by P D Singer
“I don’t want to promise you an ‘us’ I may not be able to deliver. You could live here or sell. People will line up to buy it.” Jon was suddenly aware of how hard Davis pressed against his shoulder and thigh, and forced himself not to slide away.
“What if they can’t get financing? That’s what you’ve been predicting.”
“Manhattan real estate operates in a separate universe—you didn’t get a thirty-year mortgage on this place, and neither will any buyer. At worst you’ll adjust your asking price, which will be three or four times what you spent on the raw loft and finish.”
“At best, you might decide you like lofts better when they’re complete and furnished.” Davis slipped his hand into Jon’s, resting against Jon’s thigh.
If he didn’t pull away, Davis might be able to concentrate on what he was saying. Jon left their hands entwined. “It isn’t the loft, Davis. It’s the ‘us’. I’ve spent more energy than you can imagine making sure I never thought of you and me together in any way, and I trained myself so well that I had no fucking clue what Spencer was angry about all those years ago. Or about all your subtle little hints this last month.” He squeezed Davis’s hand. “Yeah, I know, you know the difference between me and Spencer, but you and he were the only brothers I had. Every thought I ever had about you, I had to smash down, because an honorable man doesn’t think that way about his brother. I got so good at smashing, it became automatic.”
Davis squeezed back. “Please tell me it was from lots of practice.”
“Lots.” Jon could give Davis that much. “And then I met Cam.”
“I spent a lot of hate on Cam,” Davis confessed. “I was crazy jealous of him. You loved him so much.” He glanced sideways to Jon’s face. “You probably still do, somewhere inside.”
Jon could only nod. He wondered if he would ever be able to push what he felt for Ricky into some small corner like that, where he could wrap all the sharp edges of that love into something he could remember without bleeding.
“And you have to look at Ricky every day. That is really going to slow you getting over him.” Davis put his finger on the only reason Jon had hesitated to rehire Ricky and right Edgar’s injustice.
“I’m working on it,” Jon whispered to his toes.
“It’s a lot to ask, but do you think you’re working on it fast enough for me to keep up my professional chops? Finding another job in New York might take a while, and my old firm in Philadelphia wants me back, like, yesterday.” Davis’s grip on Jon’s hand became painfully tight. “They have some big projects going, in the States and overseas.”
This was too much to place on his shoulders—Davis’s professional life shouldn’t hinge on a romantic interest that Jon couldn’t provide now and wasn’t sure he ever could. “I don’t know, Davis. I really don’t. And I can’t mess with your career.” No matter what he’d told Spencer, time and separation had not dulled the reactions he’d drilled into himself. “Even if I get past him, there’s still who you are to me. My whole life, you’ve been the brother my parents didn’t give me. Seeing you differently means rethinking how to be an honorable man.”
“I am not your brother!”
“I know that! But a big chunk of my heart doesn’t entirely believe it.”
“That’s one of the things I’ve always loved about you, your sense of honor. Misplaced though it is on this topic.” Davis dropped Jon’s hand and pulled him near with an arm around Jon’s shoulders. “Sit a minute and get used to it.”
A minute was all he could manage without squirming away—the warm embrace fought with long-held convictions, and his treacherous body had its own point to make. Davis released him. “You feel like a piece of marble. Guess you aren’t kidding about your head and your heart disagreeing.”
Jon shook his head, words deserting him.
“Can you resolve that if I’m not around? If I’m only a voice on the phone?”
Jon shrugged, not knowing if yes or no would be a better answer, or even which one was the truth.
A sudden bark of bitterness—Davis followed it with, “But Ricky will be there every day. Great. I’m screwed. Or maybe not. I’m thinking Philadelphia, with cars and parking, and getting here is a two, two-and-a-half-hour ordeal on I-95 and the Jersey Turnpike. I should be thinking New York—the train runs a dozen times a day, and it takes only a little longer than the ride from the Wall Street station to Yankee Stadium, without standing all the way. The stock exchange doesn’t trade on weekends, Jon.”
“No,” he whispered, his mind buzzing with a southbound Amtrak against all the hours he’d spent on the Long Island Railroad heading to the Fire Island Ferry. “It doesn’t.” If he promised to come, he wouldn’t have to wonder what Davis was doing, or with whom, during the week. If he could promise to come.
“I can take my house off the market with one phone call. It’s got three bedrooms; you can have your own until you decide you’re ready to share mine.” Davis, groping for inducements, must have sensed he’d found the right tack, and went on, “Leave some clothes there and you won’t even have to pack a suitcase. And I’ll come sleep on your couch; I can find my way from Penn Station. With or without a suitcase. You choose.” The naked pleading on Davis’s face shamed him—he didn’t want Davis begging, yet yes did not come out of Jon’s very dry mouth.
“You make it sound so easy.”
“Probably not, but worth it, Jon. Or I can stay here in the city.” Davis got up to flick off the big floodlight, leaving the loft in the dimness of early evening. “This place won’t take all that long to finish. When you come to me, it will be in a home that could be ours, in a bed never slept in by anyone but me. On sheets that have never touched anyone’s skin but mine.”
More than he’d ever dared ask of Ricky came to him now, from Davis’s mouth.
“That’s a lot to offer someone you’ve never kissed.” Jon offered his hands to Davis and rose into his arms. Tipping his head back farther than he’d tipped for Ricky—Don’t think of Ricky!—Jon watched Davis come, in slow motion, down those few inches to meet his mouth, and felt his arms wrap, again, slowly, slowly, around Jon’s back.
Blue eyes filled with wonder at close range, and Davis left it to Jon when to slide, when to nuzzle, when to part lips and softly lick, when to pull closer. Flat against Davis’s broad chest, tight against Davis’s taut abs, and hard, so hard, against the answering hardness in Davis’s groin, Jon brushed and then pressed his mouth against Davis’s, calling up every desire he’d ever had for this man who’d been part of his life since his first memories.
Davis let Jon in, meeting soft tongue with moist stroke and a barely audible, “Unhhhh,” his eyelids fluttering shut. Jon had never seen those pale lashes this close, all soft and spiky, and let his own eyes fall shut to blot out every sense but touch. His hand pressed flat against Davis’s broad back, so much wider than when Jon had held him as a bleeding seven-year-old—
He had to break away, get some distance between them, before he could talk again. Leaning against the stack of drywall with both hands, his head drooping, Jon fought to get some breath and some perspective, and to force his awakened erection to subside. His chest prickled with the chill where he’d torn away from Davis’s warmth, and he couldn’t bear to see the face of the man with the suddenly empty arms.
“If it’s any consolation,” Jon’s voice came out hoarsely, scratchy from the briars in his heart. “I do react to you. I just don’t feel right about it.”
“So I should go back to Philadelphia.” Davis had come to stand behind him, his frame blocking some of the dwindling light from the big windows.
“I can’t make that decision for you.” Jon did not lift his head, speaking to the subfloor. “But I can’t make you the promises you want. Only time is going to tell.”
“Not even to spend weekends with me?”
“What if I ended up only giving you false hope?”
“It would be better than the ‘no hope’ you’re giving
me right now.” Big warm hands settled lightly on Jon’s shoulders. “Say we’ll have weekends together—I’ll show you the Liberty Bell and race you up the ‘Rocky’ steps at the library.”
“You need to let me have a little more time, Davis. I am so raw from everything that’s happened recently. Nothing in my life is the same as it was a month ago.”
“I’ll give you the time if you’ll give me your promise, Jon. I’ve been waiting half my life, what’s a few more months?” The coaxing question synched with the gentle massage on Jon’s shoulders.
He didn’t want to answer that, so he evaded, standing straight and turning out of Davis’s grasp. “We need to catch a cab or Allegra will give away our table.”
“That’s not a promise.” Davis regarded him with steady eyes and stillness. “Or is it ‘no’?”
“It’s me not making a promise I may not be able to keep.” But that might as well have been a “no.”
“Somehow, I’m not very hungry.” Davis’s arms fell to his sides, and he looked away. “How about we do this dinner on a weekend I come up from Philly?”
Davis would come, Jon knew, the first weekend he was welcome. He nodded, wondering when or if he could make that invitation.
“Do you mind seeing yourself out?” The little movement of lips could not be called a smile. “I think I’ll stay here a while.” Davis groped backward, falling more than sitting on the stack of tiles.
Jon fumbled the door open, only to shut it on Davis and pallets of heartache.
Chapter Thirty-Six
RICKY grabbed a sleeping Edgar by the ankle and dragged him off the couch, relishing the bounce of his ass on the floor. “You didn’t clean up after yourself, cazzone—you don’t get to laze in bed. You’re a crappy roommate, you know?” He headed into the kitchen, littered with the detritus of Edgar’s dinner and drinking, and managed to find a clean glass.
“What the fuck?” Edgar knuckled an eye and had to watch Ricky drink the last of the orange juice.
“I will be delighted when I’m out of here. Of course, little comforts like couches and dishes will leave with me, but hell, the place is all yours end of next month.” Bitterness at being forced out of his residence helped Ricky find more ways than the physical to torture this figlio di puttana who’d taken his home away as surely as Davis had taken his lover. “Hope your ex-wife leaves you enough money for a trip to IKEA.”
“Fuck you,” Edgar grumbled, but he creaked up off the floor and started to load the dishwasher.
“And vacuum,” Ricky snarled on his way out, slamming the door hard enough to make anyone with a hangover in the entire building wince. Maybe Edgar’s head would fall completely off.
His own head didn’t feel so good after that last display of temper. Damn Edgar. Damn Davis. Damn Jon for leaving with a flower in his buttonhole. Damn Davis for putting it there. How could Jon have allowed it? Or why wouldn’t he have—they were his, after all. How could Ricky bear to look at Jon today—how could he bear to hear the news that Jon had promised to share when it happened, the news that Davis had all but promised when he’d slipped that alstromeria stem into Jon’s buttonhole?
Ricky’d tried to drink the pain away last night at Sharkie’s. It was Thursday night, when the liquor would flow like water and Georgie Boy would choose the music Ricky’d fuck by. Two double shots and he went into hunting mode, but stalking through the club, he only saw men who looked like Davis if they were laughing and nothing at all like Jon if they were not. He’d been discarded, he’d been replaced—hell, he’d been told that who he fucked was no one’s business but his own, and there was no one he wanted.
Dustin and Xander disappeared when they saw him coming, and the one man who risked approaching Ricky made the mistake of being tall, blond, and smiling. Ricky almost succeeded in pulling his punch—he’d apologized and bought the man a drink, fleeing before Kip returned with the glass. The only man he wanted was off playing lofts with someone who was going to do his damnedest to give Jon everything he wanted—everything Ricky had not been willing to give.
He’d taken one last look around the club before he left, hating everyone he saw for not being Jon, hating himself for ever wanting any of these men when he could have had Jon. Hating Davis for being smarter than he was, for being shrewd enough to see Jon for the prize he was, for being willing to treasure him. Knowing he’d thrown away gold to look for trash, Ricky silently urged Jon to hold on to that family feeling long enough to talk, explain, beg if that’s what it took, anything that would let Ricky have another chance. He’d needed medical assurances to earn another chance before, but would they help now?
Morning had taken years to come. With long deliberate strides kept short of running only by willpower, Ricky strode the sidewalk in what he desperately hoped was the right sort of new day, barreling through the door. The lettering on it said “Joseph Fleisher and Sons Capital Management,” and the receptionist went to find Logan.
“I know a while-you-wait lab,” Ricky informed a cowering Logan, who followed meekly and rolled up his sleeve when requested. He authorized all results to be released to Ricky, who waited alone, fretfully, in a room full of worried men. He’d take the heat for being late, but the trading floor he walked into at Gorman Hogenboom was a madhouse, and no one had a glance to spare for him.
LATE to the office, a fine example for the boss to set. Jon had finally fallen asleep around 4:00 a.m. He’d come home in turmoil, stomping around, sitting down, jumping up, not staying anywhere more than a few minutes. Then his eyes lit on the spot on the bookshelf where his little pile of beachcombings once rested. It was no longer empty. All evening, all night, tormented by thoughts of Davis and memories of Ricky, he’d picked up and set down the leathery egg case Ricky’d left for him, unable to rest. He’d wakened, long after the alarm, with the mermaid’s purse in his hand.
“Jon-Jon-Jonny! Did you see the news?” Kate launched herself into Jon’s arms the moment he walked through the door. Trading had started nearly twenty minutes ago, and already he was hopelessly behind.
“Which news?” he asked, staggering backward under the gleeful missile’s momentum. “And why aren’t you saving this for Geoff?” He peeled her off and tried to get some sense out of her.
“He won’t be back until later, and I have to gloat with someone!” she crowed. “NorthAm Air’s made a hostile bid for GlobalSky!” Kate tried to dance him around the floor, nonsense he tolerated for two quick steps.
“And?” he demanded, looking to anyone but the whirling dervish for some answers.
“And the bonds are going up, up, up!” Kate twirled another circuit by herself. “The tender offer was for 55, and it isn’t over by a long shot!”
“Volume’s been low but growing.” Dwight turned the Bloomberg monitor so Jon could see it. “You and Kate are up about thirty-seven points. When do you want to sell?”
“Whoa!” Jon was staggered. His bonds had a basis of 18, and Kate had bought at nearly the same; Geoff had made a bundle and wasn’t even back from the airport, and did he know? “Let’s buy some more!”
“What?” came from some, the younger staff who hadn’t seen a squeeze play, and “Yeah!” came from others, who still had new capital to invest.
“Why not?” Jon asked the group, seeing glee and dawning understanding. “NorthAm is going to want all the bonds they can get, and they can buy them from us, when we decide to play. Who’s in and how much?” His Google profits—not enough by itself—
“I have a hundred K!” Kate called, and Corbin volunteered another two hundred grand, as did Miranda, but—
“How much does Ricky have lying around?” Jon asked when he hadn’t heard one voice in the money call. “Dwight?” Where the hell was Ricky, anyway?
He watched his analyst try one password, fail to get in, and another, again getting a blank screen. “Four million at 54,” Pramiti read off to the group, getting a little yip from Kate. Jon began to worry that he wouldn’t have enough capital
to create any impact.
“Let me try.” Jon pushed Dwight aside and reached to the keyboard, typing in the master password; he could only recall a few digits of Ricky’s old password, which he probably hadn’t reactivated. His own initials had figured in there, with some symbols. Jon refocused on the screen; now was not the time.
“In!” He scrolled down. “Ricky’s got nine hundred and thirty thousand bucks to work with.”
He’d use it all, and make it right with Ricky later, if he could—surely Ricky would see Jon was looking out for his interests when he wasn’t here to do it, and why wasn’t he here? But this wasn’t all; Jon flipped to another screen and got a collective gasp from behind him.
“Guess the check cleared,” Jon deadpanned. “Our visitor the other day thought we might grow the change from his piggy bank.” They’d share the new capital out after this day’s work.
The quiet behind him was so intense that the beeps of each number he punched into the phone sounded over the trading floor. Jon got his figures aligned and waited the endless moment for Larry to reach him in the queue. The silence was breeched only by Pramiti murmuring the new transactions as they scrolled by. And then Jon’s turn came.
“GlobalSky, ten million.” A transaction of a size comparable to, or smaller than, what they’d seen to this point, but it was half of everything Gorman Hogenboom had floating loose, and he had no time for margin loans.
“Fifty-three, fifty-five,” the market-maker barked.
“Fifty-five, buying,” Jon snapped back, and heard Larry’s magic words that accepted his five and a half million dollars.
“You’re done!”
When Jon hung up, he turned to his crew, trying to hide the roiling in his gut. He’d never spent that much of other people’s money in one transaction, and he’d bet half the farm on what could be a wash sale. He made it official, scribbling his signature on the paperwork Dwight hastily assembled.