25 Shacking Up

I WAS STILL holding my gun, cautiously scanning the riverbank Nothing. I holstered it and grabbed a fistful of Pooky’s mane to swing onto his back.

“I’m tired now, Pooky,” I whispered. “Let’s go home.” He turned and plodded back to the paddock where I removed the lead rope. He pushed his head into my armpit and nodded up and down, covering my left boob with his snot. “Nice one, buddy. Don’t think I won’t remember that!” I laughed and headed to my apartment and bed.

Pa agreed that we had too much to do with the horses this summer to be able to spend it up on the mountain. We needed to monitor our broodmares and foals, take care of our rescues, and tend to our boarders. We had fences to mend. We had trails to mark, veterinary visits, and farrier appointments. We had breeding records to maintain and accounting to do. And we’d been contacted by a group that was rescuing abused animals to see how many we could take.

They left me and Kyle at the ranch and took Caitlin and Phile to the upper range. They would turn fifteen this summer and Pa felt they needed the experience of working the herd. Their birthdays were so near together we practically considered them twins. Just different moms. That just left Kyle and me with twice the amount of work on the ranch. Maybe three times as much since Mom Mar decided that she was going to join them up on the range. After all, we were eighteen and could take care of ourselves.

And we had Aubrey. We presented her with an official contract to work on the ranch at LK Stables. She moved in with me. And Kyle. It was difficult to tell which. We made the offer of her own room but she felt that would be a waste. I had room in my closet for her summer gear so that was her official lodging—especially when her parents came out for a visit. But neither of us ever knew whose bed she would be in when we retired for the night or if she’d stay there all night.

We didn’t have sex every night. Not quite. Even Aubrey needed a break occasionally. But even on those nights when she slipped naked into my bed and just held me, I felt such a flood of joy and love that I wanted to cry. And I knew what I wanted.

Pa, Mom Mar, and Mom Ash came down for three days to celebrate Pa’s birthday on the Fourth of July. I guess they wanted to check to make sure the ranch was still standing, too.

“You dared to leave those two up there without supervision?” Kyle laughed. “What is the world coming to?”

“Oh, they have supervision, all right. Neither of you got rode as hard as Rafe rides them. Laura and their little boy came up for the week so there’d be another woman up there with Caitlin. I don’t think she’ll let them get away with anything,” Mom Ash said.

“Happy birthday, Pa!” Aubrey called as she walked into the room carrying a birthday cake with one candle on it. We all started singing. Pa blew out his candle and Aubrey set the cake down. “I didn’t know how many candles it should have and didn’t want to guess,” Aubrey laughed.

“Come here, young lady,” Pa said. Aubrey went to him and he pulled her down on his lap in his big leather chair. “You are so happy here that you want to be my daughter, do you?” Aubrey nodded. “Well, honey, hearing you call me Pa when you came in just did my heart good. You know we’ve been thinking of you like a daughter for a long time now. Welcome home.” Aubrey hugged Pa and then got up to go hug both Moms.

“Uh, Pa?” I said. “I guess that would make this a good time to talk to you all about something.”

“Something?” Pa asked.

“Well, yeah. I know Mom Ash felt pretty strongly about us living on campus this fall, but we just think that would make life harder all the way around. We’ve been increasing boarders and even though we lost a few for the summer, I expect we’ll have twelve or fifteen by first snow. And you know what a time we had with the rescues last winter. And then there’s six new foals and another six pregnant mares, and we need to be working with the young ones,” I said.

“Yes? And what’s that got to do with the price of bread?”

“Well, it just doesn’t seem right for us to go off to school and saddle the kids with all the work on the ranch, even if they consider themselves hired hands. They still have school. We were thinking we should live out here and commute to school. I know there will be times when commuting will be tough, but with Kyle’s new 4x4 we should be safer on the roads and we’ll still be taking the kids to high school, too.”

“So you want to stay in your apartments?” Mom Mar asked. Mom Ash snorted. Here goes nothing.

“Well, with Rafe and Laura having moved down to Grandpa’s where we’re wintering the cattle, the two bedroom apartment is vacant. We sort of thought we could move into that apartment and out of the efficiencies. And then we could ask Aubrey to move in with us,” I got out in a rush.

“I see. So you’d all be like roommates sharing an apartment. Well, that has some plusses. It would save on some expenses since we wouldn’t have to pay for dormitory rooms. You and Aubrey were planning to room together anyway. We could put another twin bed in the second bedroom for you and Aubrey.”

“Pa-ah!” He was going to make it as hard as possible on us. “Could we just get a big bed for that room? Aubrey and I don’t mind sharing our bed, do we honey?”

“I don’t mind! Really!” she practically shouted. “Ramie, could I really move in with you both?” Well, that put it in exactly the words I was trying to avoid saying to the parents but I found both Kyle and I were nodding our heads.

“You don’t want to be roommates,” Mom Mar said gently. “You want to live together. I understand, kids. We all do. If it’s what you really want, I can’t think of a reason why you shouldn’t try it out. You’re already sleeping with each other.”

“I can think of a reason,” Mom Ash sighed. We all looked at her. “You don’t think we’ll be able to keep Caitlin and Phile out of those efficiencies when they move out, do you?” We all laughed.

“Moms and Pa,” Kyle said. “You mentioned we were sleeping with each other. I guess it’s no secret that Ramie and I are both pretty much in love with Aubrey and she says she loves us, too. But Ramie and I don’t sleep with each other. It’s not like that.” He was blushing so red I could feel the heat. “If it’s okay, with Aubrey, Ramie and I will each have a bedroom and she can sleep in either one she wants to. Whenever she wants to.”

“Oh, I didn’t think you were fooling around with your sister,” Mom Mar said. “But you’ve got a unique situation. You all need to be prepared to find out if it works or not. Maybe Aubrey needs one of the efficiencies so she has private space where she can go without sleeping with either of you.”

“We’ll work it out, Mom Mar,” I said. “But could we go ahead and move this summer?”

The parents all burst out laughing.

“If I can actually get a piece of that cake before the ice cream is all melted, you can add moving to your chores for the summer,” Pa said. “But Aubrey, you need to be straight with your parents, too. Don’t pretend to them that you aren’t sleeping with both these young coyotes.”

Aubrey spent every night since graduation sleeping with either Kyle or me—or sometimes both—so you’d think setting up housekeeping together would have been easy. Not so. We were living together. Kyle’s room and my room had always been our private personal space. Now we had to share the housekeeping and make sure the common areas were picked up and cleaned up. We had a kitchen and had to figure out who was cooking and who was cleaning. The apartment had two bedrooms but only one bathroom. We had to take turns and “learn to put the fucking seat down on the toilet, Kyle!”

But the worst thing was sex.

I mean it was the best thing, too. But the shared bath and both closets were between our rooms. We no longer shared a common wall and that meant we could no longer hear each other.

“What’s wrong, honey?” Aubrey said as she sat beside me on our little living room sofa. “You look really sad. Didn’t you get off last night?” I shook my head.

“Really? What happened?”

“I’m terrible,” I whispered. The truth was I’d cried most of the night. “You were with Kyle all night and ... I’m not jealous ... I just felt ... left out,” I bawled. “I ... we ... just...” How could I put it in words? Strong arms surrounded me as I felt Kyle settle into the seat beside me.

“I know what you mean, Ramie. We all got used to being ... What do they call them? ... voyeurs,” Kyle said. “When Aubrey was with you the night before I felt the same way. I wasn’t jealous of you being with Aubrey. I just felt sort of left out. When it was just one wall between us, we were all included even if we were in different rooms.” I nodded my head vigorously. God, we were a screwed up family!

“Oh!” Aubrey said. Of course, she’d never experienced it so this was something completely new to her. “We don’t ... Well, maybe we don’t have to shut our doors. At least not all the way. I mean ... I don’t know how the two of you stand it anyway. I love you both like crazy, but I gotta tell you that if the two of you were doing it, I’d want to be right there watching.” She started giggling and I started tickling her. Then Kyle started tickling and we turned around and got him, too. It ended up with me pulling Aubrey’s shirt off over her head and Kyle and I each sucking on one of her nipples. Aubrey went off like a firecracker.

“You’d just like me to watch your tight little pussy getting filled by Kyle’s cock, wouldn’t you?” I whispered in her ear. “You want me to know how much he stretches you and how much you beg to have him pound into to your little twat.” I snaked my hand down into Aubrey’s shorts and found Kyle’s hand right there with me. He grinned at me and did his own whispering in her ear. “You can’t tell which of our hands is doing what can you? You’re just leaning back with your titties exposed to both of us and waiting to see whose finger is going to slip into you or if we’ll both get a finger in you. Does that make you hot, baby?” In fact, my brother’s finger was right with mine and we both parted those slippery folds. Aubrey jerked forward and screamed.

“I want you! I want you both! I’m such a horny little bitch. One isn’t enough. I want you both!”

“I love you, Aubrey,” I whispered. “Maybe we could at least leave the doors open.”

We had the big round-up and got the cattle down the last full week of August. Mom Mar rode down ahead of the crew and she and Aubrey went straight to work in the kitchen while Kyle and I rode to the herd. Aubrey did us proud and Mom Mar bragged about how the chili this year was all her doing. There were fresh tortillas, too, along with Mom Mar’s cornbread. We all sat around the outdoor table eating once the cows were in the north pasture near the grandparents’ ranch house. Gramma Bell and Gram and Grampa Alexander were all with us, too. We listened to the stories of this year’s cattle drive.