“I hope it goes well.”
He flashed me a brief smile. “Yeah, me too.”
Dancing around the subject like this was painful but of my own doing. Confronting whatever the fuck was going on with Avery felt like too much right now, even though I was dying to know what was going on inside of his head.
But the problem was that I wanted more. Last night wasn’t enough to satisfy that deep rooted craving in me that had always wanted him.
In fact, it seemed to have only made it all worse. I had hoped, years and years ago, that by exposing myself to as much of Avery as possible that it’d somehow get my brain to wean off of him, force me to get bored of him until all that I had left was general apathy in what used to be my feelings for him.
The reality, of course, was much different. All it’d done was make me want to drop to my knees right here in the middle of my shop and get him back in my mouth again. Just to see that blissful expression once more while he came.
Avery surprised me out of my thoughts by cupping my jaw in his hand, holding me firmly in place. His thumb grazed overmy cheek, sending a spiderweb of pinpricks radiating across my skin.
“Have dinner with me tonight.”
It was a bad idea. But him apparently not regretting last night was what my mind was getting stuck on.
If that was true, then what else was Avery hiding from me?
Or himself, for that matter?
How much farther could this line be pushed between us until a chasm inevitably opened up and swallowed us both whole?
Oh my god, I’m so screwed.
“Okay.”
Dinner I could do. That was simple.
There didn’t need to be any strings attached to dinner.
Avery smiled. “I’ll pick you up at seven.”
CHAPTER 18
Avery
Nothing could bringme down from that high of getting Brandon to agree to grab dinner with me tonight.
Not the horrible traffic coming back into Ellington Heights, or the guy who cut me off at the red light pulling into Ted’s office, and not even the Russian model that was more than likely going to try and fight me for my inheritance waiting inside said office.
All right, maybe that last one was a little more annoying than the rest.
But right at this moment, though, I hardly cared outside of a mild flash of feelings.
I had nothing actually planned for tonight, however, as soon as I got out of this meeting, I’d get to calling around to the high-end restaurants in the area to see which ones were open to taking reservations and plan from there.
Tonight needed to be special. I needed to show Brandon that last night wasn’t some fluke in my judgment and that I was open to exploring whatever insane chemistry that was brewing between us further.
I’d put my own personal reservations about my sexuality on the back burner for the time being, knowing that if I got too caught up in the label of things, it was only going to cause me to make a fool out of myself in front of him.
Leaning into my desires in an uninhibited manner was allowing me to stretch my wings in ways I never thought possible. Giving into the temptations instead of forcing myself to behave and move on felt more freeing than I had been in years.
I wasn’t about to go psychoanalyzing myself just yet. Not when I’d just started to erase the distance between Brandon and I.
Popping open the door to my car, I climbed out into the afternoon sun and felt the tension bleed back into my body almost immediately. Going into this meeting, I was preparing for the worst. Without having any background as to who this woman was, there were only a few realms of possibility that I could see this moving in.
Was it fair of me to judge someone I hadn’t met yet based solely on who I knew my father used to surround himself with?
