“If you want to—”
“I don’t want to,” Ramsey said. And to his own surprise,meantit.
“Alright. So, you want to stay? I have to get up early.”
“I should too.” He had things to do. A workout to get in. Wes’ inevitable gloating to endure. Several resumes to review for the bar.
“But you want to stay?” Nate looked shocked.
Okay, that was fair, but Ramsey still made a face. “Why is that so hard to believe? Itoldyou . . .” He trailed off. What had he said? It felt like he’d said too much, but also not enough, before they kissed.
Nate raised an eyebrow. “You told me?”
“I told you I wanted to be around.” Ramsey was having trouble meeting Nate’s dark eyes, because it felt like they saw all the way through him, like bolt of electricity right through him. Exposing all the tender, sweet parts of him that Ramsey hadn’t even been sure he possessed until this year.
But no matter how much he’d pretended they didn’t exist, no matter how hard he’d shoved them down, they were surfacing now.
Nate had brought them out, without even trying.
“Okay,” Nate agreed, and it was easier even than Ramsey had thought to trail after him back into the bedroom.
Not for sex, but forsleep.
Nate unearthed a spare toothbrush from his cabinet and they brushed their teeth side by side.
Such a domestic scene would have been enough to send him running and screaming, but then Nate nudged his foot, smirk on his face, and it was all the reminder Ramsey needed that he’d wanted and wanted andwantedand now he was here.
Why would he want to leave?
He’d done that once, and it certainly hadn’t worked. It had never made Ramsey want Nate any less.
They went to bed, tosleep.
Ramsey was sure at this point that the enormity of this action would hit him, and a hundred things would bother him enough to keep sleep at bay, but to his surprise, the steadiness of Nate’s breathing and the smell of him on the sheets combined with the exhaustion of a good day, thebestday, to send him into drowsiness immediately.
Nate didn’t touch him, but the way he looked over at Ramsey, the foot or two of mattress between their bodies, was good as a touch.
The sweet, intimate kind.
“Night,” Nate said softly, and Ramsey didn’t think he was imagining the wealth of meaning in just that one word.
All the things he wanted to say, and wasn’t, because he was still afraid the heartfulness would send Ramsey running to the door.
Maybe in time, Ramsey could convince Nate—and himself—that none of it would.
He was still thinking about it as he drifted off into sleep.
Woke up to Nate’s alarm, gentle but insistent, and then the sound of Nate rolling over, shutting it off.
Without any more warning than that, a warm body was encasing his, and Ramsey sighed as Nate’s breath ruffled the curls at the base of his neck.
“You’re still here,” Nate said, tone gravelly with sleep and full of wonder.
“Don’t sound so shocked,” Ramsey said. But he was shocked, too. He wasstill here. He’d stayed the night, and the world hadn’t imploded. Nothing terrible had happened. He’d let someone that wasn’t part of a very select inner circle, friendswho’d never let him treat them like any of the others, see him at his most vulnerable.
And even more shockingly, he didn’t feel freaked out about it.
Nate nuzzled his scruff onto Ramsey’s neck, and he shivered. “When you said you had to get up early—”
