by Renae Kaye
There was only one person left in the room who hadn’t agreed. Six-foot-four Aaron. He looked dismayed and stared directly at me as he said, “You mean I don’t get to tell the guys at work that my friend Shane is playing hide the salami with Bro-Jak?”
A collective groan echoed around the room.
“Du-ude.”
“Did he just say—?”
“Oh my gawd.”
“I say we all piss on his grass.”
“I’m going to have to say nine Hail Marys for the sin of loving that man.”
“If we all piss in the same spot on his grass, I’m sure it will kill it. Let’s pick a patch right in the middle.”
Aaron looked around in confusion. “What did I say?”
Chapter Thirty-One
DANIEL LEFT, and Ambrose came. That was a good thing, because I came too.
After the confessions to our mothers and then my friends, I was feeling pretty ragged, but Ambrose knew exactly how to make me feel better. He started by pushing me up against the door and kissing me senseless and ended with fucking me senseless into the bed. It turned out that leaving the brace on his leg and pushing me flat against the sheets, Ambrose could get enough leverage to make it much better for both of us.
I groaned loudly as Ambrose pulled out of me. He groaned even louder as he rolled to the side and flopped on his back. When I turned, I saw him clutch his thigh.
“You hurt that knee, didn’t you?”
“Yes. Now shut up.”
I sighed noisily. “Why didn’t you stop if it was hurting?”
“It wasn’t hurting at the time. Or perhaps it was, but there were other things more important than a little bit of pain.”
I rolled my eyes and heaved myself up. “I’ll get your painkillers.”
“Thank you.”
I fetched them from his bag and grabbed a glass of water for him to swallow them down with. To my surprise, Ambrose unsubtly checked me out as I walked naked into the room with his medicines. To be fair, I was checking him out too. I was still getting used to the new tattoo of the dreamtime snake on his shoulder. But he was gorgeous. I knew it wouldn’t matter to me if he didn’t stay the fit, muscled prime specimen of manhood he currently was. I loved his body, but I loved the man inside more.
And most importantly there was a connection between the two of us that transcended the physical and mental.
So if I could enjoy him no matter what his body looked like, did that mean Ambrose enjoyed my shorter, paler, nearly-to-flab body?
“Were you just checking me out?” I asked, emboldened by the fact that we were moving in together… which I would have to break to my manager the next day.
“’Course I was.” He said it like duh, Shane.
I looked down at my naked body. Nope. I hadn’t grown muscles since I last looked.
Ambrose sighed noisily and held out his hand for me to come closer. I passed over the bag of pills, which he fished in until he found the box he wanted. Then I passed the glass of water, and he sat up carefully, swallowed down the pills, and placed the glass on the bedside table. To my surprise he reached out and touched my leg in a caressing manner. I smiled and sat on the bed next to him, happy to be in his presence.
“Don’t you get it?” he asked curiously.
I shook my head. “Get what?”
“You.” He stared at me intently. “I want you. You’re the one I want and need. And yes, love. I’m sorry if you needed me to say it and I hadn’t. I love you. I love Shane. I don’t love everyone, and looks actually mean very little to me. The person inside you is the person I love. Not your body.” Hadn’t I only that minute been thinking the same about him? “Which, by the way,” he went on, “is mighty fine, and please stop putting yourself down.”
To illustrate his point, he ran his hand up the inside of my thigh and brushed his fingers against my cock. My stomach muscles clenched, and despite the recent orgasm, I could feel my arousal rising.
I looked down at his cock and felt my arousal spike. His stomach was within reach, so I touched. He loved me, and I had permission. Those stomach muscles were hard and gave me funny feelings when I thought about all the work he’d put into them. Ambrose’s drive was part of what I admired the most in him.
I ran my hand up his side and gave him a gentle push so he got the message to lie back down on the bed. Then I lifted his arm and checked out our tattoo again.
It was our tattoo. It was me and him.
“I love you,” I said as I traced the picture. It still blew me away that he’d felt so deeply about me that he’d got it permanently etched into his skin. “Should I get the same tattoo? What do you think? Where would I put it on me?”
Ambrose didn’t answer, so I looked up with concern to see him biting his lip.
“What?”
We stared at each other. His face was as familiar to me as my own. I loved him so much.
“You love me?” he asked.
Hadn’t I ever said that? Wasn’t it clear? Maybe just like Daniel could see that Ambrose loved me, but I couldn’t, maybe Ambrose couldn’t see that I loved him.
“Ambrose Jakoby? I love you. I think I fell in love with you when you were fourteen and told Hunter Mackenzie to leave me alone. It was certainly the first time I became aware of you as more than just a friend. I loved you when you went to Melbourne. I’ve loved you every time you’ve come home. I haven’t stopped loving you one little bit. I think I’m doomed to love you forever.”
He blinked a couple of times in rapid succession. “You love Ambrose, right? Not Bro-Jak?”
I leaned down and kissed him gently. It wasn’t a short kiss. “I loved you before you were Bro-Jak, so what does that tell you? I love you off the field. And until recently, I’ve never told anyone I even knew you. Do you think, if I had an infatuation for Bro-Jak, that I would’ve done that?”
He looked satisfied with my answer, and he moved his hand to caress my nipple. I touched the tattoo again.
“So? Where do you think I should get my tattoo? When I get to Melbourne, we’ll go to the same tattoo artist, and I’ll get inked, just for you. But where? Where would it hurt the least? Because I’m not really into pain.”
His hand moved to the side of my rib cage. “Here. The same place. I got the tattoo of us there because that’s where I always want you. By my side, right next to my heart. It had to be next to my heart.”
I was not going to cry. I was not. I would not. I swallowed and tried to keep it in. When it was clear that I couldn’t, I pitched forward and buried my nose in the curve of his neck. I reasoned he wouldn’t know if it was snot or tears if I hid it. Okay, I also loved the smell of his skin and the sensation of him against me.
“I love you, Ambrose.” I said the words against his neck and added a kiss so the saliva would blend with the tears.
He brought his arms around me, and we rolled on the bed until we were side by side and holding fast. “I’m sorry it took so long to tell you I love you too, Shane. You were always there. I just didn’t know what to do with it. And then I didn’t know what to do when suddenly you were no longer at my side. I’ve been so lost this year.”
“Your mum mentioned your playing has been off. That’s not why, is it?”
He didn’t answer, so I pulled back and casually wiped his neck, just in case it was snot. He looked guilty.
“Ambrose? You know you can tell me anything, right?”
He looked down, not meeting my gaze but not letting me go either.
“I haven’t been playing at my top form this year. Oh, it was fine to get by, but I knew I could do more. The coaches knew as well, and they’ve been on my back. But I couldn’t be bothered. I mean, stuff with you has been going around and around in my head. And then my knee wasn’t quite right, and I knew it, but I didn’t say anything. They strapped my knee the last game, and the strapping wasn’t quite right….”
I gasped. “And you didn’t say anything? You just left it?”
H
e shrugged. “I couldn’t be bothered. I think I wanted to get hurt. I think… I think I deserved to get hurt, the way I hurt you.”
“No.” I was firm in my rebuke. “For a start, there’s no way you have to do penance by physically injuring yourself. And secondly, don’t put that on me. Don’t say it was my fault you got injured. Because then I’ll start thinking that if I hadn’t upset you, then you wouldn’t be hurt, and then my guilt will crush me.”
He frowned. “No. None of it’s your fault.”
“No,” I agreed. “You were distracted and not playing to your full potential, but that’s not anyone’s fault. Let’s agree on that. It’s in the past—water under the bridge. You’re going to get better, and you’re going to get your head back in the game. And I’m going to be there to help you. And from now on, we’ll do it all together. Right?”
He kissed me. “Right.”
“Good.”
He let his hand drift from my shoulder, down my side, to my hip. Then he gave me a suggestive look. “And I think those painkillers are kicking in.”
“Oh, that’s good.”
“Yes. Good. Because I think we have years to make up for.”
I pretended to think about it. “But I was going to read my book. I’ve just got up to the chapter where the hero is about to—”
He cut me off by kissing me. “You can tell me over breakfast. You have more important things to do now.”
“I do?” I pretended surprise.
“Yep.”
He took my hand and brought it down to his cock, which had renewed in strength. “My coach says I need to train hard. He wants me to get better—mind and body. And I think this is a good place to start.”
I grinned and slid my fingers around his length. “Anything for Hawthorn’s star player. You know how much of a Hawks fan I am.”
“I thought you only went for Hawthorn because I played on that team?”
I could tease when I wanted to. “I was merely stroking your ego when I said that.”
“I like your stroking.” He looked down at where I held him tightly.
“Funny that.”
Epilogue
AMBROSE PLAYED his best season ever the following year. The commentators, the analysts, and even the coaches had written him off as someone who would return but not at full strength.
One thing to know about Ambrose—he doesn’t like the word no. He doesn’t like it when you say he can’t do something.
Ambrose was right about a lot of things. He was right about him being stronger mentally with my support. Daniel was my support. He showed me the ins and outs of the behind-the-scenes stuff. I joined the club as a member, and Dan and I got seats together so I could go to the games—undercover, as such. I also got to see what Ambrose meant about the women throwing themselves at him, even when I was standing right beside him. Not that they knew he was with me, but they didn’t care who saw or overheard their sexual invitations.
Ambrose used me as an excuse a lot of the time. “No, thank you. I’m here with my friend Shane. I can’t abandon him.”
Liam was also correct that it wouldn’t stay hidden. At first it all went really well. I quit my job, applied for a place at the University of Melbourne doing an arts degree in English, rented out my house, moved to Melbourne, and started my course in the new year.
In June, after Ambrose had been smashing on the field, the assistant coach dropped by one evening to speak with him. I think he suspected after that, but Ambrose assured me nothing was said. As long as Ambrose was playing well, no one wanted to tip the scales back the other way. So it wasn’t until after his season, during the win for marriage equality in Australia, that suddenly it came out.
Ambrose was asked point-blank by a reporter, and like we’d always said to our friends, we didn’t deny it, but luck was certainly on our side. The news hit during the off-season, during a time when the nation was celebrating LGBT, while we were in Perth away from the football crowd, and just after Ambrose had become involved in a youth charity that urged young minority kids to not give up their dreams. It heavily focused on indigenous kids, kids who’d immigrated from other countries, and kids who identified as LGBT.
Suddenly he had the support of the nation behind him—61.6 percent of them supported him with a tremendous yes vote—a newfound extended family from his father’s side, and a charity that loved him even more. Ambrose was in his element. He’d finally found all the pieces of himself and was happily putting them all together as we waited anxiously for the same-sex marriage bill to pass through the two houses of government.
Aaron proposed to Vinnie, even before the voting results were announced, so we were all anxiously watching for them. I wondered whether there was a proposal for Jamie coming too.
As for me? My mother said happiness glowed from me. Just before I moved to Melbourne, I got the courage to ask her about my father… and if he had anything to do with the house. It turned out Ambrose was right on the money. My mother thought about it for a day and then came back and confessed all.
My father was a married man, twenty years my mother’s senior, who was also my mother’s boss for forty years. He was still her boss. He’d been one of my bosses too when I worked for that company. To my utter dismay, Mum still referred to him as “Mr. Whittaker.” It’s startling when your mother doesn’t call your father by his given name. My conception came about when Mr. Whittaker’s wife was seriously ill with cancer and Mr. Whittaker needed some time for himself.
Romantic it was not. Did I think my mother was taken advantage of? Of course. But she had no regrets and said she knew what she was doing at the time. She denied she ever expected a wedding ring. But she did point out that it had guaranteed her a job for life. I acknowledged that women of my mother’s age were vulnerable because fewer employers would take a chance on a woman over fifty. Mum, it seemed, was a realist and a survivor. She had been promoted to her current position on her own merit, but she always had that ace up her sleeve.
When I needed a hand on the housing market, she calculated how much child support Mr. Whittaker hadn’t paid, and she facilitated the purchase of my house. She left it up to me whether I wanted to meet my father now that I knew who he was, but I’d seen no real need. Apparently I had a half sister, but I wasn’t interested. My family was Tracy and Ambrose.
And the boys.
They surrounded us with their love and support in the days after Ambrose came out. But after a year in Melbourne, my first tattoo, and Ambrose’s stellar season, we were stronger together, like we always said we would be.
Ambrose knew me, and I knew him, and sometimes that’s all that matters—not labels, not rings, not big announcements, not blood ties. Sometimes love is a thunderclap, a roaring of emotions, and a raging of hormones. Other times it’s the quiet of the turning of a page, the satisfaction of a job well done, and knowledge shared.
Ambrose loved me, and I loved him, and that’s definitely all that matters.
Interview Eleven
Ambrose
“WHEN DID you know that Shane was the one for you, Bro-Jak? How long did it take you to fall in love with him?”
Smiles. He moves his right hand to his left side and touches his rib cage.
“I was born loving him. But, as Daniel loves to point out, it took me twenty-seven years to realize it.”
Author’s Note
IF YOU enjoyed Shane and Ambrose’s story, don’t forget to check out the other stories in the series.
I often tell people that my author journey started with the words “I was going to miss my train.” That’s the opening sentence to the story, Loving Jay, and the event that led to Liam and Jay meeting that first fateful time. Loving Jay was the first story I ever published, and those characters hold a special place in my heart. It’s wonderful to include Liam and Jay in this book along with some of the others we met in that tale—John, Jackie, Aaron, and Ben.
After Loving Jay was published, I knew I wanted to give Jay some friends.
Someone as fabulous as Jamie surely had a fabulous circle of friends. The next thing I knew, Kee and Tate had materialized and were telling their story in Don’t Twunk With My Heart. It was during the writing of that story that I knew that Jay’s other friends all needed happy endings too. The first time Aaron wrestled Kee to the floor during Don’t Twunk With My Heart, I knew that Aaron needed his own story… and Vinnie was standing right next to him.
The whole gang reappeared during the writing of Knowing Me, Knowing You. I love those guys, and their personalities are strong in my mind. Even Vinnie’s large extended family made an appearance.
So one could perhaps say that the journey to creating Shane and Ambrose started with that first line I wrote in Loving Jay. But once I finished writing the story, I realized that the journey started even earlier than that. It started over a year before I wrote that line and a year before I even entertained the thought of becoming an author. It started with another line.
Mid-February, the city of Melbourne takes on a different smell.
That’s the first sentence in the book by Sean Kennedy, Tigers and Devils. I read that book and fell in love with the characters of Declan Tyler and Simon Murray. It was the first book by Dreamspinner Press that I’d read that was set in Australia… and I was hooked. It gave me hope for my own writing dreams. It made me think that maybe I too could write a book.
It’s therefore a privilege that I now call that author—Sean Kennedy—my friend, and he gave me permission to use his characters, Declan Tyler and Micah Johnson, in this story. Declan’s story starts in Tigers and Devils, and I highly recommend it. You can also meet Micah Johnson, the first out AFL player in The Ongoing Reformation of Micah Johnson, available through Harmony Ink.
More from Renae Kaye
Loving You: Book One
One thing Liam Turner knows for sure is that he’s not gay—after all, his father makes it very clear he’ll allow no son of his to be gay. And Liam believes it, until a chance meeting with James “Jay” Bell turns Liam’s world upside-down. Jay is vivacious and unabashedly gay—from the tips of his bleached hair to the ends of his polished nails. With a flair for fashion, overreaction, and an inability to cork his verbal diarrhea, Liam believes drama queen Jay must have a screw loose.