by Ella Frank
I stopped halfway through zipping up the bag, a memory of a particular summer roaring back to me with blinding force.
A blue tent.
My buddy, Gary.
My kid brother and his friend camping like dorks in the backyard.
And a side ditch, filled with…frogs.
“What?” Xander said, and I busted up laughing. “I’m so glad you think this is funny, Sean.”
“I don’t, I swear. Not this. That’s not why I’m laughing.”
“Then what are you laughing at?” Xander crossed his arms, and his arched eyebrow made me laugh even harder. He was going to kill me.
“It’s just… I have a confession to make.” I walked over to him and switched the flashlight off, but I was close enough that we could see each other’s faces without the light.
“A confession?”
“Yeah…but I want your assurance that whatever I say now can’t be held against me.”
Xander narrowed his eyes.
“Me and a friend of mine—Gary? We, um, we put the frogs in your tent that night.”
The silence that followed could only be likened to the silence before a storm. Then it hit—Hurricane Xander.
“What did you just say?”
“Me and my friend Gary—” Before I could finish, Xander snatched the flashlight out of my hand, turned on his heel, and marched off toward the woods. “Xander!” I shouted, then grabbed up the bag. “Come on. It was years ago. I’m sorry.”
“Sorry?” I could see him shaking his head as he tromped through the woods, all the while muttering obscenities. “He’s sorry.”
“I was just a stupid kid—”
“Stupid is right,” he called back to me. “Stupid. Moronic. Idiotic!”
Okay, so he wasn’t taking this particularly well. But, not about to let him out of sight in a place he didn’t know, I picked up the pace and finally caught up with him.
I dropped the backpack and wrapped an arm around his waist, and when Xander stiffened and began to squirm, I couldn’t stop laughing.
“Oh yeah, anchorman. Keep rubbing your ass against my cock. That’s a surefire way to get me to let go.”
Xander froze then turned his head to glare at me. “You’re an idiot.”
“So you just told me, and anyone else within a hundred-mile radius.”
“Which is how many people, exactly?”
“Zero,” I said by his ear. “But maybe a couple of frogs.”
“I hate you.”
“I might’ve believed that a couple weeks ago, but now…” I let go of him enough to turn him in my arms. “Now I know better.”
“You put a frog in my tent. I’ve been traumatized by that for years.”
“Technically, I put a frog in my brother’s tent. You were just an unwilling participant in my prank.”
Xander’s mouth fell open, but before he could say anything, I backed him up to a tree, trapping him between its thick trunk and me. I could feel his chest heaving against mine, and his erection brushed against my leg.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“With all that laughing, I don’t think I believe you.”
So uppity, so extremely hot. I wanted to strip him down right there. “Let me take you back to the cabin and I’ll prove it.”
Xander put his hands to my chest and shoved me, but there was a half grin on his lips, and he shined the flashlight in the direction of my stiff dick.
“You promise?”
“To prove it? Fuck yes. As many times as you want me to.”
Xander held his hand out. I slid mine into his, and he went to walk off in the direction he’d been going, but I tugged him to a stop.
“What?” he said.
I pointed in the opposite direction. “Home’s that way.”
He shined the light at the broken tree branches we’d obviously cleared on our way out here. “Don’t even think about laughing.”
I had to bite down extra hard to accomplish that, but somehow I managed, because I’d be damned if I ruined my chance to apologize to him when we got somewhere more comfortable—and hopefully frogless.
36
Xander
“HONEY, WE’RE ALMOST home…”
My eyes opened. I’d taken a nap on the last half of the drive back to Sean’s place. The night had been closing in, the car cloaked in shadows, as the soft beat of some old rock classic played in the background and we exited paradise and prepared to re-enter reality.
I couldn’t believe I’d survived nearly a whole week out in the wilderness. At first I’d thought the isolation would kill me, but after that first trip down to the river, I’d forgotten all about my cell phone.
Something that was made abundantly clear as I turned it on and message after message poured in. There were texts, voicemails, and emails galore. As it continued to ding with abandon, Sean side-eyed me and shook his head.
“Okay, Mr. Popular.”
I smirked. “Hey, you’re dating someone famous now. Better get used to it.”
Sean reached over and took my hand. “Is that what we’re doing? Dating?”
I rubbed my thumb over the back of his knuckles. “If you want to.”
“Seriously?”
“Well, you were the one who told me you tend to do casual hookups, because when you’re on the job all the other person does is nag, nag, nag.”
Sean’s lips twitched. “I did say that, huh? But then again, you usually make people sign an NDA before you have sex with them. And I don’t remember seeing one of them when you sat on my lap the other night.”
I shoved him in the arm, but then grew serious. “Really, though. We’ve been pretty isolated at my place, then yours, and now out here. You’re going to shock the hell out of people when you announce you’re dating a man.”
“I mean, I wasn’t planning to take out a billboard or anything, but…”
“You know what I mean,” I said, my mind immediately shifting to Bailey—the one person we’d yet to discuss in any detail. But we couldn’t ignore it any longer, especially now that things had grown serious. “Your family is going to have a lot of questions.”
“Bailey?”
“Bailey, Kieran…Henri.”
“Fuck Boudreaux. I don’t owe him any kind of explanation. He can shove his questions.”
I shook my head and squeezed Sean’s hand. “You might want to rethink that when we go to tell Bailey. This… I have no idea how he’s going to take this, and Henri is who he’s going to turn to.”
My phone dinged again, and when I looked down to see a text from the very man we were discussing, my stomach tied itself into a knot.
“It’s Bay, isn’t it?”
I rubbed a hand over my lips and nodded.
“Do you need to call him back?”
I opened the message to see him asking if we were coming over tomorrow for Saturday night dinner. It was written so casually, so innocently, but after the week I’d just spent with Sean, I became paranoid.
Maybe Bailey knew. Maybe he’d already worked out what was going on, and wanted to talk to us about it?
But no, that was foolish to think, and also really fucking cowardly. Bailey didn’t know what was going on—why would he? This was something we were going to have to tell him about.
We were in love, but it wasn’t just our lives that was going to change.
“We’re nearly home. I’ll call him then. He just wants to know if we’ll be there tomorrow night.”
“Ah, okay.” Sean rubbed a hand up and down my thigh. “You okay?”
“Yes,” I said automatically, but then shook my head. “No. Can I be honest?”
“Of course.”
I looked down at the phone, and then back to Sean. “I’m scared.”
Sean turned off the main road into a street that led back to his place. “Of Bailey’s reaction?”
“Yes.”
“I get that. I am too.”
We fell quiet as he pulled into his g
arage. I unbuckled my seatbelt and reached for the door handle, but Sean’s hand on my wrist halted me.
“Can I ask you something?”
I let go of the handle and twisted in my seat to face him. “Of course.”
“I want you to be honest with me.” His voice was so serious that I tensed up.
“I’m always honest with you.”
“Okay.” Sean swallowed and, for the first time maybe ever, appeared unsure of himself. “Are you worried about telling Bailey because you think I’m gonna change my mind or somehow fuck this up?”
Wow, talk about reality crashing back in. “Honest?”
Sean blinked and looked like he wanted to say no. But he nodded.
“At first, yes. Not the fucking up part, but you changing your mind. Back when this first started, I thought this thing between us was situational, circumstantial…”
Sean reached for his own seatbelt and freed it, then moved his hand to the door as though he were about to get out without responding. But at the last second, he stopped and looked at me.
“You said when it first started, you thought that.”
“Yes.”
“Then what do you think now, if it isn’t either of those two things?”
I leaned over and took Sean’s face between my hands. “I think this thing between us is essential. At least, it is to me.”
“Xander…” He sighed. “I know it’s selfish and he’s had you longer, but I don’t want to lose you.”
“You won’t.”
Sean rubbed his thumb over the pulse point on my wrist. “Tomorrow, when we go over there, we’ll sit Bailey down and talk to him together.”
“I think that’s the smartest thing to do.”
When his head snapped up, I tried for a tight smile.
“You do?”
“Yes. I do.”
“Oh, thank God. I’m glad that’s settled. Okay, let’s unpack.”
I nodded and climbed out of the car as Sean unlocked the house and turned off the alarm. When the trunk opened, I went to pull out my suitcase, but Sean gently shoved me out of the way.
“Uh uh. I’ve got it. You grab my duffel.”
I crossed my arms and eyed him as he pulled my suitcase from the back and set it on the ground.
“You do know I can carry that myself, right?”
Sean looked to the bag and then back to me. “Right, but then I can’t show off my big, brawny muscles.”
“Brawny? What are you, a paper towel ad?”
Sean scoffed and wrapped his arm around my waist. “Quit bitching at me, anchorman. If I want to show off for you now that I’m not an invalid, just let me.”
I ran my palms up his chest and over his shoulders, then looped my arms around his neck. “I’m sorry. Please, show off all you like.”
Sean groaned and took my mouth in a kiss that would’ve knocked me on my ass had he not been holding me up. It’d been too long since I’d had his mouth on mine, and as I greedily took what he was eager to give, I forgot all about the bags. He turned me until my ass was hitting the back bumper, then lifted me so I was sitting on the floor of the trunk.
“You’re asking for it,” he said.
“Am I?” I spread my legs and wound them around the back of his thighs.
He grabbed my shirt and hauled me up. “Yeah, you fucking are.”
“So, why don’t you do something about it?”
Sean’s chest was heaving, his erection throbbing against mine. He crashed his lips against my mouth, and I moaned. I’d been waiting for this. Waiting for Sean to let go and take what he wanted the way he wanted. Rougher, harder, it was right there simmering just beneath the surface.
I reached for his shorts wanting to get my hands down his pants and on the cock he was grinding all over me. As I popped the button open and slid the zipper down, I heard my name and pulled my mouth free. But when Sean just looked at me, hungry and ready to dive back in, I let go and looked around his shoulder, suddenly realizing he wasn’t the one who’d just said my name.
37
Sean
“XANDER? SEAN?” THE sound of my name being uttered in that familial voice made me stiffen.
Much like myself, Xander had gone from firestorm to iceberg in the space of three seconds, and I knew my worst fucking nightmare had just come true.
Wincing, I let go of Xander and heard, “Oh my God. It is you.”
“Bailey.” Xander looked past me as he struggled to get to his feet, and once he was out of the trunk, I turned to see my brother standing in my driveway with a bag of groceries in his hand, his mouth hanging open.
“I…I…” Bailey’s eyes ping-ponged between us. “You… Were you just kissing Sean?”
Xander looked to me, his expression full of guilt. Though it killed me to see, I knew it wasn’t directed at me.
How did I know that? I felt the exact same way.
“Yes,” Xander finally said.
“Yes?” Bailey swung his eyes to me and blinked like he was trying to clear his vision, like he was trying to understand. “What do you mean, yes? Sean’s… He’s straight.”
Xander took a step forward and went to reach for Bailey’s hand, but he quickly snatched it back.
“Don’t touch me.”
“Okay,” Xander said, holding his hands up as though trying to calm the nearly vibrating man in front of him. I’d only ever seen Bailey this angry once before: the day we’d found out about our father. Xander had been the one to calm him then, but I wasn’t so sure he’d have the same luck now.
“Bailey,” Xander said, “if you’ll just let us talk to you for a minute, we can try to explain—”
“Us? We?” Bailey reared back as though Xander had sucker-punched him. “What the fuck are you talking about? Why were you kissing Sean, Xander? How about you start by explaining that.”
Xander blanched, and, unable to stand there and watch this go on any longer without saying something, I finally spoke up. “Bay.”
Bailey’s jaw bunched, but he didn’t look my way. His fingers were curled around the keys he held, and his cheek had begun to twitch—not good.
“If you’d just listen—”
“Shut up, Sean.”
“Hey, you need to listen for a fucking minute.”
“Why? So you can both lie to me some more?” Bailey’s tone was so biting, so ice cold, that I barely recognized it. His eyes were still locked on Xander, the look of betrayal heart-wrenching even to me, the outsider in this equation.
“Bailey,” I said, about to tell him to calm the hell down.
Xander reached for my arm and shook his head. “No. He’s right. We did lie to him.” Xander looked to Bailey and shook his head. “If I was in your shoes, I’d be just as angry. But you asked me a question, and you deserve an answer. Why was I kissing Sean?”
Bailey swallowed, and for a second I thought he might throw up.
“The simple answer is that I like kissing him. The complicated answer? You’re not ready to hear that yet.”
“Fuck you,” Bailey spat out, his eyes welling, the pain and humiliation evident on his features. “Don’t treat me like I’m a kid, Xander. Simple and complicated? Seems pretty straightforward to me. You were hard up after not getting any over the past month and went after the biggest dick around.”
Okay, ouch. I’d had no clue how Bailey would react to the news of us being together, but I hadn’t expected this anger. “Bay, come on. You need to settle down.”
“Or what? You’re going to make me?” Bailey let out a derisive laugh that sent a shiver up my spine. “You know, I didn’t think there was a lower place for you to sink to than the way you treated Henri when we first met. But congratulations, you found one. My best friend, Sean, really?”
Bailey’s eyes flicked back to Xander as he backed up a step. “And you. My brother? Wow…” Bailey scrubbed a hand over his buzzed head. “You two fucking deserve each other.”
“Bailey!” I shouted as he dropped th
e groceries on the ground and stormed off down the driveway, but when I went to go after him, Xander grabbed my arm.
“Let him go,” he said in a voice that was barely audible.
I turned back to see tears running down his face and felt completely and utterly helpless.
Two of the people I loved most in the world were hurting right now, and I didn’t know how to help either one.
“I’m sure I can still catch up with him. Let me go and—”
“Sean?”
“Yeah?”
“We need to let him go.”
I searched Xander’s face, wanting to make sure he really meant what he was saying. When he brought his hands up to his mouth and his shoulders began to shake, I pulled him into my arms and held on tight.
“He hates me.”
“No,” I said as we stood there in my drive, the night surrounding us. But unlike last night, there was no peace from this darkness, just turmoil and pain. “He’s just angry and confused, but he doesn’t hate you. He loves you.” I swiped a tear from his cheek and offered a half-smile. “Messy and complicated, remember? That’s how you described this love thing, right?”
“Right.”
“Then we all must be doing something right. Because this is all kinds of messed up.”
Xander nodded, and I kissed his temple.
“He’ll come around. You’ll see.”
I’d faced down gang leaders, murderers, and strung-out drug lords in my line of work, but I’d never been more terrified than I was right now, wondering what would happen if Bailey didn’t come around.
Would Xander leave me? Would he think it easier or smarter to cut his losses now, and salvage a friendship he’d treasured for years?
No, that was just crazy thinking. We loved each other and we’d work through this together. Bailey would eventually see that this was a good thing, and then everything would go back to normal—right?
Right.
But what if it didn’t?
Thank You
Thank you for reading BREAKING NEWS. I hope you enjoyed watching Sean and Xander fall in love as much as I did!