “I still don’t think it’s worth risking my wife’s life over.”

“But she does. You’ll find your wife becomes a tiger when it comes to her child. If I’d had things my way, Danielle would never have discovered that piece of herself. Finn wouldn’t have had this experience. I wouldn’t have grown. We would have gone through our days, but for us, something would have been missing. Jennifer could die on you in a hundred different ways. Are you willing to give up everything you could have with her today because you’re frightened that it could be gone tomorrow?”

Stef took a long breath. Was that what he was doing?

“It’s funny,” Julian continued. “I think about my parents a lot these days. They died when I was so young. I wonder if they regretted that so very much of their married life was spent taking care of me rather than enjoying each other. I wonder if they were happy to go together.”

Stef knew far too much about his parents’ bad marriage. “And what did you decide?”

A peaceful smile lit Julian’s lips. “Oh, I know that they would have fought to stay with me. My parents loved each other very deeply, but they would have wanted one of them to stay with me. They would have sacrificed if the opportunity had been there. I’m a grown man, and yet something settled inside me when I realized that. Our childhood can seem far away, but it is always bubbling under the surface.”

His father had left. He’d thought he was doing the right thing. And Stef wouldn’t have left Bliss, but now he wondered if he was simply waiting for something bad to happen. He was happy. He loved his wife. Why was he waiting for the other shoe to drop?

“Master? I managed to find some Scotch.” Finn had a softness to his eyes that made Stef wonder how much he’d overheard. “And I also found some sunscreen.”

Julian took the drink. “Excellent, Finn. I’ll help you with that. We’ll be back in a bit. And Stefan, you should talk to your wife. We Doms forget that our subs can hold our hands, too.”

Julian stepped away with his sub, a hand on Finn’s shoulder.

He was restless, anxious. He hated the feeling. And now he had to wonder if he was being fair to Jennifer. She was carrying his child and he was pulling away from her. Oh, sure he took care of her, but was he giving her what she really needed? He wasn’t in the moment with her. He hadn’t been able to take joy in feeling the baby kick. He certainly hadn’t enjoyed these last few months with her.

She’d asked him in a hundred different ways to make love to her, but he was afraid.

Was he going to be this much of a pussy every time something went wrong?

“Talbot! You son of a bitch!”

Stef looked up and Max Harper was stalking across the lawn, his shoulders set in an angry line. Rye was walking beside him, his face just as stern.

What the fuck had he done now? Max hadn’t thrown down with him in almost a year. And Rye never joined in their fights. Rye always talked about how stupid they were.

His hands squeezed into nice fists. Yeah, it had been a long time since he’d had a little exercise. Maybe thrashing Max would clear his head. Pounding him into the ground would feel damn good.

“Don’t you think for a second that you being nekkid is going to stop me! I ain’t afraid of your junk.” Max was in his normal boots and jeans. It put him at an advantage.

“I am afraid of your junk,” Rye declared. “No one warned me there would be man junk swinging in my face. There is only so much I’m willing to do for a friend.”

Stef ignored Rye. Max was the dangerous one. “What is your problem, you freak?”

“You know exactly what my problem is!”

Max had been Stef’s best friend for over twenty years, and for as long as he could remember, they had beaten the crap out of each other every so often. Though most people believed it was due to Max’s insanity, Stef knew the truth. He’d needed it for a long time. He’d been so shut off that he’d required the twice a year throw downs with Max as a release valve.

But he wasn’t like that anymore. He was an adult with a baby on the way. He couldn’t just fist fight his best friend. He forced himself to relax. “Max, come on, man. We’re not going to do this here. I am not going to fight you while I’m naked.”

Max was a mean shit. God only knew what he would do. Stef wouldn’t put it past Max to use his junk against him.

Max stopped in the middle of everything. He frowned as though that was the last thing he’d expected to hear. “But you’ve been itching for a fight.”

He had. He’d actually kind of been baiting Max for a month. It was stupid and childish, but he relied on those damn fights.

And he had to stop because he was going to be a dad. Max already was a dad. Like it or not, understand it or not, his world was changing and he had to change with it. And that meant no more throw downs with Max Harper.

Who should really be more of a damn grown-up. His second kid was on the way.

“Max, we’re not twelve anymore.”

Max’s eyes rolled. “Obviously.”

“We have to start acting like responsible adults at some point in time.”

“Says the man who’s standing around nekkid.”

Stef gritted his teeth and forced himself to respond. “It’s a naturists’ resort, asshole. Now tell me what imaginary shit you’ve come up with this time. And you, Rye? What the hell did I do to you?”

Rye and Max exchanged a long glance, the anger in Max deflating at once.

“I thought you had a reason,” Max said.

Rye shook his head. “No, I thought you did.”

Max threw up his hands. “Rye, you’re the brains of this operation. I’m just the pretty one. I was supposed to beat the shit out of Stef and you were supposed to come up with a good reason why. What are you here for anyway? What the hell are we going to do now? Jen is going to be pissed.”

“Jen?” What the hell did his wife have to do with any of this? His wife usually just rolled her eyes when he fought with Max.

“Max, you dumbass.” Rye whistled, a high sound he usually used on horses, but it wasn’t a horse who showed up this time.

Caleb Burke and Alexei Markov showed up. Caleb was carrying his tranquilizer gun.

Stef took a step back. “Caleb, now, you put that shit away. You are only supposed to use that when Mel goes insane.”

Caleb sighed. “I switched to the low dose. Don’t be a baby.”

Had he stepped into a really bad dream? “What the fuck is wrong with you? I swear to god if you shoot me with that thing, I’m going to sue your ass.”

Caleb’s eyes rolled. “No, you won’t. That’s the great thing about being the only doctor for forty miles. Night-night, Stef.”

And the son of a bitch shot him. The tranq dart went right into his upper thigh, and Stef went down, his backside hitting the grass. Fuck. His head was already swimming a little.

Max’s face stared at him. “It’s going to be okay, buddy. And actually I want to thank you for being naked. It makes things so much easier. Alexei, get his legs. And watch out for his junk. I think the client is interested in it.”

Caleb stepped up. “Hey, as your doctor and your wife’s doctor, I’m totally giving you permission to have sex when you wake up. Go for it, man. Jen’s perfectly healthy. Hell, she’s ready to pop. A little sex might get the process started.”

He hated Caleb. Why had he ever thought bringing a doctor into town was a good idea?

As his peripheral vision started to fade, he realized something.

Responsible adult or not, he was so going to kick Max’s ass. He might kick all their asses. Some things could never, ever change.