1
Ryder
Seth:you’re looking for a big cock
Ryder:hasn’t that gotten me in enough trouble lately?
At least Iwas at a point where I could joke about it. Sure, the entire internet had seen my dick, almost every friend I’d thought I had was busy distancing themselves from me, but at least I could laugh.
Sort of.
The lump in my throat was probably just because I hadn’t slept since this time yesterday and the last forty-eight hours were a blur.
Otter Bay was one part exactly as I remembered it—Main Street lined with dusty storefronts and sleepy locals—and one part foreign country, with new faces, updated signs, and at least twice as many cafés as there were ten years ago.
I’d never planned to come back here. I’d never even thought about it before this week.
But that was what people did when the going got tough, wasn’t it? They ran home.
Seth’s big cock—a giant rooster perched on top of one of the new cafés—caught my attention as soon as I looked up from my phone again, and I sped up to get there, eager to see one friendly face that I knew belonged to someone who was still on my side.
As soon as I pushed the door to the café open, the smell of frying bacon reminded me that I couldn’t remember the last time I’d eaten. Mouth watering, I scanned the room looking for—
Shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
I’d expected Seth to be here, but the man sitting next to him…
It wasn’t that I’d forgotten about him. How could I possibly forget?
Nobody ever forgot their first best friend, their first crush, or their big gay awakening, and he’d been all three for me.
It was just that I hadn’t expected to see him there, large as life, his hair grown out and tied up in a cute little bun, old t-shirt straining across his broad chest.
He looked like something out of my most embarrassing wet dreams.
Ward.
“Ward,” I blurted out, blinking at him as I took in the whole package.
He’d been tall last time I saw him, in an awkward teenage way, but now he’d… well, saying he’dfilled outseemed like an understatement. I couldn’t have gotten both hands around his bicep.
Okay, that was maybe an exaggeration, but it would’ve been close.
In his plaid shirt—straining at the shoulder seams—with just enough beard hair for it to be soft and those big puppy dog eyes I’d fallen for a thousand times, he was…
My big, shy, awkward best friend washot.
This was the last thing I needed. As if I didn’t have enough problems right now.
“Ryder,” Ward said, standing up from the table and holding his arms out for a hug.
I couldn’t say no, could I? I hadn’t seen the guy in almost ten years.
Besides, I needed a hug.
As soon as Ward folded me into his huge, strong arms and held me against his equally huge, strong chest, everything I was worried about vanished. He smelled of cedar and coffee and wood shavings, like something out ofSexy Lumberjacks Quarterly, and my fucking knees almost gave out on me.
