by Rachel Kane
He rubbed his face and sat up, getting his bearings, tracking down the phone's residual glow.
When he saw the message, he became totally, fully awake, like someone had secretly dosed him with an IV of espresso.
Alexander! I was talking to a mutual friend, who said you were laid up with a broken leg. I am frantic with worry, and Bastian is the only thing holding me back from flying to the states immediately. Just message me back and let me know you're okay.
Ian. Of course.
Only the sluggishness of his muscles after waking from sleep kept Alex from slinging the phone at the wall.
There really was no escape from humiliation, was there?
He could just imagine Ian and Bastian talking about him over their morning tea…or, what time was it in Shanghai right now? Maybe their evening brandy. Ian saying, Poor Alex. He brought it on himself, you know. I always told him he could do better than life in that small town, but you can’t control people’s choices. Bastian humming in agreement, perhaps fluffing that exquisite white-blond hair of his. Hmm, hmm, poor Alex.
This was so clearly against the rules. So clearly a violation of the things they had talked about. As though the postcard weren't enough.
The phone was back in his hands, his thumbs poised over the screen, ready to tap back a furious reply. But he paused.
Answering Ian would just make for more conversation.
He'd ignore it. He'd block Ian's number. What could Ian do about that? He was halfway around the world. It's not like he could show up at the door, looking concerned, sweeping in to take charge of things.
And yet again Alex paused, this time with his finger over the contact screen that had Ian's number. It was the right thing to do, wasn't it? Tap once, get rid of him forever.
You always did like to run away from your problems. He could hear Ian's voice in his head as clearly as if he were in the room, perhaps amplified by the aftereffects of the pain medicine. What you need in your life is someone to help you stop running. Someone to guide you, someone to—
"Yes, well, you did a fine job of that, didn't you?" Alex said to the empty room. He let the phone slip out of his fingers, falling softly against the duvet. Then he lay against the pillows, consciously clearing his mind of all thoughts. He wasn't going to sit here and think about the past. He wasn't going to obsess over whether he'd done the right thing. He knew he had. Once Ian had revealed the affair with Bastian, once he had broken Alex’s heart, forcing him out of Alex’s life had been the smartest thing he'd ever done.
It wasn't until he heard the knock on the door that he realized he'd fallen back asleep. The sun was higher now, visible above the horizon, bathing the room in gold, making it look even more luxurious.
"Come in," he said, although in his mind it sounded more like a question. Come in?
Judah pushed the door open, a silver tray in his hands. "Room service!" he said. "I wasn't sure what you liked for breakfast, but I made sure you had coffee, and fruit, and toast, and eggs, but if you'd rather—"
"What's all this?" he asked.
"You're our first guest! So we're getting practice. There's also a newspaper, but it's just the local one, and it's mostly high school sports scores and a story about the barn fire out on Route 9, sorry to spoil it for you."
"Judah, you don't have to—"
"Actually this time I do. I know you don't want my help. Believe me, you've made it very clear. But you're staying at my resort, and this is what we do for guests."
Believe me, you've made it very clear. Judah had said it with that winning smile and a little chuckle. But was there an underlying sincerity?
Had he been rude to Judah? His memory was not at its best these days, with the pain and meds, but he didn't think he had. Unless there were some slight he hadn't even realized he'd made?
It would be far too awkward to ask, especially the way Judah held the tray with such determination.
Why do you look so tense?
It wasn't like Ian was messaging Judah. Alex was the one who deserved to be tense.
I’ve offended you, haven’t I. God, I’ve done something terrible and not even realized it. He resolved to watch every action, make sure he was properly friendly.
After all, they were friends. Who had rushed to his aid? Who had brought him here? Only a true friend would’ve done everything Judah had.
My head’s just a wreck, that’s all.
But the smell of the coffee cut through his mental and emotional fogginess, and reluctantly he gestured Judah forward. "I was promised a champagne brunch," Alex said. "What kind of dive is this?"
"Champagne is for paying customers," Judah said, “but there's juice."
"Any asparagus?"
"Surprisingly little. I can go get some if you like."
"Please no." He opened the newspaper, the single folded sheet that held all the events of Superbia. "Ah, see, you misled me. There were actually two barn fires."
"I wanted to ask you..."
Oh no. Alex couldn't guess what was coming, but from the tone, he worried Judah was going to offer to help him with something else. Shaving. A bath.
Then again, I haven't had a bath in two days. I'm starting to smell uncivilized.
"What's up?"
"Are you going in to work today? I only ask because it's getting kind of late in the morning."
It was a surprisingly hard question to answer.
He should have said a simple yes. Because of course he was going to open the store today. Of course he was going to work. That's what responsible people did, wasn't it? Even when they were in pain? Even when they couldn't take care of themselves?
Even when the man who had destroyed their lives wakes them up before sunrise?
What would Ian say, if he saw Alex hesitating right now? He would have advice. Maybe the reason you're not leaping out of bed to rush down to your store, is because you know you're meant for better things than selling paperbacks to farmers. Maybe you're starting to realize life owes you more than that.
"I can help, if you need me to," offered Judah. "Do you need me to bring you anything? Electric razor, or—”
"Judah...no. Please, no."
There must have been something in his tone though, some residual anger over Ian's intrusion, because Judah looked stricken. He was biting his lip, stepping away from Alex's bed.
Damn it, I just told myself I’d watch my words…
"Look, Judah, I'm sorry—"
"No, no, I'm sorry. I'm clearly overstepping my bounds. Again. You've made it very clear that you don't want my help. I guess I'm just pushy. The things you learn about yourself, you know!”
“Seriously, stop. Right now. Please.”
Miraculously, Judah did as he was told, pausing at the door. Wordless, but clearly in quiet pain, he looked back at Alex.
There were things Alex couldn’t say. A man has his dignity, doesn’t he? He couldn’t sit there and talk about how humiliating it had been to accept Ian’s help at every turn. The way their conversations would twist, until Alex was no longer sure why Ian’s words had hurt him so badly, except that it certainly seemed like everything was Alex’s fault. You’ve always taken things the wrong way, Ian would say, and he’d mean it with absolute sincerity. Ian’s intentions were good. They were golden. But those talks—you couldn’t exactly call them arguments—went on forever. Hours and hours of this, interpretation and reinterpretation, until all Alex wanted was to get away, to sit in silence, no more words—and this, from a man who loved words more than anything, who would pull down a favorite book and open it at random just to feel that delight from the familiar words on the page. But when those conversations were done, he wished he knew no words at all, like those feral children raised by wolves he used to hear about, children who were surely mythical, as mythical as a life where someone’s help didn’t come with sharp strings pulled taut.
“I’m not good at…this,” he said, gesturing at the bed, the breakfast, the pants on the floor. “I’m u
sed to doing everything myself. I’m sorry if I’m coming across as rude.”
Judah’s face softened, and for a moment Alex was afraid he would rush over to embrace him. (And why would that be so bad? It was only half a thought, half a memory, the feeling of Judah’s arms encircling him, lifting him up.)
“Thanks for saying that. I don’t think I’m good at this either. I like…problems.”
Alex laughed. “That’s an odd fetish, but okay.”
“You know what I mean? I like things I can solve. Things I can fix. Router problems, bad wifi connections. Do you know how hard it is to get proper wireless in a century-old house?” He knocked on the wall. “These things are so solid, the whole place is practically a bomb shelter. But you don’t want help. I get it.”
Alex shrugged. “I still remember when Mason wired up my shop for internet. Not that I thought I could do it myself…but I couldn’t help thinking, maybe I should know how to do it myself? All those ladders and wires and screws.”
“You let Mason install the cables?” Judah’s look of mock-horror made Alex laugh.
“This was before you showed up. I would’ve totally let you wire me up if you’d been here.”
Um…phrasing.
If Judah caught the unintended double-meaning, he had the decency not to mention it.
“If you do need anything,” he said more brightly, “don’t get all self-reliant and try to do it yourself. We’ll probably all be in Liam’s office if you need a ride to work, anything like that. Just dial 0 on the phone."
"Judah—"
His friend paused again. “Yeah?”
“Just…thanks. Thank you for all this.”
The smile he got in return was an unexpected reward.
He sank into the pillows as the door closed, convinced he’d dodged some kind of friendship bullet. This business with Ian had left him too rattled to function among other humans, really.
But real life beckoned. He wasn’t going to miss getting to the store.
Which meant he had to make himself presentable.
Which was going to be a lot of work.
The bathroom was charming. Not enormous, but gleaming and untouched.
Am I the first person to pee here? he wondered, looking down at the pristine toilet.
The first person to brush his teeth? The first person to shave?
There was a tub and a separate shower stall. In his doctor's instructions, showers were a no-go right now. Alex wasn't sure if that meant the cast would dissolve away or if his leg would just get itchy from water dripping between the cast and his skin. Itchy? More itchy. As it was, he already found himself absently reaching just inside it trying to scratch.
So how was a man to clean himself? Sponge bath? Walk through a fine mist of cologne and declare himself sanitary? Or…a tub bath? One leg dangling out? He could see how that could be managed...maybe. The tub was really set up in the opposite direction he needed, the spigot would be poking into his back. But he could do it. He was so damn clumsy on the crutches, he'd be lucky not to knock his skull against the side of the tub. But there was a convenient bench nearby, and he was able to sit and work his pajamas back off. He folded them into a neat stack, and started the water.
His apartment had the world's smallest bathroom. No room for a tub there. Just the narrow shower that never quite got hot enough, and whose pressure always left you having to rinse your hair multiple times before it got the shampoo out. Dissatisfying all around. He'd told himself it was a reasonable sacrifice. After all, his was supposed to be a life of the mind, a life in books. He didn't need luxuries like water pressure.
Meanwhile a veritable ocean was pouring into the tub. No pressure problems here. He held his fingers under the tap, feeling the piping heat of the water. Nice. Maybe he'd be a little later than expected to work. Maybe a soak would do him good. It might not help the broken ankle, but the rest of him could relax, could remove any hint of the stress Ian's text had brought.
Fucking Ian. What did he mean, a mutual friend had told him about the ankle? All Alex's friends knew better than to talk to Ian, especially about Alex himself. But he was always so nosy, in his well-meaning way. The sort of thing that at first seems charming: You think someone is really concerned about you. You think you've finally met someone who could take care of you.
It's always a lie. A scam. A trick. Sometimes taking care is just another form of power over someone.
"The point of the bath is to forget about him," he reminded himself. He slid his briefs off, then felt around in the tub one more time to make sure the water felt right.
Then carefully, slowly, with precise adjustments of the crutches, he got his good leg inside the tub. It took a bit of turning and hopping to get the angle right. Now, the transfer from holding the crutches, to holding the side of the tub. A real resort would've had safety rails I could've held on to! he thought. It was an odd omission. Mason was usually so thorough about safety. He was going to have to lecture his friend later.
He let the crutches down softly, leaning them against the bench so he could reach them easily when the time came, and then prepared to lower himself into the water, one hand on either side of the tub.
Maybe with all the testing of the water to make sure it was the right temperature, he'd left a bit of a puddle on the edge of the tub.
Or maybe he was residually clumsy still from the pills.
Or maybe he was just fated to never, ever be allowed to relax.
Whatever the cause, his hand bore down on what felt like a frictionless surface, and slid. Practically his whole weight was on his hands, as he tried to settle himself in the tub, and suddenly losing purchase was startling—he could see himself falling, in that split second, another fatal accident, and he yelped.
Yelped?
More like screamed.
10
Judah
There is probably a rule somewhere in the Great Laws of Resort Operation that says, thou shalt not stare at your first guest’s cock. It was a rule that Judah swore to himself he would follow from here on out. A rule never to be broken, ever, ever again.
The scream had raised every hair on his body, and his first thought was that it had something to do with the lions. Which was ridiculous, but he hadn’t exactly been a clear-thinker this morning.
He’d tried to do something nice for Alex, and yes, it backfired…but this time he wasn’t left with that weird hopeless feeling about it. Alex was definitely too self-reliant for his own good, but at least there was no secret animosity there.
Clearly a change of approach was in order. Stop trying to overwhelm him with assistance, stop acting like he’s an invalid. After all, he was still Alex, just normal old Alex he’d known for months now.
Liam was always telling him he needed better people skills, and this was a perfect example. He didn’t need to run Alex off. Didn’t need to make one of his friends into A Bitter Enemy.
Especially not him. After all, he’d halfway thought—
Well. It was the nature of the secret crush, to go further than you should, but not too far. Imagining he and Alex becoming better friends. Possibly even going out together. It always stopped short of any sex, of course. Judah thought it might be creepy to imagine what Alex’s body looked like without clothes, like it was the sort of thing a stalker might do, imagining them tangling their limbs together.
That resolution—to keep those thoughts at bay—had gotten harder after discovering Alex on the floor at his apartment, harder still when he remembered the feeling of Alex’s skin against his hands.
But that’s the whole point of it being a platonic crush. You’re trying not to sully things with any base desires. You’re trying to be above all that.
He can probably tell. That’s probably why he’s avoiding your help.
God, what an awful thought. Worse than thinking that he was far more overbearing than he realized.
But it was a possibility. He would’ve asked Liam about it, if Liam weren’t so consta
ntly busy these days. What if he was offending Alex right and left, putting too much pressure on him? What if Alex was trying to politely tell him to back off, that he was aware of Judah’s little crush and was trying to turn him away in the politest way possible?
Oh god, this is why you’re not allowed to be around people. Stop trying to read the man’s mind. Just be polite, and do what he asks you to do, and stop volunteering to help every five seconds like some nervous nurse.
But then came the yell.
The lions! They’re eating someone! What a ridiculous thought. His body was already in motion by the time the idea trailed off, he was already pounding towards Alex’s room, because there was only one person staying here, and only one voice that sounded like that.
He burst into the room, and a quick scan told him Alex wasn’t there. The bed was unmade, the tray carefully placed to the side, the food untouched but the coffee nearly gone. The bathroom door was open.
An accident! Alex slipping, hitting the back of his head against the tub, even now sinking to his death! Judah could see it all in his mind’s eye as he made his spring towards the bathroom, nearly slipping in the water on the floor.
Alex yelped again, only this time it was the sound of shock, of startlement.
He wasn’t dead, certainly. Nor was he particularly injured-looking. He was holding himself up above the water, as though he were one of those prisoners in the Inquisition being lowered into a cauldron of boiling oil, twisting his body to stay away from the water.
Every muscle taut, holding himself steady.
Completely naked.
The trail of hair leading down from his chest, down a flat belly, towards a trimmed triangle down below that framed—
Oh god, would you look at that.
“Judah, what are you doing here?”
