by Lou Harper
The look Olly gave Rich was equivalent to a slap in the face. Or more like a fist to the jaw. “Fuck you, Dick.” Olly spat the words out. “I’m not here for you. I came to help Sandy out, and I’ll stay. If you don’t like it, too fucking bad. You can take your attitude and shove it up your ginger ass.” He was staring Rich down something fierce, but his smooth young face and the floppy blond hair shading his eyes ruined the effect. Like one pissed-off kitten, he was rather…NOT CUTE—Rich cut off that line of thinking real quick.
They kept glowering at each other, but Rich found it harder and harder to keep a straight face. The sillier he felt, the more his own irritation dribbled away. He didn’t even have to force his next smile. “My apologies. I meant no offense. If you wanna get down and dirty, be my guest.” Too late did he recognize the innuendo potential of his words.
Mercifully, Olly didn’t act on it. The stiff lines of his shoulder relaxed, and he finally blinked. “Well, okay, then.”
Sandy appeared, wearing different clothes than she had minutes before. “Sorry, guys, but I have to bolt. Allan—my agent—wants to meet right away, so we can accidentally run into a certain casting agent who’s about to have brunch at Spago. Allan’s brilliant—he has spies all over town. You see, there’s this movie—” She threw her hands up. “I’ll tell you later. We should postpone this whole painting thing till tomorrow.”
“Nonsense,” Olly cut in. “Rich and I’ll do fine without you. Go.”
She considered them with misgivings etched into her face. Her gaze fixed on Rich.
He shrugged. What was he supposed to do? Olly wanted to paint; Sandy wanted them to get along. “Go, sis. We’re grown men,” he said generously. “We can manage without you. It’ll be like a party.”
She didn’t seem quite convinced, but the urgency of her business won out. She rushed off, shouting, “Play nice!” over her shoulder.
Rich went to the fridge and grabbed a beer.
Rich gave Olly a swift demonstration on the use of the power roller—it was not rocket science. Of course, he could’ve commandeered the tool for himself and let Olly toil away with the manual roller, but he didn’t. He just couldn’t bring himself to be an asshole enough. And anyway, the extra care needed for the old-fashioned method would do well to occupy his mind. He took the radio and fumbled with the tuner till he found a station playing something loud. Olly made no comment.
They started in the master bedroom. The only piece of furniture to cover up was the bed—they covered it up and moved it into the middle. In the master bath, Rich had to tape around the tiles and cover the fixtures, but it was easy enough. Ditto with the second bathroom. Fortunately, he’d already put a layer of primer on before he and Sandy moved in. They painted those rooms in different shades of pale green called “Lazy Caterpillar” and “Olive Martini”. Rich wondered if he could make a new career in naming paint colors. Was the world ready for “Self-loathing Gray” and “Crushing Anxiety Blue”?
They worked without exchanging more than a few words. Olly either sensed his desire or was sulking. Either was fine with Rich. Olly pulled more than his weight—Rich had to give the guy as much—and they were making good time.
They had to communicate about paint and cleaning their tools as they moved on. Sandy liked colors, and the living room and dining room were to be “Firefly Glow” yellow, and the kitchen a pale blue called “Ice Fishing”. It was getting hot inside even with the windows open, and Olly took his shirt off. Not only that, but he began to hum with the music and swiveling his hips to the beat. Every time Rich looked, there he was, sinuous body decorated with yellow splatters like some exotic wildlife.
Rich’s irritation was trickling back, but it was different, laced with something too much like foreboding.
To make things worse, nobody seemed to have taught Olly how to hold a proper grudge, and he was too social to figure it out for himself. “Is this what you do? I mean for a living,” he asked halfway through the kitchen.
“This and that,” Rich grunted. “I’m an out-of-work odd-job man now.”
“Sandy never told me she had a brother.”
“She never told me she had a pet,” Rich snarked, and it put an end to their chitchat. Olly pressed his lips together, transforming their curvy fullness into a thin line, and grabbed the roller.
Whatever. Rich didn’t give a hoot about Olly’s stony expression or the stiff lines of his back as he attacked the wall. Taking the radio along, Rich moved on to do the laundry room.
Sandy texted later, letting Rich know she wouldn’t be back till the evening. Fucking fantastic.
Rich cranked the music up even louder, but it didn’t help. An internal monologue kept running in his head, raging against pretty much everything—Olly, the color of the paint Sandy had picked, the heat, Olly… The guy kept sticking in his craw, and he didn’t need any more crap to deal with. Some days he felt as if the weight on his shoulders might squash him flat. He kept self-medicating with beer, careful not to get fall-down drunk but to keep numb.
Olly ordered pizza for lunch without asking Rich first, letting him know only when it arrived. They scarfed it up without a word and got back to work. Rich kept rolling the paint and churning his frustrations till his head and shoulders ached and his head was threatening to join in. But at least he finished the kitchen and the laundry room both.
Rich went to check on Olly’s progress, but his phone rang. Glancing at the caller ID made his gut clench. He should have deleted Julie’s photo a long time ago. He must’ve forgotten—they hadn’t talked since the breakup. He glanced around and saw Olly was almost done too. Rich quickly ducked into his room—the only room they hadn’t painted—and sat on the plain mattress on the floor before answering.
“Rich, how are you doing?” The concern in her voice was genuine, and it irked him even more.
“Fine. What do you care?”
“You know I still care about you.”
“You had a funny way of showing it.” He knew he was being unfair, but he simply couldn’t stop himself.
“Rich! We’ve been through this. You can’t have a relationship with someone who keeps parts of himself locked away.”
“You overestimate me. What you see is all there is.”
“Bullshit.” There was a long silence on the line, and Rich expected her to hang up, but she spoke again, her voice tight with self-control. “I don’t want to argue. I called because I’m selling the condo. We bought it together, so you should know. It isn’t worth as much as I hoped, but still.”
“It’s in your name—you do with it as you want. Is that all?”
“No. There’s something else.” She took a pause again, shorter this time. “Martin—your former boss, in case you don’t remember—he convinced Scott to take an early retirement, and brought in a new accountant. They are going over all the books.”
Martin Doss—the D in WDIC Financing—had the means to force out Scott Silva, the company’s head accountant. The only person to oppose him, Donald Willson—the W in the firm’s name and Rich’s father—was dead. The other two board members had always gone along with Martin’s wishes. “This should concern me why?” Rich forced the words out, though his heart thumped like mad. Those accounting books contained a secret he didn’t want anyone to see, and Scott had been the one guarding it.
“I don’t know, Rich. You tell me,” Julie replied. “Scott seemed to think you’d care. During his farewell party, he pulled me aside and made all sorts of insinuations.”
Sharp pain shot behind Rich’s eyes. “You misunderstood. He must’ve been drunk.” He tried not to panic. Maybe Scott had buried the dirty secret deep enough, and the new guy wouldn’t find it.
A movement at the edge of his vision made Rich glance up, and through blurry vision he saw Olly standing in the doorway, eyes big, lips slightly parted. So very bright and innocent, it hurt. Everything Rich wasn’t. In a bolt of fury, Rich leapt up and shouted, “What the fuck are you snooping around for?
I don’t care how far up my sister’s ass you are, keep your fruity nose out of my business!” He slammed the door on Olly’s shocked face.
Rich didn’t know how he finished the call. Only that he sat on the edge of the mattress with his head between his knees, trying to breathe for a long time. When he finally pulled himself together enough to stand, his head was pounding. He wandered out of his room. The living and dining rooms were done, the rollers were rinsed and lined up in a neat row, and water was running through the power roller into a bucket. Olly was gone.
Rich rubbed his temples. He needed a drink, but not beer. Something stronger.
Sandy found Rich sitting in the backyard, propped against a tree and nursing a fifth of Wild Turkey. He wasn’t thoroughly smashed yet, but on his way.
She sighed. “Oh, Richard.”
He hated when she said Oh, Richard. She sounded just like their mother. It was like sadness and disappointment fermented, distilled and aged into two little words. “Oh, Sandy,” he said, trying to throw the sentiment back at her, but his words tripped and tumbled.
She slumped onto the milk crate next to him and motioned for the bottle. She took a swig. “What’s the matter?” she asked.
“Nothing. Can’t a man get plastered without a reason?”
“Uh-huh. There’s always a reason. Sorry I bailed on you guys. You did an excellent job. I’m taking you both out to dinner.”
“Oh that… Yeah, your friend might not want to hang out with me no more.”
Her face turned to thunder. “What the fuck did you do?”
He had to look away, couldn’t take the sting of her scowl. “I might have yelled at him. He left without saying good-bye.”
“What the hell is wrong with you? Why do you keep pushing away the people who care about you and embrace the assholes who don’t give a shit if you live or die?”
“I hardly think the kid gives a shit about me, one way or the other,” Rich said to his defense.
“Olly could be good for you,” she stated simply, but the words cut deep.
“I’m not a fruit!”
Her eyes flashed, and she pointed an accusing finger at his chest. “Listen to yourself—you even sound like the old bastard. He’s dead but still pulling your strings.”
“The old bastard you’re referring to is our father, I assume.” Now Rich’s voice dripped with bile.
Sandy wouldn’t be intimidated. “Not mine. My father is Simon Baker—the man who came to my school plays and stayed up all night when I was sick. Donald was nothing but a sperm donor. He ignored me for the first eight years of my life—and that was when I was still living under his roof. Once Mom divorced him, he never even sent a Christmas card. All because I was a useless girl. And I count myself the lucky one. He got his claws in you. And for fucking what?”
“Father was a man of principles,” Rich said stubbornly. He wanted desperately to believe it.
She didn’t. “He was a coldhearted bastard—that’s what he was, and you know it. I tried to make peace with him, I really did, but he wouldn’t have any of it. Did you know that in thirteen years of marriage, he never once told Mother he loved her?”
“Why did she marry him, then?”
“Because she was seventeen and pregnant.”
“And whose fault was that?” Rich griped without conviction.
“Don’t be an ass. He was fifteen years older.” She took another deep swig of bourbon. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Keeping her hand wrapped around the bottle, she pointed her finger at him once more. “Chard, you need to get the old man out of your system before you turn into him. He was a spiteful, miserable bastard his whole life, down to the last bitter moment. I know you—you’re better than him.”
Recognizing he was losing the argument, Rich snatched the bottle back. “I’m not drunk enough for this lecture.”
She sighed. “Fine. Be an asshole. I’m gonna call Olly and apologize for you. And tomorrow, when you’re sober, you’ll apologize too,” she added with finality.
Chapter Three
Olly had fumed to himself the whole drive back to Hollywood, and as soon as he arrived home, he dialed Jem. “I want to strangle the son of a bitch. Can we have Mme. Layla put a curse on him? Maybe a jinx to make his prick fall off?” Deep down, Olly was mostly mad at himself for trying to be friendly with Rich. If it wasn’t for the look on the guy’s face as he was working on the mantel… Rich seemed like a completely different person then—focused but without the tension. So…likable. It was what made him approach Rich.
“Sorry, Mme. Layla doesn’t do hostile spells,” Jem said, dousing Olly’s hopes. “But it seems to me this guy could use some aura cleansing.”
“More like a high colonic with a fire hose.”
“Ouch. Are you sure you’re not just being oversensitive?”
“He was an ass to me from the moment we met. You know, like those fuckers who act like they could smell the gay on you and turn their noses up. He called me a prancing queen! I don’t prance!”
“Uh-huh.”
“The funny thing is…” Olly trailed off as he cast his mind back on the small details of the day.
“What?” Jem asked.
“Well…I’m not convinced he’s all that straight. There were moments when I could’ve sworn he was cruising me. Nothing obvious, only sneaky sideways glances. You know what I mean?”
“You always think men are cruising you,” Jem pointed out.
“They usually are. It’s my charming personality.”
“Uh, right. So why don’t you just stay away till he leaves town?”
Olly had considered the option and rejected it. “I’ve already switched shifts with Barbara to be free tomorrow, and anyway, I made a promise to Sandy. At the very least, I need to go over in the morning, and we’ll see then. The painting’s mostly done anyway, and I don’t think I can lift another paint roller any time soon. My shoulders are killing me.”
“Wanna come over? I’ll give you a back rub.”
“Thanks, but I’ll take a rain check. I have a date tonight. Well, an implied date.”
“Oh, the demo guy.”
“Yup. Me and my roomies are going out to Ombre, and I expect Hunter to be there too. But I think I’ll take a nap first. I’ll see you on Sunday. Oh, and give Nick a kiss from me—a deep one with tongue.” The prospect of seeing Hunter again swept Olly’s irritation aside, and he was starting to feel good about the world again.
Jem chuckled. “I will, but not from you.”
Neither Dylan nor Teague had their own car, and Olly refused to drive. Finding parking in West Hollywood on a Friday night would’ve been a pain in the ass even with his smart car, and he also didn’t want to drive back while intoxicated, even if it was a short distance. So they took a cab and split the fare three ways.
Ombre was in its weekend glory, complete with thumping music you could feel in your bones, sweat-glazed go-go dancers shaking their booties, and gay men of every shape, color, size and state of undress. A veritable sausage market. For the first two hours, Olly danced, got felt up, had three appletinis and turned down three separate propositions. He wasn’t against casual hookups on principle, but he was so over them. Sure, you got your rocks off, but they never led anywhere. Olly was longing for something more. Someone to wake up next to in the morning, and not having to rack his brain for their names. Seeing Jem and Nick together, the affection, private jokes and all that corny crap, made him feel so very lonely. By the way, where the hell was Hunter?
The question barely crossed his mind when he felt a warm body press to his back and hands brush against his thigh and hip.
“Thinking about me?” Hunter whispered into Olly’s ear.
“Maybe.” Olly twisted his head for a better view. Hunter’s eyes seemed to glow with golden mischief in the dark.
Their bodies synched in a heartbeat and began to gyrate in the same rhythm. Starting from the points of contact, arousal engulfed Olly’s body to the
tips of his hair.
As Olly’s ass ground into Hunter’s groin, through the layers of fabric he could feel Hunter’s answering hardness. Maybe it wasn’t sparks, but there was definitely something in the air. When Hunter licked the sweat from the nape of his neck, Olly shuddered. He let Hunter take his hand and pull him from the dance floor into a dark corner and press him into the wall. There were people all around them, but they were only vague shapes, and if Hunter wanted to— Olly didn’t get to finish the thought. The moment their lips touched, Hunter pulled back with a puzzled frown.
Hunter swept the palm of his hand over Olly’s chest. He stopped over the breast bone. Running his fingers to Olly’s neck, he tugged the coyote-fang pendant from under the T-shirt by its chain. “What’s this?” he asked.
“A charm to protect against evil spirits,” Olly replied, grinning as if making a joke.
Hunter, however, didn’t laugh. “So I see.”
Olly reached for Hunter so they could go back to kissing, but didn’t get far. Teague appeared from nowhere, his face full of worry and glitter. “Olly, I found you at last,” he shouted over the music. “I’m positive Dylan’s been roofied. He’s acting funny—more than usual. We better take him home but he’s not alone. I need you to get him away while I run interference.”
Olly’s head cleared in an instant. “Where is he?”
Teague gestured toward the bar and dashed off. Olly hurried after. They found Dylan listing dangerously on top of a barstool and giggling like a schoolgirl. The only thing keeping him from falling off was the meaty paw of a meaty guy. Olly had an instant dislike for the man—fake tan, fake smile, fake teeth.
Olly reached for his friend’s arm. “C’mon, Dylan, it’s time to go.”
Mr. Fake tightened his manicured fingers on Dylan’s shoulder. “We were just having a conversation. Dylan’s an adult. He can make his own decisions. Right, Dylan?”
Dylan grinned and nodded, but Teag pushed himself between them and glared at the guy. “Not after you drugged him, you fucking rapist!” Teag was the oldest and the brawniest of the three of them, but nothing like Dylan’s so-called date.