“Always,” Drew replied, summoning what he hoped was a genuine-looking smile. “What can I do for you, fearlessleader?”
Cam smirked as he plopped himself down in the seat before Drew’s desk. “Question foryou.”
Drew was used to seeing Camden Seaver as young. Maybe it was because he’d always trailed after Drew and Bas like a puppy back in the day, or maybe it was because his cheeks were still dusted with freckles and his hair a mess of cowlicks, despite his twenty-six years. Even when they’d dated, he’d felt the nagging need to protect Cam from everything. But now, madly in love with his boyfriend Cort, and confident in his job as second-in-command to Sebastian at Seaver Tech, Cam had blossomed into someone Drew saw as an equal… and a really goodfriend.
“Sure,” Drew told him. “Shoot.”
“When was the last time you talked toBas?”
Drew sighed. Maybe he should have foreseen this. He and Sebastian had been joined at the hip for years, and now things had changed. It was crazy to think everyone wouldn’t havenoticed.
Things had grown tense between them ever since thatstupidhigh school reunion Halloween party where Drew had admitted he’d wanted Bas to kiss him for a long time. Their barbs had grown more heated, their friendly get-togethers had become cold-war standoffs, and over the past month, Bas cut Drew out of his lifecompletely.
No more video game nights at Bas’s place, no lunch breaks, no Pats games on Drew’s sofa. Not a single word spoken since November. No text messages in weeks, even at Christmas. (And yeah, Drew had checked. Rather obsessively.) Being without his best friend was like losing a limb. And all because he’d lost controlone stupidtime.
And the worst part was, hurt and angry as he was, he couldn’t even blame Bas entirely. Drewhadbeen hiding his feelings for years. And he’dknownSebastian would pull this shit if Drew didn’t force him to talk so he could brush it all off as a drunken misunderstanding. But he’d been too embarrassed. And then it had been toolate.
A hell of a way for their friendship to die, if that’s what was happening. Ironic, honestly. It wouldn’t be the heartbreak of Bas’s engagement to Drew’s sister that tore them apart, nor the trauma of the plane crash, but a stupid kiss that would never have happened if Drew had remained incontrol.
But the last thing he wanted was to cause more tension among their friends by discussing this shit withCam.
“Hard to say,” Drew hedged. “We’re both busy. At least, I assume he’s been busy. I knowI’vebeen busy. Spending the holidays with my mother and her friends is enough to drive a person todrink.”
“Speaking of which!” Cam said, pointing an accusing finger at Drew. “Since when do you not spend Christmas Eve with us? That’s been a tradition since before I wasborn.”
Drew shrugged. “Eh. Things change, Cammy.” He waited for Cam to react to the hated childhood nickname, but beyond a slight eyeroll, he remained impassive. “You’ve got Cort now, and he’s got his own family, with Damon and Cain and Damon’s long-lost sister…What’s her nameagain?”
“Chelsea,” Cam supplied. “And Chelsea’s daughter Molly. But none of that matters, idiot! We didn’t see any of them for Christmas. The three of us sat around having aFast and Furiousmarathon. At least until Bas managed to drink himself into a stupor.” Cam rolled his eyes. “But even if we had seen them, it wouldn’t have made up for not having youthere.”
“That’s…well. Thank you,” Drew said, unexpectedly touched by Cam’s words. “But my mother wanted to spend the holiday with her sister and some friends in New York, so we went down there for a long weekend. And now I’m busy writing the reviews I should have been working on.” He gestured from the pen in his hand to the open file on his desk. “So…”
But Cam refused to take the hint. Instead he sat back in his seat and regarded Drew withamusement.
“Your deflection skills are amazing, McMann, but not nearly as potent as my stubbornness skills. Recall that I live with Kendrick Cortland, the man Sebastian says is like Sherlock Holmes and a golden retriever all rolled intoone.”
Drew snorted. Spot-on. Drew had warmed up to Cort quite a bit over the past few months, but it was insanely off-putting that the man always looked like he was laughing at a joke no one else couldunderstand.
“You and Bas have been dancing around each other for weeks now. Why?” Campersisted.
“I’m telling you, there’s no dancing,” Drew lied. There was so much dancing. Fred-and-Ginger-level dancing. “I’m not his keeper, Cam.” The lies kept rolling off his tongue. “We’re just… at a phase in our friendship where we need a little more timeapart.”
Cam snickered. “Wow. That was epic bullshit, McMann. First of all, you kindaarehis keeper. Who got him to leave his apartment when he was totally off the rails with grief after the crash? Who tells him when it’s time to leave the computer and join the three-dimensional people again? I don’t know if he remembers to eat if you’re notaround.”
Drew looked away uncomfortably. This was true. And just one of the many things Drew had been worrying about over the past month. But when Bas so clearly wanted nothing to do with him, what was Drew supposed todo?
“Plus, there’s no way you’d tolerate aphasewhere you couldn’t keep an eye on Bas when he was so fucked up over this Russian bullshit,” Cam saidtriumphantly.
Aaaandthere was the other thing Drew was worriedabout.
About a month ago, right around Thanksgiving because life was ironic that way, their friend Cain Shaw had been searching for evidence to prove that his father, Senator Emmett Shaw, had been the mastermind behind the Seavers’ plane crash. Instead, he’d found evidence that Emmett Shaw and Levi Seaver had taken money from a Russian criminal organization called SILA to found Seaver Tech, and SILA had been blackmailing them for years. The group, led by a psychopath named Alexei Stornovich, had threatened to harm the entire Shaw family if Senator Shaw didn’t arrange to have Levi Seaverkilled.
Now, instead of finding closure for everyone involved, they’d been given an even bigger, scarier monster to bring down. A bigger, scarier problem for Bas toobsessover, likely making risky decisions in hisanger.
Drew was pretty sure Bas hadn’t spent any time in his official, executive office across the hall in weeks, which meant that he was either working from home or holed up in his private computer lab down in the basement of Seaver Tech, either working on an actual, billable Seaver Tech project, or plotting some brilliant-but-crazy scheme to get revenge on the Russian criminals. Who the hellknew?
It would be as easy as checking his keycard access to see where he’d been spending his time, but once again, Drewresisted.
“I love that you think I can control Bas when he’s got an idea in his head,” he said, instead. “If he feels like he needs space, there’s nothing I can do to change hismind.”
