Total pages in book: 106
Estimated words: 100588 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 503(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 100588 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 503(@200wpm)___ 402(@250wpm)___ 335(@300wpm)
Fucked a man I thought was someone else’s boyfriend— in the woods. Like a damn animal.
I blew out a breath and sat down on one of the logs around the fire ring. “Have a seat,” I said to Bennett. “As much as I hate to admit it— he’s right.”
“Yeah,” he murmured, sitting stiffly next to me.
We faced the fire and I threw a nearby branch into the flames to build it up a bit before speaking.
“I’m sorry,” I began.
Bennett’s head snapped up in surprise. “What for?”
I took a minute to think about what I wanted to say before speaking. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing and accidentally make things weirder between us.
“For giving you so much hell these past few days. For not letting you even talk to me about it.” I rubbed my hands over my face and finally had the guts to look him in the eyes. “But, Bennett… I don’t want to talk about that night, okay? I just… I can’t.”
Bennett studied me for a moment before responding. “Okay. Then we won’t talk about it.”
We sat together in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes while the campfire popped and the sounds of sleeping bags rustling were fewer and farther between.
Suddenly, Bennett blew out a laugh and shook his head.
“What?” I asked. “What’s so funny?”
“This whole thing reminds me of that time your dad was going to take us to a Yankees game, remember?”
He turned to me with a wide grin and twinkling eyes. God, he was so damned cute when he had that look on his face. Like humor and mischief all rolled into one.
“Which one? We went to like a million of them.”
“The one with the fight over the jersey,” Bennett said with a raised eyebrow.
I snorted. “Oh my god, you’re right. Roger Clemens. Jesus, why couldn’t my dad have had two Clemens jerseys?”
“He did. That’s just it, remember? He was wearing one and he said one of us could wear the other.”
“Dude, you totally knew it was my turn with the Clemens one,” I accused. “You could have easily worn the Jeter jersey and been fine.”
“Fuck you. Take it back,” Bennett said, pretending to glare at me until we both burst out laughing.
“What I don’t get is why my dad didn’t just throw up his hands and offer for us each to wear a Clemens one and he could wear the Jeter one himself. It was his, after all. Not like he didn’t support the guy— he loved Jeter.”
Bennett shifted to stretch out his legs. I noticed his grin had turned into a nostalgic smile.
“He was trying to teach us a lesson,” he said. “About compromise.”
I watched the golden glow from the fire dance across his features and felt my stomach flip around. That face I’d seen in the light of a hundred campfires growing up. Eyes I’d looked into more times than I could count. And now lips I’d had the singular pleasure of feeling against my own.
Bennett Crawford was beautiful.
“Well,” I said just as softly. “I guess we never learned the lesson, did we?”
He looked up at me, eyes bright with unshed tears. “You must miss him. I know I do, Xander, so I can’t imagine how—”
“No,” I said swiftly, but firmly. “You agreed. No talking about that night and that includes what happened to my dad.”
Bennett sat up straight again and put his hand on my shoulder. The little hairs on my skin seemed to turn toward his touch like flowers to the sun. “You’re right,” he said. “I’m sorry.”
I pretended like he’d never brought it up. “So instead of just handling the jersey thing like adults, we ended up in a fistfight on the fucking lawn,” I reminded him.
He chuckled. “And didn’t see your dad walk up to intervene until it was too late.”
“You gotta admit— you’re lucky my right hook landed on him instead of you,” I said.
He shoved my shoulder. “Shut up, asshole. I could have taken that punch. You were like twelve years old and scrawny as shit.”
“Wanna prove it?” I teased. “Let’s go right now.”
Bennett laughed and shook his head, but not before eyeballing my body from top to toes. The once-over made my cock fill, and I stifled a groan. No way was I going to consider a repeat of our earlier dalliance.
When he spoke, his voice carried a husky quality. “Maybe tomorrow when we’re fresh, big guy. I had a little too much action already for one night.”
And there were the twinkling eyes again. I felt my face heat up at his reminder of the action we’d shared earlier.
“So you and Aiden…” I began.
“Me and Aiden…” Bennett said with a small smile.
“You, ah, aren’t really together?”
God, why did I sound like such a freak?
“Nope. I told you that. In fact, I’ve tried to tell you several times, but you either wouldn’t listen or you refused to believe me.” Bennett looked over at me and straightened again before continuing. “Why did you think we were together?”