“Has anyone ever told you that you can be stubborn as hell?” Drew demanded. “Not everything can be put into one category. Was hegood?Was hebad?Nobody’s all one thing or the other. I’m not. Neither are you.” He cupped Bas’s cheek in his hand. “Baby, sometimes you can’t think your way through something, because it won’t make sense no matter how hard you try. You just need to acceptit.”
Bas ground his teeth together. “I’m aware ofthat.”
“Areyou?”
“Yes! Just because I prefer logic - things I can understand and… andcontroldoesn’t mean I think everything works that way! Look at us for God’s sake! There’s no logic tothat.”
Drew raised an eyebrow, and Bas flushed as he replayed his words. “Not like that!” He squeezed Drew around the waist. “I just mean, I tried to logic my way through it, but I couldn’t make it fit into any of the boxes in my mind. And now… I dunno.” He stepped back, frustrated that he couldn’t articulate the truth he knew hovered at the back of his mind. “I’ve never been really good with emotional stuff. I wonder if… if the reason it took me so long to see the truth of what you and I could be, was because I knew itwasn’tgoing to be logical or reasonable.” He huffed out a laugh and looked into Drew’s serious brown eyes. “I don’t seem to have any reason or rationality at all when it comes to loving you. It’s beyondeverything.”
Drew’s smile, when it came, was soft andslow.
“You think it’s any easier for me? Sebastian, I fell for you while believing you were straight. That… that it was doomed. And I tried so hard to think my way out of it, to distract myself with other guys.” His gaze grew sharp and he pointed an accusing finger at Bas. “And if you bring up Mark right now I will drop you where youstand!”
Bas widened his eyes. “I wouldnever.”
They both knew he waslying.
“Uh huh. Anyway, we both made dumb choices.” Drew smirked. “I think that’s the theme of our whole friendship. Put it on a t-shirt. ‘Loving each other and making dumb choices, since1987.’”
“Yeah, I’ll get right onthat.”
“But we were both doing what we thought was best, right? In these hard situations. We did the best we could, given your overwhelmingstubbornness…”
“And your insatiable need forcontrol.”
“Yes, fine, and me being a control freak.” Drew rolled his eyes. “Can you not give your dad the same benefit of the doubt? I mean, looking back, we can see that he totally fucked up getting involved with Ilya. But put yourself in the shoes of a man who is mortgaged to the hilt with no idea how he’ll support his wife and kid. He’s got a great idea, and no one will give him a loan. Was he supposed to let you starve? Forget all of his talent and dreams so he could get anhonorablejob working at the grocerystore?”
Did he think that? Would that have been better? Bas didn’tknow.
“Look.” Drew pulled Bas close again, and pressed a kiss to his jaw. “He took a calculated risk with Ilya Stornovich. He had no idea how it would end up. You or I might have done the same thing in hisposition.”
Bas shook his head. “I hear what you’re saying. I do. And maybe I even get it logically.” He gave Drew a wry grin, acknowledging the irony. “But I don’t know how to forgive him when his choices harmed innocent people and destroyed my family.” He wrapped his arm around the back of Drew’s neck and spoke the ultimate truth. “His choices putyouat risk. How can I forgive him forthat?”
“But imagine hehadn’t,” Drew said. He braced his warm palms on both sides of Bas’s neck, and his thumbs stroked Bas’s jaw. It felt so damn good. “If he hadn’t started the company, our fathers wouldn’t have worked together for years. We wouldn’t have grown up together. We wouldn’t have been friends. We wouldn’t be togethernow.”
Bas wanted to fight against Drew’s words, against the truth in them, but he couldn’t. Logic and emotionbothinsisted that he was right. If his father had made a different choice, everything might have changed and that… that wasunthinkable.
“He just always seemed larger than life. He had a solution for every problem,” Bas told him. He looked around the office, at the bank of monitors where he and his father had spent so many hours together. It had been a long time since he’d allowed himself to remember the good times they’d had here. The laughter they’d shared. The joy of discovery andchallenge.
“He was a lot like you,” Drew said, and Bas knew that was true, too. And maybe he was blaming his father because he would have made the samechoice.
“So you’re saying I need to put this behind me,huh?”
“No way. It’ll take time to get through it. To grieve for the man you thought he was. I’m just saying maybe it’s time to stopblaming. Forgive him for being human. For your sake. For the sake of ourfuture.”
The need to kiss Drew was overwhelming, and Bas didn’t bother trying to resist. As he lost himself in the taste of Drew’s mouth, in the heat of his embrace, he sent up a silent message to hisfather.
I forgive you. I’ll live well. I’ll take care of Cam. I’ll love Drew until Idie.
Because that was a choice Bas couldmake.
All too quickly,Drew made a noise in the back of his throat and pulled back slightly, his lips clinging toSebastian’s.
“Jesus. We need, like, an entire week when this is over. Just us. No phones. No family. Nowork.”
“No clothes?” Bas asked, ducking his head to claim one last kiss. “Are you sure a week will beenough?”
“Did I say week?” Drew sucked in a breath and ran his hand down the front of Bas’s sweater, which peeked out from his open coat. “I meantmonth.”
