They were both in the position to see Diesel lurch out the doors holding a mug of coffee in his hand.
He moved to the open slider, collapsed into it, lifted a heavy leg and dumped it on the ottoman next to Mad’s feet and mumbled, “Yo,” before taking a sip from his mug.
“Mornin’, DD,” Molly said through a grin.
“Mornin’, man,” Maddox said, also smiling, but not entirely committed to it.
D made a distracted move with his mug in the air before he sucked more back and stared unseeing at the sun beyond the covered patio.
Molly gave it time.
Maddox gave it time.
Diesel drank coffee (so he took the time).
When Maddox finished the sports section, he shoved up out of his seat, grabbed his mug, reached over, grabbed Molly’s and bent deeper, touching his mouth to hers, before he straightened.
He then moved around the ottoman, dumped the sports in D’s lap and took his empty mug from his unresisting hand.
“Warm up?” he asked unnecessarily.
“Duh,” D mumbled.
Maddox chuckled, linked the handle of Diesel’s mug with the other two he had hooked in his finger and used his free hand to give the hair at the back of D’s head a tug.
D tipped that head back.
Half alert, half still hazed, all so good looking, Maddox’s cock took notice and his mind took that opportunity to run over what he intended to do to his boy later.
But right then, he just bent in and touched his mouth to D’s.
D accepted it and his blue eyes were still half hazed, but now warm when Maddox pulled away.
Easy as that.
One day, none of that shit.
A few days later, he was offering up his mouth without hesitation, and taking Mad’s at every opportunity.
And telling him he loved him.
Connected, post-scene, telling Mad he loved him.
Maddox didn’t make a deal of it.
Any of it.
Then.
Or now.
He took the mugs into the kitchen and did the refills.
As he was walking back out, he did it looking at the back of D’s head.
Love you, buddy.
It just came out of him like he said it all the time when he fucking didn’t.
Maddox should be thrilled.
But it was carving him up.
Because that love you, buddy, felt a lot like goodbye.
Mad handed Diesel his cup. Gave Molly hers.
And settled in his slider with his.
Ten minutes later, D arranged the sports so he could read it.
Sunday morning it was together time but quiet time. There was eye contact. Smiles. Kisses (or, at least there were between Mad and Mol, or D and Mol, but now it seemed there were between Mad and D). Touches. But not a lot of talk.
Sunday mornings with his man and woman were Maddox’s favorite times with them.
Not that day.
The sun was shining.
But he couldn’t get it out of his head that a cloud was on the horizon. It was huge. And it brought doom.
Molly shifted and Maddox looked to her, seeing she threw her feet over the back of the glider, the seat rocking with her movement.
Her pretty face was relaxed but there was tension around her eyes as she lay there, not reading, not doing anything, her mug of coffee sitting forgotten in her hand resting on her belly, her eyes aimed at her feet.
“Baby,” he called.
She turned her head his way.
“In a little bit, I’m takin’ D back and fuckin’ him. Just him and me. You cool with that?”
He felt heat coming his way from Diesel’s direction, but Molly got him.
Totally.
“Take care of me later, Mady?” she asked.
“Absolutely, darlin’,” he promised.
She nodded. “I’m cool.”
Only then did he look to Diesel to see he’d lost interest in the paper and his gaze was glued to Maddox.
“When you’re ready, go. Naked. Get out your ropes, bud. And wait for me,” he ordered.
D nodded too, his eyes hot, but there was a tightness around his jaw like the tightness around Molly’s eyes.
This wasn’t right.
None of it was right.
Somehow, after a ray of light broke through, brightening their world, they’d all slid into a zone where they seemed to be stumbling through the dark, going through the motions.
D finished his coffee, got up, and without a word, but more unusually, without even a look at Molly, he walked into the house.
Maddox watched the door close behind him and turned right to their girl.
She didn’t hesitate.
“I’m scared, Mady. He’s so deep in his head, he’s like a zombie. Last night at dinner, his favorite, crab and lobster mac ’n’ cheese, the only thing he said was, ‘This is great, Mol.’”
“What did Rebel say when you talked to her?” Maddox asked.
She shook her head. “Not much. She told me she had called him the night before and she thought he sounded like he was in a bad place. But that wasn’t news, since he was. And then he wasn’t. But now there’s this.”
“She didn’t say anything else?”
She shook her head then her eyes lit and she sat up abruptly.
“She told me about what happened when D’s friend was outed.”
“D told me that too,” Maddox shared. “It didn’t go down too good, but it worked out for him. An excuse for him to get away from somewhere that was toxic.”
“It might have worked for Tommy, but Diesel having to watch him go through it didn’t work for D.”
Maddox felt something move in his chest. It was huge. Colossal. Titanic.
Of course.
Fuck.
Christ.
Of course.
That was why D told him about Tommy. With them getting closer to making the moves to declare to the people in their lives what they had and their commitment to it, which meant D would need to let it all hang out, Diesel was thinking about what happened to his friend.
Maddox stared at Molly hard.
So hard, her voice was trembling when she called, “Mady?”
“He doesn’t care,” he announced.
“What?”
“About what they’ll say. What they’ll do. About losing them. He doesn’t care.”
Her voice was gentle when she disagreed. “You’re wrong, Maddox. He totally does.”
“No he doesn’t. What he cares about is what we’ll go through when they hit him with the ugly, because he knows exactly how that feels because he watched Tommy go through the same thing.”
Molly sucked in a breath so sharp, he heard the hiss.
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “You’re right.”
“And Rebel,” he went on. “It’s all on him, not that he’s going to lose them, but when they make that play, she’s going to lose them too.”
Tears brightened her eyes. “Yeah . . . yes, he . . . that’d kill him.”
“He’s got issues about money,” Maddox told her and watched her head twitch.
“Sorry, what?”
“He’s got issues that he doesn’t make as much money as us. He’s gonna take a second job at the Bolt.”
Molly started to look angry. “That’s . . . it doesn’t matter to me. Or you. He has to know that.”
Maddox shook his head. “This, baby, I see. If it was me where he’s at, that’d eat at me too.”
She studied him a beat before muttering, “Men.”
“It is what it is.”
“What it is, is not a discussion for now. I took on this amount of testosterone. It’s not like I can play dumb about not knowing there’d be times when you two would do stuff or think stuff that was completely annoying and totally frustrating. And just FYI, this isn’t the first instance that kind of thing has happened.”