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Will. He was finally holding his sweet Will. Tasting him. Devouring all his whimpers and cries of pleasure.
He’d thought he’d never have this again.
All the blood in his body had left his brain. He was so light-headed he could freaking fly. Will tasted exactly the same, kissed the same. It was as if nothing had changed. They’d skipped back in time to that tiny apartment in Paris where they’d laughed and made love on every possible surface.
Will ripped his mouth away and shoved hard, breaking free. Charlie was so shocked he released him, causing him to stumble. His heart stopped at the look of gut-twisting pain that flashed across Will’s features for a second before the anger returned. He never saw the fist coming until it collided with his jaw, whipping his head to the side.
“Don’t fucking touch me!” Will snarled. “You don’t get to touch me. Do you have any idea how long it took me to get over you?”
Charlie staggered to the right, holding his aching jaw. The brief pleasure he’d tasted was now blood tinged and throbbing, but it was nothing compared to the pain in his chest.
“Fuck! My hand!” Will hissed and paced the opposite direction in the living room as he held his right hand in his left.
“I’ll get the ice!” Kairo called out from the next room. His chair scraped across the wood floor and feet raced toward the kitchen.
“And the fucking booze,” Edison added.
Yeah, they needed it.
Charlie straightened to stare at Will’s back. His shoulders were hunched inward and he was cradling his hand to his chest. His entire body was tensed as if he were waiting for some new attack, and that hurt more than his jaw.
“I never did,” Charlie whispered.
“What?” Will whipped around, his eyes narrowed and his lips pressed into a hard, unforgiving line.
“I never got over you,” Charlie repeated. Will’s gaze darted away, but not before Charlie saw the surprise that filled his eyes. “But you’re right. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have kissed you. Losing my temper and being scared aren’t excuses. I’m sorry, Will.”
Will gave a jerky nod and swallowed hard. “Okay. Thank you.” He sounded surprised that Charlie had even apologized. His shoulders drooped a little and he started to relax by tiny measures.
Everything in him ached to cross the room and wrap Will up in his arms, to say or do anything to make that pain on his face go away, but Will was correct. He didn’t have that right any longer. Will wasn’t his to protect and comfort.
They stood in a heavy, awkward silence for more than a minute before Kairo rushed in. He tossed a bag of ice at Charlie and handed another wrapped in a dish towel to Will. Edison and West moseyed into the room after him with bottles of beer in their hands.
“Well, now that we finally got that out of the way, maybe we can talk about this shit like adults,” West drawled as he dropped onto the arm of the couch.
Will’s gaze slid over to Charlie for a second. It quickly darted away again, and he settled on one of the couch cushions. Kairo took the center cushion next to Will while Charlie fell into the armchair. Edison remained standing, his shoulder propped against the doorway, sipping his beer and grinning as though he were watching the world’s most interesting soap opera.
“It’s kind of a long story, and insane,” Will started slowly. With the ice balanced on his right hand in his lap, he lifted the beer to his lips and took a long swallow.
Charlie set his own beer on a side table and held the ice to his jaw, but he didn’t feel the pain or the cold. His eyes were locked on Will, inspecting every inch of him in a new light. The rose-colored glasses of Paris had been ripped away, and he was faced with someone he wasn’t sure he knew any longer.
Will’s features had grown leaner and harder with time. Though he was only thirty-seven years old, there were definite flecks of gray mixed into his shaggy brown hair that fell in front of his eyes every time he looked down. And those eyes, they were colder and weary—two things he would never have said about Will’s eyes when he’d known him in Paris.
Even his lips seemed thinner and harder, but amazingly they still felt exactly the same when they kissed. He didn’t exactly understand the physics of that, but he wasn’t complaining.
“It’s okay. We like long, crazy stories,” Ed urged.
“I don’t want you to think I’m not grateful for all that you’ve done for me. I know you’ve saved my life twice now. I appreciate it, but—”
“Stuff the appreciation, Will,” West cut him off. “Regardless of whether Charlie is an asshole, you know we’d always help you. Why don’t you stop stalling and just spill it already?”
