Flushed, Matthew mumbled something that could have passed for a goodnight. If he didn’t get inside soon, someone was going to notice the erection tenting his towel.
Before he could go, Damien spoke again. “Now, before anything happens to your dad, I want to lay things out nice and simple with you. Think of his glittery death like that scene at the beginning ofKill Bill—if one day you decide you want to get revenge, I understand, and I’ll be waiting. I’m sorry for what I have to do to your father. He’s a bad, bad man.”
No, Matthew knew better than that.
Theywere the bad men.
The ones with the secret.
The ones who wanted what they couldn’t have.
But for the first time since Emily had been born, Matthew found that he didn’t care. Hewantedto be bad. He wanted to steal away into Damien’s bed in the middle of the night and feel what it was like to be corrupted.
Bad didn’t seem so terrible when they were invested in it together.
Matthew’s father snorted, dampening the overwhelming arousal igniting in Matthew’s veins. “Go to bed, Knot. Leave Matthew alone.”
It was Matthew’s cue to get out before he flubbed up and made things horrible. He bowed his head to escape Damien’s gaze, mumbled a second, hasty goodnight, and hurried to the front door of his bungalow. Thank god he’d left it unlocked. The longer he stayed out with Damien, the more likely it was he’d blow their cover.
Matthew turned the doorknob.
“Gwynn?” Damien asked, entirely too alarmed, as Matthew opened the door. “Isn’t that your bure?”
“Nope,” Matthew’s father replied as Matthew stepped through the doorway. “Why?”
Matthew’s foot snagged something low to the ground that shouldn’t have been there. He stumbled forward, the towel around his waist coming undone. It fell to the floor, getting in the way of his feet. At the same time, he heard Damien and his father cry out in unison, “Matthew,no!”
But it was too late. Escape was impossible.
The carnage had begun.
Atwang!similar to a guitar string snapping echoed through the room. It came from the thing Matthew’s foot had snagged, which had broken under Matthew’s weight. Before Matthew could catch his balance and check on what it was, there came a noise from overhead like the sound of fabric flapping in the wind. Attention redirected, Matthew lifted his head and instantly wished he hadn’t. A shimmering sheet of sparkling rainbow devastation crashed down onto him, so thick that it blocked out the light.
Glitter.
It was all glitter.
It broke over his head and tumbled down his shoulders, stuck to his chest and slipped into the waistband of his speedo. Fine flecks of it adhered to his arms and his hands. It bedazzled his eyebrows and eyelashes, and as if that weren’t bad enough, it sneaked its way between his lips and glued itself onto the inner walls of his nostrils. There was so much of it that for a second, all Matthew heard was the rush as it ran over him.
Then, nothing.
Afraid to breathe through his nose, Matthew sputtered, freeing what glitter he could from his lips before sucking in a shaky breath. It was a waste of time. Glitter had found its way onto every part of his body, and it hung in the air like the smell of rain after a storm. When Matthew breathed in, glitter followed, coating the inside of his mouth, his tongue, his throat, and more than likely, his lungs. He coughed and sputtered, but there was no way that he wasn’t now fabulous both inside and out.
One day, a pulmonologist was going to have a good laugh at his expense.
“Holy fucking shit-sticks,” Damien rasped from the doorway. “Matthew, don’t—”
Disoriented, Matthew spun around to try to face Damien, but put his foot down on his wet, glittery towel and ended up sliding farther into the room, hitting yet another trip wire.
And another.
And another.
A symphony oftwangs!went off in stages, some from down low, others from up high. The glitter from the doorway dump was everywhere, and it had turned the floor into a skating rink. Matthew managed to catch his balance while the room descended into chaos.
First, the ceiling fan turned on. Silver and white glitter snowed down from its blades, nowhere near as intense as the deluge from the doorway, but far more widespread. It coated Matthew’s suitcase, the furniture, and his bed. While it made a mess of everything in sight, the air conditioner kicked on, and jets of aqua-blue glitter shot out of the vents, hitting Matthew between his hip and his shoulder.
“Get down!” Damien shouted from… from somewhere. The glitter clinging to Matthew’s eyelashes redirected all sources of surrounding light into his eyes, blinding him. “Matthew,get—”
