Page 18 of Toren

Andrew didn’t know which he preferred either. He did know he would have crawled through broken glass if Toren asked him to do it.

“We can take our time to figure it out,” he suggested.

“I like that.”

Toren finished his beer, and Andrew wasn’t far behind.

“I should get home,” Toren said, and Andrew was shocked by how much he hated that idea.

“Probably,” he agreed. “Is it too forward for me to ask if I can see you next weekend? If you’ll consider staying the night?”

“Depends on if you’ll still have a boyfriend then or not.”

Andrew wasn’t sure what the right answer was. They’d talked about the cheating during sex and both of them had liked it, but Dave’s presence was a reminder of the dishonesty Andrew had held between them. And in the midst of that was a third option, one that would give him the thing he wanted most, but it was too soon to ask for that.

“I’ll talk to him before then.”

“Not quite an answer.”

Andrew shook his head. “No boyfriend.”

“Is it bad of me to say that’s a shame?”

“A little.”

“Thought so.” Toren stood up and grabbed both empty beer bottles in one hand, flicking the butt of his finished cigarette into the bottle that had the most beer left at the bottom. “But yes, I’ll consider staying the night. Maybe even both nights if you ask very nicely.”

“Do you want me to get on my knees?” Andrew was down before he finished asking the question.

Toren’s nostrils flared and he stared down with unrestrained want in his eyes.

“Would you stay the whole weekend with me?” Andrew asked, each word breathier than the last. He rocked back onto his heels, sank down and splayed his hands open on the tops of his thighs.

Toren’s chest heaved with every breath until he answered Andrew with a confident and definite, “Yes.”

CHAPTER 7

Toren

Toren woke up Monday morning with an ache in his balls and a hole in his conscience. He rolled over and buried his face into the pillow, letting loose a hoarse scream before flinging back the covers and committing to going about his day.

“It shouldn’t be hot,” he told himself on the drive to work. “Shouldn’t even be an option.”

If someone he knew got involved with a man who had a boyfriend, Toren would have told them to run for the hills. He would have passed immeasurable judgment on the other person, but he came up short as to why he refused to do the same to Andrew. There was no identifiable reason why he believed Andrew was telling the truth, either. He’d lied—or at least omitted—important information their first night together, but Toren’s fascination had gotten the better of him.

He’d always been prone to it, ever since he was a kid. He and Ev would spend hours in the backyard digging in the grass and climbing trees, always on the lookout for new insects, new animals. Toren would come up with wild ideas and experiments, and Ev would always follow along and help, even if the results were lackluster.

His brother never stopped believing in him, but after Ev died, Toren had quit believing in himself. He’d willfully let himself become a husk of the man he’d been when his brother was alive, and seeing Riggs again for the first time in so many years drove that knowledge home. Toren had woken up terribly lonely one morning, he’d missed his brother more than usual, missed Riggs, and he’d decided to drive to LA to see him. He had no idea how to bridge three years of absence, but his grief was softer and he hoped Riggs’s was also.

He had not expected to find another man in Ev’s clothing, fingers moving swiftly across Riggs’s skin the way Ev’s used to. Toren had reacted poorly, but as he always had, Riggs gave him the same patience and grace Ev had done in life. Repairing their relationship would be hard and slow work, but it would be worth it. Unfortunately, they were not at a place yet where he could call Riggs and ask for brotherly advice about the situation he’d gotten himself into with Andrew.

Instead, he did the next best thing.

He called his friend Donovan, who as he always did, answered the phone.

“It’s early,” Donovan said.

Toren stared at the stacks of paperwork on his desk, putting his phone on speaker beside a half-used notepad. “Want me to call back?”