Marshall yawned, stretching his arms high above his head and arching his back. He was still in pajamas, and I wasn’t sure I believed he’d already been up when I gave him a two-minute text warning of my arrival.
“Sure, Marsh.”
I elbowed him out of the kitchen and turned my attention to his fridge, finding a carton of eggs, half a package of bacon, and an apple. Taking it all out of the fridge, I shot him a dubious look. “I see domestication has hardly domesticated you.”
“I like you better when you talk less.”
I gave him the finger, then made myself at home in his kitchen, scrambling eggs and slicing the apple into eighths while I waited for the pan to get warm enough to fry up the bacon. I’d just laid the first strips down when Silas staggered out of the bedroom, eyes half closed and hair sticking up in every direction. He had on an old hoodie and the outline of a pillow in sharp angles across his cheek. He went straight to Marshall, walking into his arms and letting my brother kiss him on the head.
“Good morning, Hunter,” Silas muttered, accepting his kisses before taking a seat on the stool to Marshall’s right.
“Good morning, Silas. Coffee?” I offered since I was in the kitchen.
Since I was inhishouse.
“Yes, thank you.” He sniffed the air, smiling. “And bacon once you’ve gotten enough.”
I poured Silas some coffee and set the mug in front of him.
“Eggs and apple too?” I asked.
“Please. Thank you.”
Silas yawned and leaned against Marshall’s arm while I finished frying up breakfast. The two of them spoke in hushed tones, which was lovely for them but less great for me, considering the reason I’d come over in the first place was because the last place I wanted to be was alone with my thoughts. They were so deep in it, much like they had been from the start, so there was no way of avoiding thoughts of Jay and the time we’d spent together the night before.
He’d been so nervous and earnest on his arrival, so broken and defeated by his departure. I shouldn’t have let him leave, but there was no way I could have let him stay. I could—I should…maybe—text him to check on him later in the morning. To at least make sure he got home okay, even though there was no reason for me to do that.
I wasn’t anything more than an experiment to him. A transaction where he paid and I delivered goods. If he’d wanted someone to follow up on his mental state, he wouldn’t have hired an escort.
Fuck, I needed to delete that app.
I dished up some eggs, bacon, and fruit for my brother and his boyfriend, then reached into my pocket for my phone. I was going to delete that ridiculous app once and for all, and maybe someday in the future if I felt brave enough, I’d tell Finn all about how his fat fingers caused me to accidentally become a sex worker. I swiped a greasy finger across my phone screen, findingtwo notifications on the app. Ignoring them, I pressed my finger down until the One Night Stand app began to wiggle, ready to delete it. Whatever notifications the app had for me could go unread. I needed to be done with that part of my life once and for all.
“Smells so good,” an almost familiar voice said from the hallway, and my head snapped up at the sound of it. I had the spatula in one hand and my phone in the other, dropping them both when Jay shuffled into the kitchen wearing nothing more than a pair of way too big pajama pants. They hung low enough there couldn’t have been more than an inch of skin between the waistband and his cock, and I would know since I’d gotten up close and personal with the latter only hours before.
Jay had both hands over his face, rubbing sleep out of his eyes, but when my phone landed against the tile, he dropped his arms to his sides and squinted the room into focus. He saw me first, his nose clearly chasing after the bacon I’d finished cooking, and his eyes went wide as the two plates I’d just loaded up with food. I tore my stare away from him, bending down to pick up my phone. The corner of the screen had cracked, but other than that, the damage looked minimal. The hookup app still danced on my screen, and I turned the whole thing off and shoved it back into my pocket.
“I thought you’d sleep longer,” Silas said from behind me.
Jay blinked hard, tearing his stare away from me and looking directly at Silas.
“Good morning, Lincoln,” Marshall greeted, unbothered and unaware. “I don’t think you’ve met my brother, Hunter. Hunt, this is Silas’s best friend, Lincoln.”
Jay—no—Lincoln and I faced each other head on, bodies tense and jaws locked.
“Good to see you,” I said softly.
“What are…” He stopped himself, snapping his mouth closed before taking a step closer.
“I’m making breakfast,” I said. “Did you want some coffee?”
“I can get my own,” he muttered, stepping around me to get to the coffee pot. I turned back to the stove, and we were shoulder to shoulder, staring at the wall.
“Ethan,” he said under his breath.
“Middle name.”
Lincoln made a derisive noise in the back of his throat. “Hunter Ethan Covington.”
