Kessian seemed to understand. He smiled. It was a secretive thing, dimpled on the right and not the left. He tipped his glass against my own after the barman handed them to us. “Charmer. Cheers.”
I asked about his work. He told me he’d been with the Shearwater Spa for a few years. That explained his presence at the wake; I wondered how well he’d known Grandad. When he asked about my own work, I got carried away describing the newest mug I’d made, how I’d been experimenting with glazes and got one that reminded me of the aurora, how I’d enchanted it to keep your drink at the perfect temperature.
“And now I’m trying to design a teapot to do the same thing, but I’m not so sure about the proportions yet, and—” Mid-sentence, I stopped short. I’d been rambling. Something I was unfortunately prone to, and which I’d learned most people found obnoxious, boring, or both. “And none of this is probably very interesting.”
Kessian had been leaning on the bar, sucking on the orange slice that garnished his gin and tonic. He said, “Incorrect. The sexiest thing a man can do is yap passionately about his eclectic, hyper-specific interests. Join me outside for a smoke?”
My blissful little bubble popped. I’d really wanted to kiss Kessian just now, but the smell of smoke would invariably put me off. Certain sensory experiences always did. “I don’t smoke.”
“Join me anyway?” Kessian said.
Good company was still good company. I’d sate my loneliness where I could. We might just have to forgo kissing …
I slid off my stool, and he gave the crowd of mourners a once-over before sneaking out the back door.
It was too cold to use the patio and gardens, so none of the furniture had been set out, and nobody else was there.
Instead of reaching into his pocket for a pack of smokes, Kessian grabbed me by my belt loops, dragged me out of sight of the pub windows, and kissed me.
Chapter 3
He didn’t taste like cigarettes; he tasted like oranges.
It took a moment for my mind to catch up, but my body needed no such reflection period. I pressed him against the wall and kissed him back.
He had a practiced mouth, a talent for applying just the right pressure to make mine open. He tilted my jaw and made sparks shoot down my spine with the stroke of his tongue over my lower lip.
He broke away too soon and said, “I don’t smoke either. I just wanted to kiss you.”
“I gathered.” My voice sounded rougher than usual. It was my grandfather’s wake, and perhaps it was disrespectful to get off with a stranger when I ought to be mourning him.
But I felt as though I’d already mourned everybody here; nine years of estrangement will do that to a person. Instead, I found myself mourning an unrealized future. A series ofwhat-if’sthat would never come to pass.
I was never around long enough for anyone to stick, and given what I was running from, that was probably for the best, but loneliness, for all its familiarity, had never gotten easier.
Kessian pulled back, his breath a butterfly’s kiss against my lips. I drank in his sea-blue eyes and a mouth shaped perfectly for wrapping around—
Hell. I really needed to get laid more often.
I couldn’t recall if it had been two months or three since I’d last been to bed with anyone. If flesh had memory, mine often forgot the warmth of a body lying next to mine. Once upon a time, I’d lived in a big house with many people who hugged me goodnight, patted me on the back for passing exams, punched my arm when I said something insensitive. Incidental, platonic touches that let me know I was not alone.
Now I was an unfortunate contradiction who at once hated touch and craved it. More precisely, I craved connection, no matter how brief, if only to indulge the fantasy of being loved again. Given the abrasive first impressions I gave off, opportunities for those connections were rare.
I kissed him again. He invited me, with a subtle tilt of his head and arch of his back, to press him against the wall. His breath drew short when I did, a little gasp of satisfaction when he felt my cock stiffening against his stomach.
I shouldn’t risk sleeping with anyone this close to home, even if home was like a stranger wearing a family member’s old clothes. But I wouldn’t be staying long. In the morning, I’d be gone.
Kessian drew back. “Want to blow this popsicle stand?”
My frankness didn’t always serve me well, but it did now. “I’d rather blow you.”
“Ohoho,lovethat, but, er. You should know— Not possible in thetraditionalsense of the word.”
“Why?”
“I’m transgender.”
Kessian had taken a humorless day and made me laugh. Plus, he looked like a man who liked having his hair pulled.
