“Grady?”
Sully blushed a deeper shade of crimson.“That, that was his name.Grady.He was a bit older than me, new to the area, he’d just moved up the road aways to Carson City a few months earlier.Got the job with the liquor company and figured he’d give me a shot since I’d never bought from them before.I told him I was glad he did and, well, after that ...we kind of stopped talking about work.”
Dean smiled hesitantly.“What’d you talk about instead?”he prodded, eager to unfold Sully’s hard, taut exterior to find the soft spots underneath.
Sully smiled, dimples in his richly suntanned face.“Trying to remember,” he mused, getting that faraway look in his eyes.The same one he’d had when he’d glanced over Dean’s shoulder to peer at the cash register in the lobby.“Can’t remember a single thing.It was one of those kinds of, uh, dates, you know?”
Dean shook his head ruefully.“No, Sully, I don’t.”
“No?”
Dean glanced back, eyes unblinking and chin unbowed.“I’ve never had the privilege before.”
Sully fiddled with his place setting, big, oversized fork shifting back and forth across a wild west map of Clay County beneath it.“You mean, with another guy?Or with a girl?”
“With either,” Dean said diplomatically, though there was hardly any need at this point.After all, here was Sully—big, bad, macho, sexy, studly, hard as nails and tough as dirt Sully—gushing over his date with another man.A bro.A dude.Dean could hardly deny his growing attraction any longer.“And before you say it, it wouldn’t have happened in high school no matter how long I’d stayed.”
“But college?Freshman year?Dorm buddy?Study buddy?Tutor?Naughty professor?Random hookup at some frat party?”
Dean just cocked his head.“Me?At a frat party?Or batting my eyes at some professor, no matter how naughty?Get real.”
Sully quietly nodded, but for once had no quick retort.
“I mean, we can’t all be you,” Dean nudged, hoping to get a rise out of the suddenly sullen cowpoke sitting across from him, all elbows and knees, long and rangy like a winding road Dean couldn’t even imagine being able to explore.
“What?”Sully clucked at last.“Going out on some hairbrained, cockamamie date once a year?Spending most of my days with hillbillies and farmers, cowgirls and cow pokes, talking about the weather and, oh, yeah, just for a change up, more weather?”
“What a waste,” Dean blurted without thinking of it, only to rethink the minute he saw the quiet scowl creep across Sully’s pretty face.
“Yeah, well,” Sully pretended to snarl, wagging his water glass mock menacingly.“We can’t all live fascinating, academic, college boy lives like you, City Slicker.”
Dean rolled his eyes at the hyperbole.“I meant,” he said, swallowing hard before just going for it.“What a waste to keep a guy like you under wraps, Sully.”
Sully did his little head cock thing, twice as cute without the ball cap shading his teasing expression, more clues to read across his expressive, chiseled face.“Is that ...was that ...a compliment?”
“Shut it,” Dean was barking as the waitress arrived, bearing a tray laded with the sampler they’d ordered, plus steaming biscuits and a sidecar of spiced pear jam to spread atop them.
“Everything in order?”Calamity asked, little hands on her tiny waist, chipped nails tapping the frayed ruffles of her old-timey waitress apron.
“Looks great!”They both said at the same time, making her giggle.And not just for show, Dean thought, as she sauntered away, twice as much wriggle in her jiggle as the last time she’d left their table.
They stared at the bounty in front of them, rustic creations aplenty, from fried okra and green beans to bacon wrapped smokey links to honey mustard short ribs.“I hope you’re hungry,” Sully teased, already slathering thick, spicy fig jam on a still steaming biscuit.
“Notthishungry,” Dean muttered, taking one of each item onto his appetizer plate just to be polite.“I mean thanks for ordering, just don’t be offended if I can’t finish my half?”
“Sorry,” Sully muttered, doing the same.“I eat when I get nervous.”
Dean had a rib halfway to his lips, pausing to regard his dining companion—long and lean and limber and casual and sexy as all get out.“This?Is you?Nervous?”
“I mean, yeah?”Sully bit off a wedge of his biscuit, beaming at the sweet and savory combination as it apparently melted on his sexy little tongue.
Dean nibbled on his rib, fall-off-the-bone tender and vaguely spicy with a dry mustard rub under a tangy honey glaze.“The fuck for?”he spat, patting his grateful lips with a checkerboard napkin he’d had spread across his lap.
Sully chuckled, a little biscuit crumb on his lower lip until he licked it off self-consciously.“Isn’t it obvious?”
“No, it’s not, Sully.At least it isn’t to me, otherwise I wouldn’t have asked?”
Sully nodded, patting rib sauce from his lips as he glanced around the crowded diner.“My last date didn’t work out so well...”
