Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118125 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 591(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
There it was again—that irritating urge to console Rian, when Damon had learned the hard way in the last day exactly where that got him.
So why the hell did he want that feeling back?
Fuck—Rian probably had it right. They were just too much of a mess together, all odds and evens, coming at each other in all the wrong ways. They didn’t fit. Fuck, they were practically anathema to each other, and yet...
Last night, they had just felt right.
And he didn’t understand how that was possible.
How they could be so different, and yet sometimes those moments just clicked where they felt good together; where they fit together like they belonged, this connection that made their differences melt away—and for the first time in a long time Damon didn’t feel like he was trying to straddle two worlds when he had never wholly belonged in either.
He just felt like...like he was part of something all its own; something made just for him, where he didn’t have to try to belong because he just...
Did.
“You’re so quiet,” Rian murmured, never lifting his gaze from the laptop. “What’s wrong?”
Everything.
“Nothing,” Damon said. “Just thinking. Maybe they are, too. Trying to protect him from unwanted spotlight, I mean.”
Rian’s brows furrowed. “How...?”
“You said Chris is a good kid. No reason to banish him out here if he hasn’t done anything wrong; if he’s the model son, nobody’s embarrassment or problem child.” Damon shrugged, lacing his hands together against his thigh. “Maybe they didn’t. Maybe they wanted to give him a chance to grow up without the people who dog their careers dogging his heels, pushing at him about his life choices and where he belongs.”
“That’s...that’s a more benign interpretation than I’d have thought of.” Rian lifted his head, looking at Damon, the carefully blank glassiness of his eyes clearing for a moment, trouble dwelling in hazel-dark depths. “I hope you’re right, Damon.”
“Send it. Let’s find out.”
Rian lingered on him for a moment more, as if he’d say something else—before he looked down quickly, and gave the mouse touchpad a definitive tap. “Sent,” he said, then sighed, drooping. “It would make me feel better about at least part of this. Knowing Chris has parents who’ll care that something’s wrong.”
“I hope they care enough to fucking call back,” Damon growled irritably.
“And if they don’t?”
“Depends on what Chris is willing to say to us.”
Rian glanced away, peering out the window, one hand rising to tuck his hair back before he leaned forward and absently deposited the laptop on the coffee table again. “Think we should go try to talk to him again?”
“He might be a little more talkative after a night of rest and some time to think.”
And Damon might be a little less jumpy and grouchy with something to focus on other than Rian—those ever-mercurial moods, the delicacy of his movements, the way Damon was suddenly all too familiar with the lines and smooth shapes of the body hidden under his loose, flowing clothing. With a mutter under his breath, Damon levered himself off the recliner and stood, dipping to scoop up his discarded shirt from the floor.
“C’mon.”
“I...ah...” Rian cleared his throat, standing and brushing at his clothing. “I’ll meet you there.”
Damon pulled his shirt over his head, frowning as he settled the hem around his waist. “Yeah...?”
“I’m still wearing what I had on yesterday.” Rian’s smile was sheepish, strained, but his face was red from his scalp to his neck. “So are you. It...um...it might raise some questions.”
Yeah.
I got some damn questions.
Like how much of that shit you threw at me was a lie, when you won’t even look me in the goddamned eye.
But Damon ground every sharp comment between his teeth, and only nodded, stepping aside to give Rian a clear path to the door. “Fair enough.”
Rian fidgeted in place, shifting from foot to foot, then dipped to pick up Damon’s copy of A Princess in Theory from the coffee table and clutched it to his chest in both hands; he practically sidestepped Damon toward the door, then walked backward until he stopped with his back against the frame, his eyes darting toward Damon, then away; for some goddamned reason when Rian didn’t make any sense sometimes, his blush deepened.
“I’ll see you soon...?”
“We’re going to the same place,” Damon pointed out flatly.
“O-of course.” With a flustered sound, Rian reached back and fumbled for the doorknob, clumsily twisting and tugging the door open so he could take a step back across the threshold. “I...later, then.”
“Sure,” Damon said. “Yeah. Okay.”
But Rian was already gone—the door swinging closed, the latch clicking.
And Damon just...groaned, and thudded his head against the wall next to the bed hard enough to make the boards creak.
Mother fuck.
Just...
Mother fuck.
Chapter Thirteen
Rian didn’t know what to do with his hands.
He stood outside the infirmary, trying not to pace—trying not to move at all, really, when now that he’d showered and changed into jeans and an oversized cashmere cowl-necked sweater, he was much more sore than he’d initially realized, both inside and out...and every time he moved it twinged with a deep, pressing inner ache that reminded him far too much of the man he was trying very much not to think about.