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Raphael shook his head. “What’s the point?”
“To give him the chance to tell you how he feels.” When Raphael opened his mouth, Luca held up a hand. “He’s in love with you. Ridiculously, obscenely. Like he might love you more than I love Wilder.”
Raphael was shaking his head before Luca was done speaking. “Aber das kann gar nicht sein! I know he loves me, but never that way.”
Luca leaned his elbow on the table and lifted a brow at him. “Why not?”
“Because.” The rest of his defense crumbled to ash on his tongue, and he tried to swallow back the lump in his throat, but it wasn’t possible.
The truth was—he knew. He’d been ignoring it for a year, but something deep down knew, and he’d been absolutely petrified, because if he gave in, if he allowed it, it would end. Like every single one of the people who had loved him before, Dmitri would eventually stop. He would leave, and Raphael wasn’t sure he’d ever be able to recover from that.
“You’re afraid,” Luca said with a faint sigh.
“He’s so young. I’m this pathetic little man with no future to give him. What can I offer? My horrible little house or my pathetic salary? The promise that being tied to me will only get harder?”
“You think he doesn’t know those things about you?” Luca asked with a laugh.
“And loves me in spite of them,” Raphael offered bitterly.
“Loves you as you are, because Dmitri has never been that kind of person.” Luca folded his hands on the table and glanced over at the buffet where Rian was chatting with a few people and filling a couple of plates. “Does Rian know?”
“Yes,” Raphael breathed out. “Sort of. He doesn’t know it’s Dmitri, but we’re going slow because I wasn’t ready.”
“Because it wasn’t right,” Luca said. He reached over and seized Raphael’s hand, pressing a rough kiss to his wrist. “I love you. Like stupid amounts of love you. You probably saved my life in a lot of ways, and you were one of the few people who loved me even when I was a disgusting mess. You helped me find room in myself to let Wilder in. And I’m not going to let you throw this away because you’re having a sudden crisis of worth.”
“You know it’s not that sudden,” Raphael murmured.
Luca rolled his eyes. “I know you better than that. I know you wouldn’t change yourself for the world, but you still worry about being worth the effort.”
“I just happen to know how exhausting it is to love me,” Raphael started, but Luca squeezed his fingers, and he stopped.
“It isn’t. And some day in the far future, you’ll forget to worry about us getting tired of you. Right now, we’ll just keep telling you that we all want to be here in whatever way you need us. But you deserve to be happy—with the person you love, who loves you right back.”
Raphael swallowed thickly. “And if he doesn’t want to take the risk?”
“Then you move on. But don’t you think you should give him the opportunity to decide for himself before you write him off?”
Raphael knew he was right—and every excuse, every defense he’d ever built up against telling Dmitri the truth crumbled right there in his hands. “I don’t know how.”
“Yes, you do,” Luca said, then slowly drew his hand away. “You probably have like four speeches in your head already prepared for the day you might be brave enough to tell him how you feel.”
And well, that wasn’t the truth—but he had fantasies. None of them included Noah’s birthday party at the resort with his current partner getting him food at a buffet table, and the reality of that hit him hard.
“Rian…”
“Will get over it. He’s sweet and gorgeous, and you owe it to him to tell him the truth,” Luca said. “You know damn well that even if Dmitri rejects you…”
“Rian and I were not meant to be,” Raphael finished very softly, and he hated himself a little for knowingly leading Rian on. “I have to talk to him.”
“After a dance with me?”
The new voice startled Raphael, and he stared up at Santiago, who was holding out a hand. Raphael took it, more on instinct than anything else, and he let the Spanish man pull him to his feet.
“I’m not great at dancing,” he promised, and Santiago laughed.
“Neither am I. But you’re here looking sad, and I think a little bit of a waltz might cheer you up.”
The music wasn’t for waltzing. It was some slow sort of top forty romantic thing that Raphael had paid absolutely no attention to, but Santiago’s palm against his was soft, and his presence was comforting in the same way Luca’s was. He glanced at his friend, who was rolling his eyes and taking his crutches, so Raphael allowed Santiago to brace him as they took a spot at the very edge of the dance floor.
