Author's note: Continued thanks to Mofitiss, ACD, et al. You're the reason I have characters to play with. Special shout out to my fellow American citizens. Thanks for coming out to vote. Whether your candidate won or lost, your vote really did matter. Never let someone steal your voice from you by not voting.

Chapter 18

Heather and Jim walked out the door and took a seat on the front porch glider. "It's supposed to be a beautiful night. Maybe after dinner, we can go for a walk before returning home. I want to give Bash and Kate plenty of time alone tonight. Kate kind of has a thing for him and if he plays his cards right, we might come home to find them up to some naughtiness." Heather grinned teasingly. "I just hope Bash has the good sense to move things up to his room before they get too hot and heavy. I don't want to walk into my house and see Bashie buns staring me down while they're playing 'sink the shillelagh.' That would be alarming, to say the least."

Jim laughed. "Yeah, I walked in on him once when he was taking care of himself and that was horrific. He had the weirdest look on his face I had ever seen." Jim shuddered at the memory.

"Oh, did it look something like this?" Heather crossed her eyes and jutted out her lower jaw. "Was he chanting something about 'Go Big Daddy. Yeah, Big Daddy! In like a super deep voice, like a bad Barry White impression?"

"Oh my God, yeah! That's exactly what he was doing! How did you know?"

"Jim, that's his 'O' face." Heather kind of laughed. "You … you do know that Bash and I had sex together when we were in Afghanistan and then a couple times after that, right? We were basically friends with benefits. If we were both in the same town and feeling frisky, we would have the occasional booty call. It never really meant anything. It was just safe, comfortable sex. Not anymore. It's been years since we did anything like that. I insisted that we stop, when I realized that I was falling in love with him, but that he just didn't see me like that. The sex went from being carefree and fun to meaning something and he couldn't or wouldn't commit to going to the level I was on. So, we stopped for the sake of our friendship. I missed it for a while, but we both moved on a long time ago. We're both back to being great platonic friends. Neither one of us sees the other in any sort of sexual way, I promise. Besides, I'm with you now and I don't cheat. I'm a one-man kind of girl. My dad cheated on my mom a lot throughout their marriage and that caused me to lose a lot of respect for him. I wholeheartedly believe that when you make a commitment to someone, you honor that commitment 100%. Honesty and respect are huge for me. They are essential to any relationship. Brian and I talked a lot before we got married about the future because I was really nervous about it, given how shitty my parents' marriage was. We decided that there were only two reasons to ever get divorced. We called them the "2 A's." Adultery and Abuse. And they were final. If one of us committed one of them, it was over. No 2nd chances. No redos. No promises 'that it'll never happen again.' Nothing. The marriage was over permanently. We figured that everything else could be worked on, probably in therapy. It wouldn't be fun, or easy, or cheap, or fast, but it could be fixed. But cheating on your spouse and/or purposefully hurting them … uh uh, no, game over. You hurt me physically, emotionally, financially, sexually, whatever, I'm gone and I'm not looking back for anything. I grew up watching my mom tolerate far far too much of my dad's shit and I promised myself I would NEVER be like her. Ever! You need to understand that right now or this will never work out. Bash and I have an understanding that there are sometimes things he can't tell me, usually to keep me safe and that's fine. We even came up with a code word, but he knows that if he tells me something, it has to be the absolute truth. No lies. No misdirection. I know that you guys had a situation at work earlier today. I don't know what it was about. I saw Bash on the phone and was kidding him about spending his vacation doing work and he said he had to and invoked our code word and that was it. I knew to back off immediately. I'm curious to know what happened because I'm nosy, but if Bash uses our code word, then that's that. I don't ask any further. The matter gets dropped." Heather paused. "Well, ok, now that I've brought the room down to funeral-level fun, what else can we talk about else that's super depressing and sucks all of the joy out of the moment. Want to tell me about the time you found your pet dog, Scraps run over by your neighbor or the day your grandma died, and you found out that Santa wasn't real?" She smiled shyly.

"No, I hear you. I demand faithfulness and honesty too. My brother and I had a bad childhood, so trust is hard for me. I guess it's something we'll have to work on together. I trust Moran, but even that took me a long time to achieve."

"Do you trust me? It's okay if you don't just yet. I want you to, but I can appreciate the fact that it might take a while. I'll do my best to earn your trust. Can you do the same for me?"

"Yeah. Is there anything I can do to expedite that process?"

"Jim, just … just promise that you'll always be honest with me. If there is something you can't tell me for my safety or something, just say 'octopus.' That's Bash and my code word. Just don't overuse it. I need to know that I can trust the information I'm being given. You can also help by understanding that this is scary for me. When Brian died, I thought I had lost my chance to ever have true love again. You don't have the safest job on Earth and I …" Heather paused. "I don't know what I would do if I put my whole heart into another relationship and it ended the way the last one did. Brian's death almost killed me. I was deeply suicidal for a while. I was cutting myself. I started drinking a lot and overeating. I didn't sleep. I took ridiculous risks. I stopped my bipolar meds. I became very hard and bitter. I was barely functional. It was really ugly for quite a while. I can't go back to that place. I just can't. I don't know if I would be able to escape a second time."

Jim wrapped his arms around her. "Okay, I can agree to that. Honesty and keeping safe. I will do my best. Sebastian and the rest of the security team does a good job of keeping me safe and I will make a real effort to be open with you as much as I can. Octopus, huh? Okay, I'll try to remember that. Would you feel better about my safety if you met the security team when you came to London in a few weeks? You could even sit down with them and ask questions, if you wanted. If it would make you feel better?"

Heather considered the offer for a moment, "Yeah, yeah. That might help. You don't think they'll mind?"

"Love, they're my employees. I pay them to do whatever I order. If any of them give you any crap, tell me or Sebastian and they will be handled." Jim replied with a comforting smile. "Look, our limo is here. Can you hit the gates please?"

Heather opened the front door and typed in the code. "Bash, when the car leaves, could you please close the gates with the code. Thank you!"

Heather heard a giggle from the kitchen. "Sebastian, did you hear me?" She yelled out. "Please close the gates after the limo leaves."

"Ok. Will do. Have a good time. Don't hurry back!"

Heather rolled her eyes and closed the front door. "Well, the children are getting along well. We were just reminded again not to hurry back. I'm only slightly nauseous now."

Jim took Heather's arm and they walked to the limo, where the driver was holding the door open. Heather climbed in and Jim walked around to the other side and entered the car beside her. Heather smiled and laid her head on Jim's shoulder. "Jim, you are spoiling me tonight. I should tell you to stop, but this is lovely."

"Get used to being spoiled, my princess. Only the best for my girl from now on." Jim kissed her head. He addressed the driver, "Are you familiar with our destination? Maurice's."

"Yes, sir. We should be there in 25 minutes," answered the driver. "I understand I am to wait outside for you and the lady once we arrive. Is that correct, sir?"

"Yes. Please put the divider up. We wish for some privacy. Only lower it once we have arrived at the restaurant."

"Very good, sir."

Sebastian's POV

"God, I thought they would never leave," giggled Kate. "So, let's get started on that lasagna. I'm starving." She read through the recipe. "This is takes about 20 minutes to prep and then another hour to bake. I need a snack. How about you?"

"Yeah, let's see what Heather has laying around." They looked through the cabinets. Sebastian brought out the chocolate chip cookies from the night before. "Here we go. Cookies!"

They each grabbed two cookies and started to eat them. Sebastian ended up with a little bit of melted chocolate on the corner of his mouth. Kate started to tell him, but decided better. "Sebastian sit down over here for a minute," she said gesturing to a dining room chair. He sat down, and Kate straddled his lap and sat down. "You have a little chocolate on your mouth. Let me get that for you," she said gazing at him seductively. She licked the chocolate off the corner of his mouth and then traced her tongue lightly over his lips before settling in for a deep, passionate French kiss. Sebastian was surprised, but very into it. He wrapped his hands around Kate's waist and returned the kiss. He felt a sudden warmth and growth in his groin. He moved his hands up her back under her shirt and unhooked Kate's bra. Without breaking the kiss, Kate shimmied out of her bra, pulling it out her shirt sleeve. She moved her hands from either side of Sebastian's face to his belt buckle and tried furiously to unfasten it. Sebastian pulled away from the kiss just long enough to pull his and Kate's shirts off and drop them to the ground. He palmed Kate's left breast, rubbing her nipple between his thumb and forefinger.

"Sebastian, hmmm, yes," she sighed. Kate finally got Sebastian's complicated belt buckle undone and was unzipping his pants to release the beast inside. Sebastian stopped her. "Not here. I want you where we have all the room for we need for all the fun we are going to have." He picked her up and carried her upstairs with her legs wrapped around his waist. With each step, Kate's breasts jiggled and brushed teasingly against Sebastian's bare chest. When they arrived in Sebastian's room, he carefully threw her onto the bed and then stood next to the bed. Kate reached up to free his erection from its denim prison, but Sebastian smiled a slick smile and shook his head. "Ladies first." He reached down and licked and sucked Kate's right nipple while his right hand crept slowly towards her remaining clothing. He undid her pants and slipped his hand into her panties and slowly stroked her quivering mound.

Kate sucked in a deep breath. "OH SEBASTIAN! YES!"

Sebastian smiled appreciatively and stopped his ministrations. Kate looked over at him and he cocked his eyebrow at her. He stripped off his jeans and underwear in one swift movement. Kate was struck silent by what she saw. Sebastian's red, throbbing member had to be at least 10 inches long and a good 8 inches thick. It stood at a perfect 90-degree angle, like an obedient solider. Kate felt herself drawn to it like a magnet. She crawled up on her hands and knees and took hold of it. She stuck her tongue out and carefully, reverently collected the bead of pre-cum from the tip. She stared up at Sebastian through her eyelashes. "What may I do for you, sir?"

Sebastian walked over to his toiletry bag and pulled out a bottle of lube. "Oh, Katie, we are going to have so much fun tonight. Just you wait. I hope those cookies were enough because we are going to be too busy to eat much food for a while." Sebastian cooed and smiled his shark smile. Kate shuddered.

"First, why don't you lay back and just try to relax." Sebastian climbed onto the bed and between Kate's legs. He pushed them up, so that her knees were bent and relaxed off to the sides a bit. He buried his head at her split and explored her recesses with his tongue and fingers. Kate had never liked cunilingus, but realized that that was because she had never had it from Sebastian. Suddenly it was one of her new favorites. After three mind-blowing orgasms, Sebastian stopped and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "I take it that was satisfactory, madam?"

Kate sat up and kissed him. She could taste herself in his mouth and was surprised by how pleasant the taste was. "Your turn, my Lord." She tried to push Sebastian down on the bed, but he resisted. "No, no, as much as I would enjoy seeing what that pretty little mouth could do, I have something else in mind for tonight. I do want your help getting ready though. Open your hand." Kate held her hand out and Sebastian squirted a dollop of lube in her hand. "Stroke this onto my cock." Sebastian squeezed a little lube onto two of his fingers and began to stroke Kate's pussy slowly. After a moment, he said, "Okay are you ready?" Kate nodded. Sebastian picked Kate's legs up and wrapped them around his waist. He slowly eased his member into Kate's opening. "Stop me if I start to hurt you."

Sebastian got about ¾ of the way in before Kate bit her lip and got a look of panic in her eyes. Sebastian stopped and held still. "Is it too much? Would it be better if we changed positions?" Kate smiled and said, "No, it feels amazing. I just need a second to get used to you. You're a lot bigger than most guys. Not that I'm complaining!"

"Oh, thanks. But yeah, take your time. You feel amazing too, but I want this to be great for you, not painful." Sebastian started to stroke Kate's hair to relax her a bit. "You look so beautiful right now."

After a few seconds, Kate nodded and told Sebastian to keep going. He resumed slowly filling her until he was fully entrenched. The blonde started to slowly pull out and push back in, gently building up rhythm and quickening the pace. Kate was filled with bliss, except for the couple of times Sebastian went a smidge too deep and hit her cervix. Those times hurt, but she knew they were accidental and if this were to continue, could be worked on in the future. She could feel him start to crest just as she was, and they orgasmed simultaneously. Kate could feel Sebastian's hot cum filling her to brim as his cock finished convulsing inside her. He reached down and kissed her and rolled off her. He grabbed the box of tissues and offered it to her. Kate grabbed a few and tidied up and threw the used paper towards the trash. "Well, I must say that was better than lasagna any day. Wouldn't you agree, Sebastian?"

Sebastian smiled. "We probably should go at least collect our clothes from the kitchen. You know for Heather's sake. She would probably shit a brick if she knew we had sex in her perfect palace of a kitchen. I swear even for a girl, she is freakishly devoted to that room."

"Hey, what do you mean 'even for a girl.' Are you saying that women belong in the kitchen or something?" Kate eyed him suspiciously. "Because we 'girls' belong wherever we want to be. The boardroom, the courtroom, the OR, the military. We're pretty and we kick ass everywhere we go."

"No, no! That's not what I meant at all. Look, I'm all for women. I love women. Go girl power and all. Hillary 2016! Women rule and guys drool. Etc., etc. I just meant that Heather absolutely loves cooking and baking, and her kitchen is like her holy place. She would freak if she found out that we 'defiled' it by getting down in here. No women are awesome. I'm a total feminist!

"Okay, I just wanted to make sure I wasn't with some kind of male chauvinist over here. By the way, you are so cute when you're nervous." Kate giggled and kissed him. They walked downstairs and put their clothes back on. "Since we're down here, do you want to make that lasagna? I could use something to eat. What about you," asked Kate.

"Yeah, sounds good. Let's get the ingredients out and get started."

They worked in tandem getting the casserole prepared and in the oven. Sebastian set the timer on the oven. "Want to go watch some tv in the living room while this thing cooks?"

"Sure. What's on right now?"

"I don't know. Let's flip through some channels until we find something we like." Sebastian turned the tv on and sat down on the couch next to his date. He started flipping through station until he found an old 80's movie. "Oh man, I haven't seen this movie in forever. It's so good. It's like a spoof of Star Wars with Rick Moranis, Mel Brooks, John Candy, and Bill Pullman." It's so funny. Have you ever seen it?"

"No, it doesn't look familiar."

"Let me restart it. I think you'll really like it. It's super funny. And if you don't like it, I can think of something else we can do while we wait on the lasagna." He smiled seductively.

Post Script: Ok, trivia time: What movie are they watching? Whoever answers right gets a special shoutout in the next author note. Also, are you guys finally happy? Sebastian getting some and is happy! Thanks for being patient.