Oh, God.
“Uh. Not at all. It’s been good to have him around.”
“Tell us what a typical day’s like,” Tom said, still casual, like he wasn’t trying to pull at a loose thread. But Trevor knew his dad, and he couldn’t be convinced that hewasn’t.
“Up early,” Trevor said.
“Yeah,” Lane agreed. Their eyes met. Trevor frantically trying not to think of how amazing it felt to wake up next to him, now, not down the hall like he’d done for the first five months. “And Trevor makes breakfast now.”
“Because Lane’s awful at it,” Trevor said, trying to get into the rhythm. “Tried to pretend for the first few months that he could cook, that heshouldcook.”
Delia laughed. “And you let him?”
“I didn’t want to overstep,” Trevor confessed. Which was the truth.
“Yeah, he ate all my dry unseasoned chicken and my undercooked rice and my limp vegetables. Not a single complaint. Til one day he just pulled a pork tenderloin—”
“That you were about toruin,” Trevor interrupted.
“That I was about to ruin,” Lane agreed with a dry chuckle. “Took it right out of my hands. Came home the next day to half a dozen boxes of kitchen equipment and a whole-ass grocery delivery.”
“You had one pan.One,” Trevor retorted fondly. Probably too fondly. He should take it back, but how could he, now that it was out there? Better to just own it now.
Delia and Tom were smiling now, clearly pleased at how well they were getting along, so maybe it was okay. Maybe they’d interpret this all the way their teammates did. Instead of overlaying thedemon twinslabel on, they’d just stickbrotherson them and call it good.
“It’s a wonder I survived before,” Lane said, but he didn’t sound sarcastic, he sounded so pleased, like a whole world hadopened up when Trevor had refused to let him ruin that pork tenderloin. But probably, Trevor realized, it was more than that.
It was when Trevor had leaned over his puzzle table and said,I think I might be into guysand the next day when Lane had suggested that if Trevor was going to experiment, he should be experimenting with him.
“It is,” Trevor agreed, his turn to be smug about it.
Under the table, Lane squeezed his leg, and Trevor didn’t think he could look away from the emotion in Lane’s eyes, particularly green in this light and actuallysparkling, even if he should. Even if their parents were absolutely watching.
Tom cleared his throat and Trevor dragged his gaze back to his dad. “Sounds like it’s going pretty well, all things considered,” he said thoughtfully.
“Right,” Delia agreed. “We weren’t sure . . .”
She trailed off, like she didn’t want to actually say it out loud—that both she and Tom had hoped and wished that they’d be friends, at least, but they’d never had the chance.
Or,Trevor wanted to add,the balls.
Becausehe’dwanted it, for sure, he just hadn’t understood why, not until he’d gotten to Toronto.
Not until he’d gotten close to Lane and begun to see under his exterior.
“Well, it’s not always been perfect,” Trevor said, because he wasn’t about to sayanyof that. Not yet. “If you want an example, the team calls us the demon twins.”
“No!” she gasped and looked over at Tom, who just looked amused. And a little bit knowing. Like he’d already guessed why.
“Yeah,” Lane said, chuckling. “But we’re getting there, right?” He looked over at Trevor again, and goddamn it, Trevor’s good intentions were fucking useless in the face of wanting to look back.
“We’re getting there,” Trevor agreed. They were, in every single way that counted. Awkward dinner, where he was approximately five seconds away from confessing everything to his parents, notwithstanding.
Trevor just couldn’t come away from this conversation and the way Lane’s hand was so casually possessive around his knee, and then an inch and then two, upwards, around his thigh, and the way he leaned into Trevor, and think that he’d never want to tell Delia and Tom.
He would. He just needed time, and time was something Trevorcouldgive him, even if it was kind of killing him.
“Well, we’re both very impressed,” Delia said seriously.
