“I have an offer for you,” he says pointedly. He scoots closer to me and I don’t move, though I know I should.
He smells so fucking good, and the way he’s looking at me right now…
“I don’t know if I can take another offer,” I say, my voice cracking. “Aaron, I don’t—”
“Hear me out. Please, Jake.” It’s the way he says my name that makes my shoulders loosen, my heart skip a beat.
“This is a check for fifty grand,” he says. My eyes fixate on the thin paper.
“I hired you to be my boyfriend, and you did your job.” He looks at me, his gaze firm. “Very well, I might add,” he says with a smirk, his gaze turning serious. “You can take this check, and I’ll walk out that door, and that will be that. You’ll never see me again.”
My heart aches at his words, and I notice the sheen in his eyes. I hear the way his voice cracks. It makes my own soul ache, my own eyes water.
The heaviness of those words weigh on me like a world all on its own.
“Or…” I breathe, watching his lip quiver, my voice betraying me with hope I know I don’t deserve. “Or… I can rip this fucking check up right now, because you are worth so much more than this.” I watch as one stray tear slides down his cheek. “Garrett was right about one thing,” he says. “You, Jake, are priceless.”
“Aaron—” I shift my position, falling closer to him and a moment later I feel his hand on my throat, his fingers brushing over my skin with a reverence that is both relieving and a bit terrifying. Because the way he touches me.. It’s like he thinks I’m delicate. And maybe I am, when it comes to him. Because I feel weightless in his grasp, under the heat of his gaze as he shifts closer. Close enough our knees brush one another.
“Tell me it wasn’t real,” he whispers. “Tell me that it was all a lie, and I’ll leave you with what I promised you and one hell of a fucking Yelp review.”
I laugh as the tears come like rain.
“Just… tell me the truth. Please. Tell me I’m not fucking crazy.”
I look up at him with my watery eyes, noting the tears in his own.
“It wasn’t a lie,” I whisper. I reach my hand out and settle it on his neck, pulling him closer. Every ounce of my preservation tells me to fight this. That this is no different than before.
But as I look up at him, at his tearful gaze, I know it’s real. Thatthis—whatever exists between us… it’s real.
Despite the fact we couldn’t be more different, despite the fact that it doesn’t make sense.
When I’m with Aaron, everything makes perfect sense.
“God, I hoped you’d say that,” he whispers, ghosting his lips over mine. I pull him into my space, unable to fight his words, his scent, his sweaty palm on my skin. I kiss him because I can’t stand not to.
I need to feel his truth in every way possible. Aaron leans into me, kissing me adamant fervor, his tongue caressing mine as I melt like ice over a fire. I must bump the remote, because the movie starts playing again, but it’s white noise.
“I love you, Jacob Riley,” he says, gazing down at me with warm amber eyes full of so my truth it’s hard to refute.
He holds the check out to me. “I should have chosen you last night, but I was too caught up in losing you. Losing what we had.” He sucks in a breath.
“And I didn’t realize until I lost everything I thought I wanted, that what I really wanted more than anything… wasyou.” He slides his hands in the back of his left pocket, procuring a small bag of candy.
Gummy sharks. I cry like an idiot as he holds them out to me.
I grab them, staring at them like they are literal diamonds. Because to me, they are.
To me, this bag of candy means more than any check he could have written. Because it’s not about the money. It’s never been about the money with Aaron. Maybe it was at first before I knew him. Really knew him.
Before he found his way into my heart.
But once I got to know the soul of Aaron Everett, I soon realized he was so much more than what he pretended to be, for himself just as much s other people. I saw him, and he sawme.And it didn’t matter where he came from. All that mattered was that somehow we’d found each other.
“Once upon a time, I asked you to be my Prince Charming, and you said yes,” he says, his voice shaky. “Now I’m just asking you…” he says, and I can see the vulnerability in his gaze. “To let me beyourleading man. Let me be your Prince Charming.” He swallows harshly. “So… what do you say, Jake? Do you want a contemporary gay romance with me?” He smirks.
I don’t hesitate as I grab the check out of his hand and throw it over the couch. I have no clue where it lands, nor do I care. I grab his neck, my fingers brushing the edge of his jaw as I bring him to my lips, my words spilling out of my mouth as I kiss him with shaking lips.
