I still didn’t really embrace it until recently. Starting the photography side business and meeting Sequoia and James helped drive it home. I love women as much as men. Every photo session with them made it more and more apparent, and after I finally gave in and joined them for the first time, I realized this really was key to my identity. That was when I gave myself the crescent moon tattoo.
But craving sex with two people and actually loving two people are vastly different things. Seeing Celeste and Leo making love is tearing me apart because I can’t reconcile any of it inside myself. I don’t know if I can go home now, knowing they’re there. That Celeste has done exactly what I pushed her to do, though I would never have predicted they’d move so goddamn fast.
That was another stupid miscalculation on my part, of course. After the night we’ve all had, and the way she jumped me in the shower, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that they both needed that level of intimacy.
I need to be okay with it. I need to move the fuck on. Her dad would never in a million years accept me anyway. Leo has a much better chance of winning the old man over, especially if the twins’ recounting of events from last night is true. And Leo isn’t bi, or even close, as far as I can tell, so I have less than a snowball’s chance in hell of ever being with him.
Therefore, this is probably the best and only outcome for the two of them. They get each other, and I get the satisfaction of knowing I helped facilitate their happiness, even though I just paved my own road to hell.
The sign for Leo Carrillo State Park blurs past, the name pinging against my awareness. I suddenly realize how far I’ve driven without even checking the gas level in my tank. I turn off into the parking lot and head back the other direction. I have enough fuel to get me back, but I have another destination in mind to help me clear my head before I face them again.
It’s early in the day yet when I pull up to the curb outside Zarya’s shop in Santa Monica. She’s open though, and it appears I’m the first customer of the day because she hasn’t even turned all the lights on yet. Her shop smells like coffee, and I inhale, trying not to think about how the taste of the stuff clung to Celeste’s lips when she kissed me this morning.
“Mad Dog! Fancy seeing you all the way out here today,” Zarya says in her husky voice. She’s a knockout with olive skin and icy blue eyes. She added a blue stripe to her jet-black hair, which shines when she pulls it back into a ponytail. She is covered in tattoos of marine creatures over most of her exposed flesh. Only the one manta ray that graces her breastbone is my work, though—a design I did in trade for her work on me. She flips a switch to illuminate her tattooing chair and pats it as if she knows already why I’m here. “Ready to add to your ink? Let’s see how those scars are looking.”
“You know me well,” I say, pulling off my shirt for one of the few people who have seen the extent of the damage that covers my torso. Ever the pro, she puts on her gloves before even making skin-to-skin contact and is already giving me a clinical once-over as I settle in the chair.
“I don’t know you at all, sweetie, but I know your skin. It’s been a few months since the last round, so it looks like you’re ready for more. Where should I start?”
“Doesn’t matter. I just need to feel the needles for a while.”
She merely nods and sets up her cart, and with the efficiency of a master, she’s working ink into my left pectoral within minutes of me walking in the door.
The rhythmic buzz of her machine calms me. Sometimes we talk, but today she senses that all I need is silent company and the steady, constant sting of the tattoo needles as she covers up my scars. She’s an expert at this particular task, which is why I sought her out to begin with when I returned to Los Angeles. Unfortunately, not all my scars were healed enough to be covered, so it’s been a long ordeal to get the work done.
After about an hour, I have a swath of fresh ink across my chest. More tribal whorls that form part of the head of the creature that’s gradually taking shape over my entire left side. When it’s finished, it will be a hellhound made of hundreds of interlinking tribal thorns. My arm is already covered in ink that obscures the scars there, the black designs a pack of wild dogs fighting their way out from beneath my skin.
“My door’s always open,” I tell her when I pick up my helmet and get ready to head out.
She nods and smiles. “I intend to take you up on it. You take care, Maddox.”
My head is much clearer when I head back into the city, and this time when I tiptoe up my back steps and enter the apartment, Leo and Celeste are sound asleep. I fall onto my sofa in a boneless heap and am unconscious within seconds.
After I wake up, Celeste gives me the good news that her father
