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“Do I have to?” When he refuses to take it, crossing his arms, I hang it over his shoulder and brush my lips against his jaw.
“I never got to take this off of you. God I wanted to.”
He raises an eyebrow, not quite hiding how his breath catches. “I don’t know. That sounds like a reward for you, not me.”
“If you wear this tonight, I’ll go out on a date in normal clothes sometime.”
His jaw drops. “Wait, seriously?”
“I’ll even let you choose.”
“I’m thinking an open Hawaiian shirt and shark tooth necklace.” But his eyes are shining with a delight so genuine he can barely manage to joke around. “Fuck me, I’ve never been so excited to see a man in a pair of jeans.”
We both change in the same room, the quiet sound of expensive fabric sliding against skin. When I turn around, I’m so proud. He remembered how to put everything on, his cuff arranged just the way I showed him. Lip caught in his teeth, he frowns into the mirror as he knots his tie into the Eldredge style, each step adapted to work with one hand and occasionally his mouth. “There,” he huffs when he gets it right. “I had to get up a whole fifteen minutes early every day just to do that damn tie.”
Just like the last time we stood here, he fidgets unhappily when he looks in the mirror, like he can’t see the difference in confidence between then and now. “Youlook good,” he mumbles.
I wrap my arms around him from behind and prop my chin on top of his head, folding him against me in a tangle of sharp, tailored lines. “Look at you.” I kiss his neck, sliding my hand down his front and he stirs against me, his chin coming up, a spark in his eyes. “There it is. You’re fucking hot and hungry. You can’t tell me suits aren’t sexy as hell.” My fingers skim over his bulge, and he arches his back against me.
“Can I tempt you to strip me now?” He shifts his hips, trying to rub into my palm, but I pull it away.
“Not when I can spend all evening anticipating it.”
“Damn.”
Jonah
It takes us forty minutes to get to the hotel, driving along the bay with the Statue of Liberty looking ghostly and a little sinister across the water. I connectTo Kill a Mockingbirdto the Bluetooth and let it play over the car speakers. Gray’s fingers move against my thigh, restless, and I sit back and watch the moon dance along the tops of the buildings.
“Just because we were licked a hundred years before we started is no reason for us not to try.” His fingers tighten and I reach my right hand across to squeeze his wrist, brushing the delicate skin with my fingertips. I stroke it lightly, sliding my thumb up the tendons of his arm, then down again to the swell of his palm as the night flows past like silk and we listen to the story of a brave lawyer who believes too hard in the good parts of a terrible world.
I can’t stop gawking at the restaurant, thick wooden pillars that reach four stories in the air, hung with indoor plants and holding up a wall of windows overlooking the water. The waiter obviously thinks we’re business colleagues having a work dinner. “I can’t believe he got a good look at me and still thinks I’m some kind of professional,” I gripe, poking my fork into the seared ahi tuna that Gray suggested I order.
“Maybe you’ll listen to his opinion, if you insist on ignoring mine.” Gray hooks his foot around mine under the table, slides his other shoe between my legs. He steals a bite of my meal and replaces it with a piece of his peppered duck breast. When he tips his head back to look at the pianist playing live music at the back of the room, I swap our plates. His lips twitch, but he pretends not to notice that he’s eating tuna instead of duck now.
“Your friends were awesome.” I sip whatever wine the restaurant thought paired well with our meal—a concept which I don’t think I understand. Pabst pairs with everything, but they don’t have that on the menu.
“I think Victor likes you better than he likes me.” He sounds pleased, like I did something right.
“And it went well, didn't it? Our whole experiment.” I trail off awkwardly, wondering if I should have said anything at all.
His fork goes still. “Do you really think so?” He reaches across the table to put his hand on my stump.
“Good evening, Gray.” That fucking photograph, the one that’s still in my wallet, has come to life next to our table. He’s almost as tall as Gray, smells like a million dollars, and looks very comfortable in a suit.
I don’t know if Gray or I pull away first. I guess it doesn’t matter. Colson’s eyes flick from my stump to Gray’s hand to my face and linger there for a minute, one of his eyebrows drifting upward. Then he turns back to Gray. “I’m surprised to see you here. I actually have something for you, in my car. I was going to give it to you tomorrow.”
Gray’s face is a polite mask, but I can feel dark, suffocating waves just rolling off of him—pain, anger, some kind of old, leftover want. It’s the first time I’m hit by the full weight of what he’s lost, something I don’t have the experience to understand. I squeeze my fork so tightly I'm surprised it doesn't snap. “I’m confused,” Gray says calmly. “What do you mean?”
“Can we talk for a minute?”
Gray shakes his head. “Anything you want to say to me you can say in front of him.”
“Fine.” Colson pointedly ignores me. “I want to say I’m sorry. For everything that has happened and everything that’s going to happen. One of my mentors contacted me recently about a firm in Australia looking to hire a lawyer. It has you written all over it, and I wanted to pass it on, as a kind of peace offering. I have all the paperwork in my car. Can I give it to you?”
Gray sets his fork down loudly on the edge of his plate. “Why the hell would I want to go to Australia? My work is here. My life is here.” His eyes catch on mine for a second.
Colson scoffs so dismissively it makes my skin crawl. “You will never learn to let go before you’re beaten to death. Just hear me out.”
