I had to admit, he looked more engaged than he had earlier this morning, but I doubted it would last, especially when his phone continued to vibrate off and on for several minutes.
Then my phone rang.
“Don’t answer that,” Shaw ordered before I could even reach for the phone.
I reached for it anyway.
“Nash,” Shaw said in warning. Since I wasn’t about to ditchprotocol, not to mention fuck with a guy who could likely rearrange my internal organs with one punch, I ignored him.
“Nash,” Shaw repeated, but this time his voice was different. Gone was the no-nonsense tone. I looked up at him and felt something go through me at the way he was looking at me.
He’d looked at me in a lot of different ways over the past week since I’d first arrived at his home, but he’d never looked at me like he was now.
“Please,” Shaw murmured softly, and I could tell it killed him to do it.
A shiver of awareness seeped into every nerve ending as I held the man’s gaze. His bright blue eyes were alight with some emotion I couldn’t quite name. I held my phone hard enough to potentially break the damn thing.
Follow fucking protocol, Nash. This man is not your friend!
“I have to at least check who it is,” I finally said.
Shaw sent me a nod. I quickly flipped the phone over and saw that it was an unknown caller. The need to answer it was great, but for some reason, the need to see the life stay in Shaw’s eyes for a while longer was greater.
Jesus, Nash, get a fucking grip.
I put the phone away and tried not to enjoy the spark of warmth that went through me when a small smile graced Shaw’s lips.
My phone rang a couple more times over the following few minutes, and I did as Shaw asked and ignored the calls. I only half-listened as Nathan and Shaw began talking, but it took everything in me to keep my eyes on the security monitors in front of me when Nathan flat-out admitted to Shaw he was gay.
“Bet that felt good,” Shaw said.
Nathan let out a little laugh and said, “You have no idea.”
“Yeah, Nathan, I do,” Everett murmured.
I couldn’t stop myself from looking over at Shaw as his quiet words sank in.
No way.
No FUCKING way.
Heat flooded my entire system as Nathan expressed the disbelief I was feeling. I managed to catch Shaw saying something about his son not speaking to him when Nathan pointed out he’d been married, but I couldn’t really process what exactly that meant.
Everett Shaw, former president of the United States, is gay.
Everett Shaw is gay.
Shaw is gay.
Holy fuck.
“I knew something was wrong when I married Elanor, but I didn’t know what it was. I was in denial for a really long time…”
That was as much as I could bear to hear. Not only were his words hitting just a little too close to home, I felt like I was violating the man’s privacy by being there. Yes, he knew I’d overhear him, but still, it wasn’t right.
I quietly turned and hurried down the hall and out the front door. I began sucking in big gulps of air.
Everett Shaw is gay.
