Leaning Into Touch (Leaning Into Series Book 4)

by Lane Hayes

  He kissed me then. And I supposed that was when I knew this wasn’t just sex anymore. This was an act of love. Every subtle push and pull was like the thread in a tapestry, woven tightly in an intricate and unique pattern that was ours alone. I’d never heard an “I love you” spoken so clearly without words in my whole life. I trembled at the depth and beauty and sincerity in his eyes before tumbling into space as my orgasm slammed into me. And Finn was with me all the way. He roared with his release, urging me to keep moving until we were both completely drained.

  We lay entwined in a sticky mess afterward. I wrapped the used condom in a tissue and tossed it somewhere near the nightstand. Finn rolled onto his side when I lay beside him and then propped himself on his elbow.

  “That was brilliant.”

  I snorted with amusement. “I can’t believe you let me—I mean…I didn’t think you liked to bottom.”

  “I hadn’t done it in years.”

  I heard the “not since my first lover” loud and clear, though the words went unsaid. I waited a moment to see if he’d bring it up but he didn’t. Thank God. The past had no place in this bed.

  “And how was it?” I asked in an over-the-top lascivious voice.

  “Brilliant,” he repeated with a smirk. “Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome. It was definitely my pleasure.” I turned to face him and pushed a leg between his thighs. “Did I hurt you?”

  Finn shook his head then set his hand on my hip and scooted closer. “No. I trust you and…that’s not something I do easily.”

  “Same here. Actually, that’s not true. I probably trust too easily. Sometimes I’m a sucker,” I said with a self-deprecating half laugh.

  “Hmm. You don’t see yourself the way I do.”

  “How do you see me?” I asked, feeling a little overwhelmed by his sudden intensity.

  “You’re like a rare work of art, not the flashy one that takes up wall space and demands attention, but the subtle one that depicts a day in the life and yet reveals something new every time you look at it. If you were a painting, you’d be the gentle brushstroke depicting a change in wind. You’d be the color blue and smallest signature in the bottom right corner. You’re the subtle parts that make the whole thing come to life.”

  I opened my mouth and closed it twice before finding my voice. No one had ever said anything so beautiful to me. Ever. I wanted to soak in every word. But then he added, “Whatever happens, whatever comes up along the way…I’ll never forget this.”

  The note of longing in his voice almost sounded like a good-bye. And funny enough, I was reminded of Marley’s translation of the famous Matisse painting…the give and take of a simple conversation. The words you say and the ones you infer.

  I was terrible at guessing. I had to ask, “What’s going to happen?”

  “Everything. Nothing. I don’t know.” His shy smile took the sting out of his opaque words.

  Finn grasped my hand and kissed it before leaning in to seal his mouth over mine in a toe-curling kiss that made me dizzy yet grounded at the same time. Before I could regain my footing and ask what he meant, he rolled out of bed and fumbled with his phone.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Listen…” He held his hand to his ear and cast his eyes skyward just as the first notes of a familiar Van Morrison song piped through the speakers. “Do you remember this song?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Come dance with me.”

  My smile was so big it hurt. I let out a laugh I hoped would release me from my imminent free fall into space. “Dance? We’re naked.”

  “That’s the best way to dance. Take my hand, love.”

  So I did.

  He held me against his chest, anchoring me close with his left arm around on my lower back as he swayed from side to side. It was impossibly romantic. My feet may have technically been on the ground, but I was a million miles above, floating on a heady cloud. His touch was hypnotic. Firm but gentle. I rested my head on his shoulder as he moved in a circle. I squeezed my eyes shut as though I was readying myself for an uptick in momentum or a stomach-lurching fall into the unknown. Instinctively I knew it was too late. The free fall had begun months ago, but now…I was in deep.

  I loved him. And there was no turning back.

  12

  The following weekend, I was at Eric and Zane’s, guzzling beer and chomping nachos. Football season was officially in full swing, which was as good an excuse as any to hang out with old friends. In the past, we took turns contributing snacks but Eric had slowly taken over the chore, insisting he’d rather keep busy than sit around pretending to care about the game. Before Zane and he had officially become a couple, Eric had always been a gracious host. But truthfully, we cared less about the food than we did about being together. Today was no exception.

  I tapped the beer bottle Eric handed me against his wineglass and smiled. “Thanks.”

  “You’re welcome. How come you’re so late? I thought you were coming with Grant.” Eric perched his ass on the corner of the sofa next to Zane.

  “Aw. Did you miss me, Grant?” I singsonged.

  Grant nodded and batted his eyelashes comically. “Of course I did. I never see you anymore, roomie.”

  “That’s ’cause you and Steroid Steve are busy doing the nasty.”

  “The nasty?” Zane snorted. “Are we still in college?”

  “My bad. I was going to say knockin’ boots. That sounds way more mature, huh?” I tipped my bottle back then ducked at the last second when Grant flung a tortilla chip at me.

  “Cool it, you two,” Eric scolded, giving me the evil eye before turning to do the same to Grant. “Who’s Steroid Steve?”

  “A guy I was seeing. Past tense.”

  “What happened?” Nick asked, leaning across Wes to grab a handful of chips.

  Grant shrugged. “Nothing. We weren’t serious. It was physical only.”

  “That’s code for ‘he was getting too clingy.’ Am I right?” Zane asked.

  “I don’t know. Maybe. It was never going to be anything more than it was.”

  His guarded reply was typical Grant. He had a habit of engaging in short-term affairs with guys most of us could guess wouldn’t last. We used to give him a hard time about waiting for Mr. tall, Greek and gorgeous, but sadly, that didn’t seem like a joke anymore.

  “What was wrong with him? He was built like a brick house and I know the guy put out. I heard. Often,” I teased.

  “Ha. Ha. There was nothing wrong with him. He’s a good guy. Just a little immature.”

  “I highly recommend older men,” Nick piped in. He threw his leg over Wes’s and gave his boyfriend a sideways lascivious glance.

  “Hey, want me to have my dad and Lars ask around? They can probably hook you up with a hot, mature gentleman,” I suggested in a faux serious tone.

  “You’re fucking hysterical. I’m gonna pass, but if your boyfriend knows anyone, I may be interested.”

  “Boyfriend?” Zane let out a wolf whistle. “Sounds like things are heating up, Joshy. Tell us all about it.…After this play.”

  “Yeah, Joshy. Tell us,” Nick said in an intense tone. He sat up straight and pivoted to face me just as the commercials started to roll.

  Suddenly, all eyes were on me and to my absolute mortification, I blushed.

  Grant and Zane razzed me good-naturedly while Wes chuckled at their sophomoric antics. Nick and Eric, however, went eerily quiet. I would have ignored them, but the silent knowing glance they shared got under my skin. I was too sensitive and yes, protective, about my relationship with Finn. The last thing I wanted was negative feedback from my friends.

  “Do you guys have something to say?” I asked nonchalantly.

  “No, but—” Eric sighed heavily and worked his lower lip. Then he pointed at my beer. “Want another one?”

  “You just gave me this one,” I reminded him. “I don’t get it. I thought you guys were chummy with Finn now. Traveli
ng to Chicago, schmoozing the crowds at geek conferences. What do you have against him?”

  My voice rose an octave in frustration. I was L-word crazy about Finn. I didn’t know what their problem was, but I wanted to. Finn was important to me and these guys were my brothers. I hated the idea of not being able to bring him around because there was bad blood I wasn’t privy to. It was time to have this out.

  “Nothing,” Nick said, lifting his hands in surrender. “Finn is a good guy. He’s just very…driven.”

  “So are you,” I reminded him.

  “Yeah, but—”

  “He’s serious about expanding his business,” Eric intercepted.

  “I know,” I said, narrowing my gaze.

  “Has he told you our plans for Chicago?” Eric asked in a kind tone.

  “Your plans? No. I know he’s opening an office there but—”

  “Right. That’s true, but we also recently signed a contract to merge a few mutual interests. EN Tech has offices around the globe. Finn wants to help us grow our sales team.”

  “But he’s a reseller. That means his firm is the middleman between you and the purchaser, right? How do you merge? I can’t see him selling his company to you.” I furrowed my brow, thoroughly confused. High tech and business talk made my eyes cross. I couldn’t believe I once thought about becoming an engineer.

  “No, he definitely doesn’t want to sell,” Nick huffed. “Finn likes his cake and he wants to eat it too. He’s artfully opportunistic.”

  “What does that mean, asshole? Be straight with me.”

  “It means he’s smart and he knows how to make money,” Eric said in a gentler tone. “He suggested merging his sales force in areas EN Tech hasn’t found much traction. Like the Midwest. We opted to give him a trial run at discounted prices and a cut of the profit, depending on sales performance. Our experiment started a year ago and paid off spectacularly. So we agreed to partner with him in the opening of his Chicago offices…on the condition that we have a say in who runs the region. He hasn’t found an appropriate candidate yet—”

  “So he’s moving to Chicago,” Nick finished.

  “Nick!” Eric growled. “What the hell is your problem?”

  “He should know what’s going on! He’s our friend. Finn is business. We owe Josh honesty. Don’t be naïve, Er. You can’t…”

  I tuned them out. I had to.

  I pasted a weak smile on my face and held up my beer bottle like a kind of white flag before moving toward the kitchen. I needed space to think and hopefully regain my balance. I grabbed a new beer from the fridge and uncapped it slowly.

  Move to Chicago? It never came up. Even if it had, it didn’t make sense. Finn had a life here. Friends, family, a thriving business. Hell, he had a kid on the way. And he had me. He wouldn’t want to leave now. It didn’t make sense. Maybe I’d misread him and made assumptions based on my own desires. Or maybe this was what he meant when he said, “Whatever happens.”

  “Hey. You okay?” Eric asked. He bumped my shoulder then leaned against the counter and fixed me with a concerned stare.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You know how Nick is. He—”

  “Yeah, I know Nick very well. He has a broken filter. He can’t tell a lie and he’s incapable of sugarcoating anything,” I sighed. “But I’m a big boy, Er, and so is Finn. I trust him. If he’s going anywhere, he’ll tell me.”

  Eric nodded in agreement. His expression seemed pained, as though he wanted to believe what I did, but wasn’t quite a good enough actor to pull it off. And I couldn’t really blame him when I didn’t know what to think myself.

  Doubt was by definition a form of fear. I refused to be afraid or wallow in uncertainty where Finn was concerned. Eric and Nick thought he was moving, but they didn’t really know. The guy I took to the airport for his most recent jaunt to Chicago, and talked to daily during the week he was away, was the same man who shared bits and pieces of his childhood freely now and would stop whatever he was doing to dance to his favorite songs. Perhaps those weren’t necessarily declarations of love, but I had no reason to doubt his sincerity. If he had major life-changing news to tell me, he would.

  I firmly pushed aside any negativity and useless speculation and quietly counted down the hours until he was scheduled to arrive home Friday evening. And because my overachieving gene manifested itself out of the blue and in the weirdest of ways, I decided to greet him with a home cooked meal.

  This could be a disaster. I rarely cooked. My culinary repertoire consisted of basic go-tos like eggs, oatmeal, and mac and cheese. I could pop a frozen pizza into the oven like nobody’s business, but making dinner from scratch was akin to constructing a piece of furniture from IKEA. I could do it, but it was going to take a little time.

  Finn gave me the key to his place back in August when he was out of town and needed a signature for a delivery. When I tried to return it, he shook his head and told me to keep it. I’d been tempted to view the gesture as romantic at the time, but he’d quickly changed the subject to something very unromantic like the new blender he was thinking of purchasing. I remembered hiding my grin behind my coffee mug, thinking his studied nonchalance was kind of adorable.

  I stirred my Bolognese and took a quick peek past the mess on the island to the neatly set table for two next to the window. The salad was assembled and my back up pasta sauce was in the pan next to a pot filled with water ready to be boiled for pasta. A bottle of red wine was breathing on the counter and jazz was playing softly through the speaker system. I was ready. Or I would be after I cleaned up.

  “Josh?”

  “Hey! In the kitchen,” I called out.

  Oh shit. I madly rushed to throw onion peels, empty tomato cans, bits of carrots and other debris into the trash. I couldn’t do much about the flecks of sauce splatter without putting some real elbow grease into the effort.

  “Whoa! What’s all this?”

  I wiped my hands on my jeans as I skirted the island to greet my lover. “I made dinner. Welcome home.”

  Finn pulled me into his arms and held me close. “This is a nice surprise.”

  I stepped backward and splayed my hands over his suit coat then coyly met his gaze. “You may want to reserve judgment until after you’ve had a bite. But I came prepared with backup. If everything sucks, we always have wine.”

  Finn chuckled lightly before crashing his mouth over mine. He softened his lips, allowing the ardent kiss to give way to something almost unbearably sweet. When we broke for air, I swayed on my feet and blinked like I was coming out of a dark cave into a brilliant light.

  “God, I want you. I don’t understand why this isn’t going away,” he muttered.

  “Do you want me to leave?” I teased, nibbling his lower lip.

  “Never.”

  He released me and shrugged off his coat then hung it over one of the barstools. I grabbed the wine then poured two glasses and handed one to Finn. Then I gestured for him to take a seat at the table while I grabbed the bread and olives I’d bought as an appetizer. I collapsed onto the chair next to his and picked up my glass in a toast. “Sláinte.”

  Finn smiled and tapped his wineglass against mine. “Tell me what I missed this week.”

  “We talked every day. You know everything. I worked, applied to a couple more grad schools, hung with my friends. Nothing exciting. How about you? Any news about the baby?”

  “That’s months away,” he glibly replied.

  “Don’t you talk to Scarlet every day?”

  I winced the second the words left my mouth. There was an accusatory edge to them I didn’t like. Finn cocked his head curiously. He’d obviously noted it too.

  “Not every day,” he sipped his wine, observing me carefully over the rim of his glass.

  I felt like a bug under a microscope. Worse yet, that gnawing feeling of uncertainty was back in spades. The half questions and vague answers invited suspicion and made my stomach ache. I pasted a smile on my face and tri
ed again.

  “How is she feeling?”

  “Rotten. She has morning sickness now, and it seems to last all day.”

  “Oh. That’s too bad. Maybe you should bring her ginger ale or something,” I said helpfully.

  “Hmm. Maybe.”

  I narrowed my gaze and bit the inside of my cheek. My companion was preoccupied, and he looked mentally and physically exhausted. I wanted to credit jet leg and the strain of keeping up with running a business in two time zones, but I had a niggling feeling there was more to it. Although I wouldn’t have been surprised if I was guilty of reading into his mood. He was making me nervous. I felt like I was walking on eggshells suddenly and I didn’t like it at all.

  “I can go with you if you want. I’ve seen Scarlet from afar but we’ve never been formally introduced.”

  “You haven’t?” he asked, seeming mildly bewildered by the oversight though I was sure this wasn’t the first time I’d mentioned it. “She’s nice. You’d like her.”

  “I’m sure, but honestly, I’m more curious about meeting your kid.” My tone was playful but deliberate. Fuck, I sounded like my mother. The passive aggressive repartee was constraining and claustrophobic.

  Finn let out a humorless huff. “That won’t happen for a while yet, Joshy.”

  “Okay but I could talk to her stomach. Don’t you do that? You should. I read that it’s as important for fathers to communicate with their unborn babies in the womb as mothers. That way, he or she will recognize you right away.”

  “I appreciate your enthusiasm, but I’m not raising this child. I don’t know anything about kids and…it would be difficult to even try from another state.”

  And there it was. The proverbial shoe I’d been waiting for him to drop.

  I stared at him for a long moment then set my glass down and swallowed hard. “Another state?”

  “Aye. I’m needed in Chicago for longer stretches than I’ve been currently doing.”

  “How long?” I choked in a strangled sounding voice.

  “I can’t say for sure. It might be three to six months or as long as a year or two. It will depend on market stability and…”