Chapter Three
Blake leaned back in his swivel chair, stretching his arms out behind him and yawning widely. He was ready to go home, drink one and a half beers, and fall asleep in front of the TV with a quarter of a box of leftover Chinese food in his lap.
Like he did most Saturday nights.
The calendar by his desk caught his eye as he settled back down, cracking his wrists and preparing himself to finish the last few things on his slate for the day.
The fourteenth was still circled in red.
Blake sighed. Everyone who’d been into his office had given him crap about circling Valentine’s Day on his calendar, and he’d had to explain to all of them that no, he didn’t have a mystery man to take him out on an Earth-shattering date that night.
It just happened to be his sister’s wedding.
Cliché didn’t even begin to cover it, and it wasn’t exactly something Blake was looking forward to. Going home meant being reminded that he hadn’t changed since he left. His life hadn’t improved. He hadn’t found meaning, he hadn’t had his non-existent art career take off, he didn’t even have anyone who was willing to go as his date.
He was the same Blake who’d left years ago because he couldn’t stand the fact that his life wasn’t going anywhere.
And it still hadn’t.
A knock on the door startled Blake out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see Ellie—the latest intern—poking her head through the door.
“There’s a really attractive man here to see you,” she said. “He said his name is Russel Ellison, and that he knows you.”
Blake blinked at her, unsure how to respond to that. The name wasn’t immediately familiar, but Blake wasn’t amazing with names. Maybe it was someone he’d met at some kind of networking… thing, or something.
If he was attractive, at least he’d bring a little joy to Blake’s otherwise boring day.
“Send him in for me,” Blake said. “But you’re not my secretary,” he added.
“You don’t have a secretary,” Ellie pointed out. “I don’t mind talking to your hot clients.”
Blake chuckled at that. This guy wasn’t a client, not as far as he was aware, but at least this would give him an excuse to stop staring at his computer screen for a few minutes.
Instead, Blake watched as a man wearing dark, fitted jeans walked through the door, his eyes lingering for a split second too long before he started moving them upward, taking in the plain white t-shirt lazily tucked into the waistband, the narrow waist framed by a leather jacket…
A familiar leather jacket.
Blake’s gaze shot up to the other man’s face, his heart pounding as he recognized him.
Rusty had barely aged a day.
Blake had never expected to see him again.
“What the hell,” Blake began. “Are you doing here?”
It wasn’t that he wasn’t happy to see Rusty. It was just that it seemed so far out of the realm of possibility that he’d never considered it before. It was like meeting a unicorn.
A really hot unicorn who was still in Blake’s regular fantasy rotation, but… that was beside the point.
“Is that any way to greet your beloved husband?” Rusty asked, closing the door behind him and approaching Blake’s desk.
Blake closed his mouth with a click.Beloved husband. Those… weren’t the words he would have used to describe Rusty.
Before he could object, Rusty handed over bundle of fabric, beaming like he’d just given Blake the greatest gift imaginable.
It took Blake a few moments to realize that it was the sweater he’d loaned Rusty all those years ago. The one he hadn’t gotten back.
Rusty had been wearing it at their wedding. Something borrowed, he’d joked.
