“You were the one getting finger banged in the pool in front of everyone,” Mateo argues with a grin.
Alessa’s mouth pops open. “I’ve never heard such vulgar language in my life. You should be ashamed of yourself.”
“Who should be ashamed of themselves?” Gage asks, walking up and wrapping his arms around Alessa from behind.
“Mateo. He has a potty mouth,” Alessa tells him. How the hellshe’s keeping a straight face, I’ll never know. Her mouth is worse than ours on a good day. She spins around to face Gage. “I have details.” She leads us to a corner table and then fills Gage in on what we heard inside. His eyes get wider by the second, making me bust out laughing.
“I knew it!” Gage yells, causing all of us to shush him at the same time. “I knew it,” he whispers.
Ryder walks over, plucks Alessa out of the chair, then sits with her in his lap. “I don’t trust you three together,” he comments.
“Sure, Ryder. You can sit here,” Alessa mutters, looking over her shoulder at him. He grins, pecking her on the lips.
“What are you gossiping about now?” Ryder asks, pulling her to lean on his chest.
“Nothing,” Gage and Alessa say at the same time, making mine and Ryder’s eyes roll.
As funny as our eavesdropping was, I am worried about Evander. I knew something was wrong, but he would never tell me what it was; now I know why. He didn’t want to put me in a situation to dislike Micah, knowing it would put a strain on Alessa and me. I got it, though. Falling for a guy, when you never have before, is different. It brought up many different emotions, some you didn’t know how to deal with, especially when you thought you were straight, like Evander and Micah.
I refuse to let this sway how I feel about Micah; I’m going to help.
I wokeup the next morning, ate breakfast with everyone, then asked Micah if I could talk to him. Alone. He looked skeptical, but agreed. Micah and I got closer after Les went missing; he stopped giving that look that he thought I was always up to something and finally accepted me into the family. It didn’t mean we were best friends, though.
“What’s up?” he asks once we’re seated on the back patio.
Now that I am out here, I have no idea how to bring it up, so I figure the truth is the best. “I overheard you and Evander talking last night.”
Micah’s back goes ramrod straight. “What did you hear?”
“Enough to know some heavy shit went down for Evander to leave.”
“It was nothing,” Micah says, waving his hand like what I’m saying is ridiculous.
“Look,” I sigh, “Evander’s my brother, and it fucking sucks that he’s hurting, but I get it, Micah.”
“There’s nothing to get,” Micah says harshly. “It wasnothing.”
“If it was nothing, why were you trying so hard to fix it?” I ask, just as harshly.
“Listen,” Micah growls.
“No. You listen,” I say, turning to face him. This was more than just two people coming together in a moment of passion. This was two people fighting their attraction to each other because they still thought it was wrong. “I went through the same thing you’re feeling right now about Gage. I thought I was losing my fucking mind whenever I thought about what it would feel like to be with him. And when I started having feelings for him? It was scarier than falling in love with Alessa.” Micah finally turns his eyes to mine, signaling he is listening for once instead of getting defensive. “There is nothing wrong if youdohave feelings for Van. Your boss,” I jerk my thumb over my shoulder, indicating Alessa, “is very accepting of this sort of thing.”
Micah stares at me for so long I start to get nervous; he finally sits up, bracing his elbows on his knees and burying his head in his hands. “I fucked up. It started as an experiment because we both felt…things.” He doesn’t have to explain what those things are. “Then it wasn’t an experiment anymore, and I fucked it all up because I couldn’t admit I would ever have feelings for a man.”
“What happened?” I ask gently. I need to know if I’m going to help either one of them.
Micah barks a harsh laugh, sitting back in his chair, leaning his head back to stare at the sky. “He told me when he started feelingmore and said that if I wasn’t feeling it, we needed to cool it with each other. I couldn’t stay away from him,” Micah says hoarsely. “I let him believe we were headed somewhere just because I’m a selfish fucking bastard, then he laid the ultimatum down that we tell you guys or he was out.” Micah turns his head to look at me. “That’s when I told him I wasn’t ready yet and used Les as an excuse. I fucking knew she would be fine with it, and so did he."
“When did all this start?”
Micah looks back at the sky. “Almost as soon as the alliance was made. Les had me helping with getting them more social, preparing them for the return of the Perez’s. It became more when we shared the pool house,” he sighs. “The night he told me he was leaving to Cabo, I was an asshole. Instead of admitting what I felt and how much I didn’t want him to leave, I told him that what we had was just an experiment. That I never felt anything for him.”
“Holy shit, Micah.” No wonder Evander is fucked up over this. He is going through the same thing as Micah, trying to accept his feelings, and he got them shoved in his face. “Do you want to fix it? Or are you just leading him on again? Because I have to tell you, I won’t fucking like that.”
“I want to fix it, but it doesn’t matter now.” Micah smiles, but it’s sad. “After last night, he’s done.”
I roll my eyes before I can stop myself. “One conversation isn’t going to fix what you did. You need to remember he’s just as confused as you. I know how that feels. Gage knows. Ryder knows. Holden knows.” I stand up to head into the house to give him time to process what I just told him. “You don’t have to deal with this alone.”
