She held him tightly to her, his face pressed against her shoulder as she stroked his back, his hair, the stubble on his cheeks.
And even though she knew Caph was yearning for his turn, he didn’t rush his lover, his husband, letting him draw healing from her as he slowly recovered his senses.
Aaron kissed her deeply as he pushed up on his arms. “I love you,” he said.
She smiled. “I love you, too.” Without even thinking about it, she looked at Caph and kissed him. “And I love you.” And then Ford. “And I love you.”
Aaron let out a happy sigh and sat up. “I’d better move before Caph tackles me.”
“I wasn’t going to say anything,” Caph said, “but yeah.”
Emi giggled. She shared a wink with Ford, knowing he was more than happy to wait until last this time. He’d had her all to himself and wanted his husbands to have this time with her.
Caph kissed her, different than Aaron, but his energy held the same happy glow of Aaron’s. “Hi.”
She smiled. “Hi.” When she sensed hesitancy from him as he worried about hurting her, she reached between his legs and grabbed his cock. Rubbing it up and down between her labia, now soaked from her own juices and Aaron’s, she said, “I think this is what you want to do.”
With a groan, he sank home, his entire body trembling with the effort of holding back.
She made him look down at her. “As hard and fast as you want. You won’t hurt me.”
His sweet green eyes widened a little, but he took her up on it, not bothering to hold back once he had her assurance.
She felt his release building fast, explosive like a force of nature. And when his balls drew up tight before adding his own juices to her, he burst into tears and collapsed on top of her.
All three of them comforted him, but she knew he needed this, to get the pain out of his soul before it ate away at him. The big man with the even bigger heart.
And then it was Ford’s turn.
Instead of positioning himself to fuck her, he lay between her legs and began laving her pussy and clit with his tongue. When she finally begged him to stop three orgasms later, he sat up wearing a wicked grin. His cock jutted out from his body. “How was that?”
She nodded, beyond speech.
Caph moved with incredible speed for a man his size. He leaned over and wrapped his lips around Ford’s cock, almost knocking the smaller man over as Ford had to brace himself against Caph’s shoulders.
She snuggled against Aaron and enjoyed watching them together, the way Caph eagerly bobbed his head up and down as he worked to drain Ford’s sac of his cum.
“He’s got a very talented mouth,” Aaron softly whispered in her ear. “And he’s been beyond wanting to put it to use.”
She giggled. Ford had given up trying to stay vertical. He fell over on his side, Caph moving with him and never releasing Ford’s cock from his mouth. When Ford grabbed Caph’s head and started fucking his hips in time with Caph’s motions, Caph let out a happy moan of his own.
And then Emi watched Ford’s fingers tighten in Caph’s shaggy hair, his body tensing as his orgasm hit him and Caph fell still, his throat working while he swallowed.
“Better?” she said once Ford had once again opened his eyes.
He nodded. “Oh, yeah. Jesus, I missed that.”
She felt her eyelids already growing heavy as Caph returned to snuggle next to her. Ford, satisfied with spooning Caph from behind, completed their group.
“Okay,” Aaron mumbled, already falling asleep. “Captain’s orders. Everyone sleep late.”
The twins both said, “Aye, aye, Cap.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Dr. Graymard placed his hands on his desk and looked at Emi. “I cannot guarantee you we will be able to retrieve all your memories.”
“I know.”
She heard his sigh and didn’t know if he was more worried for her, or worried about her men. “Promise you won’t try to hit me this time when you come out of the sim?”
She didn’t understand his quirky smile. She must have looked confused, because a brief wave of sadness replaced his concern. “The very first day when you came in to be evaluated for the program,” he said, “you were put through a sim session to match you with Aaron, Caph, and Ford. When you came out of it, you hit me because when it ended, you thought Aaron was going to his death.”
That tweaked something in the dark, murky recesses of her brain, but it flittered away again before she could hold on to it. She wasn’t sure what the proper response should be. “Oh. Sorry?”
The wave of sadness washing from him didn’t match his smile. “It’s quite all right. I’ll gladly take another punch if it means you do get all your memories back.”
“What do we do next?”
“What I’d like to do is put you through a replay of your initial sim session with your men. Not with them. However, Dr. Stephens has volunteered to go through it with you as an active observer, if you’d like.”
“To hold my hand?”
“You can say no, if you wish.”
Emi thought about it. Looking at pictures and vids of her past with Donna Stephens was another pleasant trigger in her memory, in a different way than her men.
“Okay. Is she here?”
“Dr. Stephens and her men are on their way down from the orbiting space station now. They’ll be here in less than an hour.” He glanced down at his desk. “She’s very concerned about you. They all are.”
Emi had read through the files, both their professional files and Emi’s saved personal correspondence with her. “Dr. Stephens—Donna—and I were very close, weren’t we?”
“You were roommates in college. You went to school together. She joined the DSMC after you left Earth. She is your best friend. Both her and Dr. Vanderlin. Although you both met Dr. Vanderlin at the same time and haven’t known her as long.”
Emi took a deep breath. “Why don’t you want me going through it with my men?”
“You can, but I’d like you to go through it first as just an observer. I think it would be better for you to be able to watch it without the emotions of your men influencing you the first time. They might be overwhelmed watching it. It will play for you and Dr. Stephens like a vid. But the two of you will be able to interact with each other. That she volunteered to do this shows how much she loves you as a friend.”
“Why?”
He smiled and rubbed his jaw. “Because she swore she’d never get into another sim. She also packs an even meaner punch than you do.”
Emi looked up from the handheld she’d been reading when the door opened. A woman looking like the file pics and vids Emi had watched walked in.
When she spotted Emi, she smiled and rushed over to her, enveloping her in a huge hug.
“Emi, oh my gods!” She leaned back to look Emi in the eyes. “Jesus, when Ford told us what happened, I thought I’d never see you again. And then we were the ones who found the pod…” Tears brimmed in her eyes. “Then when Graymard got hold of me when you got to Mars with the Beyants…” She hugged Emi again, sobbing against her shoulder.
Donna’s mix of old grief, relief, and joy threatened to overwhelm Emi. She returned her embrace, unsure what to say and feeling guilty for not having the memories of the deep bond they’d so obviously shared.
Finally, Donna composed herself and put on a smile for Emi. “Hey, I said I’ve been wanting empath training. Graymard said I can use the time here to do it, if I want. Work with the techs who will help you. He said we can stay here as long as I want, or until you’re returned to duty, whichever comes first.”
Graymard hadn’t told her that part, but Emi welcomed Donna’s company. Already, little snippets of things about Donna wanted to tease at Emi’s brain, as if memories lurked on the backside of windows clouded by soot and were knocking for recognition and release.