Ryan inched forward and held Graeme’s face with both hands. Goddess help him, but he couldn’t resist when Graeme looked at him like that. He slanted his mouth over Graeme’s, kissing him tenderly and with passion. It wasn’t an explosion and an invitation for more, like Art’s kiss, but it was just as powerful.
He stepped back and took a breath before he lost complete control and tried for more. “I would be honored to attend this wedding with you, Graeme Dallen,” he said like he was proposing.
Graeme took a heavy breath, then blew it out, relaxing and melting into a warm smile. “Thanks, Ryan,” he said, barely above a whisper. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”
“It’s my pleasure,” Ryan replied.
Art would have made a joke, but there was no teasing in the way Ryan felt. Maybe a mini-break with Graeme would be just what he needed to sort his feelings. Maybe he would find the answers to whatever was stuck in him in Cornwall.
NINE
Nervous?That didn’t come close to describing how Graeme felt as he and Ryan drove up the long, winding drive of Penwith Grange, the gorgeous, old estate in Cornwall where Mavis and Benny were having their wedding. He fiddled with his seatbelt, squirmed and pushed his feet against the front of the footwell, and even played with the switch that locked and unlocked the door several times before Ryan gave him a gentle warning to stop.
“We’re almost there,” Ryan said. “We’ll be checked in by three, the service is at five, and the reception supper is at six and over by ten. You only have to endure this for a few hours.”
“I know, I know,” Graeme insisted breathlessly.
He didn’t have the heart to tell Ryan that he’d been enduring this for twenty-four years, or that the last year had been so intense it felt like an additional twenty-four. Ryan was dealing with his own struggles and didn’t need the extra weight of the kind of homophobia that was a foreign concept to the Hawthornes but par for the course for his family.
The parking lot of Penwith Grange was already filled with cars when they reached it. Ryan found them a spot at the far end of the lot, the shady end. That seemed about right.
Ryan cut the engine, but turned to Graeme and took his hand instead of rushing to get out of the car. “You’re going to be okay,” he said like he had the authority to make it so. “Mavis wants you here, and apparently Benny does, too. Whatever anyone else says or does, just remember that.”
“Okay,” Graeme said, forcing himself to smile, though he didn’t think the expression was all that convincing. What he really wanted to say was, “That’s easy for you to say.”
Ryan took Graeme’s hand and squeezed it, looking straight into his eyes. “I’m here for you,” he said. “I care about you, and I want you to be happy. If all else fails, remember that.”
Graeme’s tight smile turned genuine. “Thanks, Ryan. That means everything to me.”
Ryan’s gaze dropped to Graeme’s lips. The intention to kiss him buzzed in the air between them, although the kiss remained just a wish. Someone with a kid walked behind the car, making enough noise to subtly push Graeme and Ryan apart. Now wasn’t the time.
But there had been a time, Graeme remembered as they got out of the car, then fetched their overnight bags from the back. Graeme’s lips still tingled from that kiss in the garden a few days before. How a simple kiss in broad daylight could be so sensual and make his legs turn to jelly was still a mystery to him. So was the hot and heady kiss Art had planted on him in Brighton.
For someone who had hardly been kissed at all before Damien came along—Mavis hadn’t been that affectionate, and Damien liked his mouth on other things besides Graeme’s lips—Graeme sure had been kissed soundly lately.
He pushed those thoughts aside as he hitched his bag over his shoulder and followed slightly behind Ryan to thefront entrance of Penwith Grange. Like so many other former aristocratic estates, Penwith had been turned into a hotel several decades ago so that the family could make enough money to keep it. Graeme preferred the Hawthorne family’s idea to turn their estate into an arts center, but whatever family owned Penwith had done alright for themselves.
The interior was decorated with understated elegance, which was perfect for a wedding venue. There were plenty of soft colors, just enough gilding to be posh without being tacky, and fresh flowers in enormous vases throughout the entry hall. Once he and Ryan checked in and dropped their bags in the small, two-bed room they’d been given in a quiet wing of the house, Graeme had a chance to explore the estate’s gardens as well.
“I knew bringing you outside would calm you down,” Ryan said with a grin as they investigated the manicured lawns and numerous themed gardens.
“It’s lovely,” Graeme said, “but I’m not sure it’s been properly taken care of.”
“Really?” Ryan’s brow shot up.
“Parts are a bit straggly,” Graeme said, pointing to a bed of dahlias that hadn’t been tended properly. “And the borders are patchy.”
Shifting into work mode was a defense mechanism, pure and simple, but it did its job and calmed Graeme. He would have gone on pointing out the subtle flaws in the garden and making suggestions for improvement, but his phone buzzed in his pocket.
He pulled it out to find a text from Art.
“Thinking of you on this momentous occasion.”
Graeme smiled at the text.
“Is that Art?” Ryan asked as three dots appeared on Graeme’s phone.
“Yeah,” Graeme said, showing his phone to Ryan. “He’s been texting me since last night with motivational comments and encouraging messages. Not that all of them have been appropriate, mind you,” he said, laughing at the memory of some of the more colorful things Art had sent.
