by Beth Bolden
“Oh, yeah, that,” Sean said weakly. “Um, yeah, we did. But no, I am definitely not thinking about him. No way. It’s just . . . a sex thing. That’s it.”
“That’s it?” Tate repeated with disbelief.
Okay, so Sean was a terrible liar. If he hadn’t been so convinced he couldn’t possibly have any feelings—he’d know, because he’d been deeply in love before and it would be impossible for him to mistake it for lust—he wouldn’t have even convinced himself.
“It’s just a sex thing,” he said. “No big deal, right?”
The look Tate shot his direction made it clear that it was very much a big deal, but that was why Sean hadn’t gone around sharing any details of what they’d done. It was nobody’s business but their own.
Especially since it wasn’t going anywhere.
“Right,” Tate said, clearly not convinced.
Sean decided it was time to change the subject. “Have you ever met any of Gabriel’s family?” he asked. Okay, so it was technically not a change of subject, but Sean was really curious after their conversation the other day.
“Only a few of them,” Tate said, “There’s like a million of them. Did Gabe tell you he’s the middle child? Like literal middle child? Of seven kids?”
No, he had not. Sean told himself again that he had no right to feel disappointed.
“Wow,” Sean said. No wonder Gabriel had left the family restaurant business to branch out.
“I met Luca once—he’s the oldest,” Tate said. “He comes down once a year, to make sure Gabe isn’t fucking up or something.” Tate rolled his eyes. “He’s a little ridiculous. Imagine Gabriel times about a hundred. And talk about anal retentive. Geez.”
“I bet Gabriel can’t stand it,” Sean said. Not surprised that he’d never met Luca; back then, he’d have wanted to keep Sean away from any vulnerable spots.
But things between them had changed. Maybe they would never see eye to eye about who should change their name, but they weren’t constantly at each other’s throats any more.
“Oh, he does,” Tate said. “And last year, he brought Dario, who I think is a year younger than Gabriel.”
“What’s he like? Are he and Gabriel friends?”
“Well, anything looks good compared to Luca,” Tate said. “But yeah, they seemed to be.” He hesitated. “You sure seem interested in Gabriel, considering all you have is a sex thing.”
Tate was not wrong. He rarely was.
“Oh, well, just gathering info, you know. I’ve got to convince Gabriel to change his name, and well, why not go back to the original? That’s the family restaurant name, right?”
Even as he said it, Sean knew Gabriel wouldn’t want to go back to that. He’d changed it for a reason and he’d already told Sean that he didn’t feel like he could take any credit for anything he did. Changing the name would only make that worse.
“Yeah,” Tate said. “But I wouldn’t hold my breath.”
“I’m not,” Sean reassured him. “Just exploring some options.”
Tate did not look totally convinced. “You could both change it, you know, and that would be a solution where neither of you feels like you lost,” he suggested. “Maybe you could even be friends afterwards.”
Tate was sweet; he really did mean well. But he didn’t have all the facts. He didn’t know about Milo. He didn’t know that Sean was never going to give in.
Gabriel would just have to figure out a way to reconcile himself to a new name, or the old one.
“Speak of the devil,” Tate said, gathering together his trash and standing to dump it into the bin a few feet away. “Looks like Gabe’s coming over this way.”
Sean squinted against the bright sun, wishing he’d brought his sunglasses, but Tate was right, Gabriel was on his way over, a determined expression on his handsome face.
“I’ll let you two . . . well”—Tate paused—“do whatever it is you two do together.”
Sean opened his mouth to argue, but snapped it shut again. “See you later,” he finally said. They’d been stupid enough to be all over each other at the party; it was inevitable they were going to get some shit for hooking up.
Maybe they should just own it.
Gabriel wandered over, all casual, like he hadn’t been clearly walking this direction for the last sixty seconds.
“Hey,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” Sean said.
Gabriel shifted his weight from one foot to the other. “Busy day,” he said. “You finally get a break?”
It was almost three now. Gabe was right, it had been a crazy day, if he was only just eating lunch mid-afternoon.
“Yeah,” Sean said. “Lunch was busy for you guys, too?”
Gabriel nodded. “Super busy.”
You should just ask him now. It’d be so easy. Just say: hey, do you want to come over after work and fuck me?
They should be easy to say. He knew Gabriel wanted him. They’d already had a really good time together once. They’d clearly left it open-ended—like it could happen again.
Who was he kidding? They both desperately wanted it to happen again. That was why Gabriel was over here, eying him like there was something he wanted to say—needed to say—but couldn’t quite spit it out. And Sean? Well, he was just as pathetic. If Gabriel hadn’t come over, he’d have gone over to Gabe’s truck after his break and done just about the same goddamn thing.
“Are you busy later?” Gabriel finally asked.
“Like this afternoon?” Sean wondered.
“No,” Gabriel said, and he shoved his hands into his pockets. “Like way later. Like after we close, later.”
“Oh.” Duh. “Well, yeah, I’m free.” Gabriel had come part of the way, Sean reasoned, he could at least go the rest. “Did you want to come over again?”
“Yeah, I would,” Gabriel said, a sudden smile breaking across his face. “That would be great.”
Sean found himself smiling right back, so wide his face literally hurt. “Yeah, it really would.”
“Alright. So . . . meet you after close?” Gabriel said hopefully.
“Yeah, sounds good,” Sean said, rising and throwing away his mostly uneaten salad. He hated to waste food, but between the midday heat and the sudden excitement pumping through his veins, he wasn’t hungry at all.
Well, that wasn’t quite true, Sean thought as he and Gabriel just stared at each other. Like neither of them knew quite what to say. He was hungry. Just not for food.
“Alright, I should get back to the truck; give Ren a break,” Gabriel said, but didn’t move.
“Yeah,” Sean said. Not moving either. “I should re-open.”
The air between them was practically crackling with the tension—it was somewhat similar to how they’d always been, Sean realized, but different now too. Because he knew how Gabriel tasted and he smelled and the noises he made when he came.
Everything between them, which had always felt so impersonal before, felt intensely personal now.
Gabriel knew about Milo. He’d told Sean about his family and a little about his insecurities.
Nothing, Sean realized, was going to be the same after that.
And suddenly, he really did not know what they were going to do about the name. He couldn’t change it, but knowing what he did now, about Gabriel and his family, could he legitimately ask him, even as a friend, to change it back?
He didn’t know.
Maybe Tate had the right idea after all, and they should both change it.
But that tiny sore spot inside of Sean, the one that still occasionally thought that Milo might pop his head through the door and shoot Sean that big smile of his, the one that he continued to remember and to grieve, it rebelled. He couldn’t give in; if he did, what kind of a person would that make him?
“Maybe you could make me one of those quesadillas again,” Gabriel said hopefully.
“I’d love to,” Sean said, and discovered he meant it.
W
asn’t that weird? He could have sex with Gabriel and make him a quesadilla and it was fine, but the thought of changing the food truck’s name made him panic.
“Good.” Gabriel still hadn’t walked away.
Sean really needed to re-open his truck, though if he was a few minutes late, who would know? Maybe he could sneak Gabriel back there for a quick make-out session. Just something to ease the tension a bit.
But would it? He didn’t really think it would. Kissing Gabe would only make him want him more.
“I . . .” Sean hesitated. “I guess I’ll see you later?”
“Yeah,” Gabriel said.
There was finally nothing left to do but to turn and walk back to his truck. And Sean was left feeling the whole time that he’d just left something behind. He just couldn’t figure out what it was.
———
The afternoon and evening both crawled and sped by, all at the same time. It was just as busy for the dinner rush as lunch had been, and even though Sean was busy, taking orders, assembling wraps, and feeding hungry people, he found for the first time in a long time that he couldn’t lose himself in his work.
Instead, he was thinking about what was going to happen when he flipped his sign from Open to Closed and he met up with Gabriel.
What would they do?
The thoughts kept racing through Sean’s head, until he was overwhelmed by the possibilities.
Would he let Gabriel take control again and let him make the decisions about how things would unfold the moment they walked into his house?
Or would Sean put his foot down and demand the thing he’d wanted last time? The idea of being fucked again, of Gabe doing the fucking? It made his fingertips tremble as he rolled up a wrap. It had been something he’d wanted before they’d ever touched each other, but now that he knew what Gabriel sounded like when he was just about to lose control, the thought was inevitable.
How would he sound when he was deep inside Sean?
“You look distracted,” Ren said when he came by to grab a late dinner.
“I’m not distracted,” Sean lied. “Not even remotely.”
“Okay, good, well, you should know that Gabriel’s barely been able to put one foot in front of the other the last three days. So please go fuck him so he’s useful to me again.”
Sean couldn’t stop his cheeks from flaming bright red. “Oh, uh, I don’t . . .”
Ren held up a hand, shooting Sean a wry smile. “It’s alright. I know what’s going on. It’s not hard to read, when you know what you’re looking for. And you’ve got flashing neon lights.”
Sean hoped it was flashing neon lights that advertised that he was only here for sex. The last thing he wanted was to give Gabriel the idea that he could feel something. That was why he’d been so clear upfront.
“We were hardly hiding it the other night,” Sean said slowly. Tried to steady his still-trembling fingers as he finished folding Ren’s chicken caesar salad wrap.
In the last two years, he’d done this approximately a million times, but his hands felt clumsy and unsure as he wrapped it up in paper and sliced neatly through the center with one of his sharp knives.
“No, but now you’re all shy,” Ren said and Sean instantly felt his hackles rise. He wasn’t shy. He was . . . well, it was a big thing to have sex again. It was an even bigger thing to have regular sex again. Especially with someone that, before the last week, he hadn’t been sure he even liked.
“If you really want to know, we’re meeting up tonight,” Sean said, determined not to be shy. Especially determined that Ren wouldn’t find him shy and awkward. Because Ren was clearly the expert on hookups, and if he was speaking with so much disdain about shyness, then that was something Sean needed to overcome. He’d done it the other night, hadn’t he?
“I’m glad to hear it,” Ren said with a wink. “Maybe Gabe’ll be less of a bear.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” Sean promised, sliding Ren’s wrap through the window.
Ren took it but didn’t leave. Dusk had fallen, and the lot had emptied out, only a few stragglers behind. He could probably theoretically close now, which might even be something Gabriel was considering too, especially if Ren was eating his late dinner.
“You know,” Ren said slowly, “Gabriel isn’t really like me. We might look a little bit alike, but we’re not really similar underneath.”
“Oh, you’re much hotter than Gabe,” Sean said, which was another lie. A lie he hoped, desperately, would not make it back to the man in question.
Ren smiled softly. “I’m just saying we’re not very similar. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten hurt in my entire life—not from a hookup. It’s neat and easy, and there’s a lot to be said for that. But Gabe? He likes it messy.”
“Messy?” Sean wasn’t sure what Ren was getting at exactly.
“Yeah. Just . . . remember that, okay?”
“Alright.” Sean frowned as he watched Ren walk off.
He puzzled through Ren’s words all through his cleanup, but he still wasn’t quite sure what he’d meant. Was Ren trying to warn him away from Gabe? Warn him that he could get hurt? Tell him that he shouldn’t get involved? Sean thought that if that was the case, then Ren wouldn’t have encouraged them in the first place.
And he most definitely had.
When he met up with Gabe half an hour later, he still wasn’t sure what Ren had meant, but the moment he saw Gabriel, all the doubts and all his confusion just melted away. This was why he’d wanted Gabriel; no matter what Ren claimed about his cousin liking things messy, this was as easy and as natural as breathing.
“Hey,” Gabriel said, breaking into a huge grin when he saw Sean approaching where he was sitting on one of the picnic tabletops, flicking through something on his phone.
“Hey,” Sean said. “Sorry if you were waiting.”
“Not for long,” Gabriel said, jumping down. Without even discussing it, they headed out of the lot the same way they had the other night. Towards Sean’s townhouse. “Ren was insufferable today, so I let him take most of the cleanup.”
“You should be nicer to him, you know,” Sean chided him, thinking of how earlier, Ren had possibly tried to protect Gabriel.
“Why?” Gabriel asked. “He’s a pain in my ass.”
“He means well,” Sean said. Though he wasn’t sure that was quite true. On the surface, Ren was a very straightforward person, but now that he thought about it, there were almost certainly mysterious depths to him.
“He fucking does not,” Gabriel said with a chuckle. “He practically started a fist fight in line today, during lunch.”
“Seriously?”
“His flirting is lethal. You know that,” Gabriel added, the edge of his voice going a little darker. “Anyway, I told him to cut that shit out. I don’t need two people throwing down for the chance at his fucking phone number.”
“Do you think he’ll ever settle down?” Sean wondered. Thinking he wasn’t just asking about Ren, who’d made free and easy his trademark, but himself, too. Would he be happy like this, just hooking up, with no strings, forever? Would he ever find what he’d shared with Milo again?
For a very long time, he’d been sure that was impossible. Milo had been one of a kind, and there was no way he could ever fall for someone that easily ever again.
“Naw,” Gabriel said. “He’s a free spirit. I think he actually likes the hookup thing. Free and easy, you know?”
Sean knew, because Ren had just told him, and he’d also just told him that Gabriel didn’t like things free and easy. He liked it messy. And Sean didn’t think that Ren was talking about getting down and dirty during sex.
Maybe Sean liked it a little messy too; if he didn’t, he wouldn’t have picked Gabe to be his hookup. Of course, he hadn’t really deliberately picked Gabriel; if he thought about it, it was his cock that had done all the picking.
“Yeah, I can see that,” Sean said.
They were quiet on the last block before Se
an’s townhouse.
He was wondering the whole time, with every step closer they took, if Gabriel would be on him the second the door closed, if it would be like last time or if it would be different. If Gabriel would change it up.
He did.
Sean unlocked the door, and even though he felt the warmth of the man beside him, hovering close, he didn’t touch him. Didn’t even touch him when they were inside. Just stood there, looking at Sean like he was some kind of mystery he wanted to unravel.
He’d been so relieved that last time things hadn’t been awkward. That Gabriel had just seamlessly taken over, and made him feel good, and hadn’t let him think too much or too hard about it.
But now, he couldn’t stop thinking.
“I wasn’t sure we were going to do this again,” was what Gabriel finally said, and Sean wanted, despite that he knew better, to scream at him.
“Why?” he asked, instead. Because if he did scream, then this definitely wouldn’t be happening again.
“I don’t know.” Gabriel shifted his weight again, looking just as uneasy as he had earlier today. “You didn’t say you wanted me again.”
Sean rolled his eyes. Was that what this was really about? That he hadn’t, the very next day, gone up to Gabriel, and confessed how life-changing the sex had been? The man was smart, but he could be pretty damn stupid, too.
“Get over here,” Sean said gruffly, and Gabriel came, melting into him like it was just the invitation he’d been waiting for.
Sean’s fingers tangled in his hair, and he tilted him just the way he wanted, kissing him deeply. It was incredible how Gabriel shivered in response just with a kiss, his cock a hard, hot line against his thigh.
He pulled away for a second, sliding his fingertips down Gabriel’s exposed arms, feeling the goose bumps rise on his skin as he touched him. “Let’s go to the bedroom,” he said.
Gabriel’s eyes were dark. Intense. Sean sometimes felt like he could lose himself in them, if he didn’t keep one foot on solid ground. “What do you want?” he murmured. His hand, hot and certain, trailed down Sean’s spine, resting right above the curve of his ass. “Do you still want what you did last time?”