Dino said nothing, taking his shot and missing.
“What? Can’t say the word all of a sudden? Since when?” Forrester challenged, trying to temper his volume and failing miserably. “I know you got some good ones. Real funny stuff. Butt-pirate, peter-puffer, sperm-burper.” He gave his chin a sarcastic tap. “Though it doesn’t really make you burp, if you must know.”
Dino’s face twisted with shock and revulsion. “Keep it down, Frankie. You want somebody to hear you?”
“Or maybe you don’t want anyone to hear me.”
Looking around, Dino clenched his fists at his sides, like he wanted to hit him.
Forrester wished he would punch him.
At least that hurt would eventually heal.
He pursed his trembling lips, refusing to allow Dino to see the pain tearing him up inside. Then he threw his stick down on the slate, knocking the balls all over the felt. “Go fuck yourself, Dino!”
At the outburst, the people playing darts behind them turned to stare.
“Take a picture, it lasts longer,” Forrester snarled at them.
They rolled their eyes and returned to their game.
Forrester stormed back toward Kyle, shoving through the celebrating bar patrons. Maybe someone said something to him, but the blood thundered so loud in his ears, he couldn’t be sure. He snatched up Kyle’s beer and chugged it down.
“Hey, what’s—” Kyle stopped short when he saw Forrester. “I wasn’t going to finish that or anything.”
Wincing at the bitter flavor, Forrester slammed the empty bottle on the bar. “We’re leaving. Now.”
“Okay, I have to pay our tab first.”
“Then get to it,” he snapped, gesturing irritably. “I’ll be outside.”
He had to get out of there.
He didn’t know how to stop the combustible thing building up inside him. If he stayed a second longer, the explosion might come out in great hiccupping sobs or a murderous rampage.
Neither would be good.
He couldn’t believe this was how it had finally played out. He’d agonized over every scenario, telling them privately, getting caught walking into the Flames, some big Italian drama with the Spaghetti Hotline ringing off the hook. But in all of them, Dino had never been cruel. Laughing at him like his whole life was some hilarious joke? And his brothers had made a bet on him?
Rushing outside, he rubbed his face, fighting back tears. When the door shut, the raucous laughter inside the bar disappeared and the hot July air slapped his flaming cheeks like cruel fists. Wound tight and straining to burst, he couldn’t get enough air into his lungs. He paced outside the door, pulling off his hat and clenching fistfuls of his hair, trying to contain his emotions. In a matter of five minutes, he’d traversed elation, fear, anger.
And misery was close on its heels.
A familiar voice in the parking lot drew him up short. Squinting into the semidarkness, Forrester saw Joey, arms wide, arguing with a shorter man. He recognized the little greaseball immediately.
“Dammit,” Forrester spat, a cold fury welling up inside him and needing an outlet.
Alfie fucking Parisi seemed as good as any.
“Joey!” Forrester shouted, slamming his hat back on so his fists could be free. “What the fuck are you doing?”
His brother’s eyes widened, and Alfie frowned.
“Frankie, just wait a second,” Joey began as Forrester stormed forward. “Alfie and I are just talking.”
Alfie took a step back when Forrester pointed at him. “What did you get my brother into now, Alfie?”
Fast as lightning a strong hand gripped his arm, stopping him in his tracks.
Kyle had ahold of him. “Dammit, what’s the matter with you?”
The force of Kyle’s question stunned Forrester enough to freeze. He’d never heard Kyle raise his voice in anger, not even when Jasper pissed on the bed.
Blood still pounding, Forrester took a breath, the binds on his chest loosening. “Nothing, let’s go.” He planted his hands on his hips, turning his head side to side. “Where the fuck is the car?”
Kyle depressed the key fob, and the headlights flashed off to their right as the car chirped happily to indicate its location. Without another word, he walked away, and Forrester followed.
“Hey, Frankie, wait up,” Joey called.
With a growl, Forrester waved him off. “I don’t care anymore, Giuseppe.”
Looking none too pleased, Kyle opened the passenger door and gestured him inside like an errant child. “Get in.”
Forrester didn’t argue but obediently piled in, his entire body still vibrating with humiliation. Kyle slammed the car door, making Forrester jump. After he got behind the wheel, he repeated the door slamming. Offering Forrester a scowl, he wordlessly turned the engine over. Revving it once, he put the car in gear and pulled onto the main road.
Once they were a few miles away from the bar, Forrester’s heart rate returned to a less-than-fatal pace, and he realized what an ass he’d just been to Kyle. “I’m sorry.”
“Would you like to explain to me what that little psychotic episode was all about?” Kyle asked in a studied, calm voice—so calm it unsettled Forrester more than the yelling.
Forrester’s lip trembled, and tears smarted his eyes. His face contorted as he tried to stop them from falling, but he couldn’t. Burying his face in his hands, a broken sob escaped him.
“Babe? What’s wrong?”
“They made a bet on me,” he blubbered through a sudden flurry of tears. Dammit, I shouldn’t have drank so much!
“A bet on what? Oh, you don’t mean…?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I mean!”
Kyle placed an appeasing hand on his knee. “Please tell me what happened so we can talk about it. Rationally, huh? Not like some hysterical Italian opera, okay?”
Forrester gave him a begrudging sniff.
“There are tissues in the glove box,” Kyle told him in a softer tone, popping the compartment open for him.
After drying his face and regaining some semblance of composure, Forrester reached for Kyle’s hand. Anchored by the connection, his heart quieted, and he told Kyle everything.
“I can’t believe you said all that stuff to Dino.” Kyle’s expression was divided between disapproval and amusement. “Did you actually say butt-pirate?”
It might have been funny if Dino hadn’t been such a jerk.
“He just laughed at me,” Forrester muttered, his lips swollen.
“I’m so sorry.” Kyle stroked the back of his hand with his thumb.
His cell phone rang.
“You don’t have to answer it.”
Forrester looked at the caller ID. Joey. “Hello?”
“Why did you yell at me, then run off?” Joey asked, talking loud over the sounds of the bar in the background. “You coming back? I need you to spot me a twenty.”
The anger he thought he’d reined in roared back to life. “Why didn’t you get it from Alfie? Don’t you lie to me. You’re still hanging out with him, aren’t you?”
Joey sniffed. “Yeah, like you got any room to talk to me about lying. How long you been keeping it a secret that you’re queer?”
Squeezing his phone tight to his ear, he hissed, “Don’t you ever fucking call me a queer, Giuseppe Giordano! Don’t you ever say that word again, or so help me God, I’ll wring your fucking neck!”
“Jesus Mary and Joseph, don’t blow your O-ring,” he said with a liberal dose of sarcasm. “Fine, I won’t say it again. But don’t you call me a liar. Like I said before, I’m not working for Alfie and we’re not friends.”
Blood pounded in his ears. “Oh yeah? Then what was he doing there?”
“None of your business.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me,” Joey said in a high-and-mighty way. “If you can keep the secret that you’re gay, I can keep secrets too. How do you like them apples?”
Forrester liked them so
little he wanted to reach through the phone and throttle Joey.
A voice in the background cut him short. “Who’s gay, Joey?”
It sounded like Marla with the mouth as big as her tits. Before Forrester could tell Joey to keep his trap shut, he heard his brother reply, “My brother Frankie. I guess that dude Kyle was his boyfriend or partner. Whatever they call it. Yo, Frankie? Which is it? Boyfriend or partner? I don’t know all the gay lingo, and I don’t need you yelling at me about it again.”
Forrester’s mouth opened and closed like a landlocked fish’s. He lowered the phone from his ear, as if somehow not hearing Joey’s voice might make the last ten seconds disappear.
“What is it?” Kyle asked.
He gaped at the phone. “H—he just outed me. He….” Putting the phone back to his ear, he whispered, “Did you just out me at Smitty’s?”
“What do you mean out you?” Joey asked, confused. “I thought everybody knew. Dino came over and told me after you left. Even Amanda knows. I can’t believe Tony was right. Bastard made me pay up, and now I can’t pay my tab.”
Speechless, Forrester’s mouth remained open, but no sound beside unintelligible squeaks came out.
“What did you say, Frankie?” Joey asked. “I can barely hear you. Must be a bad connection.”
Forrester just shook his head, his entire body trembling, and disconnected his phone. He dropped it into his lap, staring at it as if it were a stick of dynamite ready to explode.
“What happened?” Kyle asked, dividing anxious looks between Forrester and the road.
“Joey just outed me. Right now the whole bar is laughing at me.”
“Maybe not,” Kyle said in a placating tone. “Maybe they realize this isn’t a joking matter.”
“You have no idea what they’re like when they’re drinking. Everything’s a joke. You should’ve heard how hard Dino was laughing.”
He’d desperately wanted to believe that while Dino might make gay jokes, he wouldn’t think Forrester was a joke.
Turned out his fears had been justified all along.
His cell sounded again. Like he wasn’t in possession of his own body, he answered it.
“Hey, Frankie. It’s me. You okay?”
Hearing Tony’s calm voice on the other end caused him to erupt like a volcano. “You fucking asshole!”
Kyle jumped when he shouted. “Babe, you need to calm down.”
“What the hell?” Tony sneered. “I was just calling to see how you were doing. What’s your problem?”
Forrester let out a loud laugh, which sounded insane even to his own ears. “You called to gloat, don’t even deny it, you asshole,” he growled, throttling the phone like he wished he could do to Tony. “I can’t believe you made a bet about me!”
“So what if I did?” Tony challenged. “You should’ve fessed up a long time ago.”
“Are you kidding me right now?” He sounded hysterical, he knew it, but he didn’t care. “You think it’s okay to make a bet on me like my life’s a ball game? Fuck you, Tony!”
Forrester fumbled for the stupid Disconnect button. He growled when he missed it, wishing he still had a flip phone so he could have the satisfaction of slamming it shut.
Rolling down the window and chucking it into the street was far more rewarding.
Noticing Kyle staring, mouth agape, Forrester realized he must look like a lunatic. “Sorry for shouting,” he mumbled.
Kyle merely pressed the button to roll up the window.
Chapter Twenty-Six
FORRESTER WOKE to a hand stroking his back. His eyes ached from last night’s tears, and his head pounded from all the alcohol. His mouth tasted like he’d eaten a bag of cotton balls dipped in sour apple. He bit back a gag.
In the light of morning, a deep sense of shame and loss consumed him. He wasn’t sorry for yelling at Tony, the jerk. And Joey? Well, he was up to something with Alfie, so he deserved to be yelled at. But he regretted saying all that stuff to Dino. He should’ve just punched him.
Then maybe Dino would hurt like Forrester did.
Kyle kissed his brow, his lips more heavenly than usual. “Did you sleep at all?”
“Maybe.” With a sigh, he drew Kyle back into bed with him. Kyle obliged, and Forrester pressed his face into his belly. “Do you think they told Ma yet?”
“No idea. You threw your phone out the window.”
He managed to sniff. “That’s right, I forgot. I’ll regret it when I have to pay for a new one, but I’m glad I don’t have to answer it.”
“What now?”
“I sure as hell ain’t going to Tony’s party tomorrow, that backstabbing bastard. Making a bet on me? The jerk.”
“Hon, yeah, it was a douche move, but if Tony suspected you were gay and never treated you any different, don’t you think you should give him a chance? And Joey was thoughtless, yeah, but he wasn’t cruel. I know Dino laughed, but I think they’ll come around.”
“I’m still not going to his stupid picnic.” He bristled, having had those hopeful thoughts in the last few hours but refusing to grant them quarter. His brothers thought it was all a joke.
Like Forrester was a joke.
“This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen,” he said again, voice cracking.
“I know.” Kyle released him and stood up. “Stay here, please.”
Half out of it, he watched Kyle disappear from the bedroom. When he returned, he had a damp washcloth. He pulled Forrester into a sit and, without asking, proceeded to wash his face. The cool cloth soothed his fevered skin, and he closed his eyes under the tender ministrations. The way Kyle lovingly cared for him made tears smart Forrester’s eyes.
“Shhh,” Kyle cooed. “No more crying. Let’s just try and relax today. Holly’s got the store, and she said you don’t need to come in.”
“Did you tell her what happened?”
“Yeah, I texted her and Lucas this morning.”
“What did they say?”
“Holly wants to beat up your brothers, and Lucas thinks we should call a family meeting to talk it out.”
“No. Way.”
“I know. I told them both to just sit tight and you’d call them when you’re ready.”
The morning sunlight mocked him with its cheery light. “What time is it?”
“Ten. They wanted to come over, but I said maybe later.”
Forrester lay back in their bed. “I don’t really wanna talk to anybody right now. Not with everything falling apart.”
“It’s not falling apart. It’s just some family drama,” Kyle assured him. “Don’t you guys always have that? I mean, what happened with you and Joey and your cousin Alfie in the parking lot?”
“How’d you know it was Alfie?”
“Well,” Kyle began, sitting back on the bed, legs crossed and washcloth in hand, “I had his file for a few days, remember? What’s going on with that?”
“Nothing. Alfie’s just bad news, and I told Joey to stop going to his nightclub. He was bouncing there for a while.”
Guilt burned under his skin when Kyle nodded, accepting his story.
You asshole, lying to Kyle….
Kyle leaned down and kissed him. Forrester relished the sweet taste of his mouth and drew their bodies flush, feeling revitalized. Basking in the beauty of embracing him and feeling Kyle’s muscled body wrapped around him felt wonderful. Not having Kyle in his life would be crippling to his very being.
He had to tell him the truth.
“I’m sorry,” Forrester said.
“No, don’t be sorry. Yeah, you acted a little crazy last night, but—”
He cut Kyle off with a finger to his lips. “No, I’m sorry I lied about Joey just now.”
Kyle’s face scrunched up. “What?”
Forrester spilled all of it. How Joey had been involved with storing Alfie’s boxes next door and the illegal alcohol from “some Mexicans.” And Joey supposedly quitting but still talking to Alfie.
�
�Wow.” Kyle sat at the edge of the bed afterward.
“Do you have to report Joey now?” he asked. “That’s why I didn’t say anything after Tony searched the shop. I didn’t want him to get into trouble.”
“Did he do anything besides pour booze into the bottles and load boxes?”
“I don’t think so.”
But with Joey, who knew what he’d gotten talked into?
“I’d like to talk to him,” Kyle said. “Maybe these Mexican guys are a lead on the heroin ring. Even if they aren’t, charges of bootlegging would be a nice thing to add to Alfie’s rap sheet.”
Forrester hesitated. “I don’t know. Joey isn’t the sharpest tack. He might say something wrong and get himself into more trouble.”
“I can talk to him privately,” Kyle suggested. “See if there’s enough reason to bring him in for a statement.”
“You sure he won’t get in trouble? He didn’t know it was illegal to sell booze that way, and he isn’t working there anymore.”
Kyle sighed. “More than likely, Alfie’s club will simply lose their liquor license. Alfie was his employer, but Joey can still be held accountable for illegal alcohol distribution. Though it’s unlikely. The prosecutor wants Alfie’s supplier, not a former employee pouring illegal booze. If he makes a statement, I’m sure it’ll be fine.” Kyle frowned. “I wish you would’ve told me about this sooner.”
The disapproval in Kyle’s gaze was like a knife in the heart. Forrester collapsed back on the bed and covered his face. “I couldn’t get Joey in trouble, and when Joey quit and you were off the case, I thought it didn’t matter. I only told you now because you’re the only one who loves me anymore. Please don’t be mad. I don’t wanna lose you too.”
“You think I’m gonna dump you over this?” Kyle said. “Nice to know you think I’m such a stand-up guy.”
He stared at Kyle, fighting a grin. “You’re not mad?”
“I’m not pleased, but if Joey makes a statement, then it should be no big deal.”
“Yeah, okay.” Hopefully, his brother wasn’t into anything more serious. “I should send them a message,” Forrester decided. “Can I borrow your phone?”
Kyle picked it up from the bedstand and unlocked it. When Forrester saw the picture on the screen, he drew up short. It was him and Jasper sleeping downstairs.
La Famiglia Page 27