Page 13 of His Christmas Love Song

He tries to go back to sleep but he’s still wide-awake minutes later with the aftereffects of adrenaline running through him. He’s thirsty, too. Quietly, he slips out of bed and opens the door to the common area. The light he’d left for Ryan is still burning. It’s useful to have it to see by as he walks through the living room to the kitchenette, fills a glass with tap water, and heads back to his room. The door to Ryan’s room is ajar, and he pauses when he hears a noise from within. Maybe he should just go check on Ryan for a second. He takes a step toward Ryan’s door, and hears the noise again, louder.

It’s a moan.

Jesse cocks his head. A moan of pain? But then he hears another noise, the sound of rustling sheets, and what sounds like the slide of skin on skin.

Fuck. Ryan’s jerking off.

In the six years they’ve known each other they’ve shared close quarters from time to time. Touring together puts them in each other’s personal space plenty. But they always have their own rooms on the road, and Ryan’s a naturally private guy. Jesse, to his knowledge, has never, ever had so much of a hint that Ryan even masturbated at all, much less heard him do it. And he’s definitely never seen Ryan more naked than wearing swimming trunks at a pool.

But now he’s hovering a couple of feet outside of Ryan’s door, listening to his best friend get himself off and it’s doing things to him that he can’t explain. He wants to run away. He wants to open the door and watch. He wants—he wants not to have the mental image of Ryan touching himself in the next room while he tries to fall asleep.

And he very much wishes he could rethink his late-night sojourn to get water when he hears Ryan’s voice formulate a sound. “Ahhh.”

Oh fuck. Was that Ryan coming? Was he—was he coming thinking about Hank?

Jesse doesn’t wait for Ryan to come down from his orgasm, just walks as quietly and as quickly as he can back to his room, where he shuts his door soundlessly and gets back into bed. He sets the water on the night table, puts a pillow over his head and wills himself to go to sleep.

It’s almost dawn before he finally succumbs.

SEVEN

Ryan’s not as hungover as he thought he might be when he rolls over and opens his eyes to sunlight coming through his window. He forgot to put the shades all the way down last night and even though it’s much earlier than he usually likes to be up, he has warring needs to take a piss and drink a gallon of water, so he shoves out of bed and stumbles to the bathroom. He takes care of business and then fills a water bottle and chugs half of it. The shower wakes him up enough to relive last night’s debacle in excruciating detail.

The first part hadn’t been so bad. Then Jesse left and it was just him and Hank. Again, not the end of the world. Hank’s easy on the eyes, easy to talk to. Easy, period. And he’s interested, or Ryan thinks he is. Maybe he’s written Ryan off after he’d stalled, drunk a couple more fingers of bourbon than he should have had, then planted a sloppy kiss on Hank’s mouth.

Hank, decent human being that he is, had gently pushed Ryan away, saying something about not wanting to do this when Ryan was drunk. Ryan’s face heats just thinking about it. He can’t even get a casual hookup right. But he’s glad Hank hadn’t let things go further. He’d probably feel even shittier.

But he feels like a tease, and while the kiss with Hank—brief as it was—was okay, it just reminded him of what he wants with Jesse. What he wants and what he’s never going to have. He stumbled home in the dark and the cold and the minute he’d come in the cabin and smelled Jesse’s cologne, his dick had hardened up and he’d had to do something about it before passing out.

He wishes he could say it was the first time he’d fallen asleep directly after jerking off to the fantasy of his best friend sucking his cock.

He gets dressed and drinks some more water. Jesse’s bedroom door is closed. Looks like it’s Ryan’s turn to go out and find breakfast.

The lodge great room is warm and cozy and smells amazing. He gets a table by the fire pit in the center of the room, trying to feel the festive spirit. Christmas is just around the corner now. He already had gifts shipped home, and Jesse’s in charge of their plane tickets back to Austin when their work-slash-vacation week is up. He’s actually looking forward to a quiet holiday.

He’s been dosed with coffee from a smiling server who tells him her name is Joy, and orders the Lodge Special for himself, plus one to go.

“Is the one to go for Jesse?” Joy asks, startling him.

“Uh, yeah?”

“I’ll make sure they put in extra marmalade. He was practically licking the jar clean yesterday,” she says with a twinkle in her eye.

He laughs. “Sounds like Jesse.”

“I’ll be right back with your breakfast.”

Ryan checks his texts and is about to search for a few Christmas songs they might want to cover, even though Jesse probably has a list prepared, when Joy comes back with his food. Only when he looks up from the steaming plate that’s been placed in front of him, it’s not Joy but Hank smiling down at him.

“Oh, hey,” Ryan says weakly, willing himself not to blush.

“Can I join you? I was stealing some coffee from the kitchen, and I saw your order come up.”

“Sure.”

Hank takes the seat across from Ryan, a silver travel mug in his hands.

Ryan looks at his plate, appetite suddenly gone. He glances at Hank, who seems relaxed. “You aren’t eating?”