by Warren, Rie
I wielded our cart into the lobby, following Nicky as he strolled up to the check-in desk. His demeanor changed the instant we walked through the doors. Gone was the scrappy South Cackalackee bad boy. He rolled up the sleeves on his oxford twice, neatened his hair back into a sleek ponytail, and greeted people with effortless charm.
While we stood in line, a commotion at the back of the queue drew my attention. A woman wrangled with her cart and then watched—eyes wide and mouth open—as four boxes crashed to the floor. Books, dresses, shoes, wigs . . . lingerie swam onto the polished marble floor.
I noticed her cock-up with the cart first.
Her legs second.
Her tits third.
Her face last.
Holy fuck.
“Who the hell is that?” I whispered, pointing at the babe surrounded by ten tons of shit spilling all over the floor.
Nicky glanced over his shoulder. “No idea. New kid on the block, I guess.”
“I’m gonna go help her.” I shouldered through the crowd and squatted down next to her. “Need a hand?” Because one thing Ma had taught me was always help out a lady in distress.
She blew a tendril of the lightest red hair from her brow. “I’d sure appreciate it.”
I helped pack her things back up and tidily stacked it on the cart. I willed myself not to look at her as I stepped back. Definitely not remembering the lace, the frills, the full-on feminine lingerie I’d handled.
“My knight in shinin’ armor?”
Shaking my head, I backed away. I saw Nicky at the elevators, waiting for me. “Not really, miss.”
New kid on the block. There was nothing kid-like about her. She was voluptuous, a handful from hips to hourglass waist to perfect breasts. The southern drawling miss in a knee-length skirt and clinging top didn’t seem to realize she’d made my cock railroad-spike hard. I walked away, mesmerized by her feminine-fuck-me appearance up to her goddamn adorable face. A killer combination. Full throttle attraction the likes of which I’d never felt made my head spin, my heart speed.
And there was no way I could act on it because I’d just signed up for five and a half days of Gaydom at the Rom Con.
Two
Tuesday: Gamecocks and Henpeckers
LITERARY LOVE CONVENTION 2013 had kicked off with a bang all right, just not the kind I suddenly needed care of the lusciously curved lady who’d caused a heavy ache to settle low in my groin.
As I approached Nicky at the elevators, he asked, “Do what you needed to do?”
I shrugged. “Sure.” Not really, since my dick’s still in my pants.
To offset the fact I could barely keep from looking back at little miss sex-on-legs, I grabbed Nicky’s hand and rubbed my thumb over his knuckles. His forearm tensed as he fought against pulling away from the unexpected caress.
“Goin’ up, babe?”
I thought he was gonna snort, which would really kill the mood I was going for. Holding himself in check, he twined his fingers through mine and gave me a peck on the cheek. “Sure, love.”
Motherfucker better not try to one-up me in the gay-stakes. ’Cause I’m gonna bring it.
We pushed into an empty elevator and broke apart as soon as the doors closed. Nicky knocked his shoulder against mine, laughing when I alternated between rubbing the heel of my palm against my just-kissed cheek then my hand against my thigh. To wipe off boy cooties presumably. Christ.
“You’re gay!” He nearly cackled.
I hit him with a broad smile. “Only for you, babe.”
He was still chuckling when we made it to our room. He waved the key-card in my face, and I snatched it from him as we went inside. A Fabio wannabe with some half-dressed pirate’s booty babe decorated the card—someone’s book cover. Oh, good for a buy one, get one free appetizer at the mezzanine level Grille on Tuesday. I had to hand it to the writers, customers loved BOGO. I might learn a thing or two.
I unloaded shit. Nicky checked out the bathroom and the freebies before chucking everything off the desk to set up his laptop. I cracked a beer then growled, taking in the one and only bed in the room. Keepin’ up appearances.
He shucked his jeans, pulling on the same pair of University of South Carolina sweats he’d been wearing for over ten years.
I tanked the beer and went for another, checking my iPhone. There was an urgent message from the garage. Imagining fires, destruction, utter fucking mayhem, I opened the attached file . . . then wished I’d never been given the gift of sight. The knuckle-draggers obviously thought they were funny as fuck. They’d stepped out behind Stone’s to drop trow and shine their moons for the camera. I pushed the phone as far away from me as possible with a loud groan.
Nicky looked over. “What?”
I pointed at the cell with a firm shake of my head.
Undeterred, he reached for the phone and reeled back when he saw the photo. In the next second, he fell all fricking over himself, laughing it up. “Ray looks like his ass could use a weed whackin’, dude, yeah?”
I grabbed the phone back, quickly texting, “All y’all are FIRED.”
“See ya Monday, sport!” Ray replied.
“Meatheads,” I muttered.
Nicky continued to rock with laughter. Meanwhile, I was scarred for life. I ignored the rest of the buffoons’ incoming bullshittery and settled back onto the bed, pressing the most used contact on the phone.
“Stone’s! At your service, y’all.” The sweet voice humming over the wire warmed my heart, her greeting not so much.
“Ma, you’re not supposed to answer your home phone that way. Gives people the wrong idea.”
“Joshy! We were wonderin’ when you’d call. You get to ’Lanta all right? You know those people out there drive like it’s the Indy 500. Like to take your life into your own hands. You stopped to eat, now, didn’t you?”
I waited for her to take a breath. “Yes and yes, ma’am.”
It didn’t take her long to gather more speed. “You tryin’ to sweet talk me? Five days away is a long time to get into trouble. Now I know Nicky’s a good boy, but I don’t approve of you spendin’ all that time around all those ladies. Y’all best make sure to mind your manners and your morals.”
Unlike everyone else on God’s green earth, Ma didn’t know I was playing Queer Eye for the Straight Guy.
Nicky had heard her rant from half a room away. He shouted, “Hey, Gigi! Don’t worry, I’m keepin’ Joshy here under lock and key.”
That calmed her down some. Nicky always had that affect, while I riled her up by breathing the same air, simply because I was, and always would be, her baby boy. Not that she was much for babying, unless it came to JJ.
“The kid there, Ma?” I asked.
“Oh, he’s sittin’ right here. Had him some pulled pork for dinner, your memaw’s old recipe, and a tiny piece of cobbler. And then we went to the Piggly Wiggly to get some Popsicles. I think he’s about tuckered out.”
Tuckered out? JJ was gonna be bouncing from his sugar spike for the next three hours. I listened to the patter of little feet while my heart flip-flopped in my chest.
“Daddy?”
It never goddamn failed. I shifted to the side of the bed and stared at the wall, quickly blinking. “Yep, I’m here.”
“Miss you, Daddy.” His squeaky voice cut a path straight through my heart.
I cleared the gruffness from my throat. “Me too, kid. But you’re havin’ fun with Jamma, right?”
That was the right tactic because he launched into a tale of all the crap Ma had already done—including a trip to Target capped off with a “gween shushy”—which I’d have to unlearn him from when I got home.
“And then Jamma lemme swim in the deep end of the pool wiffout fwoaties!” He finished on what he thought was a high note, but what gave me the forerunner of a heart attack.
I imagined his mussed up hair, his hazel eyes he got from me. The fearlessness of the Stone family that had me worried like only a dad could be from
those first wobbly steps and every day since.
“Can I talk ta Uncle Wicky?”
I beckoned Nicky over.
“Hey, dude-man.” Nicky’s deep voice rumbled out as he greeted my son.
The rest of what I heard was a series of high-pitched nonsense and Nicky rambling on, a huge smile on his face. “Nah, I ain’t famous.”
There was a pause, then Nicky’s loud chuckle. “No, I don’t know Mickey Mouse.”
A couple minutes later, he handed the phone back. “He’s winding down.”
“Sugar crash,” I mouthed.
“Daddy?”
“Yeah, baby boy.” I listened to him yawn, that soft pop of his innocent mouth.
“Do Baloo for me.”
I fell back on the bed. “‘Bare Necessities’?”
“Mm hmm.”
I shut my eyes and curled against the phone like I folded around his little body when I sang him to sleep. I’d employed every trick I could think of when he suffered from colic the first nine months and Claire was battling postpartum depression. Disney characters were the old standby. Putting on my best Baloo-bear voice, I sang him the song as he sleepily harmonized as Mowgli.
The song ended and all I heard were soft breaths, deep and heavy. Ma came on the line, whispering, “I don’t know how you do it, Joshy. He’s already asleep. You’re a good daddy.”
I crooked my arm over my face, swallowing a few times. “Thanks, Ma. Thanks for takin’ care of him.”
“Oh hush now, you do all the work. I just do the spoilin’.”
“You know he’s gonna be up pissing all night because of the sodas and ice pops, right?” A grin slid across my mouth.
“Hmm. I hate to break it to you, but you were the same way. And I done been through the wars with you.”
“Love ya, Ma.”
Her voice softened. “I love you too. Behave, or I will break out the willow switch when you get home. On you and Nicky both.”
Ending the call, I kept my eyes closed. JJ still asked about Claire, wondering why his momma left him, why he could only remember me singing him to sleep at night. I didn’t believe in sugarcoating the truth, but I did believe in protecting him. Most times I told him she wasn’t ready to be a mom. “But she sure missed one helluva a kid.”
Then I’d sit in the rocking chair beside his bed all night, making sure his dreams didn’t turn into nightmares. That’s why I’d never left him before.
“Still hurts?” Nicky read my mind.
“Yeah. But not because Claire left me. Because she left JJ high and dry.” I propped up onto an elbow. “Man, what if I’m not good enough to be everything to him?”
“That’s bullshit and you know it. Anyone who sees the two of you together knows it, too. Besides, you’re not doing it alone. You’ve got me and the guys, you’ve got Gigi.”
“You think?”
“Yeah. But, if you stopped sowing your wild oats around the lowcountry and settled down, maybe he could have another mom.” He knocked into my shoulder.
“Well that isn’t gonna happen now that I’m your lover, right?” With a grin, I pushed him right back.
Sure, marriage had never been a cakewalk. That had been blatantly obvious as soon as Claire smashed a piece of our pretty wedding cake into my face after the shotgun-she’s-pregnant ceremony. But I’d been determined to give it my best shot, which meant putting up with all of Claire’s worst ones. I’d stuck it out for the kid because family was important. Now I didn’t give any woman the chance to shake me up, shake me down. There was too much at stake.
It wasn’t as if I didn’t have offers. Half the female population in Mt. Pleasant—including a good quarter of the married ones—acted like I was a high commodity. They saw the surface only: tough guy, big muscles, successful business owner. They didn’t delve into the single dad working all hours, whose personal time was spent with his son, his family, his friends. The Friday night freebie-fucks were what I needed to de-stress from a week full of worries, bills, and bitching.
And I sure as hell was not looking for anything else.
At least here I’d be somewhat anonymous. Nicky’s love muffin, not Mt. Pleasant’s most-wanted bachelor.
I sat up when Nicky popped the cork on a bottle of wine, wedging a few more inside the mini-fridge. He took a sip of the pink-colored fizz in his glass. “Done moping?”
“I wasn’t moping, I was thinking,” I replied.
“I knew I didn’t recognize that look on you.”
I chucked the hotel menu at him, which he swiftly deflected. “Blow me.”
“Might have to before the week’s out.” He gave me his best attempt at a leer.
“Speakin’ of, the cost of registration . . . that’s a write-off, right?” I’d have to sort through all these receipts when I got home or, better yet, hand them off to Ray.
“Yeah. If you’re a writer.” Nicky tossed a red-ribboned lanyard at me. “You can get a thirty percent deduction as my assistant though.”
“And this is?” I looked at the thing he’d thrown into my lap.
“That’s your name badge.”
“I gotta wear it?”
“Yep, at all times.” Then he threw something else over and I grabbed it midair. “Don’t forget to pin your pretty silk flower onto it. It’s the same as mine.”
What the hell? A corsage too?
I dutifully pinned the peach-colored flower to my name badge and did a double take. “Stone?”
“Straight up Stone.” He swigged down the rest of his wine.
“No pun intended, huh?”
Ambling closer, a seductive swagger to his steps, Nicky bit his bottom lip.
I hustled back on the bed, laughing nervously. “Uh, Nicky? You’re kind of giving me the heebie-jeebies here.”
He ran his fingers through the shoulder-length hair freed from his ponytail, peering at me with eyes that suddenly smoldered. Jesus, this is scary. Is this what he does to the ladies? He stopped right in front of me, breathing into my ear until my shoulders shot up. “Stone. Hard Stone. It adds to your aura, lover.”
I gulped. “I can work with that.”
Canning the Casanova crap, he started crowing loudly, enjoying every second of my discomfort. “Dude, you actually thought I was hitting on you? I already told you you’re too hairy for me.”
I punched him in the stomach. “Douchebag.”
He continued to laugh as he began his total transformation from plucky Nick Loveland, to natty dresser Nicky Love, New York Times best-selling paranormal author. Changing into a flowing poet shirt, tight-ass charcoal gray slacks, he finished it all off with a slash of guy-liner and the long silver medallion that sat in the open collar of his shirt.
I strolled up behind him in the bathroom and pinched his ass. “Lookin’ good, babe.”
“Maybe you should take a lesson.” He scraped a blunt fingernail down my dark stubble.
“I am not going clean-shaved. It hides my weak chin,” I grumbled quietly.
“You do not have a weak chin!”
“How do you know? You’ve never seen it. I was growing this when I was fifteen.” Jesus, I already sound like I’m flaming.
He looked at me in the mirror from all possible angles. Then he nodded. “Designer stubble.”
I could work with that.
“Yeah, butch gay instead of pretty underwear model gay, you can pull it off.”
I nodded. “Right on.”
With that huge problem solved, i.e., my hairy face, he left me to my cleanup. I changed again, feeling like a frigging clotheshorse as I pulled on another pair of jeans, my shitkickers, and a navy button down shirt. I brushed my teeth, slapped on some aftershave for the shave I hadn’t had, and left the bathroom.
Another beer from the mini-fridge in hand, I quickly found ESPN on the TV. Nicky settled at the desk doing his conference shtick. He used one hand on the laptop, the other on his cell, both flying with speed as he pounded out . . . something. His tongue stuck out
of the corner of his mouth, and a frown dug deep lines into his forehead.
“Dude, you look like you’re about to drop a double deuce over there.”
He looked up with glazed eyes. “Huh?”
“Straining, like you’re about to drop a load.”
“Facebook and email.” He waved at the computer. “Twitter, tumblr, and texts.” He shook his phone.
I didn’t know twatter from tumbleweed from fuck-all, and I definitely didn’t have a Facebook account. “You look a little stressed, my friend.”
He chugged a glass of wine. “Well, how many accounts do you have?”
I held up my thumb and fingers in a big fat zero.
Pressing a hand to his heart, he gasped. “That’s—that’s—social media suicide!”
“Hey, I’ve got a website for Stone’s and it’s on Facebook, as you well know, but Javier handles that crap. I don’t have time to diddle around on the Internet.”
“It’s not diddlin’. Where do you think my readers come from? How do you think I get the word out there?”
“Whoa, hoss, no need to get your nuts in a knot. I just don’t want you to stroke out because of social media before I get a chance to get in your pants.”
He pressed a key on his computer and hovered over something on his cell simultaneously, grinning at me.
I shrugged and muttered, “I even hate my iPhone, man.”
“You are such a throwback.”
“Yep, that’s me.” I retrieved the fedora from my bag and set it on my head at a rakish angle. The hat combined with my smirk was a guaranteed pussy-magnet. Hell, maybe it worked on dudes too.
“So you’re okay with PDAs?” Nicky turned his attention away from the Internet to me.
“Portable electronic devices?”
He walked up and rapped his knuckles against my forehead beneath the hat brim. “Public displays of affection. Asshole. With me.”
“Yeah. Already done it, didn’t I? But just so you know, rimming is off the table.”
“Gotcha,” Nicky said with a wince. Then, not to be outdone, he widened his eyes. “What about tea-baggin’?”