A vision of his father dragging him to that damned conversion therapist climbed out of the mental lockbox he kept it in and leered menacingly. He shoved the fucker back inside and slammed the lid shut, then imagined adding a nice big chain and a combination lock for good measure.
“Sorry I’m squashing you,” Rusty said. “My shoulders and crowded conditions don’t mix.”
“Nota problem.” Ace hoped the big man didn’t hear the hoarseness in his voice.
Flipping on the stolen truck’s blinker, Angel used a straightaway on the country lane to swerve around a granny in a Volkswagen puttering away at ten miles per hour under the speed limit. Since the farm truck was old and crotchety, and since the back road could use some work, the maneuver was less graceful than expected.Rusty was suddenly smashed against Ace’s side. A tingle spread across Ace’s collarbones, and if he wasn’t mistaken, a burst of heat flew to his cheeks.
“Damn. Sorry,” Rusty said again. “You okay?”
Rusty had a nice voice. All deep and sure. It hit Ace directly in his belly. Which wasnotwhere voices were supposed to land. They weresupposedto land in the ears andstaythere, damnit.
There had only been one other voice in Ace’s whole life that hit him in the belly, and the fact that Rusty’s did so now made him feel guilty. As if he was somehow cheating on the memory of thatothervoice.
“Fine,” he said. Or more likecroaked.
Now that lovely, terrifying heat wasn’t only in his cheeks. It was everywhere. Spreading across his chest, down his arms.
He tried to blameit on the warm air coming from the vents, but knew he was fooling himself. It had nothing to do with the heater and everything to do with Rusty. Rusty and his big, strapping body. Rusty and his deep, stomach-churning voice. Rusty and his sweet smile and oddly sad eyes and…
Ace shoved his thoughts aside and lifted a hand to…what? Fan his face? Holy hobbling Christ on a crutch, talk about obvious.
Instead, he pointed the vent away from him as if that had been his intention all along. Too late, he realized that was obvious too, damnit!
Fisting his hands in his lap, he cleared his throat and tried to concentrate on something,anything, other than the redhead plastered along his side. It might have worked, had the people in the pickup truck offered any sort of distraction. But Christianand Emily had fallen quiet. Angel was no help. He was back to being his usual buttoned-up self. And Rusty…
Gah! Ace’s mind had circled back to the very thing he was tryingnotto think about!
The seconds plodded by like hours. The air inside the truck seemed hotter, despite him having turned off his vent. And the silence…Fracking hell, the silence!It grated on his very last nerve becausehe could hear Rusty breathing, hear Rusty swallowing, hear Rusty’s whiskers rasp against his rough palm when he rubbed a hand over his face.
Ace couldn’t stand it a second longer. “So, Rusty,” he blurted, “you never told us what brought you to England. I mean, really, howdoesa former marine from Pittsburgh end up as a charter fishing boat captain in Folkstone, UK?”
“It’s a long story.”Rusty shrugged.
Ace glanced at his watch, then at the sign telling him they had seven miles to go before they reached the airport. Which translated into seven more miles of silence unless he could get Rusty to fill it. Since seven more miles of silence would feel like an eternity, he figured he’d start with something simpler. “How long were you a jarhead?”
“Eight years.”
Ah, progress.“And what made you leave?”
“I got a bum knee, thanks to a bad mission over in Afghanistan that made me not so good at humping gear and squatting in foxholes. They honorably discharged me as soon as my contract came up for renewal.”
“Was that difficult? I mean, assuming you wanted to stay in the Corps?”
Again, Rusty shrugged and remained frustratingly silent.It’s like pulling teeth, Ace thought.
“And afterward? Is that when you moved to England?”
Rusty shook his head, his eyes zeroed in on the road ahead, but unless Ace was mistaken, Rusty wasn’t really seeing it. He seemed to have turned in on himself. “I ended up going back to Pittsburgh to work for my pop at U.S. Steel. But I…” Rusty’s jaw hardened. “I wasn’t happy there.”
“No? Why not?”
“Lot of good ol’boys I didn’t fit in with ’cause I’m…” Rusty made a rolling motion with his big paw.
“I think the word you’re looking for isgay.”
“Yeah.” Rusty hitched one mammoth shoulder. “And then there was my dad’s crew, the white-collar boys. But I didn’t fit in with them either ’cause I’m more brawn than brains.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
