Sam gaped.“Seriously?”
Jurgen rolled his eyes.“Probably not,” he admitted, then made a face like he’d licked a toad.“But hemight.I’ve seen him try to do it before.And if he does, you don’t want to be his convenient fuck on the side.”
Reformed rakes make the best husbands.Sam managed to stop himself from blurting that out.
Jurgen gave him a long, silent look.Then he sighed.“Fine.”He turned and walked away down the hall.
The rest of the party was semi-torturous.Sam was sure he would have to watch Ian going at it with some guy, somewhere.Ian was a flirt, in spite of not laughing and rarely smiling.Guys threw themselves at him.
Probably Ian was better described as a flirt-magnet.He was also a bastard.Toying with Sam, doing subtly sexy things to make him nuts that no one else seemed to notice.Did a normal guy need to lick that many drops of beer off his lower lip?Did a normal guy wait until each droplet hovered on the point of falling, practically begging for someone else’s tongue to suck up said droplet from the bottom of his plump, full lip?
Did normal guys have to scratch their flat, taut bellies, pulling their shirt up with their searching fingers, revealing slivers of skin and clinging hair?When Ian used a pinky fingertip to circle his belly button, not quite dipping in ...that had to be on purpose, right?Who finger-rimmed their navel at a partyaccidentally?
Only the occasional moments of humor from Nik and Jurgen made the suffering bearable.When Nik wasn’t “cock blocking” Ian, he was throwing Miller at every available guy in the place.Sam couldn’t imagine where Nik had found half these guys.He recognized a fifth of them, maybe less, and he had a hard time believing Jurgen had that many friends.This had to be every gay man in Marlyle County, and then some.
The only guys Nik didn’t throw Miller at were Sam and Ian.“This is worse than my mother introducing me to nice girls at church,” Miller complained to Sam at the keg.
A keg!Nik and Jurgen had gotten a keg for this party.Sam shook his head in some shame.“It’s appalling,” he told Miller, who was pretending to fill his plastic beer cup.
“It sure the hell is,” Miller said.Sam had a feeling they were talking about different things.“I can get my own damn gay life,” Miller muttered.“Someday.Once I get used to being gay.”
“Are you gay?”Sam asked.It seemed appropriate.
“’Pears so,” Miller said, as if they were discussing the weather report.Sam had spent enough of last summer on the porch of Nik’s parents’ store to have some experience discussing farm weather.
“Heard it might rain,” Sam returned.The polite reply to any statement about precipitation.
“Heard it might rain men.”Miller winked at him.“Really could use some men.”
Sam looked around at the sea of men.“We’re surrounded by them.”
Miller tilted his head in a gesture Sam had only ever seen country folk make.A sort of sideways, single nod.Body language for conceding a point, but ...“I think I might prefer the ones that fall outta the sky.Less pressure,” he said.
Miller was cool.Sam would have talked to him more, but Nik showed up with some guy who had a shaved head and two rings through his lower lip that Miller just had to meet.
Sam was relieved that he didn’t just have to meet the guy, too.Not that he had anything against piercings, per se.Though it looked like Miller might, judging by his expression.
Sam looked aside, and there was Jurgen introducing yet another guy to Ian.Jurgen looked serious about not wanting Sam to hook up with his cousin.
Meanwhile, said cousin winked at Sam, then turned to face the newest offering.Ian had his arms crossed over his chest, red plastic beer cup in one hand propped up on the other forearm, showcasing his pecs.
Sam scowled.Bastard.Did he think Sam was that easy, that some muscle and a wink would cut it?He snorted and looked away, crossing his own arms over his chest.
Jurgen quirked a knowing brow at Sam.
Sam scowled at Jurgen.Big, dumb asshole.
Fuck this.Sam straightened up and walked out.
The place had cleared out by 3 a.m.Not even a single passed-out drunk littered the floor.Sam couldn’t believe it.If they were having a kegger, couldn’t they at least do it right?Dave had left early, though Sam hadn’t even noticed—Miller had told him as much when Sam had found him hiding in the bathroom.
He was so ready for bed.He didn’t need any more of this humiliation.No more Ian torturing him for his own amusement.Sam wasn’t his type; he’d heard it from the horse’s ass himself.
Nik wasn’t allowing him to go to bed, however, because—in an effort to be the perfect gay couple or something—Nik and Jurgen had bought a place with a hot tub.Which he insisted Sam get into.Fortunately, Sam had been forewarned this might happen, and he’d come prepared.
Sam put on his swim trunks and walked out into the hall, where he ran right into Nik.
Nik stared at him a second.“What are youwearing?”
