fic: love was shrewd and bold (ava/boyd/raylan) --- part two
title: love was shrewd and bold (part two)
author: someotherstorm
fandom: justified (vaguely future-ish)
pairing: ava/raylan/boyd
rating: MA
content advisory: references prior domestic abuse
word count: 14,167 (/facepalm)
summary: In which Ava learns that while the third time may indeed be a charm, first times are always awkward.
love was shrewd and bold (part two)
Ava needs a bit of a break after that.
She gets up and grabs a short, silk robe, drapes it over her shoulders without bothering to tie it, and grabs her smokes. This time she heads for the window, running her fingers through Boyd’s hair on her way.
“I used to have clients pay thirty bucks for product to make their hair do this.” She tugs on the strands, which are sticking straight up like all that energy buzzing through him shot right out of the top of his head. “Should’a just had ‘em go to bed with you two.”
“Think we might have to charge a little more than thirty bucks, Ava. My pride won’t let my sexual prowess be valued at a jar of wax pomade.” At her look, Raylan laughs. “I was married, darlin’. Sometimes we pay attention to all that crap in the vanity.” Raylan’s arm is bleeding a little, but he doesn’t seem to mind so Ava doesn’t, either.
Ava opens the window and lights her smoke, half-heartedly aiming the smoke out of the screen. The cool air feels good, she can’t tell if it’s because she’s too warm or if there’s just too much sin in the room for it to be anything other than hot.
Boyd and Raylan go back to making out and she watches them through two straight cigarettes, her head feeling woozy from the booze and sex and the nicotine. She’s content to just look her fill, wondering if they know that no amount of biting and roughing each other up will hide how much they want each other.
Maybe that’s what she should have told Raylan, when he asked her why it didn’t bother her. Be like tryin’ to tell the sun to stop risin’, gettin’ you two to keep your distance. Besides, if Ava didn’t want Boyd trying to change her into someone else, like Bowman did every day of their marriage until she needed a shotgun to tell him to knock it the hell off -- she couldn’t go around trying to change him, either.
And the fact it was really hot, that sure as hell didn’t hurt any.
“All right,” Ava announces, stubbing out her second smoke and dropping the robe to the floor. “What do you boys have to show me, next?”
Raylan surprises her with an answer -- she thought it was going to take a lot more banter, that seemed to be pattern -- trying to push Boyd on his back. “I’ll suck him off. Bet you’d like that, Ava.”
She would indeed, but because Raylan suggests it, she’s immediately suspicious of his motives. “Well that does sound nice, Raylan. I’m sure you’re very good at it.”
Raylan nods, then elbows Boyd in the side. When Boyd doesn’t say anything, Raylan scowls and elbows him, harder. “Boyd. Tell her I’m good at it.”
Boyd rubs a hand over his side. “Ava, Raylan is very good at sucking cock.” He’s giving her the same look he does when they’re at a party and he wants to leave, or when he’s trying to tell her he has to go outside and take care of some business and she should pay the tab and meet him at the truck.
“Is there anything Raylan isn’t good at?” Ava teases, taking the ever-present black elastic from her wrist and twisting her hair up on her head.
Boyd smiles, obviously pleased. “There’s a few things.”
“What?” Raylan elbows him again. “What few things are those, Boyd? Don’t recall you ever havin’ that many complaints. And don’t say something dumb like, making puns or Jeopardy or driving.”
Boyd gets on top of him again, straddling him easily. “Killin’ old friends?”
“I could get better at that. Practice makes perfect -- hey, get off me, you know I don’t like sucking cock on my back.”
Ava can’t stop the unholy grin that comment elicits. “My, my. The things I have learned about you during this threesome, Raylan. So informational.”
“God, you even sound like him.” Raylan’s look is accusatory. “Stop that. One’s enough.” He shoves at Boyd’s shoulder. “Now get on your back so I can suck you off and thrill your woman. It’s late, and some of us do have legitimate jobs to get to in the morning.”
Ava wonders if Raylan knows what time it is. She considers taking her panties off and tossing them at the clock to cover up the numbers, but instead she just moves nonchalantly and tries to stand in front of it.
Boyd moves so he’s straddling Raylan’s legs. “Move down a bit, would you? Ava’s gonna need a place to sit if she’s gonna hold your arms. Ava, baby, my light in the darkness...get over here and hold Raylan’s arms for me.”
Raylan looks like he’s going to argue, but Boyd’s hand rubs over the front of his jeans and Raylan snaps his jaw shut and doesn’t. Ava gets settled behind him and takes his arms from where they’re crossed underneath his head, and tugs them so they’re in her lap.
Boyd pauses as he’s taking off Raylan’s belt to admire her, eyes bright like stars. “You’re so beautiful, baby. Seems like it ain’t right, me gazin’ upon you with these sinner’s eyes.”
“Oh, you’re kidding me.” Raylan makes a dismissive noise. “Does he say stuff like that a lot?”
“Fairly often.” Ava traces the inside of him, watches him fight not to react.
“And does it work?” Raylan’s eyes are closed, but they open and he looks up at her -- well, mostly up at her, as he seems to get distracted by her breasts.
“Depends on what you mean by work.” Ava rubs her thumb on the inside of Raylan’s wrist. The bite Boyd left on his upper arm is stark against his skin. The fingers of her free hand are gentle as they run lightly over the fierce, angry mark.
Raylan inhales sharply and shifts beneath her. “What the hell are you doing, Boyd?”
“As I recall, I was tellin’ Ava about things you ain’t good at in bed,” Boyd says, undoing the button on Raylan’s jeans and easing the zipper down. “First one, Raylan -- know what that is?”
“I hate when you do that,” Raylan snaps, growing more agitated by the minute.
“Take your pants off?”
“No, ask me questions that you don’t really want me to answer. Obviously I don’t know what it is, you just want to tell me.” Ava can see the muscles in his arms and shoulders tensing as Boyd tugs at his jeans.
“You ain’t so good at lyin’.” Boyd smacks him on the thigh, an unspoken command to lift his hips up.
Raylan doesn’t seem inclined to obey. “Seems like I’m doing that just fine right now.”
“No, not lyin’ as in, on your back. Lyin’ as in, tellin’ un-truths,” Boyd clarifies, roughly kneeing Raylan’s legs apart. “‘Course, you ain’t very good at that out of bed, either.”
“Well, we all can’t be as good as you. Maybe you ought to give a seminar. Except try and do it without the Nazi flag this time.” Raylan still won’t lift his hips up.
“That was uncalled for, Raylan, it really was.” Boyd grabs the fabric of Raylan’s jeans. “Ava, my dearest love, would you do me the singular favor of pressin’ down on that bite I left on Raylan’s arm? Do it hard, he won’t mind.”
Raylan’s eyes narrow dangerously. “What the--”
Ava does it before she can think about it or before Raylan can stop her, presses the broken skin with her thumb. Raylan pulls and twitches beneath her, his eyes closed, gasping for breath.
“Harder please, darlin’.”
Ava does it harder, and that gets what Boyd wants -- Raylan’s hips cant up sharply as his body bows on the bed, so Boyd can tug Raylan’s jeans and underwear down. It must have hurt pretty bad, but the noise Raylan makes sure as hell doesn’t sound like pain.
“You’d feel real bad about hurtin’ him, wouldn’t you, if he didn’t like it so much.”
“I don’t know,” Ava says, fascinated at how Raylan looks all stretched out on their bed, with his jeans pulled down low around his hips and his arms in Ava’s lap, Boyd’s bite marks in his skin. “I might have liked it, anyway.”
“There is somethin’ that ain’t quite right about you two.” Raylan’s eyes are open again, blurry and dark.
Ava and Boyd share a grin. That’s certainly one way of putting it.
“The other thing you ain’t good at --”
“Oh, Jesus Christ, this again?” Raylan tugs his arms, but not necessarily like he’s trying to pull away.
“Ava, darlin’, you got a free hand you could use?”
“Sure do.”
“I’d sure like Raylan to pay attention and stop interruptin’ me. Think you might help me out with that?”
“Be happy to.” Ava uses her forearm to hold him again, and smacks her other hand over his mouth. “Shush, Raylan.”
He gives her a furious look, but they both know he could get out of her hold if he wanted to. That’s probably why he’s so angry.
“My, now, that is a sight I will certainly keep burned into my mind. The two of you are enough right now to tempt any righteous man to sin.” Boyd’s expression is entirely too smug.
“Good thing there ain’t no righteous men here,” Ava sasses him, and Raylan’s head moves like he’s trying to nod. She feels him say something against her palm, the words muffled but they sound like thank you.
Boyd’s laugh is bright, unfettered. “Good thing, indeed. Now, Raylan, I just got one more thing to say and then I’ll do something else with my mouth instead of talk.”
Even with his arms pinned and his mouth covered with Ava’s hand, Raylan still manages to look skeptical.
“You, Raylan, are very bad about expecting people to treat you decent instead of awful. It’s like you think if they ain’t hurtin’ you, they ain’t payin’ you no attention.”
Ava tries not to make a suspicious, throat-clearing, you’re one to talk noise.
“And so when you’re in bed, it’s a lot easier to just let someone hurt you, or for you to pin someone down and, oh, let’s say, suck them off which you are indeed very good at --” Boyd settles himself lower, rubbing his hand over Raylan’s stomach affectionately. “ --than just lay there and let someone make you feel good. So that’s what we’re doin’, here.” He moves his hand lower, his touch deliberate and slow as he rubs Raylan’s cock with his palm.
Ava’s caught up in the way that looks, how it’s clear Boyd’s done a time or two, that she initially misses him telling her to take her hand away so she can hear Raylan. But she does, and then Boyd takes Raylan in his mouth -- Raylan’s head snaps back and he swears, eyes screwed shut like he can’t bear to watch.
“Raylan,” Ava murmurs, because now he sounds like he’s pain and that doesn’t make a lick of sense to her, she knows from a slightly different perspective how good Boyd is at what he’s doing. “Open your eyes, darlin’.”
He does, and there’s pleasure and panic there in equal measure. “I -- stop holding my arms.” For all that it’s an order, it sounds awfully desperate.
“Nope.” Ava tightens her hold, her fingers wrapped now around both his wrists, pinning his arms on either side of his head instead of her lap. “Goddamn, Raylan, that has got to feel good.” She’s enthralled with how Boyd takes him deep and works him over hard with his hand, how Raylan’s hips are starting to push up, faster and faster like he can’t help himself.
“Yeah,” Raylan answers, everything about him twisted and breathless. She can feel the muscles in his forearms straining and tightening as his hands flex.
Boyd stops for a moment, and she thinks it’s so he can catch his breath but it’s actually so he can talk, which she really should have expected. “Raylan, I am trying to make you feel good and I am also tryin’ to get my lady all hot and bothered and impressed, so if you would stop treatin’ me like a high school girl who ain’t ever had her throat fucked before, I’d sure appreciate it.”
“Then you best get your goddamn mouth back where it should be and stop talkin’.” He glances up at Ava. “You better hold my arms a little tighter, sweetheart.”
Ava raises her eyebrows at the endearment but leans forward and puts more weight on her palms. “How’s that.”
“It’ll do,” Raylan bites out, and then moans when Boyd puts his mouth back on Raylan’s cock.
Oh, if she thought that was hot before it’s nothing compared to how it looks now. Raylan’s hips are snapping up so hard the mattress is moving off of the box springs, and Boyd’s choking but he’s taking it, his hands braced on either side of Raylan’s hips.
Ava doesn’t think she’s ever seen Raylan afraid of anything, but there’s something in his eyes that looks suspiciously like fear.
“Raylan, s’all right,” Ava murmurs, leaning down and kissing him despite the awkward angle. Strands of hair have escaped her messy ponytail and fall around his face.
He kisses her back almost desperately, and she can feel the noises he’s still making against her mouth.
She straightens back up, still lightly pinning Raylan’s wrists, and finds Boyd’s eyes on them. “You look so good like that, baby. Doesn’t he, Raylan?”
Raylan lifts his head enough to look down at Boyd. “Yeah that’s ‘cause -- he ain’t talkin’ -- ow, goddamn it, did you just pinch me?”
Boyd winks and lowers his head again, and Raylan’s falls back on the pillow. Raylan’s breathing gets all fucked up and shallow, and she watches appreciatively as the muscles in his stomach tighten as he gets closer.
“Come on, Raylan,” she murmurs, because the wildness is in his eyes again and she can tell he’s fighting it. “Let go, darlin’. You really ain’t got any other choice.”
Raylan comes with a groan and she watches the whole thing, how his eyes close and his face flushes, how Boyd doesn’t move away until it’s over and he sits back on his heels, breathing hard and rubbing the back of his hand over his mouth.
Boyd moves smoothly up the bed and kisses Raylan. Raylan’s wrists are free, so he raises one arm and slings it almost roughly around Boyd’s neck, pulling him closer and kissing him back.
The only sound in the room is their breathing, like they’re saying in silence what they can’t ever seem to say in words.
* * *
Raylan kicks his jeans off and lays on his side, Ava stretched out on her back next to him. He’s touching her quietly, easily, and it doesn’t feel like it’s just about sex anymore -- though Ava is starting to wonder if it ever actually was.
“Guess we ought to do something about you,” Raylan says gruffly, looking around her at Boyd.
“That’s awful kind of you,” Boyd murmurs. He’s sitting on the bed, still in his jeans though the top button is undone. Ava doesn’t remember doing that, which means he must have done it himself at some point. While he was sucking Raylan off.
Okay maybe it’s not all about the sex, but there’s no denying that part is really, really good. Damn.
“What do you want?” Raylan asks, still addressing Boyd. He makes it sound like a challenge, though there’s much less of an edge to his voice than usual.
Boyd’s hand slides into her hair, pulling it out of the ponytail. “Now, Raylan, we want to know what you want.”
“Please have a threesome with us, Raylan. It’s about you,” Raylan mocks, but he’s smiling, fingers tracing her collarbone and the curve of her breast, his eyes warm.
“We are very generous to our friends, you know.” She smiles and reaches up to smooth Raylan’s hair off his brow. Her fingers touch the streaks of grey at his temples. “Bet you’ve gotten some more of that since you got back here.”
“Bet I know whose fault that is.” He leans down and kisses her, surprisingly gentle. “You really are somethin’ else, Ava. Ain’t no way Boyd deserves you.”
“And I suppose you’re gonna tell me you do?”
“Hell, no,” Raylan laughs, straightening up. He looks over at Boyd, back at Ava, and it’s obvious he wants something and isn’t sure how to ask.
“Just say it. Boyd’ll probably do it. ‘Specially if I ask him.”
Boyd gives her hair a playful tug. He’s obviously still wound up, and it makes her want things, too -- despite the fact she can tell from the way the sky looks outside the window that it will be soon be dawn.
It took her a long time to do that, look into darkness and trust the light would come back.
“I want to watch. The two of you.” Raylan’s gaze never wavers, his voice steady. “Unless Ava’s too tired.”
“Ava is definitely not too tired.” She is, or at least her body is, but she wants this to keep going because it feels right in ways it maybe shouldn’t.
“Just checkin’.” Raylan moves over a little, still on his side. He clears his throat. “You can start whenever. You know. I’ll understand if you need a minute, Boyd. You sure ain’t gettin’ any younger.”
“It’s like you’ve never been to bed with me.” Boyd stands up to take off his jeans, but Raylan stops him.
“No. Ava, you do it. Come on, girl, least you can do is give me a bit of a show after I let you pin me down like that.”
Ava sits up and smacks him in the shoulder. “You let me?”
Raylan grins at her, and despite the lines around his eyes and the gray in his hair, he looks younger, mischievous. It’s a nice look on him.
She takes Boyd’s jeans off and it’s kind of weird at first to feel Raylan watching them but she gets used to it pretty quick, finds she actually likes it. Boyd is all energy and hands and enthusiasm, pouncing on her and when she kisses him he tastes like Raylan and that’s hot, too.
“Raylan, you’ll get on your back for Ava without the fuss you make when it’s for me, won’t you?”
“Of course. She’s a lot better lookin’ than you are.”
“Never gonna hear a word to the contrary escape my lips, Raylan. Lay on your back.”
Raylan lays flat and Boyd reaches down and wraps a strong arm around her middle, his mouth close to her ear. “I have engineered somethin’ I think you’ll like, darlin’. Hold on.”
Boyd picks her up, or as much as he can in their position, and settles her on top of Raylan, with her knees on either side of his and her hands on his shoulders. There’s a moment of hyper-awareness of how she’s straddling one man naked while another man gets behind her, but then Boyd starts fucking her and Raylan takes her hands off his shoulders and lets her push against his own, turned palms-up with his elbows propped up on the bed.
It gives her leverage and holds her steady, and it feels so good she can’t even think about being embarrassed, about feeling anything other than really goddamned lucky.
“Hi,” Raylan drawls, sleepy-eyed and smirking up at her. His fingers tighten. “Let’s see how you like it.”
“I like it -- fuck -- as much as you did,” she manages, tossing her head and trying to look through her hair.
“Boyd, hold the lady’s hair back so I can watch her face while you fuck her, would you?”
“I might be persuaded, Raylan.” Boyd’s breathing is rough as he slides one hand warm up her back and into her hair, gathering the strands and holding tight.
He could have just left her hair in the ponytail, but Ava doesn’t bring that up. He’s a bit theatrical.
“You know I thought about this, once,” Raylan continues, conversational, shifting a little beneath her. “About how you two’d look in bed together. Thought it would make me mad, picturin’ that.”
Raylan’s still shifting beneath her with unknown. “No, no, Ava, stay right where you are. Boyd, you could move -- come on, now, be accommodatin’, here, I’m only trying to help.”
Ava has no idea what he’s doing -- she’s not really concerned, she just wants Boyd to go back to fucking her harder -- and then suddenly she feels Raylan’s thigh pressed against her, between her legs and oh, oh. Every time Boyd thrusts into her, it pushes her forward and the friction is amazing, gets her throwing her head back and making noises that maybe sound a little like a scalded kitten.
“But thinkin’ about it, it got me hot. And angry, but we all knew that already. Boyd, you give it to that girl harder, you hear? I know you can, been where she is now.”
The thought of that is almost too much -- and not just for her, she can feel how Boyd reacts, the way he moves harder, rougher, fingers tight in her hair and on her hip.
“And maybe the next time, I thought about how maybe I’d be a less mad if I was there, too.”
Ava’s not sure she believes that, but it doesn’t really matter. She comes pressed up and rubbing against Raylan’s thigh, and Boyd drives hard inside of her and half-falls on top of her, gasping for breath.
The whole precarious situation holds for longer than she thought it might, before they all collapse in a piles of knees and elbows and ow and well guess that means I am done for the night.
Maybe that’s an omen.
* * *
Raylan makes noises about heading home, getting some sleep before work.
“You looked at the time, Raylan?” Boyd asks, and he’s tired so the words all run together, Raylan’s name a slur of consonants where a vowel or two should be.
“If you tell me it’s the devil’s hour, I’m gonna hit you.” Raylan yawns.
“Witching hour,” Boyd corrects. “And no, because that ain’t what time it is. Even demons are in bed at this hour.”
Ava rummages through her dresser until she finds a pair of sleep shorts. Because she’s a girl, she spends a few more minutes looking for the matching tank-top and being irritated she can’t find it. “Thought the witching hour was midnight?”
“Yes, you’d think that, wouldn’t you.” Raylan pulls on his boxers and peers at the clock. “Holy -- is that right? It can’t be. Fuck, I’d be late for work if I left now.”
“That’s why we should all go to bed,” Boyd says reasonably. Ava gives up on her tank top search and crawls into bed just wearing the sleep shorts. She moves in close to Boyd, who presses up behind her and tugs her close.
She can also feel his hand, inching closer to her breast. Ava smacks the top of it. “You can’t be serious.”
She feels him smile against her neck. “The spirit is always willin’ as far as you’re concerned, Miss Ava.”
“That’s real sweet, but you best will it to settle down.”
Raylan clears his throat. “You got a blanket or somethin’? I can take the couch.”
Ava startles at that, realizing Raylan’s just standing there and...leaning, like he does, instead of coming to bed. “No, we left you room. Come on. Turn the light out and get over here.” She pats the side of the bed that’s empty. “Good thing you two sleep on different sides, or else this whole thing would be doomed.”
“Yes, hooray, all our many and varied issues have been resolved.” In typical Raylan fashion, he follows up that sarcastic comment by doing exactly what he’d been stubbornly resisting to do, which was get in bed with them. And he’d only been resisting in the first place because he wanted to.
God, and men thought women were exhausting.
The bed is definitely not big enough for the three of them. She’s pretty sure Raylan’s feet are hanging off the edge, he always had that problem when he stayed over before. But no one is saying a thing, and when Raylan turns with his back to her, she just curls close and flings a leg over his, and one of her arms over his side.
He takes her hand and moves it up to his chest, pats it once and holds it there. She watches Boyd’s hand move from her waist to Raylan’s hip, and his thumb stroke once, twice, before Raylan twitches and tells him to knock it off.
“He’s ticklish,” Boyd murmurs.
“Heard that. Am not. Hate you.”
“You were supposed to, yes you are, and no you don’t.”
Ava makes a mental note to ask about how exactly Boyd figured out Raylan was ticklish. Maybe request a demonstration. But not until after they’ve had a (very, very late) breakfast. She’s going to be starving when she wakes up -- threesomes really work up the appetite. Which reminds her of something. “Hey, Raylan, you still coming to dinner on Sunday?”
“Well now, I reckon that depends.”
“On what?” Ava asks, smiling wickedly. “If I take my shirt off at the table?”
“I wasn’t thinking specifically that, but can’t say I’d complain any. But what it really depends on -- hey, Boyd?”
“Hmm?” Boyd sounds half-asleep, his breathing deep and even.
“You gonna make those mashed potatoes again?”
Boyd’s quiet for a moment. “That a request?”
“Maybe it is. After the other shit you made me ask for, I figured this one was small potatoes.”
“....Raylan.”
“What?”
“Nothin’. And I suppose I can, but we only have sweet potatoes. You all right with those?”
“Sure I yam, Boyd.”
Ava can’t see to be sure, but she’s pretty sure Boyd’s smiling.
author: someotherstorm
fandom: justified (vaguely future-ish)
pairing: ava/raylan/boyd
rating: MA
content advisory: references prior domestic abuse
word count: 14,167 (/facepalm)
summary: In which Ava learns that while the third time may indeed be a charm, first times are always awkward.
love was shrewd and bold (part two)
Ava needs a bit of a break after that.
She gets up and grabs a short, silk robe, drapes it over her shoulders without bothering to tie it, and grabs her smokes. This time she heads for the window, running her fingers through Boyd’s hair on her way.
“I used to have clients pay thirty bucks for product to make their hair do this.” She tugs on the strands, which are sticking straight up like all that energy buzzing through him shot right out of the top of his head. “Should’a just had ‘em go to bed with you two.”
“Think we might have to charge a little more than thirty bucks, Ava. My pride won’t let my sexual prowess be valued at a jar of wax pomade.” At her look, Raylan laughs. “I was married, darlin’. Sometimes we pay attention to all that crap in the vanity.” Raylan’s arm is bleeding a little, but he doesn’t seem to mind so Ava doesn’t, either.
Ava opens the window and lights her smoke, half-heartedly aiming the smoke out of the screen. The cool air feels good, she can’t tell if it’s because she’s too warm or if there’s just too much sin in the room for it to be anything other than hot.
Boyd and Raylan go back to making out and she watches them through two straight cigarettes, her head feeling woozy from the booze and sex and the nicotine. She’s content to just look her fill, wondering if they know that no amount of biting and roughing each other up will hide how much they want each other.
Maybe that’s what she should have told Raylan, when he asked her why it didn’t bother her. Be like tryin’ to tell the sun to stop risin’, gettin’ you two to keep your distance. Besides, if Ava didn’t want Boyd trying to change her into someone else, like Bowman did every day of their marriage until she needed a shotgun to tell him to knock it the hell off -- she couldn’t go around trying to change him, either.
And the fact it was really hot, that sure as hell didn’t hurt any.
“All right,” Ava announces, stubbing out her second smoke and dropping the robe to the floor. “What do you boys have to show me, next?”
Raylan surprises her with an answer -- she thought it was going to take a lot more banter, that seemed to be pattern -- trying to push Boyd on his back. “I’ll suck him off. Bet you’d like that, Ava.”
She would indeed, but because Raylan suggests it, she’s immediately suspicious of his motives. “Well that does sound nice, Raylan. I’m sure you’re very good at it.”
Raylan nods, then elbows Boyd in the side. When Boyd doesn’t say anything, Raylan scowls and elbows him, harder. “Boyd. Tell her I’m good at it.”
Boyd rubs a hand over his side. “Ava, Raylan is very good at sucking cock.” He’s giving her the same look he does when they’re at a party and he wants to leave, or when he’s trying to tell her he has to go outside and take care of some business and she should pay the tab and meet him at the truck.
“Is there anything Raylan isn’t good at?” Ava teases, taking the ever-present black elastic from her wrist and twisting her hair up on her head.
Boyd smiles, obviously pleased. “There’s a few things.”
“What?” Raylan elbows him again. “What few things are those, Boyd? Don’t recall you ever havin’ that many complaints. And don’t say something dumb like, making puns or Jeopardy or driving.”
Boyd gets on top of him again, straddling him easily. “Killin’ old friends?”
“I could get better at that. Practice makes perfect -- hey, get off me, you know I don’t like sucking cock on my back.”
Ava can’t stop the unholy grin that comment elicits. “My, my. The things I have learned about you during this threesome, Raylan. So informational.”
“God, you even sound like him.” Raylan’s look is accusatory. “Stop that. One’s enough.” He shoves at Boyd’s shoulder. “Now get on your back so I can suck you off and thrill your woman. It’s late, and some of us do have legitimate jobs to get to in the morning.”
Ava wonders if Raylan knows what time it is. She considers taking her panties off and tossing them at the clock to cover up the numbers, but instead she just moves nonchalantly and tries to stand in front of it.
Boyd moves so he’s straddling Raylan’s legs. “Move down a bit, would you? Ava’s gonna need a place to sit if she’s gonna hold your arms. Ava, baby, my light in the darkness...get over here and hold Raylan’s arms for me.”
Raylan looks like he’s going to argue, but Boyd’s hand rubs over the front of his jeans and Raylan snaps his jaw shut and doesn’t. Ava gets settled behind him and takes his arms from where they’re crossed underneath his head, and tugs them so they’re in her lap.
Boyd pauses as he’s taking off Raylan’s belt to admire her, eyes bright like stars. “You’re so beautiful, baby. Seems like it ain’t right, me gazin’ upon you with these sinner’s eyes.”
“Oh, you’re kidding me.” Raylan makes a dismissive noise. “Does he say stuff like that a lot?”
“Fairly often.” Ava traces the inside of him, watches him fight not to react.
“And does it work?” Raylan’s eyes are closed, but they open and he looks up at her -- well, mostly up at her, as he seems to get distracted by her breasts.
“Depends on what you mean by work.” Ava rubs her thumb on the inside of Raylan’s wrist. The bite Boyd left on his upper arm is stark against his skin. The fingers of her free hand are gentle as they run lightly over the fierce, angry mark.
Raylan inhales sharply and shifts beneath her. “What the hell are you doing, Boyd?”
“As I recall, I was tellin’ Ava about things you ain’t good at in bed,” Boyd says, undoing the button on Raylan’s jeans and easing the zipper down. “First one, Raylan -- know what that is?”
“I hate when you do that,” Raylan snaps, growing more agitated by the minute.
“Take your pants off?”
“No, ask me questions that you don’t really want me to answer. Obviously I don’t know what it is, you just want to tell me.” Ava can see the muscles in his arms and shoulders tensing as Boyd tugs at his jeans.
“You ain’t so good at lyin’.” Boyd smacks him on the thigh, an unspoken command to lift his hips up.
Raylan doesn’t seem inclined to obey. “Seems like I’m doing that just fine right now.”
“No, not lyin’ as in, on your back. Lyin’ as in, tellin’ un-truths,” Boyd clarifies, roughly kneeing Raylan’s legs apart. “‘Course, you ain’t very good at that out of bed, either.”
“Well, we all can’t be as good as you. Maybe you ought to give a seminar. Except try and do it without the Nazi flag this time.” Raylan still won’t lift his hips up.
“That was uncalled for, Raylan, it really was.” Boyd grabs the fabric of Raylan’s jeans. “Ava, my dearest love, would you do me the singular favor of pressin’ down on that bite I left on Raylan’s arm? Do it hard, he won’t mind.”
Raylan’s eyes narrow dangerously. “What the--”
Ava does it before she can think about it or before Raylan can stop her, presses the broken skin with her thumb. Raylan pulls and twitches beneath her, his eyes closed, gasping for breath.
“Harder please, darlin’.”
Ava does it harder, and that gets what Boyd wants -- Raylan’s hips cant up sharply as his body bows on the bed, so Boyd can tug Raylan’s jeans and underwear down. It must have hurt pretty bad, but the noise Raylan makes sure as hell doesn’t sound like pain.
“You’d feel real bad about hurtin’ him, wouldn’t you, if he didn’t like it so much.”
“I don’t know,” Ava says, fascinated at how Raylan looks all stretched out on their bed, with his jeans pulled down low around his hips and his arms in Ava’s lap, Boyd’s bite marks in his skin. “I might have liked it, anyway.”
“There is somethin’ that ain’t quite right about you two.” Raylan’s eyes are open again, blurry and dark.
Ava and Boyd share a grin. That’s certainly one way of putting it.
“The other thing you ain’t good at --”
“Oh, Jesus Christ, this again?” Raylan tugs his arms, but not necessarily like he’s trying to pull away.
“Ava, darlin’, you got a free hand you could use?”
“Sure do.”
“I’d sure like Raylan to pay attention and stop interruptin’ me. Think you might help me out with that?”
“Be happy to.” Ava uses her forearm to hold him again, and smacks her other hand over his mouth. “Shush, Raylan.”
He gives her a furious look, but they both know he could get out of her hold if he wanted to. That’s probably why he’s so angry.
“My, now, that is a sight I will certainly keep burned into my mind. The two of you are enough right now to tempt any righteous man to sin.” Boyd’s expression is entirely too smug.
“Good thing there ain’t no righteous men here,” Ava sasses him, and Raylan’s head moves like he’s trying to nod. She feels him say something against her palm, the words muffled but they sound like thank you.
Boyd’s laugh is bright, unfettered. “Good thing, indeed. Now, Raylan, I just got one more thing to say and then I’ll do something else with my mouth instead of talk.”
Even with his arms pinned and his mouth covered with Ava’s hand, Raylan still manages to look skeptical.
“You, Raylan, are very bad about expecting people to treat you decent instead of awful. It’s like you think if they ain’t hurtin’ you, they ain’t payin’ you no attention.”
Ava tries not to make a suspicious, throat-clearing, you’re one to talk noise.
“And so when you’re in bed, it’s a lot easier to just let someone hurt you, or for you to pin someone down and, oh, let’s say, suck them off which you are indeed very good at --” Boyd settles himself lower, rubbing his hand over Raylan’s stomach affectionately. “ --than just lay there and let someone make you feel good. So that’s what we’re doin’, here.” He moves his hand lower, his touch deliberate and slow as he rubs Raylan’s cock with his palm.
Ava’s caught up in the way that looks, how it’s clear Boyd’s done a time or two, that she initially misses him telling her to take her hand away so she can hear Raylan. But she does, and then Boyd takes Raylan in his mouth -- Raylan’s head snaps back and he swears, eyes screwed shut like he can’t bear to watch.
“Raylan,” Ava murmurs, because now he sounds like he’s pain and that doesn’t make a lick of sense to her, she knows from a slightly different perspective how good Boyd is at what he’s doing. “Open your eyes, darlin’.”
He does, and there’s pleasure and panic there in equal measure. “I -- stop holding my arms.” For all that it’s an order, it sounds awfully desperate.
“Nope.” Ava tightens her hold, her fingers wrapped now around both his wrists, pinning his arms on either side of his head instead of her lap. “Goddamn, Raylan, that has got to feel good.” She’s enthralled with how Boyd takes him deep and works him over hard with his hand, how Raylan’s hips are starting to push up, faster and faster like he can’t help himself.
“Yeah,” Raylan answers, everything about him twisted and breathless. She can feel the muscles in his forearms straining and tightening as his hands flex.
Boyd stops for a moment, and she thinks it’s so he can catch his breath but it’s actually so he can talk, which she really should have expected. “Raylan, I am trying to make you feel good and I am also tryin’ to get my lady all hot and bothered and impressed, so if you would stop treatin’ me like a high school girl who ain’t ever had her throat fucked before, I’d sure appreciate it.”
“Then you best get your goddamn mouth back where it should be and stop talkin’.” He glances up at Ava. “You better hold my arms a little tighter, sweetheart.”
Ava raises her eyebrows at the endearment but leans forward and puts more weight on her palms. “How’s that.”
“It’ll do,” Raylan bites out, and then moans when Boyd puts his mouth back on Raylan’s cock.
Oh, if she thought that was hot before it’s nothing compared to how it looks now. Raylan’s hips are snapping up so hard the mattress is moving off of the box springs, and Boyd’s choking but he’s taking it, his hands braced on either side of Raylan’s hips.
Ava doesn’t think she’s ever seen Raylan afraid of anything, but there’s something in his eyes that looks suspiciously like fear.
“Raylan, s’all right,” Ava murmurs, leaning down and kissing him despite the awkward angle. Strands of hair have escaped her messy ponytail and fall around his face.
He kisses her back almost desperately, and she can feel the noises he’s still making against her mouth.
She straightens back up, still lightly pinning Raylan’s wrists, and finds Boyd’s eyes on them. “You look so good like that, baby. Doesn’t he, Raylan?”
Raylan lifts his head enough to look down at Boyd. “Yeah that’s ‘cause -- he ain’t talkin’ -- ow, goddamn it, did you just pinch me?”
Boyd winks and lowers his head again, and Raylan’s falls back on the pillow. Raylan’s breathing gets all fucked up and shallow, and she watches appreciatively as the muscles in his stomach tighten as he gets closer.
“Come on, Raylan,” she murmurs, because the wildness is in his eyes again and she can tell he’s fighting it. “Let go, darlin’. You really ain’t got any other choice.”
Raylan comes with a groan and she watches the whole thing, how his eyes close and his face flushes, how Boyd doesn’t move away until it’s over and he sits back on his heels, breathing hard and rubbing the back of his hand over his mouth.
Boyd moves smoothly up the bed and kisses Raylan. Raylan’s wrists are free, so he raises one arm and slings it almost roughly around Boyd’s neck, pulling him closer and kissing him back.
The only sound in the room is their breathing, like they’re saying in silence what they can’t ever seem to say in words.
* * *
Raylan kicks his jeans off and lays on his side, Ava stretched out on her back next to him. He’s touching her quietly, easily, and it doesn’t feel like it’s just about sex anymore -- though Ava is starting to wonder if it ever actually was.
“Guess we ought to do something about you,” Raylan says gruffly, looking around her at Boyd.
“That’s awful kind of you,” Boyd murmurs. He’s sitting on the bed, still in his jeans though the top button is undone. Ava doesn’t remember doing that, which means he must have done it himself at some point. While he was sucking Raylan off.
Okay maybe it’s not all about the sex, but there’s no denying that part is really, really good. Damn.
“What do you want?” Raylan asks, still addressing Boyd. He makes it sound like a challenge, though there’s much less of an edge to his voice than usual.
Boyd’s hand slides into her hair, pulling it out of the ponytail. “Now, Raylan, we want to know what you want.”
“Please have a threesome with us, Raylan. It’s about you,” Raylan mocks, but he’s smiling, fingers tracing her collarbone and the curve of her breast, his eyes warm.
“We are very generous to our friends, you know.” She smiles and reaches up to smooth Raylan’s hair off his brow. Her fingers touch the streaks of grey at his temples. “Bet you’ve gotten some more of that since you got back here.”
“Bet I know whose fault that is.” He leans down and kisses her, surprisingly gentle. “You really are somethin’ else, Ava. Ain’t no way Boyd deserves you.”
“And I suppose you’re gonna tell me you do?”
“Hell, no,” Raylan laughs, straightening up. He looks over at Boyd, back at Ava, and it’s obvious he wants something and isn’t sure how to ask.
“Just say it. Boyd’ll probably do it. ‘Specially if I ask him.”
Boyd gives her hair a playful tug. He’s obviously still wound up, and it makes her want things, too -- despite the fact she can tell from the way the sky looks outside the window that it will be soon be dawn.
It took her a long time to do that, look into darkness and trust the light would come back.
“I want to watch. The two of you.” Raylan’s gaze never wavers, his voice steady. “Unless Ava’s too tired.”
“Ava is definitely not too tired.” She is, or at least her body is, but she wants this to keep going because it feels right in ways it maybe shouldn’t.
“Just checkin’.” Raylan moves over a little, still on his side. He clears his throat. “You can start whenever. You know. I’ll understand if you need a minute, Boyd. You sure ain’t gettin’ any younger.”
“It’s like you’ve never been to bed with me.” Boyd stands up to take off his jeans, but Raylan stops him.
“No. Ava, you do it. Come on, girl, least you can do is give me a bit of a show after I let you pin me down like that.”
Ava sits up and smacks him in the shoulder. “You let me?”
Raylan grins at her, and despite the lines around his eyes and the gray in his hair, he looks younger, mischievous. It’s a nice look on him.
She takes Boyd’s jeans off and it’s kind of weird at first to feel Raylan watching them but she gets used to it pretty quick, finds she actually likes it. Boyd is all energy and hands and enthusiasm, pouncing on her and when she kisses him he tastes like Raylan and that’s hot, too.
“Raylan, you’ll get on your back for Ava without the fuss you make when it’s for me, won’t you?”
“Of course. She’s a lot better lookin’ than you are.”
“Never gonna hear a word to the contrary escape my lips, Raylan. Lay on your back.”
Raylan lays flat and Boyd reaches down and wraps a strong arm around her middle, his mouth close to her ear. “I have engineered somethin’ I think you’ll like, darlin’. Hold on.”
Boyd picks her up, or as much as he can in their position, and settles her on top of Raylan, with her knees on either side of his and her hands on his shoulders. There’s a moment of hyper-awareness of how she’s straddling one man naked while another man gets behind her, but then Boyd starts fucking her and Raylan takes her hands off his shoulders and lets her push against his own, turned palms-up with his elbows propped up on the bed.
It gives her leverage and holds her steady, and it feels so good she can’t even think about being embarrassed, about feeling anything other than really goddamned lucky.
“Hi,” Raylan drawls, sleepy-eyed and smirking up at her. His fingers tighten. “Let’s see how you like it.”
“I like it -- fuck -- as much as you did,” she manages, tossing her head and trying to look through her hair.
“Boyd, hold the lady’s hair back so I can watch her face while you fuck her, would you?”
“I might be persuaded, Raylan.” Boyd’s breathing is rough as he slides one hand warm up her back and into her hair, gathering the strands and holding tight.
He could have just left her hair in the ponytail, but Ava doesn’t bring that up. He’s a bit theatrical.
“You know I thought about this, once,” Raylan continues, conversational, shifting a little beneath her. “About how you two’d look in bed together. Thought it would make me mad, picturin’ that.”
Raylan’s still shifting beneath her with unknown. “No, no, Ava, stay right where you are. Boyd, you could move -- come on, now, be accommodatin’, here, I’m only trying to help.”
Ava has no idea what he’s doing -- she’s not really concerned, she just wants Boyd to go back to fucking her harder -- and then suddenly she feels Raylan’s thigh pressed against her, between her legs and oh, oh. Every time Boyd thrusts into her, it pushes her forward and the friction is amazing, gets her throwing her head back and making noises that maybe sound a little like a scalded kitten.
“But thinkin’ about it, it got me hot. And angry, but we all knew that already. Boyd, you give it to that girl harder, you hear? I know you can, been where she is now.”
The thought of that is almost too much -- and not just for her, she can feel how Boyd reacts, the way he moves harder, rougher, fingers tight in her hair and on her hip.
“And maybe the next time, I thought about how maybe I’d be a less mad if I was there, too.”
Ava’s not sure she believes that, but it doesn’t really matter. She comes pressed up and rubbing against Raylan’s thigh, and Boyd drives hard inside of her and half-falls on top of her, gasping for breath.
The whole precarious situation holds for longer than she thought it might, before they all collapse in a piles of knees and elbows and ow and well guess that means I am done for the night.
Maybe that’s an omen.
* * *
Raylan makes noises about heading home, getting some sleep before work.
“You looked at the time, Raylan?” Boyd asks, and he’s tired so the words all run together, Raylan’s name a slur of consonants where a vowel or two should be.
“If you tell me it’s the devil’s hour, I’m gonna hit you.” Raylan yawns.
“Witching hour,” Boyd corrects. “And no, because that ain’t what time it is. Even demons are in bed at this hour.”
Ava rummages through her dresser until she finds a pair of sleep shorts. Because she’s a girl, she spends a few more minutes looking for the matching tank-top and being irritated she can’t find it. “Thought the witching hour was midnight?”
“Yes, you’d think that, wouldn’t you.” Raylan pulls on his boxers and peers at the clock. “Holy -- is that right? It can’t be. Fuck, I’d be late for work if I left now.”
“That’s why we should all go to bed,” Boyd says reasonably. Ava gives up on her tank top search and crawls into bed just wearing the sleep shorts. She moves in close to Boyd, who presses up behind her and tugs her close.
She can also feel his hand, inching closer to her breast. Ava smacks the top of it. “You can’t be serious.”
She feels him smile against her neck. “The spirit is always willin’ as far as you’re concerned, Miss Ava.”
“That’s real sweet, but you best will it to settle down.”
Raylan clears his throat. “You got a blanket or somethin’? I can take the couch.”
Ava startles at that, realizing Raylan’s just standing there and...leaning, like he does, instead of coming to bed. “No, we left you room. Come on. Turn the light out and get over here.” She pats the side of the bed that’s empty. “Good thing you two sleep on different sides, or else this whole thing would be doomed.”
“Yes, hooray, all our many and varied issues have been resolved.” In typical Raylan fashion, he follows up that sarcastic comment by doing exactly what he’d been stubbornly resisting to do, which was get in bed with them. And he’d only been resisting in the first place because he wanted to.
God, and men thought women were exhausting.
The bed is definitely not big enough for the three of them. She’s pretty sure Raylan’s feet are hanging off the edge, he always had that problem when he stayed over before. But no one is saying a thing, and when Raylan turns with his back to her, she just curls close and flings a leg over his, and one of her arms over his side.
He takes her hand and moves it up to his chest, pats it once and holds it there. She watches Boyd’s hand move from her waist to Raylan’s hip, and his thumb stroke once, twice, before Raylan twitches and tells him to knock it off.
“He’s ticklish,” Boyd murmurs.
“Heard that. Am not. Hate you.”
“You were supposed to, yes you are, and no you don’t.”
Ava makes a mental note to ask about how exactly Boyd figured out Raylan was ticklish. Maybe request a demonstration. But not until after they’ve had a (very, very late) breakfast. She’s going to be starving when she wakes up -- threesomes really work up the appetite. Which reminds her of something. “Hey, Raylan, you still coming to dinner on Sunday?”
“Well now, I reckon that depends.”
“On what?” Ava asks, smiling wickedly. “If I take my shirt off at the table?”
“I wasn’t thinking specifically that, but can’t say I’d complain any. But what it really depends on -- hey, Boyd?”
“Hmm?” Boyd sounds half-asleep, his breathing deep and even.
“You gonna make those mashed potatoes again?”
Boyd’s quiet for a moment. “That a request?”
“Maybe it is. After the other shit you made me ask for, I figured this one was small potatoes.”
“....Raylan.”
“What?”
“Nothin’. And I suppose I can, but we only have sweet potatoes. You all right with those?”
“Sure I yam, Boyd.”
Ava can’t see to be sure, but she’s pretty sure Boyd’s smiling.