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But he’d done it. For almost a year.
If I’d believed him. If I’d trusted, maybe we—
I shake my head, because that’s a train of thought I don’t think I can afford to follow sitting right in front of him. “Is that why it ended?”
He looks away but not before I see the hurt in his eyes. I don’t like it.
“There were a lot of reasons. But his not wanting our relationship to be public wasn’t really one of them. His cheating on me though… definitely was.”
“Trevor, man, I’m so sorry. When did you break up?”
“Officially? Few months ago. But it had been over for a while by then.”
About the time he was playing with the Slayers. I want to ask him more about it. But there’s no missing the subtle shift in his body language, the way he closes off. Like he’s still protecting this jerk.
So I stick to the only question that really matters.
“Are you over him?”
“Him? Yeah. It? I want to be, but that kind of betrayal has a way of sticking with you.” A breeze blows through, tossing his hair around his face. “What really catches me up, though? The part that I resent the hell out of but can’t seem to get past, is this concern that if I come out, it changes things for him. Puts his secret at risk.”
“How do you mean?”
"Everyone knew we were friends. He’s terrified if people find out I date guys, they might draw conclusions. That even if they don’t know for sure… what if they ask him about me? About whether he knew? How he feels?”
“So now you… what? Feel like you can’t?” I reach across the scarred wood and take his hand. I only let myself hold it for a second, just long enough to offer the smallest comfort before giving him back his space. “It’s admirable that you want to respect his privacy, but I think you can do that and still live your own life. If anyone asks him about you… he can decide what he wants to say about it.”
The look on his face says even if he thinks I’m right he isn’t comfortable with it.
Spearing a hand through the overlong mess of his hair, he swings his legs out from the bench to stand. “You know, I’ve had a hard time making peace with that. Part of me felt like, without a good reason, what’s the harm in giving him more time to put some distance between us? But maybe he’s had enough time.”
Abandoning our coffees on the bench, I rise with him. “What changed your mind?”
His eyes meet mine, and the air in my lungs catches behind everything I’m seeing there.
He steps closer, moving into my space so there’s less than a foot separating us. Dappled sunlight plays across his brow, the crooked bridge of his nose, and those brawny shoulders, highlighting one perfect spot and then the next. Making me want to touch, to reach out and wrap my hand around the back of his neck, fist his shirt, and drag him in for a kiss.
Only, I can’t fucking move. I can’t breathe as he searches my eyes with a helplessness completely at odds with his physical presence. “I saw you again.”
“Trev.”
In what seems like some kind of slow-motion reality, Trevor reaches for my hand, the backs of his knuckles brushing lightly, tentatively… heating the nerves where our skin touches and sending tiny waves of static up my arm.
His eyes drift to my mouth, and whatever restraint I’ve built up for this man crumbles to dust. I can’t hold back, can’t stop myself from closing the distance between us. I graze his lips with a kiss that’s nothing like the heated desperation of my fantasies but somehow feels infinitely more potent.
Our eyes meet, and this time, there’s nothing helpless in his look. There’s no question between us. Emotion I’ve kept buried so deep for so long surges up in an almost violent eruption, and we come together in a crush, chest to chest, mouths fusing, hands gripping and pulling and— Christ —there’s not an inch between us. Not a breath we aren’t sharing.
How does this kiss feel more intimate than any sexual act I’ve ever engaged in?
There isn’t a pause or beat or a single second of hesitation as we angle and open, taking and giving, our tongues moving together and sliding against each other. Each spearing thrust making me moan as sensation pierces through me in ways no kiss has before. Or at least not in the past four years.
Our feet aren’t as coordinated as our mouths, and suddenly I’m staggering in a tangle of blind steps, Trev’s arm locking around me as the outside wall to the stockroom meets my shoulders and his hard body presses into mine… all the way down.
Oh hell, yes. I can feel him thickening against me and—
zzz zzz
“Oh shit,” I croak, breaking away even though it nearly kills me to do it.
