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“Thanks for the clarification.”

“He’s popular enough in a certain lane. Rough around the edges. Big. Broody. Calls himself HotnReddy, which infuriated me because of the spelling.” He leans in. “R-E-D-D-Y. Our education system is failing us.”

HotnReddy. R-E-D-D-Y.

“Maybe it’s clever.”

“Maybe it’s Maybelline. Who cares. He’s a gay-baiter.”

My eyes snap to him. “A what?”

Don sighs. “You are so sheltered. He dangles that big straight-boy body in front of gay men and makes rent off the drool.”

“That’s vulgar.”

“But accurate.”

“You don’t know him.”

“More than you, apparently.”

I look over the pool again.

Clint’s laugh from yesterday moves through my memory. Then his body coming close, the faint scent of his deodorant with his chest at eye level.

I shake my head. “He’s Renny’s son.”

“He’s also a man who knows how to manipulate other men.” Don slides closer. “Paul, we approached this wrong.”

“We?”

“We thought we could overwhelm him with Renny’s world,” Don says, low like we have something to hide. “But Clint walked into it, clocked the rules, and adapted with a quickness.”

“I invited him because it was right,” I say.

“You invited him because it was right and because it was good tactics.”

“I don’t like that.”

“Then don’t do tactical things.”

I glare at him.

“The kindness was real,” I say. “He deserved to be here.”

Don’s expression softens. “I know.”

I hesitate, then say it: “The manipulation was also real.”

“I know that too.”

I tie the trash bag closed with unnecessary precision. My fingers work the plastic into a knot so tight it may never be opened by human hands.

“I think Renny would have liked him,” I say.

The shift surprises Don. It surprises me more.

“Yeah. I think so too.”