“You’re right. It was.” God damnit. Why is his voice so sexy?
“And I think you need to admit that you’re afraid of getting hurt too. Using the way Vaughn puts himself out there as a shield for your own emotions is not okay. Yes, I want to protect Vaughn’s heart, but it’s strange for you to act like you don’t have one when Corrine clearly broke it.” Okay, maybe that was too far. I bite my lips and listen to beat after beat of silence on the other end of the line. It stretches on so long I double check the display just to make sure he hasn’t ended the call. “Are you still there?”
“Yeah. I’m just swallowing my pride or some shit.”
“Or some shit. I refuse to believe that Vaughn doesn’t call you out when you’re acting like this, ’cause I know he does.”
“He does. Look, you’re right. I am protective of Vaughn, but I was guarding my heart too. It’s why—” he cuts himself off. There’s something he’s afraid to admit.
“Shaw tell me,” I say gently.
“It’s why I wasn’t in bed when you got up.” He’s quiet, but this time I don’t push. His tone is different when he speaks again. Sadder. “Things with Vaughn and I have been kinda fucked up lately and I thought—not that you would fix things, but he wants our shit to be poly. He needs more partners and I didn’t realize I wasn’t ready to spend the night with someone new between us.”
“Oh. Well, why didn’t you just say so? Shaw, I can leave you two alone and we can just be friends. Or I can be friends with Vaughn and continue ignoring you or whatever.”
That makes him laugh. His laugh makes me smile, but only a little. I’m still kinda pissed.
“I’m not trying to be in the way of you or Vaughn figure things out.” I go on. “We tried a thing, just to try it. It clearly didn’t work for you. You try to turn it around on me and now I’m upset and Vaughn’s upset. I’m sure Roger wasn’t too happy about it either.”
“He gave me a lot of shit after you left.”
“I bet he did,” I laugh a little, trying to cover up the way my voice is starting to quiver. I know we can’t keep this going, but Shaw's reaction to and rejection of me still hurts. “I won’t say no hard feelings, but I get it. We can just, ya know, not all sleep together again.”
“That’s not what I want.”
“Oh?”
“I want to see you again. I want to be with you again,” he says.
I wasn’t expecting him to say that at all, but it does change things, ’cause I would absolutely be lying if I said I wanted to quit Vaughn or Shaw cold turkey. I know we can’t skip off into the sunset together and I’ll walk away from them if it’s what they want, but it’s not what I want. I don’t want it to be done even though I know this can’t last forever. Still, Shaw threw down a lot of rules when we were in his sex room of pain and pleasure, and if this is gonna happen, we’re gonna do things on my terms.
“I want to see you without Vaughn,” I reply.
“Okay.”
I know how it sounds, but I’ve made up my mind about Vaughn. If it were just the two of us, I’d be having serious conversations to see how he feels about finding a firm in Manhattan. He’s sweet and thoughtful and goofy. He’s kind to animals, even when they eat his breakfast, and I know Liz would love him. Hell, so would Silas. I can just picture Vaughn asking him all kinds of questions about the farm and giving Silas the space he needs when he’s had enough people time. Vaughn fits my life perfectly. Who I’m not too sure about is his asshole boyfriend.
“The three of us hanging together is a possibility, but you need to give me room to walk away from this, ’cause I don’t know yet. You’re not giving me time to figure it out.”
“That’s fair.”
“I know it is. Jesus, you drive me nuts.”
“Come up this weekend.”
“Um no. I’m going to see my sister tomorrow. Why don’t you come down here the following Friday and we can talk. If we make up, you can sleep on my couch.”
“That’s ten days from now.”
“So? I want to see my sister and her kids. Is that okay with you, sir?”
“Yeah, fine.”
“Good boy.”
“You’re gonna pay for that,” he growls, his voice straining.
“If I let you. Now, I have people over, so I have to go. Go jerk off to the fact that you could be fucking me this weekend if you’d just been nicer and we’d made plans sooner.”
