"Tomorrow," he said. "Tristan's setting it up for tomorrow afternoon."
"Fast."
"No point in dragging it out." He leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed over his chest. "I'm going to tell them everything. About being gay, about why I couldn't marry Elizabeth, about where I've been and what I've figured out."
"Are you going to tell them about me?"
The question slipped out before I could stop it. Selfish. This wasn't about me, but I needed to know where I stood in the story he was about to tell.
Tobias's expression softened. "I'm going to tell them I'm with someone. Someone who helped me. Someone who matters." He crossed the room and slid his arms around my waist. "I'm not going to hide you."
"You sure that's smart? Rich family, security guard boyfriend. That'll go over well."
"I don't care how it goes over." His hands pressed flat against my back. "They can think whatever they want about my choices. You're not something I'm ashamed of. You're something I'm proud of."
His words landed somewhere I hadn't let anyone reach in years.
"Tobias..."
"I mean it." He pulled back enough to meet my eyes. "You saved me. Not just from the wedding, but from myself, from the life I was sleepwalking through. I'm not going to pretend that doesn't matter."
I kissed him. Unable to find the words, I used my mouth instead, trying to pour everything I felt into the press of lips, the slide oftongue, the way I pulled him close as if I could keep him safe through sheer will.
When we broke apart, he was breathing hard.
"Let's go to bed," he said.
"It's four in the afternoon."
"I know." His hands slid under my shirt, palms hot against my skin. "I don't want to think about tomorrow right now. I just want you."
I let him lead me to the bedroom.
He pushed me back onto the mattress, straddled my hips, and pinned me down with his weight. He was getting bolder every time—less hesitant, more sure of what he wanted and how to take it.
"Tell me what you need," I said.
"Just you." He ground against me, and I groaned at the friction. "Just this."
We didn't rush. We peeled off each other's clothes slowly, mapping familiar territory with our hands and mouths. He was learning me—knew that the spot below my ear made me shiver, that I liked his teeth against my collarbone, that I'd do almost anything if he said please in that breathless voice.
When he sank down onto me, we both went still. Breathing. Adjusting.
"Okay?" I asked.
"More than okay." He started to move, slow rolls of his hips that built heat in waves. "I needed this."
"I know." I gripped his thighs, letting him set the pace. "Me too."
It was gentle. Tender in a way our first time hadn't been. Less desperation, more intention. By the time we both came, shaking and gasping, the afternoon light had shifted to gold through the blinds.
After, with his head on my chest and his fingers tracing patterns on my skin, the fear crept back in.
What if his parents convinced him to come back?
What if his old life looked better than this small apartment, this small town, this man with nothing to offer but a steady paycheck and a decade of baggage?
What if he walked into that meeting tomorrow and never returned?
