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“Zane?” I demanded.
But Zane wasn’t the next person in the door. That was Silas, carrying a giant leather duffel bag he threw onto the living room sofa… right where I’d planned to get Rowe naked before continuing our room-by-room christening tour of the house.
“Why buy an Aston Martin if you’re going to end up with a car that sounds like a leaf blower?” he demanded of no one in particular before walking directly to the coffeepot. “Hey, is this still fresh?”
Dev appeared right behind him, looking shaky. “At least the Spider isn’t made of tissue paper and daydreams, like the Smartcar you just made me ride in. I swear they designed it with no legroom so passengers are forced to sit in the crash position the whole time.” He plopped on a stool, gave my arm a friendly shove, and said gruffly, “Hey there, Rowe.”
Rowe lifted his hand in a tiny half wave.
“You can ride home with Zane, then,” Silas said, grabbing a mug from my cabinet. “Good luck gettinghimto listen to your sad-as-fuck country ballads the whole way.”
“Holy shit, you guys!” Zane appeared in the doorway, face flushed and dark hair mussed. “I only rolled out of bed twenty minutes ago! That car broke the fucking sound barrier. It’s a great day to be alive! Oooh! Cinnamon rolls!”
I grabbed the spatula I’d set next to the frosting container and brandished it at my friend warningly. “Not another inch closer, Zee Barlo. I haven’t even iced them yet! Would someone like to tell me what the fuck you’re all doing here? And how you got inside?”
Five pairs of eyes blinked at me in surprise. Then Silas snorted. “Someone didn’t check the group chat again.”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” I demanded, but it was hard to be as angry as I might have been when Rowe’s shoulders began shaking with laughter. “You don’t just invade a man’s house on a whim—”
“We’ve been talking for days about preparing for the board meeting Monday,” Kenji explained. “Silas said…”
“I said we need a power strategy session on how to handle Austin.” Silas began opening and closing cabinet doors. “And we do. Where’s the sugar?”
Kenji dug through one of the shopping bags and handed Silas a small container.
“Don’t blame me. I was practically kidnapped and forced to come.” Landry lifted himself up to perch on the counter and gave Kenji a glare.
“We wanted to make sure you were okay, too,” Zane said, his eyes still on the cinnamon rolls. “So, like, were you gonna frost those now, or… Hey! Easy with that spatula, Bash. I was just asking.”
“Looks like things are going pretty well from where I’m sitting.” Dev had turned on his stool to look at the living room, and everyone else did, too, staring in stunned silence for a moment at the bursts of color and kitsch Rowe had added to the Hampton house decor.
“A hot-pink French bulldog.” Landry hopped off the counter and ran a long finger over the back of the porcelain figurine standing on top of a new stack of colorful art books on a nearby shelf.
“I like the turquoise lamps,” Silas said with a nod of approval. “Definite upgrade from the glass ones that were here before.”
“I love it all,” I said, setting my hands on Rowe’s shoulders and letting my thumbs drift against the soft skin at his nape. “Rowe really does have an eye for this stuff. If I’d tried decorating this room, it would have been a disaster.”
“Youdidtry,” Landry pointed out. “And it was.”
“Only because the designer Bash hired didn’t take the time to get to know him.” Rowe stood, grabbed the spatula from my hand, and began icing the cinnamon rolls. His cheeks were rosy under his freckles, the way they always were when he was praised, but he seemed to be taking the invasion of our private time in stride…
Which was more than I could say about myself.
“Speaking of disasters…” Silas took his mug of coffee across the room to the bar cart near the dining room table and added a generous pour of whisky. “The text you found about Justin was true. Rumor has it heisengaged. To a woman.” He lifted his mug in an ironic toast. “May the poor lady come to her senses faster than I did.”
“Thought he was gay,” Landry said, leaning his head against the cabinet.
“Same,” Silas agreed wryly. “Because that’s what he told me.”
Dev made a disapproving noise. “People’s sexuality can change. You know this.”
“Or they can lie,” Zane added, reaching for a handful of grapes from a bowl on the counter. “Sorry, Rowe.”
I shot him a glare, but Rowe only smiled. “No, it’s fine. I did lie. But so did Sebastian. Motive matters.”
“Oooh. Score one for the Indiana boy,” Landry said under a laugh.
“Look, I don’t know the exact details of what happened with you and Justin,” Rowe said. He grabbed a stack of plates, dished a gooey roll onto one, and walked it over to Silas. “But I do know beating yourself up over something only makesyoufeel bad. It’s what you do next that counts.” He squeezed Silas’s forearm sympathetically before returning to the kitchen to dish up more plates.
