If he noticed me pull a condom out of my wallet, he didn’t mention it. He could think whatever he wanted. I wasn’t being responsible with our budding friendship, but I could be safe with both of us. And, I reasoned as I moved him off me and got behind him on the couch, sex took two people. I wasn’t solely responsible for what we were doing.
Chapter Five
Caleb
MY JEANS slipped down a little on my hips when he moved me over on the couch and got behind me. My heart raced and really, I didn’t know what had made me decide to do this. Trent had looked so miserable sitting beside me on the couch, like he needed to be anywhere but here. I hadn’t been ready to let him go, but sex wasn’t a good way to keep someone next to me. I dug my fingers into the seat cushion of my couch at the first touch of Trent’s tongue against my asshole. I’d been rimmed before, plenty of times, but with him it felt different. Maybe because I wasn’t fully into it, maybe because I’d only known him for two days, but I knew I should have stopped this.
“Trent, stop,” I said. And instantly I felt guilty for not having sex with him because I’d started everything. He’d said he needed to go, plenty of times, but I kept pushing, and it was on the tip of my tongue to say never mind and just have sex with him anyway. He was gorgeous, and I was sure I’d enjoy it. But I wasn’t into the random, casual sex he seemed to want from me, and I was already pretty disgusted with myself after my relationship with Paul.
Trent pulled away, and once his hands were no longer on my hips, I got up and fixed my jeans. He looked confused, and I thought again of how easy it would be to simply say yes to him, that I’d made a mistake, that everything was fine. But it wasn’t.
“I can’t do this. Not tonight,” I told him as he stood up too and adjusted his clothes. He was still hard, and I was quickly losing my erection. Fucking perfect. I wanted to sigh and knock my head against the wall a few dozen times.
He nodded and started heading for the door. “I get it.”
“Where are you going?” I asked. I thought maybe we could watch the rest of the movie, each of us have another beer, and pretend this hadn’t happened.
But he kept walking to my door. “I’m not in the right space for a movie and hanging out right now. You don’t know this about me, and most people don’t actually, but when I’m not okay, like now, the only thing I’ve found that calms me down is sex. So I’m going to go fix myself.”
“You’re with someone?” I asked, feeling a bit sick to my stomach all over again. Not this. I couldn’t be the other person another time.
He shook his head. “It’s not like that. I’ll talk to you later. Bye.”
It took me longer than it should have to figure out what he meant, but after he left, I finally understood and had to sit down on my couch. I realized Trent hadn’t needed to have sex with me; I was merely convenient. He could have had sex with anyone and probably would while I sat here staring at a black TV screen. I shook my head, got up, and downed half a bottle of beer before I stopped being mad at him, and at myself. Because, really, if I was going to actually look at the situation and be honest about it, I’d nearly had sex with a man I’d known for two days. That might have been what Trent did, and I suspected it was, but I wasn’t like that. And I’d pushed him into staying and into having sex.
I wasn’t going to say no to being friends with him, but sex was most definitely off the table between us now. And yet, as I stood there leaning over my island and alternating between bites of a cookie and sips of my beer, I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I’d wanted him. It was weird and definitely not something I should have been thinking about while he probably had his dick in someone else. But the thought was there anyway.
I groaned and pulled out my phone. It was still kind of early in California, and my only close friend, Dean, would still be up. I was sure of it.
The phone rang in my hand, and I thought maybe he’d gone to bed early. Or that he and his wife were out doing something much more fun than I was. But then he picked up, and I felt instantly better at having my friend to talk to.
“Hey, Caleb.”
“Hi. How’s things there?” I asked. I wasn’t calling him to get advice on the Trent situation. We weren’t like that, and I didn’t go running to people when I had a problem. I hadn’t even told him I’d been with Paul until last year when I’d tried unsuccessfully to leave him. But it just felt good to talk to someone about nothing at all for a while.
He chuckled. “Oh, you know. Backed-up highways, all those people with their hybrids everywhere, can’t find a decent greasy burger between all the health food places.”
I smiled, remembering, and took my mostly empty beer and the box of nearly gone cookies over to the couch where I lay down and snacked. “Sounds miserable.”
“It is. How’s mountain living and no traffic, then?”
“Pretty good, actually.” When I wasn’t making ridiculous mistakes and nearly having sex with a guy I wanted but had barely even started to get to know.
“Dean, you tell him about Sam,” I heard Dean’s wife, Natalie, call to him.
“Woman, I’m getting to that!”
“Get faster!”
I laughed. “So what’s going on with Sam?”
“He got beat up at school today.” I heard the anger in Dean’s voice, and I was right there with him.
“What? How? Why?” I adored Sam, even more than my own nephews, though he was about their age. But I’d watched Sam grow up. I’d given him swimming lessons as a kid and had babysat him for years.
“Because he decided to come out in his English class.”
For a moment there I didn’t know what to say. “I thought he was going to keep that under wraps for a while.” It hadn’t been my decision, but I hadn’t been against it either. Kids were cruel more often than not, and he’d already been tormented pretty often for being black, and now they were going to beat up on him for being gay? Damn. Poor kid. I shook my head just thinking about it.
“That was what we’d talked about. But he had to write an essay about one thing that’s special about him and he wrote it and the teacher I guess liked it so much that she had him read it in front of the class. Sam says she let him decide if he wanted to or not but my guess is he was just so damn proud of his A that he decided to go for it.” Dean groaned, and I could hear the frustration in his voice. “I just wanted to keep him safe. You know? I love him, Nat loves him, and we’ll always accept him. He can be completely open and out with us at home. But I wanted him to lay low for a little while in that school.”
“So what are you doing now?” I asked. I could understand Dean’s frustration. Having kids was hard, which was probably why I didn’t have any. That and the whole not having someone to raise them with part since I was not interested in being a single parent from the start. Although I did know there was a possibility of that happening later on.
“Nat wants to pull him out of school and homeschool him for a while. I’m not opposed to it. When he was getting teased, we talked about it some and decided that it would be okay once he grew up a bit. But he’s got loads of bruises right now, and I want to go beat up some kids for hurting my little man.”
“I’ve got plenty of room, you know, if you wanted to come spend some time out here and get him away from all of that for a while.” I had just extended the same offer to my sister and her kids, but I highly doubted she’d take me up on it. And from the sound of things there, Sam needed a bit of time away from his life in LA and all the crappy people in it.
Dean didn’t say anything at first. “You sure about that? You did just move there. Maybe you want some time to relax, move your stuff in, get the lay of the land so to speak.”
I laughed at that and put my now-empty beer bottle down on the floor next to me. I had three cookies left though, and knew they wouldn’t last much longer. I should have grabbed some real groceries at the store, but junk food was kind of what I ran on most days. “Dean, seriously, my stuff is moved in. Th
e town has one street and about ten stores in it. Come on out if you can get away. If you can’t and want to send Sam out alone, that would be fine too. I’ll take him fishing or something.”
“You’d go fishing?”
I made a face. “Yeah. Probably not. So I’d make sure he ate something more than chips and cookies.” Unlike myself most days. “And didn’t get lost in the woods.”
“I’ll talk to Nat about it. Some time away might do us all some good.”
I nodded and figured Nat would probably agree with me and want to come out. She always did like me. I couldn’t wait for her to make some of her fresh pecan pie for me again. Thinking about it right now, I knew I’d be deprived if she never sent me any again. “How’s the job hunt going?” I asked as I munched on a cookie.
Dean sighed, and I heard him get up from wherever he was sitting. Probably from his dark green recliner that was even older than the sofa I was currently stretched out over but twice as comfortable too. “It’s…. Well, there aren’t many jobs for a general contractor here right now. I’m still looking, though.”
I knew he was trying to be optimistic, but I heard the disappointment in his voice too. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. I’m going to go talk over a trip with Nat so I’ll call you later.”
“Sure. Bye, Dean.”
“Later.”
I hung up and rested the phone on my stomach as I finished off the last of the cookies. Times were hard for Dean, especially since his income was all they had. I’d offered to help them a lot of times since the settlement money had come in, but he’d always refused me flat out. I wished there was more I could do for them.
I got up from the couch and went back to the island after tossing out my trash. It was time for me to order a whole lot of furniture to fill up my new house.
I DIDN’T see or hear from Trent for three days, but that was most likely because I’d been so busy with people delivering furniture that I hadn’t been to Rosie’s, or anywhere in town, during that time. But even when I did see him, it was just a video of him and a lot of other cops rescuing some horses from a neglectful farm south of Denver.
I decided to leave the guys putting my bed together alone and give him a call just to say hi. And I was also a bit curious about why a Thornwood cop would be needed for something that far away. “Hey, it’s Caleb,” I said when he answered the phone.
“Hi. How’re you doing?”
I shrugged. I’d thought about him a lot over the past few days, mostly wondering how he was, and who he was having sex with. But I tried not to think about that while I was on the phone with him right then. I’d already spent plenty of time imagining who he could have run to after I turned him down the other night.
“Good. I saw you on TV rescuing some horses.” I headed downstairs and took some pain pills because my back was acting up after I’d attempted to help put a dresser together before the furniture guys took over. Now I just needed my couch, a glass of water, and some mindless TV to keep me company for a few hours until they got done putting my house together for me since I was useless in that department.
“How’d I look?” Trent asked.
I smiled at his ego. “Covered in mud and tired but still hot.” There was no use in pretending I didn’t find him attractive after what we’d done. “Why’d they call you guys down? Doesn’t Parker have its own police force?”
“Yeah, but it was sort of an ‘all available guys come help out’ situation. One of my buddies in Denver called me up and told me about it. I was off, so I headed down there to do what I could. A place called Green Acres Equine Sanctuary took them in if you want to check the horses out.”
I made a face at the name. “Why would I want to do that?”
“In case you ever want to adopt. The woman who runs it is Evaline Green.” He chuckled, and I wished he was there with me instead of talking to me on the phone. I liked him, even if I’d made a mess of things the other night.
“I’ll check them out,” I told him, not meaning anything much by it.
“You should. I saw a cute little Appaloosa colt there.”
I shook my head quickly. As much as I hated to squash whatever little dream he had of me owning a bunch of horses, that was simply not going to happen. “I’m not getting one of them.”
He didn’t seem fazed by my response. “Sure.”
“I’m not.”
“Okay.”
I pursed my lips at the ceiling. “I can’t.”
Trent laughed. “I’m not saying anything.”
I knew that, but there was also a suggestion in his words, and now I wanted to go check out the Appy colt he’d been talking about. I liked Appaloosas because they were interesting to look at with spots all over them. But that was as far as I went. “Do you want to come over sometime?”
“As friends?”
“Yep.” I nodded. There wouldn’t be anything more between us.
“Sure. Tonight?”
“I’ll have a pizza made. Seven?” I asked. It wouldn’t be much, since it was just a frozen one, but it was something. And maybe we could go for a walk or something. Or there was always my fairly extensive movie collection. I was pretty proud of it. Having him over for a movie didn’t go so well last time, but I thought maybe tonight would be different.
“Sounds good. See you then.”
We hung up and I smiled as I got up from the couch and went to the big windows to look out over the pine trees. I knew it wasn’t a date since we weren’t anything more than friends. But I wished my stomach would realize it and settle down.
SEVEN O’CLOCK came and went, and then at nearly eight, I heard a car coming up my driveway. I was going to be upset at Trent for being so late until I saw his expression through my glass front door and shook my head. He looked like he’d had a rough time of it. I unlocked the door and waited for him to take off his holster and hat, leave them in the car, then come up to my front door.
“I’m sorry I’m late. I had a call,” he said as he entered.
“Was it bad?” I asked. I didn’t really need to know, since I could tell it hadn’t been pleasant just by his face, but I was making conversation as much as anything. I tossed a pizza into the oven, since my first choice of a buffalo chicken pizza was cut up and put into the fridge and I wanted something fresher for my dinner with Trent. I went to my fridge, grabbed him a beer, and poured myself some water. I’d had a beer while waiting for him, and the one I gave him was my last one.
“Thanks,” he said as I handed him the beer. “And yeah, it was kind of awful. Domestic violence, which we don’t get often here, but this one couple has been a problem for us for a while.”
“Were they okay?” I asked as we sat down together at the island. His shoulder nearly touched mine and I tried not to think about it.
He turned to give me a look. “You didn’t ask if she was okay, just if they were. Thanks for that.”
I shrugged. I didn’t really know what he was getting at. “Sure.”
“You didn’t automatically assume it was a man and a woman,” he clarified for me.
Frowning, I shrugged. “Why would I? I’m gay. I know there are more relationships than just heterosexual monogamous ones.”
He gave me a little smile and took a sip of his beer. “Yeah, I know. But it’s refreshing. The guys I work with are very hetero. Most have long marriages and kids my age. It’s….” Trent frowned and drank a little more. “Kind of really nice to be around someone who doesn’t see the world in a certain way.”
“I know what you mean.” I put my hands around my water glass and looked down at it. “Trent, I’m sorry about the other night. You wanted to go and I should have let you.”
He shook his head and pressed his shoulder, for just the briefest of seconds, against mine. “Don’t be sorry. I was having a rough day anyway.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” I offered.
“No. Maybe someday. But not right now.” He smiled at me, like he was tryin
g to convince me that things were okay with him, that he was okay. I didn’t press him, even though I did see the cracks in his smile and the way his eyes looked sad.
I nodded and tightened my hands on the glass. “Okay. No worries.” I licked my lips and thought about if I actually wanted the answer to the next question I was going to ask him. But I really did want to know, despite what knowing could mean. “When you left here, did you find someone else?” I asked bluntly.
He put down his beer and nodded. “Yes.”
“Oh.” I didn’t know what else to say to that.
“I’m not going to apologize for how I am,” he told me, sounding defensive as he said it.
I took a long drink of my water before I spoke again. I needed the minute to be able to think. “I didn’t expect you to. Or even ask you to. I just wanted to know.”
Trent turned to look at me, and there was something in his expression, something about not wanting to be judged, about being angry at me for even asking, about being scared even. I didn’t know how to get him to turn that all off and just be with me as my friend. Maybe tonight hadn’t been a good idea either.
“Why did you want to know?” he asked.
I didn’t have a good answer, or even one really lined up. So I went with the truth as I turned on my stool and looked over at him. “I want you as my friend, and maybe, someday, I might like the chance to see if more could work between us. I think you’re hot—you know I do. And I think you want me too. Or at least it seemed like it the other night. I want to know what I’m getting into first, though.”
He nodded, and I breathed a little sigh of relief at being able to actually get the words out. “I like you too, Caleb,” he told me. “It’s been a long time since I’ve done a relationship though, and I can’t do that again right now. I like casual sex because I get my needs met without having to get involved in any other way. I know you can’t do that, and that’s fine, but if you want to be my friend and actually know about me, then that’s where I am.”
One More Time Page 6