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He looked so outraged, and I couldn’t help but smile. “No, we’re not. I’ll just prove how wrong you are.”
“By leaving? You promised, Abe.”
“I’m going home to shower and jerk off,” I replied.
Lust obliterated Lio’s annoyance, giving me hope that we’d work through this. “Or we could shower and jerk each other off, then continue thisconversationover dinner.”
Lio inhaled sharply, but I saw the determination in his eyes. He wasn’t going to budge on his stance, but I would bet money he’d be jerking off in his shower before I made it down his long-ass driveway.
Fucking Lio.He’d be the death of me.
I turned on the radio to drown out my thoughts on my forty-five-minute drive to Pembroke. The only station that came in played nineties country music, which suited me just fine. I turned up the volume and sang along until Lio’s accusations faded away. I went straight to my bathroom and turned on my shower. I peeled out of my dirty clothes while waiting for the water to heat up, then I allowed thoughts of Lio to reenter the playing field. I didn’t dwell on his words but focused on the way he felt in my arms and how good he tasted. I pinched my nipples, thinking of the way he’d stared at my chest. My dick was primed and ready long before the ancient heater warmed the water enough for me to get in. I closed my eyes and pictured Lio in the cramped space with me. I wanted him on his knees or bent over the edge of the bathtub. I needed more of his kisses and lusty whimpers. More than anything, I needed to call him mine. The last thought was the one that thrust me into climax.
My cell phone rang on the bathroom vanity, and I let myself hope Lio was calling to take me up on the dinner invitation. I turned the water off, wrapped the towel around my waist, and stepped over the edge of the tub. I leaned forward and snagged my phone off the vanity while debating if I should brag about the massive load I’d just shot in the shower to amp up the tension even more. Lio didn’t need to think I was backing off or giving up. If he thought I played dirty when we were kids, he hadn’t seen anything yet.
Then I saw the name on the caller ID, and my gut churned with dread when I answered.
“Hello, Abe.” The woman’s voice was soft and gentle but held a hint of sadness that worsened the roiling. “My name is Whitney, and I’m a nurse at Twin Oaks Senior Living.”
“Are you new?” I asked, stalling for time. “I don’t think we’ve met.”
“I’ve been a nurse for fifteen years, but I started at this facility on Monday.” She cleared her throat. “There’s never an easy way to say this…”
“Is Earl gone?” I rolled my eyes at my phrasing. I wasn’t questioning if he’d wandered off.
“No,” Whitney said, “that’s why I’m calling. As I mentioned, I’ve been at this for a while. Your grandfather is showing signs that his passing is close. I thought you might want to visit and say goodbye. According to his file, you’re Earl’s legal guardian and the only one he wants to visit him, but is there someone else you’d like me to call?”
A clan of scoundrels shared the same last name, but neither Earl nor I claimed them. “There’s no one,” I replied. “It’s just the two of us now. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes or less.”
“I’ll see you when you get here.”
Whitney, a pretty redhead with big brown eyes, was waiting for me at the nurses’ station. We shook hands, and she expressed her sorrow that we weren’t meeting under better circumstances.
“He’s resting comfortably in his room,” she said. “You go on in, and we’ll try not to disturb you too much when we make our rounds.”
“I appreciate it,” I said.
I headed down the hallway to Earl’s room and paused outside his closed door. Christ, I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to him yet. In my entire life, there’d been three people I could count on: Earl and Lucinda, my grandfather and late grandmother, and Lio. Soon, there would be just one, and if I didn’t pull my head out of my ass, I could lose Lio too. I had the strongest urge to call him and admit he was right. I could promise him whatever he wanted to hear, but he was too sharp and would see through me. When I bared my soul to him and made the commitments he needed, it shouldn’t come from a place of grief and fear. I squared my shoulders as Earl had taught me, opened his door, and stepped into his room.
The lamp on his bedside table was on, casting soft light over the room. The gentle glow was much better than the harsh, clinical glare of the overhead lights. Earl seemed to be asleep—or worse—as I inched closer to the bed. Only six days had passed since my last visit, but the difference in his appearance was staggering. Earl’s skin was sallow and waxy. The skin under his eyes was sunken, and his cheeks were hollow. It was hard to believe his thin shoulders and frail frame had once been as brawny as mine. I was getting a preview of my future, and it rocked me back on my heels. Not because I would one day be old and frail like him but because I might not know the kind of love my grandfather had shared with my grandmother. Lio was offering it to me, but I had to be brave enough to meet him halfway.
Earl’s concave chest rose and fell slightly, and shame heated my skin. Here I was, faced with my granddad’s imminent passing, and all I could think about was myself and Lio. Always Lio. A hard lump formed in my throat, and I found breathing impossible. Stopping at the foot of his bed, I swallowed hard and gathered my composure. Fuck me, this was going to hurt so bad.
Before Lio crashed into my life, my grandparents were my only source of support. How two wonderful people could spawn a son as worthless as my father was beyond me, but my dad—and his younger brother—were the worst kinds of losers. My mother had eventually figured it out and took off to save herself, leaving me at Amstel Beecham’s mercy. Some days, I hated her guts, but on others, I was glad at least one of us had gotten away. I couldn’t imagine what my life would’ve been like if the law hadn’t finally caught up with my father and sent him to prison when I was twelve. Earl and Lucinda Beecham had saved me—body and soul—and everything good inside me was owed to them.
“You just going to stand over me like the grim reaper?” Earl’s voice was as thin as butterfly wings and as shaky as a newborn fawn’s legs. His lashes fluttered, and he opened his eyes to peer up at me as well as his poor vision allowed. His blue eyes, once as vivid as mine, were clouded, the milky white of cataracts muting the blue.
I cleared my throat and stepped up to the head of his bed. “No, sir.”
His gaze tracked me while his lips quirked up at one corner. “You’re still hovering, son.”
I snagged the chair in the corner of the room and dragged it over, then lowered myself into the seat. “Is this better?”
Earl swallowed hard, and I wanted to tell him we didn’t have to speak. We could sit together this last time and enjoy one another’s company. One of the things I enjoyed most about our relationship was that neither of us felt the need to fill every second with chatter. I couldn’t count the number of times we’d sat quietly on the bank of a river or lake with a fishing rod in one hand and a beverage in the other. But Earl’s clenched jaw and furrowed brow expressed how important he felt his words were, and I wouldn’t deny him this opportunity.
“How about a sip of water?” I offered instead.
Earl relaxed and nodded, so I poured a cup of water from the pitcher and raised the head of his bed a little. I held the straw to his lips and waited while he took a few pulls from it. “Much better,” he said afterward. “There are things I need to say, and I’m short on time to get them out.”
