Second Position

SECOND POSITION

An Erotic Romance

by Kyle R. Hudson

Some lines are made to be crossed.

At thirty-six, Joanna Reyes runs the Montana Ballet Company with perfect posture and a heart she keeps locked away. She hasn't let anyone close in years, until Laura.

Laura is twenty, fearless, and the most gifted dancer in Joanna's corps. Every correction lingers, every glance in the studio mirror holds a second too long, and the chemistry between them is impossible to ignore.

Then Laura makes an offer Joanna never saw coming. She doesn't want an affair. She wants Joanna to join her and her boyfriend, John, as something real.

But when John opens his door and whispers "Aunt Joanna?", the woman who once babysat him finds herself face to face with the grown man who never forgot his first crush.

One dinner. One snowy Bozeman night. Three people who refuse to want each other any less.

Sensual, explicit, and unapologetically romantic, Second Position is a story about desire and devotion, and about finding the family you were always meant to have.

Chapter One: Rehearsal

The studio at the Montana Ballet Company smelled of rosin and radiator heat. Outside, the October light had gone gold over the Bridgers, but Joanna Reyes hadn't looked out the window in an hour. She was watching the mirror, the way she always did, and in the mirror she was watching Laura.

"Again," she said. "From the développé."

Twelve dancers reset. Eleven of them barely registered. Laura Bennett took her place at the end of the line, chest rising, a strand of dark hair stuck to her neck, and met Joanna's eyes in the glass for exactly one second before looking away.

One second. It was always one second, and it was always too long.

The pianist started the phrase. Joanna walked the line with her hands clasped behind her back, which was a habit she'd picked up in her first year as director. It kept her from touching. It mostly worked.

"Hips square, Maddie. Lovely, Priya, lift through the sternum." She reached the end of the row. Laura's leg rose and unfolded, long and controlled, but her standing hip had drifted open by maybe half an inch. Nobody else would have seen it.

Joanna saw it.

"Hold," she murmured, and the hands came out from behind her back.

She set one palm flat on Laura's hip and the other at the small of her back, just above the waistband of her tights. The skin there was warm and damp through the thin cotton leotard. Joanna pressed, gently, bringing the hip back into line, and felt Laura's breath catch under her hand.

"There," Joanna said. Her own voice sounded strange to her, lower than she meant. "Feel that? That's where it lives."

"I feel it," Laura said quietly.

Neither of them was talking about the hip.

Joanna let go and stepped back, and the space where her hands had been seemed to hum. She clapped twice. "Good. Everyone, take five."

* * *

She'd been fighting this since August.

It had started with nothing: Laura staying late to run a variation, Joanna staying late to watch, a shared laugh when the building's ancient heater clanked like a ghost. Then it was coffee orders remembered without asking. Then it was a lift in the pas de deux workshop, when the partner was out sick and Joanna, thirty-six and twelve years off the stage, had stepped in to demonstrate. She'd caught Laura at the waist and lifted, and Laura had come down slowly along the length of her body, and for a long, terrible, wonderful moment they'd just stood there, breathing each other's air.

Joanna had made a joke. Laura had laughed. They had both gone home and, Joanna suspected, not slept.

She was the director. Laura was twenty and in the corps. There were lines, and Joanna had spent her whole adult life being very good at lines.

* * *

After the break they ran the second-act ensemble twice, then broke for the day. The dancers peeled off in clumps, pulling sweatpants over their tights and trading complaints about their calves. Joanna stayed at the piano with her notes, pretending to write.

Laura didn't leave either.

She sat on the floor by the barre and unlaced her pointe shoes slowly, wincing a little at a raw spot on her toe. When the last of the others had gone and the door had sighed shut, the studio got very quiet.

"You're doing the thing," Laura said, without looking up.

"What thing?"

"The pretending-to-write thing. You've been on the same line for ten minutes."

Joanna looked down. She had written Act II: spacing and then nothing. She set the pen down. "Maybe I'm thinking."

"About spacing."

"About lots of things."

Laura finally looked up. She had a dancer's face, all clean angles and huge eyes, and right now those eyes were frank in a way that made Joanna's pulse jump. "Can I ask you something, and you don't have to answer?"

"That depends on the something."

"When you fixed my hip today." Laura pulled her knees to her chest. "Did you feel it too? Or am I making it up?"

The radiator ticked. Somewhere down the hall, a janitor's cart rattled past.

Joanna had a dozen good answers ready. You're a talented dancer. I correct everyone. This isn't appropriate. All true, and all useless. She'd taught a hundred girls to stop lying with their bodies. It seemed a little rich to start lying with her mouth.

"You're not making it up," she said.

Laura let out a breath like she'd been holding it since August.

"But I'm your director," Joanna went on, gently. "And that matters. I'm not going to do anything in this room. Not here, not like this."

"Okay." Laura nodded slowly. Then the corner of her mouth curved. "So, not in this room."

Joanna laughed despite herself, a real one that surprised her. "You're trouble."

"I'm honest." Laura stood, shoes dangling from two fingers by their ribbons, and padded across the floor in bare feet until she was standing beside the piano. Close, but not touching. She smelled like sweat and something floral underneath. "Have coffee with me tomorrow. Off the clock, not here. Just talk. If you hate the idea after that, I'll never bring it up again and I'll still be the best dancer in your corps."

"You're very sure of yourself."

"About the dancing, yes." Laura's voice softened. "About the rest, not even a little."

Joanna looked at her for a long moment: the flushed cheeks, the brave, unsteady eyes, the rosin dust on her fingertips. Then she picked up her pen and wrote an address on the corner of her notes, tore it off, and held it out.

"Wild Joe's on Main. Ten o'clock."

Laura took the scrap of paper. Their fingers brushed, barely, and it went through Joanna like a struck chord.

"Ten o'clock," Laura repeated, and smiled, and walked out barefoot into the hall.

Joanna sat alone in the gold-lit studio for a long time afterward, her hand still tingling, and didn't write another word.

Chapter Two: Coffee

Wild Joe's was loud in the way Joanna liked: espresso machine hissing, a ski-bum barista singing along to something folky, and nobody paying attention to anybody. She got there at 9:50 on purpose so she'd be sitting down, composed, holding a cup, when Laura walked in.

The plan lasted until Laura walked in.

She'd never seen Laura out of rehearsal clothes. Jeans, a cream-colored sweater slipping off one shoulder, hair down and loose in a way it never was in the studio. Cheeks pink from the cold. She spotted Joanna, lit up, and waved with her whole arm like a kid, and Joanna's composure folded quietly up and went home.

"You came early," Laura said, sliding into the chair across from her.

"I'm always early."

"I know. I was counting on it." Laura grinned. "Gave me time to panic in the car."

"Did you panic?"

"Extensively."

Joanna laughed, and something in her chest loosened. "Get your coffee. Then we'll panic together."

* * *

Laura came back with an oat-milk latte and a scone she broke in half and pushed across the table without asking. They talked about nothing at first: the heater, Maddie's chronic lateness, whether the new Giselle sets would arrive before Christmas. It was easy. It had always been easy, which was half the problem.

Then Laura set her cup down and wrapped both hands around it.

"Okay," she said. "I'm going to say the thing."

"Say the thing."

"I can't stop thinking about you." It came out in a rush. "Not in a crush way, or not only in a crush way. You walk into a room and I can feel exactly where you are without looking. When you touched me yesterday I forgot the choreography. I've never forgotten choreography in my life."

Joanna held very still. "Laura..."

"I know about the director thing. I respect it. That's why I wanted to be out of the building." Laura took a breath. "But I needed you to know it's not just a little thing for me."

The espresso machine shrieked. Joanna waited for it to stop.

"It's not a little thing for me either," she said quietly. "I've been very careful for a very long time. You make careful hard."

Laura's smile was slow and incredibly soft. "Good."

"But." Joanna lifted a finger. "There's a lot I don't know about your life. And I'm thirty-six. I'm not interested in being anyone's experiment."

"You wouldn't be." Laura hesitated, then turned her cup a half circle on the table. "There's something I have to tell you, and I need you to hear the whole thing before you react. Deal?"

A little cold thread went down Joanna's spine. "Deal."

"I have a boyfriend."

The cold thread became a wire. Joanna sat back. She knew this script. She'd been on the wrong end of it once, at twenty-five, with a married choreographer in Seattle. She kept her face pleasant out of pure habit. "I see."

"No, you don't, not yet. You promised the whole thing." Laura leaned in. "His name's John. We've been together almost two years. And he knows. He knows about you. I told him in September, the week after that lift."

Joanna blinked. "You told him."

"I tell him everything. That's how we work." Laura's voice steadied as she went. "I'm bi, he knows that, he's always known. And we've talked about this a lot, about what we want. We're not looking for a fling. I'm not looking for a side piece. I would never ask you to be somebody's secret."

"Then what are you asking?"

Laura met her eyes, and there was nothing playful in them now. Just nerve and hope, the same look she got right before a hard jump.

"I'm asking you to think about being with us. Both of us, for real. Committed. A polycule, a triad, whatever word you like best. Dinners and holidays and arguing over the thermostat. Not a weekend thing. A life thing."

Joanna didn't say anything for a long moment.

She'd been asked for a lot of things in her life. To dance hurt. To smile for donors. To sign papers in a hospital at sixteen and not look at the tiny face again. Nobody had ever sat across from her and asked her, so plainly, to come in.

"That's..." She laughed, a little helpless. "That's not what I expected you to say."

"I know. I'm sorry. I mean, I'm not sorry. But I know it's a lot."

"What does John think? Honestly. Not what you hope he thinks."

"Honestly?" Laura's grin came back, crooked. "He thinks I've been talking about you for two months straight and he'd like to meet the woman who makes me forget choreography. He's very curious. He's also really, really kind. You'd like him." She paused. "He's straight, so it'd be you and me, and him and me, and you and him, if that's ever something you want. No pressure on any of it."

Joanna looked down at the scone half in front of her. She'd shredded it into crumbs without noticing.

"I'm not saying yes," she said slowly.

"I didn't think you would. Not today."

"But I'm not saying no."

Laura went pink all the way to her collarbone. "Okay. Okay, that's... okay."

"I'd want to meet him first. Somewhere that isn't a coffee shop. Somewhere we can actually talk."

"Come to dinner." Laura was already pulling out her phone. "Saturday. Our place, up by Bridger Canyon. John cooks, I'm useless, it's a whole thing. Just dinner. If it's weird, you leave, and I'll still be the best dancer in your corps."

"You keep saying that."

"Because it keeps being true."

Joanna laughed, really laughed this time, loud enough that the singing barista glanced over. She reached across the table and, for the first time, touched Laura on purpose and in public, just her fingertips on the back of Laura's hand.

Laura turned her hand over and laced their fingers together.

"Saturday," Joanna said.

"Saturday," Laura agreed, and didn't let go until her coffee had gone cold.

Chapter Three: Dinner

The house sat at the end of a gravel drive up Bridger Canyon, all cedar and big windows, with smoke curling from the chimney into a sky going violet. Joanna parked, turned off the engine, and sat with her hands on the wheel for a full minute.

She'd changed three times. She'd settled on a black wrap dress, soft wool that clung where it touched and moved when she moved, with nothing underneath it, the way she always dressed. Twenty years of leotards had left her with no patience for straps and elastic. Tonight, though, she was aware of it in a way she usually wasn't, of the fabric sliding against her skin with every breath.

Just dinner, she told herself, and picked up the bottle of wine from the passenger seat.

Laura opened the door before she knocked.

"You came," she said, barefoot again, in a thin green slip of a dress that made it very obvious she had the same opinion about underwear as Joanna. Her hair was loose. Her smile was enormous. She leaned in and kissed Joanna's cheek, close to the corner of her mouth, and lingered just long enough. "He's in the kitchen. He's nervous. It's adorable. Come in."

The house smelled of garlic and rosemary and woodsmoke. A fire popped in a stone hearth. Somewhere a record was playing, old soul music, warm and crackly.

"John!" Laura called. "She's here!"

"Coming." A man's voice, deep and quiet, from around the corner. "Sorry, I had my hands in the..."

He came out drying his hands on a dish towel and stopped dead.

He was tall and broad through the shoulders, in a soft gray henley pushed up at the forearms and worn jeans that rode low on his hips. Dark hair, a little shaggy. And eyes, hazel with a green ring around the iris, that Joanna knew. She'd known them for years, once, looking up at her from a booster seat.

The towel slipped from his fingers.

"Aunt Joanna?" It came out barely above a whisper.

"Oh my God," Joanna breathed. "Johnny?"

He didn't laugh. His face just opened, wonder and a kind of old, quiet ache, and he crossed the kitchen slowly, like she might vanish if he moved too fast. He stopped in front of her and searched her face.

"It's really you," he said softly. "You did the voices. In Where the Wild Things Are. Nobody else ever did the voices."

Joanna's eyes filled. "You roared at the end. Every single night."

"I remember." He smiled, small and warm, and then, carefully, as if asking: "Can I hug you?"

She nodded, and he folded her into his arms, gentle as anything, and held her like something precious he'd lost and found again.

"Wait." Laura looked back and forth between them. "Wait, what?"

* * *

"Johnny Calloway," Joanna said when he finally let her go. She pressed her hand flat against her sternum. "Diane's boy. I used to babysit him. He had a dinosaur nightlight."

"Hold on." Laura's mouth had fallen open, and then, slowly, she started to laugh. "This is Aunt Jo? The Aunt Jo? The one you..." She clapped a hand over her mouth, eyes dancing.

John's ears went red, but he only smiled down at the floor.

"The one he what?" Joanna asked.

"Oh, I'm not letting this go." Laura took the wine from Joanna's hands, set it on the counter, and steered her by the elbow toward the kitchen island. "Sit. Both of you, sit. I need to hear this whole thing and I need wine for it."

The story came out over the first glass.

Joanna had been nineteen and Diane twenty-eight, both of them in the company in Missoula back then. Diane had been her best friend, almost a big sister, and Joanna had spent half her nights off on Diane's couch, watching her son so Diane could have a life. Then Joanna's career took her to Seattle, and Diane moved to Billings for a new husband, and the phone calls got further apart until they stopped. Fifteen years, just gone, the way the best things sometimes go, without anyone meaning it.

"She talks about you," John said quietly. "Still. She keeps a picture of you two on the fridge."

Joanna's throat went tight. "I should call her."

"You should." He smiled. "She'd be so happy."

"Okay, okay, this is beautiful," Laura said, topping off all three glasses. "But tell her, John."

John didn't groan when Laura pushed him. He went quiet, looked down at his wine, and turned the stem slowly between his fingers.

"You were my first crush," he said at last. "I was seven. I made you a Valentine with so much glitter glue it took two days to dry."

"The pink one," Joanna whispered. "With the lopsided heart. I kept it for years."

He looked up, startled and moved. "You did?"

"I did."

He was quiet a moment. When he spoke again, his voice was low and very honest.

"That was a little boy's crush, and it was innocent. But I want to be honest with you about tonight, too." He held her gaze, steady, without a hint of a smirk. "When you walked in, I didn't see Aunt Jo. I saw a woman I'd really like to know. Laura told me how she feels about you. I think I understand now."

The words landed softly and stayed.

Joanna was suddenly very aware of the heat of the fire, of the wool against her bare skin, of the way he was looking at her, and that she didn't mind. She didn't mind at all.

Laura watched the two of them over the rim of her glass, and her smile went slow and wicked.

* * *

Dinner was roast chicken with lemon and rosemary, potatoes crisped in the fat, a salad with pears. John really could cook. Joanna said so, and he ducked his head, pleased, and she found herself thinking about the boy who'd proudly made her peanut butter crackers and the man who'd just plated a meal she'd have paid fifty dollars for downtown, and how strange and lovely it was that they were the same person.

They talked for two hours. About Diane. About ballet, about Laura's solo audition in the spring, about John's work as a wildland firefighter in the summers and a carpenter in the winters, which explained the shoulders. About Seattle, and why Joanna came back to Montana. She found herself telling them more than she meant to. About the baby she gave up at sixteen. About the surgery, years later, that meant she'd never have another. She'd never said it so plainly to anyone over a dinner table.

Neither of them flinched. Laura reached over and took her hand, and John reached across the table and laid his hand over both of theirs, warm and calloused.

"Thank you for trusting us with that," he said quietly. "You were family to me when I was small. You were already so good at it. I'm sorry you've had to carry all that alone."

Joanna had to look at the fire for a while after that.

* * *

It was Laura who moved them to the couch.

The record had flipped to something slower. The fire had burned down to deep orange coals. Laura curled up at one end with her legs tucked under her, her thin dress riding up her thighs, and pulled Joanna down beside her, close enough that their hips touched. John sat on Joanna's other side, an arm along the back of the couch, not quite around her shoulders.

Not quite.

"So," Laura said, quietly. "Is this weird?"

Joanna thought about it honestly. "It should be. It's not."

"Good." Laura leaned in and tucked a strand of Joanna's hair behind her ear, her fingertips trailing down the side of her neck, slow, deliberate. Joanna's breath went shallow. "Because I've wanted to do this since August, and I promised I wouldn't do it in the studio."

"We're not in the studio," Joanna whispered.

"No," Laura agreed. "We're not."

She kissed her.

It was soft at first, a question, Laura's lips warm and tasting of wine. Then Joanna made a small sound in her throat and kissed her back, and it stopped being a question. Laura's hand slid into her hair. Joanna's hand found Laura's waist, felt the heat of her through the thin silk, nothing underneath, and pulled her closer.

When they finally broke apart, both breathless, Joanna turned her head.

John was watching them. His eyes had gone dark, his breathing slow and deep, but he didn't reach for her. He waited, patient and certain, the way a man waits when he knows something good is worth it.

"Johnny," Joanna whispered.

"I'm right here." He said it so gently. "Only if you want this. Tell me."

"I want it."

"Then look at me."

She did. He cupped her jaw in one big rough hand and tilted her face up, unhurried, and simply studied her for a long moment.

"You're so beautiful," he murmured. "Breathe for me, baby."

She hadn't realized she'd stopped. She breathed. And he kissed her, slow and deep and utterly sure, and it wasn't a question anymore. Joanna melted into him with a soft moan.

When he drew back, his thumb stroked her cheek.

"Good girl," he said quietly.

Something hot and liquid curled low in her belly. Nobody had ever said that to her. She hadn't known she wanted them to.

Laura's fingers found the tie at Joanna's waist.

"Stay tonight," Laura breathed.

John's eyes held hers, steady and kind, leaving her room to say no.

Joanna reached down, covered Laura's hand with her own, and pulled the tie loose.

Chapter Four: Firelight

The wrap dress fell open.

For a moment nobody moved. The fire threw copper light across Joanna's bare skin: the long dancer's lines of her, small high breasts, the flat plane of her stomach, the faint silver scar low on her belly that she'd stopped hiding years ago. She heard Laura's breath catch. She heard John's stop altogether.

"Oh," Laura whispered. "Oh, Jo. Look at you."

Joanna had been looked at her whole life. On stage, in mirrors, by critics and partners and donors. She'd never been looked at like this, like she was something holy that had just walked into the room.

She shrugged the dress off her shoulders and let it pool on the couch behind her.

"Your turn," she murmured.

Laura didn't need to be asked twice. She rose to her knees on the cushions, caught the hem of the green silk, and pulled it over her head in one smooth motion, then tossed it somewhere behind the couch. Nothing underneath, exactly as promised. Twenty years old and all of it a dancer's: strong thighs, narrow hips, full soft breasts with dusky nipples already tight in the firelight, a neat dark strip of hair between her legs.

Joanna had seen her in a leotard every day for months. She hadn't been ready for this.

"You're beautiful," she said, and her voice shook.

"Say that again." Laura straddled her lap, slow, settling her weight onto Joanna's thighs, bare skin to bare skin. Heat bloomed everywhere they touched. "Say it while you touch me."

Joanna put her hands on Laura's waist and slid them up, over her ribs, until she was cupping both breasts in her palms. Laura arched into it with a soft, shocked moan.

"You're beautiful," Joanna breathed, and brushed her thumbs over both nipples at once.

Laura's head fell back. "God."

* * *

On Joanna's other side, John hadn't moved. He sat back against the arm of the couch, watching with a stillness that was its own kind of intensity, his eyes dark and soft. The front of his jeans strained with a long, thick ridge, but he didn't touch himself and didn't reach for them. He just watched, like a man watching something sacred.

"Johnny?" Joanna managed.

"Don't stop," he said quietly. "I want to see you two. Show me how you make her feel, baby."

His voice was so gentle, and so certain. It wasn't a request. Joanna's whole body answered it anyway.

She pulled Laura down and kissed her, deep and open-mouthed, nothing careful left in it. Laura moaned into her mouth and rocked her hips, and Joanna felt her, slick and hot against her thigh, and the knowledge went through her like lightning. She slid one hand down Laura's back, over the firm curve of her ass, and squeezed. Laura ground down harder.

"Jo." Laura was panting against her lips. "Jo, please. I've thought about your hands for so long."

"Show me where."

Laura caught Joanna's wrist and guided it between them, down over her stomach, lower, until Joanna's fingers slipped through soft hair and into wet heat. They both gasped at the same time.

"There," Laura whispered. "Right... there."

Joanna stroked her slowly, learning her. Through the folds of her pussy, up to the tight swollen bud of her clit, circling it lightly, feeling Laura shudder. She'd been with women before, not many, and never anyone who responded like this. Every touch drew a sound out of Laura, every slow circle made her thighs tremble around Joanna's hips.

"So wet," Joanna murmured against her throat. "Is that all for me?"

"Since August."

Joanna laughed softly and slid two fingers inside her.

Laura cried out, her whole body clenching, her nails digging into Joanna's shoulders. She was tight and hot and soaked, and Joanna curled her fingers forward and found the spot that made Laura's eyes fly open.

"Oh fuck. Oh fuck, Jo, right there."

"Slower," John murmured from beside them. "Make her wait for it, baby."

Joanna obeyed without thinking, easing her rhythm until Laura whimpered.

"Good," he breathed. "Look how beautiful she is when you do that. Now curl your fingers, just a little. There. Good girl."

Laura sobbed. Joanna felt the praise land between her own legs like a touch. She bent her head and took one of Laura's nipples into her mouth and sucked, and Laura rode her hand in long, fluid waves, a dancer even now.

"Let her go now," John said softly. "Let her come for you."

Laura came apart with a long broken cry, her body clamping down hard around Joanna's fingers, her thighs shaking, her forehead dropping against Joanna's shoulder. Joanna held her through every pulse, stroking gently, murmuring nonsense against her hair, until Laura went boneless in her arms.

* * *

For a long moment the only sounds were the fire and Laura's ragged breathing.

Then Laura lifted her head, flushed and glassy-eyed, and smiled a smile that was pure sin.

"My turn," she said.

She slid off Joanna's lap and down onto the rug in front of the couch, kneeling between Joanna's knees. She pressed a hand to each of Joanna's thighs and pushed them gently apart, opening her to the firelight, and to John.

Joanna's face burned. She had never felt so exposed, or so wanted.

"Laura..."

"Shh." Laura kissed the inside of her knee, then a little higher, then higher. "You've taken care of everyone for so long. Let me take care of you."

She kissed the soft crease where Joanna's thigh met her hip. Then she brushed one long, slow lick straight up the center of her.

Joanna's whole body jolted. "Oh."

Laura hummed against her, delighted, and did it again, slower. Then she settled in like she had all night, and she did. Her tongue was soft and then firm, broad strokes along Joanna's labia and then a light, teasing flick across her clit that made her hips buck off the cushions. Laura caught her hips and held her down and kept going.

Joanna's hand fisted in Laura's hair. Her other hand gripped the arm of the couch. Her head fell back.

John had moved closer without her noticing. He sat beside her now and cupped her face in his palm, steady and warm.

"Look at me," he said.

She did, gasping.

"Don't hide from it. Let me see you." His thumb brushed her lower lip. "You've been holding yourself so tightly for so long. You don't have to anymore. We've got you. Let go."

"Johnny..."

"Shh. Breathe for me." He kissed her softly, swallowing her moans, while between her legs Laura slid two fingers inside her and closed her lips around her clit and sucked. John drew back just enough to whisper against her lips: "Come for her, baby. Now."

Joanna came so hard she saw white.

It went on and on, wave after wave, Laura's mouth relentless, John's hand holding her together, until she was shaking and sobbing for breath and pushing weakly at Laura's head because it was too much, too good.

When it finally ebbed, he was still there, stroking her hair, murmuring, "Good girl. So good. I'm so proud of you."

She had never in her life been told that while naked. It undid her almost as much as Laura's mouth had.

Laura eased off with a last tender kiss to her inner thigh and looked up, her chin shining, her eyes bright with triumph. "Worth the wait?"

Joanna could only laugh, helpless, tears in the corners of her eyes. "You're going to kill me."

"Not yet." Laura rose up on her knees and kissed her, and Joanna tasted herself on Laura's lips. Then Laura grinned up at John. "Somebody's very overdressed."

Joanna turned. "Please," she whispered. "I want to see you."

* * *

John stood. He didn't make a show of it. He pulled the henley over his head, quietly, a little shy under their eyes, firelight sliding over a firefighter's broad chest and stomach and the dusting of dark hair trailing down into his jeans. His hands went to his belt and paused.

"You can tell me to stop anytime," he said softly. "Anytime at all. Okay?"

"Okay."

The belt, the button, the zipper. He pushed his jeans down, nothing beneath, and stepped out of them.

Joanna forgot how to breathe.

He was enormous. Long and thick and cut, heavy and fully hard, curving up toward his stomach, ten and a half inches of him, so thick she wasn't sure her fingers would meet around his cock.

"Oh my God," she whispered.

John's cheeks colored. "I know. It's... a lot." He held her gaze, earnest. "We'll go as slow as you need. I'd never hurt you."

Laura kissed Joanna's shoulder. "He means it. He's the gentlest man alive."

John held out his hand.

"Come upstairs with me, baby," he said. It was soft and sure, and somehow both a request and a command.

Joanna took his hand.

Chapter Five: Upstairs

The stairs were narrow and dark. John went first, holding Joanna's hand, glancing back at every turn as if making sure she was still with him. Laura's fingertips trailed down Joanna's spine behind her.

The bedroom was all slanted ceilings and a big bed under a skylight, moonlight silver on a white duvet. John switched on one low lamp in the corner. Then he turned to her and just looked, his face soft.

"Before anything," he said quietly, "I want you to know something."

Joanna's heart thudded. "Okay."

"What I said about the crush was a little boy's thing, sweet and innocent. That isn't why you're here." He brushed his thumb along her cheekbone. "You're here because tonight you told us the truest things I've ever heard anyone say. I want that woman. I want to take care of her."

Something in her chest cracked open, warm and aching.

"Will you let me?" he asked.

"Yes," she whispered.

"Good girl." He kissed her forehead. "Lie down for me."

She did. The duvet was cool under her shoulders. He knelt over her, braced on his forearms, his cock lying heavy and hot against her belly, and she shivered at the size of it.

"You're trembling," he murmured.

"You're so big, Johnny."

"I know. I'll be careful with you." He kissed the corner of her mouth. "You only have to do one thing for me tonight. Breathe, and tell me how you feel. Can you do that?"

"Yes."

"Yes, what?"

The question surprised her, and so did the heat that answered it. "Yes... Johnny."

He smiled, slow and pleased. "That's my girl."

He kissed his way down her body like he was memorizing it: her collarbones, the soft undersides of her breasts. He drew each nipple into his mouth and rolled it gently against his tongue until she was arching up off the bed. When he reached the silver scar low on her belly, he stopped and kissed it, slow and reverent. Joanna's eyes stung.

"Every part of you is beautiful," he said against her skin. "Every part."

Then he settled between her thighs, eased them wide with his big hands, and looked at her pussy with open, unhurried wonder.

"Laura got you so wet for me," he breathed.

He didn't rush. He parted her labia with his thumbs and licked her in long, slow, savoring strokes, humming softly when she moaned. When she tried to lift her hips, he laid one palm flat on her stomach and held her still, gently and completely.

"Stay still for me, baby. Let me do this."

She whimpered and obeyed. He rewarded her by closing his lips around her clit and sucking, soft and steady, until her thighs shook.

The mattress dipped as Laura stretched out beside her and smoothed the damp hair off Joanna's forehead.

"Isn't he wonderful?" Laura whispered.

"Yes," Joanna gasped.

John eased one thick finger inside her, then a second, stretching her slowly and patiently, curling them forward until she cried out.

"Good," he murmured. "You're opening up so well for me. A little more."

A third finger. The stretch burned sweetly, and Joanna writhed.

"Johnny, please. I need you."

He lifted his head, eyes dark and steady. "Tell me what you need. Use your words."

"I need your cock inside me. Please."

His face softened into something almost tender. "Since you asked so sweetly."

He knelt up between her legs and took himself in his fist. Joanna watched, mesmerized, as he stroked once from root to tip. He was thicker than her wrist, veined, the head broad and flushed and already slick.

Laura leaned in and kissed her. "Breathe out as he goes in," she whispered. "He'll go slow. He always does."

John rubbed the head of his cock through her folds, up and down, coating himself in her, nudging her clit until she whimpered. Then he lined up and held her gaze.

"Eyes on me," he said. "The whole time. If it's too much, tell me, and I'll stop. Promise me."

"I promise."

"Good girl. Breathe out."

She did, and he pushed into her.

The stretch was enormous. He went in by inches, pausing every time she tensed, stroking her hip with his thumb and murmuring to her the whole time: That's it. You're doing so well. Breathe for me. Look how beautifully you're taking me. Laura's fingers found her clit and circled slowly, and Joanna's body melted and opened until he sank the last inches into her and their hips met.

She had never been so full. She felt him everywhere.

"Oh my God," she sobbed.

"I know, baby. I know." His arms shook with restraint, but his voice stayed soft. "You're perfect. You feel perfect. Are you okay?"

"Yes. Yes. Please move."

He drew back slowly, and the drag of him made her see stars. Then he slid back in, deeper still, and Joanna made a sound she'd never made in her life.

He found a rhythm: long, deep, rolling strokes that pulled at that spot inside her on every pass. Laura's fingers and mouth were on her breasts, and Joanna wrapped her legs around John's waist and held on.

"Harder," she gasped. "Please, Johnny. I'm not glass."

He studied her face for a long moment. Then he nodded, slowly, and slid one big hand up to rest lightly around the base of her throat. It wasn't squeezing, just there, warm and grounding.

"All right," he said quietly. "But you take what I give you, and you tell me if it's too much. Yes?"

"Yes, Johnny."

He gave her more.

The bed rocked and the headboard knocked the wall. He drove into her with deep, powerful thrusts, every one controlled, his eyes never leaving her face. Joanna stopped thinking at all.

"Come for me," he said, low, firm, and so tender. "Come on my cock, baby. Now."

Joanna came screaming.

Her pussy clenched down around him so hard he groaned. He didn't stop. He fucked her straight through it, steady and relentless, murmuring good girl, good girl, that's it, give me another, and a second orgasm crashed over the first before she could breathe.

His rhythm finally faltered.

"Jo." His voice had gone rough. "I'm close. Where do you want me?"

"Inside. I can't get pregnant. I want all of you."

Something flickered across his face, almost shyness. "Baby... I should warn you. It's... a lot."

Laura giggled into Joanna's shoulder. "So much."

"I don't care," Joanna gasped. "Please."

He pressed his forehead to hers, buried himself to the hilt, and came with a long, shuddering groan.

Joanna felt it: a hot, powerful pulse deep inside her, then another, and another. It was more than she'd known was possible, flooding her and spilling out around his cock, running down between her thighs onto the duvet. He kept coming, pulse after pulse, trembling and moaning her name, while she stared up at him in stunned disbelief.

When he finally stilled, the bed beneath them was soaked.

There was a long, dazed silence.

"Johnny," Joanna breathed. "What... what was that?"

He went pink to his ears and hid his face in her neck. "Sorry," he mumbled. "It's always like that. I should've warned you better."

Laura dissolved into giggles. "We buy so many towels."

Joanna started to laugh, helpless and overwhelmed, and wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders. "Don't you dare apologize. That was the most incredible thing that's ever happened to me."

He lifted his head, searching her face. "Yeah?"

"Yeah."

His smile was shy, sweet, and enormously relieved. He kissed her softly, then eased out of her slowly and carefully. A warm flood followed him, and he winced in apology and reached over the side of the bed for a towel. He cleaned her gently, every inch, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

Then he lay down and pulled both women against his chest.

"How do you feel?" he murmured into Joanna's hair.

She thought about it. Her thighs were trembling. She was wrecked, emptied out, glowing.

"Cared for," she said. "I feel cared for."

His arms tightened around her.

Laura propped her chin on Joanna's shoulder, eyes sparkling. "That's lovely," she said. "And now it's my turn. With both of you."

John smiled down at them both, slow and warm.

"Then come here, baby," he said softly. "Let's take care of you."

Chapter Six: All Three

Laura rose up on her knees in the lamplight, flushed and bright-eyed, her dark hair a wild tangle down her back. She looked at the two of them lying tangled together and bit her lip.

"I've thought about this so many times," she said softly. "Now I don't know where to start."

John reached up and took her hand. "Then let us start for you. Come here, baby."

He drew her down between them, so that she lay on her back in the middle of the bed with Joanna on one side and John on the other. Moonlight from the skylight spilled across her. Joanna propped herself on an elbow and simply looked at her.

"You were so patient," Joanna murmured, brushing her knuckles down Laura's cheek. "All night. All autumn."

"I'm not patient." Laura laughed shakily. "I'm dying."

"We know." John kissed her shoulder. "We'll take care of you. Lie still for us."

They took their time.

Joanna kissed her mouth, slow and deep, while John kissed his way down her throat. Two pairs of hands found her breasts at once, Joanna's fingertips light and teasing, John's palm broad and warm. Laura gasped into Joanna's mouth and arched up into both of them.

"Look at her," John murmured to Joanna, his voice low and reverent. "Look how she gives herself to us."

"She's beautiful."

"She is." He brushed his thumb over Laura's nipple, and she whimpered. "Tell her."

Joanna leaned close to Laura's ear. "You're beautiful," she whispered. "You've been beautiful every single day in that studio, and I couldn't say it. I can say it now."

Laura's eyes filled. "Jo..."

"Shh." John kissed her temple. "Just feel it."

Joanna's hand drifted down Laura's stomach, slow, over the soft dark strip of hair, and slid between her legs. Laura was soaked.

"Oh, sweetheart," Joanna breathed.

"I've been wet since dinner," Laura confessed, breathless. "Watching you two... God."

John's hand covered Joanna's, warm, and gently guided it. "Spread her open for me, Jo."

Joanna parted Laura's labia with two fingers, and John slid his thick middle finger slowly between them, into her. Laura's back bowed off the bed.

"Good girl," he murmured. "Jo, her clit. Just circles. Slow."

Joanna circled. Laura sobbed.

They played her together like a duet, John's deep, patient fingers inside her and Joanna's light circles above. Laura writhed between them, gasping their names, until John said, very softly, "Come for us, baby," and she did, shaking, crying out, clutching at both of them.

She was still trembling when John kissed her and whispered, "Do you want me inside you?"

"Yes. God, yes, please."

"How?"

Laura opened her eyes and looked at Joanna, and a slow, wicked smile curved her mouth. "I want to be on top of Jo," she said. "I want to kiss her while you take me."

John's breath went out of him. "Jo?"

Joanna was already reaching for her. "Yes."

She lay back against the pillows, and Laura crawled over her, straddling her hips, their breasts pressing together, their mouths meeting. Joanna wrapped her arms around Laura's back and held her close. She felt the mattress shift as John knelt behind them both.

"Lower your hips a little for me, baby," he said quietly. "That's it."

Laura's pussy settled right against Joanna's, slick to slick, and they both moaned into each other's mouths.

Then Joanna felt him. The broad, hot head of his cock slid through both of them, through the wet heat where their bodies met, rubbing over both of their clits at once. Both women cried out.

"Johnny," Joanna gasped.

"I know." His voice was rough with feeling. "I can feel both of you. You're both so wet for me."

He did it again, slow, gliding between them, and again, until they were both shaking and clutching each other. Then he drew back, angled down, and slowly pushed into Laura.

Laura broke the kiss with a long, shattered moan against Joanna's lips.

Joanna held her face and watched it happen. She watched Laura's eyes go wide and glassy, her mouth fall open, her brow pinch with that sweet impossible stretch. Joanna knew exactly how it felt now. She stroked Laura's cheek.

"Breathe, baby," she whispered, the way he'd said it to her. "Let him in."

"He's so deep..."

"I know. I know. You're doing so well."

Behind her, John groaned low. "You're both so good. Both of you. God."

He began to move.

Every slow thrust into Laura rocked her down against Joanna, their bodies sliding together, Laura's clit grinding against Joanna's with every stroke. Joanna gasped. She hadn't expected to feel it so much herself, but it was like being fucked through Laura, the rhythm carrying through both of them.

"Kiss her," John murmured. "Don't stop kissing her."

They kissed, messy and desperate, moaning into each other while John moved behind them, deep and steady and controlled. He stroked his hands up Laura's back, then reached past her and laced his fingers through Joanna's on the pillow, so that the three of them were tangled together, joined at every point.

"Look at us," he said softly. "Look what we are."

Joanna looked up past Laura's shoulder into John's eyes and saw herself there, wanted, held. She came without warning, just from that and Laura grinding against her, a sweet rolling wave that left her crying out into Laura's mouth.

That set Laura off. She clenched around John's cock, shuddering, and went over with a sob, and John held her hips and kept her there, murmuring, "Good girls, good girls, that's it, both of you."

He pulled out slowly, still hard, glistening.

"Not yet," he said gently, when Laura whimpered. "There's something I want to see."

He shifted, and then Joanna felt his cock slide back between them. This time he didn't go into Laura. He pushed slowly into her, beneath Laura, while Laura lay sprawled on top of her, and Joanna gasped at the sudden deep fullness.

Laura lifted her head, dazed, and stared down at Joanna's face. "Oh," she breathed. "Oh, Jo, I can see it. I can see what he does to you."

"Watch her, baby," John murmured. "Watch her take me."

Laura cupped Joanna's face and watched, eyes huge, as John fucked Joanna slow and deep beneath her. Every stroke dragged a cry out of Joanna's throat. Laura kissed every one of them away.

Then he switched again, pulling out of Joanna and sinking into Laura, back and forth, a few slow strokes in one and then the other, until neither woman could tell where she ended and the other began. They were both sobbing his name. He was trembling now, his rhythm going ragged, his breathing harsh.

"I'm close," he managed. "I want... can I come on you both? Both of you?"

"Yes," they said together, and Laura laughed tearfully and added, "Bring a towel."

He drew out, knelt back, and stroked himself once, twice, with his eyes on the two of them tangled together, flushed and wrecked and beautiful.

"Look at me," he said softly.

They looked.

He came with a deep, shuddering groan, and it seemed it would never end. Hot thick ropes of it spilled across Laura's back and the curve of her ass, then down over both of their thighs, pulse after pulse, more and more, pooling and running and dripping onto Joanna's stomach until they were both drenched and gasping and starting to laugh helplessly at the sheer impossible volume of it.

"Johnny," Joanna wheezed. "You just did this."

He collapsed back onto his heels, red-faced, chest heaving, looking adorably sheepish. "I know," he said. "I'm sorry. I can't help it with you two."

Laura was laughing so hard she shook. "We're going to need the big towels."

He got them. He cleaned them both with a warm washcloth, slow and tender, every inch, kissing each place when he was done with it. Then he changed the soaked duvet for a dry blanket from the closet and climbed back in between them. They curled into him like they'd done it a thousand times.

The skylight above had gone deep and full of stars.

Laura sighed against John's chest. Joanna rested her cheek on his shoulder and reached across him to tangle her fingers with Laura's.

"Is it always like this?" Joanna asked quietly. "With you two?"

"It's never been like this," Laura said. "Not this good. You make it different."

John kissed the top of Joanna's head. "You make it whole," he said softly.

Joanna closed her eyes, and for the first time in a very long time she let herself believe someone.

They didn't sleep. Not really. They drifted, and touched, and murmured, and the night was nowhere near over.

Chapter Seven: Before Dawn

Sometime after three, the stars in the skylight had wheeled halfway across the glass. The house was silent except for the wind in the pines and the slow, even breathing of the man between them.

Joanna lay awake with her cheek on John's shoulder, tracing idle circles on his chest. She'd been working up to something for the last half hour and still hadn't found the nerve.

"You're thinking very loudly," John murmured without opening his eyes.

She startled. "I thought you were asleep."

"I was listening to you think." He turned his head and kissed her hair. "What is it, baby?"

On his other side, Laura stirred and propped herself up on one elbow, sleepy and curious. "Jo? You okay?"

"I'm fine. I'm wonderful." Joanna felt heat climb her throat and was grateful for the dark. "There's... something I want. I've never told anyone. I've never even said it out loud."

John's hand came up and settled warm against her back. "You can tell us anything," he said quietly. "Nothing you say will change how we look at you."

Joanna pressed her burning face into his chest. Her voice came out muffled. "It's embarrassing."

"Look at me," John said softly.

It took her a moment. She lifted her head. His eyes in the starlight were kind and steady and utterly unafraid.

"Breathe," he said. "Then tell me."

She breathed. Then, in a whisper so small she could barely hear it herself: "I want to drink you. When you... when you pee. I've wanted it for years. I've never trusted anyone enough to ask."

The silence lasted maybe two seconds. It felt like an hour.

Then Laura made a sound Joanna had never heard from her, a sharp, shocked, hungry little gasp.

Joanna turned, mortified, and found Laura staring at her with huge dark eyes, lips parted, her hand pressed flat over her own breast.

"Jo," Laura breathed. "Oh my God. You too?"

Joanna blinked. "What?"

"I've never told anyone either. Not even him." Laura glanced at John, flushing crimson. "I've wanted it forever. I thought I was the only one..."

John looked from one of them to the other, and slowly, wonderingly, he smiled. It wasn't smug in the slightest. It was something closer to awe.

"You've both been carrying this alone," he said softly. "Look at you two."

"You're not..." Joanna swallowed. "You don't think it's..."

"I think," he said, "that you two just trusted me with something tender. And I'm honored." He cupped her cheek. "Yes, baby. If that's what you want, you can have it. Both of you."

Laura actually whimpered.

The bathroom was all slate and warm cedar, with a huge tiled walk-in shower with no door and a heated stone floor. John turned on the soft light over the sink, and then turned the shower on low and warm, letting steam begin to curl.

He stood in the middle of the tile, naked, broad and quiet, and held out his hands.

"Come here, both of you."

They came. He drew them close and kissed each of them in turn, slowly.

"This is yours," he said, low. "We go at your pace. If either of you wants to stop, you say so, and we stop, and nobody's disappointed. Promise me."

"We promise," they whispered.

"Good girls." He touched Joanna's chin. "Kneel for me, baby."

Joanna sank to her knees on the warm wet tile. Laura knelt beside her, so close their shoulders pressed together, both of them trembling.

John looked down at them, his face soft and serious in the steam. His cock hung heavy and half-hard between his thighs. He took it gently in one hand and guided it toward Joanna's mouth.

"Open for me."

She opened. Her heart was pounding so hard she could feel it in her throat.

"Look at me," he murmured. "Stay with me."

She lifted her eyes to his. He held her gaze, breathed slowly, and let go.

It was warm. That was the first thing, warmer than she'd imagined, a soft steady stream across her tongue, and Joanna closed her lips around the head of his cock and drank. Salt and heat and something purely him. She swallowed, and swallowed again, and a long, shuddering moan rose from somewhere deep in her chest that she couldn't have stopped if she'd tried.

Years. She'd wanted this for years.

"That's it," John said, his voice rough and tender all at once. "That's my good girl. Take what you need."

Tears slid down Joanna's cheeks and mixed with the steam. She didn't care. She drank him down, eyes locked on his, her hand clutching his thigh, utterly, shamelessly happy.

Beside her, Laura was making small desperate sounds, her hand gripping Joanna's shoulder hard.

"Johnny," Laura begged. "Please. Me too, please..."

He gently eased back from Joanna's lips, the stream still flowing, and turned to Laura. She was already open for him, tongue out, eyes wild. He let it pour into her mouth, and she gulped greedily, moaning, spilling some of it down her chin and over her breasts. Joanna leaned in without thinking and licked it from Laura's throat, and Laura made a sound that echoed off the tile.

He moved between them, back and forth, and they shared him, sometimes kissing each other with their mouths full, warm and messy and laughing and moaning. When the stream finally slowed to nothing, they were both glowing, dripping, wrecked, and kneeling together on the tile with their arms around each other.

John was fully, achingly hard now. He was breathing like he'd run a mile.

"You two," he said hoarsely, "are the most beautiful things I have ever seen in my life."

Laura laughed, breathless and tearful, and looked up at him with her face shining.

"Then come here," she said, "and let us say thank you."

They worshipped him together on their knees, their two mouths on his cock at once. Joanna's lips moved along one side and Laura's along the other, meeting at the head, sharing him back and forth between deep sloppy kisses. John braced one hand on the tile wall and buried the other gently in their hair, murmuring praise in a low unsteady voice, good girls, so good, look at you, God, I love you both, until his thighs were shaking.

"I'm going to come," he warned softly. "Open your mouths for me. Both of you."

They tipped their faces up, side by side, tongues out, eyes on his.

He came with a long, broken groan, and it was everything they'd come to expect from him, a hot thick flood across both their tongues and lips and chins. It kept coming, overflowing their mouths and running down their throats and breasts while they gasped and laughed and swallowed and kissed it from each other's faces under the warm falling water.

When he finally sank down onto the tile with them, his legs gone, they climbed into his lap together. He held them under the spray, the three of them tangled and slick and laughing softly, steam rising all around.

"Thank you," Joanna whispered against his neck. "For not looking at me like I was strange."

"Baby." He tipped her face up. "I looked at you like you were mine."

Laura kissed her shoulder. "Like you're ours," she corrected.

Joanna closed her eyes and smiled, the warm water falling over all three of them, the dark windows just starting to go pale with dawn.

Chapter Eight: Morning

Joanna woke to sunlight and the smell of coffee.

For a moment she didn't know where she was. Then she felt the warm weight of Laura curled against her back, an arm slung over her waist, soft breath on her neck, and the night came back to her all at once. Every single moment of it. She buried her face in the pillow and laughed silently until her shoulders shook.

"You're laughing," Laura mumbled into her hair.

"I can't help it."

"Good laughing or bad laughing?"

Joanna rolled over to face her. Laura's eyes were puffy with sleep, her hair a glorious disaster, a crease from the pillow across one cheek. Joanna had never seen anything so lovely.

"The best laughing," she said, and kissed her.

John came up the stairs a few minutes later carrying a tray: three mugs of coffee, a plate of toast, a little jar of huckleberry jam, and two clean, fluffy towels folded on the side.

"Good morning," he said softly, and the way he looked at them, sleepy and tender, made Joanna's chest ache.

He handed out the mugs and climbed back into bed between them, naked and warm. Joanna wrapped her hands around her coffee, took one sip, and paused.

She looked at the coffee. Then at John, already half-hard from the sight of the two of them tangled in the sheets. Then back at the coffee.

Laura noticed. Laura always noticed. "Jo," she said slowly, a grin spreading. "What are you thinking?"

Joanna blushed to her collarbones, which was absurd after last night. "It's missing something."

John glanced at the tray. "Sugar? I can grab some..."

"Not sugar." She bit her lip and held the mug out toward him with both hands. "Johnny. Would you... would you cum in my coffee? Please?"

Laura made a strangled, delighted sound and clapped a hand over her mouth. "Oh my God. Jo. I've dreamed about doing that."

"You have?"

"I'm a semen freak," Laura confessed, beet red and beaming. "I thought I was the only one."

"You're not," Joanna whispered. "Believe me, you're not."

John looked from one to the other, and his face softened into that slow, tender smile, the one that made her knees weak even lying down.

"Last night you were afraid to ask me for anything," he said quietly. "Look at you now. Both of you."

"Is that a yes?"

"Baby, it's always a yes." He took the mug gently and set it on the nightstand. "But you'll help me. Both of you."

They didn't need to be asked twice.

Laura slid down and took him in her mouth, slow and greedy, moaning softly around him. Joanna kissed his throat and his chest and wrapped her hand around the rest of his thick length, stroking in long adoring pulls. He threaded his fingers gently into their hair and murmured to them the whole time, low and unsteady: good girls, that's it, look how good you are to me.

When his breathing went ragged, Joanna took the mug from the nightstand and held it ready beneath him, eyes bright.

Laura eased off with a wet, reluctant kiss to the head. "Let me watch," she breathed. "Please."

"Look at me," John whispered. "Both of you."

They looked.

He came with a deep, shuddering groan, stroking himself over the mug. It was the same impossible flood as always, thick and pearly, pulse after pulse after pulse, swirling into the dark coffee until it rose nearly to the brim and spilled warm over Joanna's fingers. Laura was licking them clean before he'd even finished.

Joanna lifted the mug and stirred it slowly with one fingertip. Then she raised it to her lips and took a long, slow sip, her eyes locked on his.

She closed her eyes and moaned.

"Perfect," she breathed.

Laura was staring at her, flushed and trembling, both hands clutching her own empty mug. "Can I... Jo, can I taste?"

Joanna smiled and held it to Laura's lips. Laura sipped, and shivered all over, and made a sound so happy it was almost a whimper. Then she held out her own mug toward John, eyes huge.

"Me next," she said. "Please."

John laughed helplessly, flushed and sweet, and pulled them both into his arms. "Give me ten minutes, baby."

"Five," Laura bargained.

"Seven," Joanna said, and took another long, blissful sip.

He made it in six.

Afterward they drank their coffee in a warm heap of limbs and blankets while the sun climbed over the Bridgers and poured gold through the skylight. Laura got jam on her chin. John kissed it off. Joanna watched them and felt something settle quietly inside her, like a dancer finding her balance on one foot and holding it, perfectly still.

"Can I ask you something?" John said after a while.

"Anything."

"Would you call my mom with me? This week, maybe." He turned his empty mug slowly in his hands. "She's going to scream. And then she's going to cry. And then she's going to want to know everything."

Joanna laughed, then sobered. "Everything?"

He glanced at the mugs on the nightstand, then at her, and his mouth curved. "Well. Not everything."

"Thank God."

"But I want her to know you're back," he said softly. "That you're in my life again. That you're... ours."

Joanna looked at him for a long time. Then at Laura, watching her with that open, brave, hopeful face from the studio.

"Is that what I am?" she asked. "Yours?"

Laura set down her mug and took Joanna's hand in both of hers.

"I asked you at Wild Joe's to think about it," she said. "Dinners, holidays, fighting over the thermostat. A life thing." Her voice wobbled just a little. "So. Have you thought about it?"

Joanna thought about the girl who signed papers at sixteen and never got to hold her baby. About the surgery. About fifteen years of perfect posture and empty rooms and lines she never crossed. About a little boy roaring at the end of a bedtime story, and the gentle man beside her now, who had held her face in his hands last night and told her to breathe.

"I've thought about it," she said.

They both waited.

"Yes," Joanna whispered. "Yes. A life thing."

Laura burst into tears and threw herself into Joanna's arms, nearly knocking the tray off the nightstand. John caught it one-handed, set it safely aside, and wrapped himself around both of them.

"Welcome home, baby," he murmured into Joanna's hair.

She cried a little too. She was too happy to be embarrassed about it.

Later, much later, after another slow and very thorough hour that required both towels and then a third, they lay tangled together in the sun-warmed sheets.

"I have to be at the studio at two," Joanna said drowsily. "Company class."

"Me too," Laura said. "I'll be the one who can't walk straight."

"You'll be the best dancer in my corps."

"I know," Laura said, smugly, and they all laughed.

John kissed one forehead and then the other. "I'll make dinner tonight," he said. "Both of you. Here."

"And breakfast?" Laura asked innocently, nodding at the empty mugs.

John went pink. "Every morning you'll let me."

Joanna closed her eyes. Outside, the wind moved through the pines, and the sun sat high and bright over Bozeman. For the first time since she was sixteen years old, she knew exactly where she belonged.

She had a family.

She'd simply had to find her way home to it. THE END