by Tessa Bailey
“So,” Marcus asked, his voice sounding hoarse to his own ears. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
Jamie stopped at the railing of the boardwalk, bracing himself on his forearms. He started to speak but broke off on a huffed laugh. “I like reading about people having serious conversations, but I hate them in real life.”
Marcus leaned sideways against the railing, facing Jamie. “Is it serious?”
“Yeah,” Jamie muttered, scratching his chin. “Listen, Marcus. Like I said, I take full responsibility for what happened last night. You’ve expressed to me that you’re not ready for anything close to what we did, or at the very least comfortable with it. So that was all on me.” He adjusted his glasses. “You were trying to put some distance between us and I should have let that happen. It probably would have been for the best. But, um…you’re my friend. Or something. And despite whatever else is there between us, I…” He gave a long exhale. “Like you as a friend, too. Or something.”
It was the weakest admission in history and Marcus might as well have been ferried off into the sunset on a gondola. “I like you as a friend, too, Jamie Prince.”
“Okay.” Not looking at him, Jamie nodded. “Good.”
“Is that it?”
If so, they were so bringing it in for a hug.
“I wish that was it,” said Jamie, passing Marcus a sideways glance. “I was reminded earlier how hard it was for me when I realized I was gay and I didn’t have an example to learn from. So I just wanted to offer my help. You can take the offer now or in twenty years, okay? Your terms, Diesel. That’s how it should be.” He paused, maintaining eye contact with Marcus. “What I’m offering to you…it’s a serious thing. And I want to make it clear that I’m on your side with no ulterior motive, so last night can’t happen again. Sex convolutes everything.”
Marcus narrowed his eyes slowly. “And convolutes means…”
“Complicates.”
“Right.” Brow furrowed, Marcus turned to face the ocean and attempted to absorb everything Jamie said. He was offering to guide him. To help Marcus make sense of his new needs and feelings. As a friend, only, though. Why did that make him feel hollow? It’s what Marcus needed to happen so he could live the way he’d always lived. No major changes. Nothing that would label him as different. “What happened that day on the beach, Jamie? With the incident?”
Jamie’s look was searching. “Why are you asking me that now?”
Marcus didn’t even know how to answer that. Call it intuition. Maybe he was just more attuned to Jamie than…anyone he could think of. Or maybe he’d suspected since the day of Monster Jam that something more serious had taken place the day Jamie was assaulted. Bottom line, he wanted to know. Needed to know. “Please?”
Jamie’s jaw flexed and he went back to staring out over the dark beach for several moments. All that could be heard was the sound of waves rolling up onto the sand, wind traveling down the boardwalk. Until Jamie spoke, his voice cutting through the humid night air. “His name was Chris. I met him at Bed Bath and Beyond when I was buying a new toilet wand, which should be the most embarrassing part of the story, but it’s not.”
Already Marcus was being hit with regret for asking to hear the story. He didn’t want to think about Jamie in Bed Bath and Beyond with anyone unless it was Marcus. All those sheets and pillows and home fragrances. The scene was too intimate. He’d push through, but Jesus, he already hated Chris’s guts simply for getting to be around Jamie in that setting.
“I’m not sure why I asked him out. I shouldn’t have. He was staring at me, accidentally ending up in the same aisle as me at least five times—”
“That’s pretty aggressive,” Marcus muttered, crossing his arms.
“Says the guy who requests the chair beside mine every day.”
Marcus grunted.
Jamie eyeballed him for a second and kept going. “I was younger and not as exceptionally wise as I am now. So I asked him out in the candles section, just to throw him off. To let him know he was being obvious. I thought he’d say no and scurry off.” His shoulders lifted and fell. “But he said yes. So we went out and…one thing led to another.”
Misery was raining down on Marcus’s head. “Like it did for us last night?”
“No. It was nothing like last night.” Jamie coughed. “I could have taken or left him, to tell you the truth. Even though he was honest in telling me he’d never been with a man, I know now that he wasn’t being authentic. He was being someone else.” He glanced briefly at Marcus. “You’re never anything but authentic. Never anyone but you. At least to me.”
Marcus knew in that moment he was in love with Jamie Prince.
His heartbeat was being conducted like an orchestra and Jamie was holding the stick thing. Christ, he’d probably been in love with him since last summer. Or the one before. It was impossible to remember a time when he wasn’t trying to find a way to get into Jamie’s orbit. Jamie made him feel superhuman. Made him want to be responsible. To make the world a better place.
Jamie made him feel safe.
With his stomach in his mouth, Marcus made a choppy gesture for him to keep going.
“I didn’t hear from Chris for a while. Maybe a week?” Jamie continued. “I wasn’t anxious to go out with him again, either. It didn’t feel right. And maybe he was trying to come to terms with himself, you know? I wanted to respect that. But he showed up drunk at my chair at the end of a shift and…” Marcus held his breath, watching Jamie’s chest start to rise and fall, faster and faster. “A bunch of his friends were with him. He’d told them some story. That I’d come on to him and wouldn’t leave him alone…”
Everything clicked into place. Why Jamie was uncomfortable having any kind of relationship with Marcus, a man who was battling his sexuality. Why he’d told Marcus more than once he couldn’t be the one who introduced him to intimacy with a man. Jamie had done that and gotten burned.
“I’m sorry, Jamie.” He swallowed. “Why would you offer to help me when this happened to you? Before, you said you couldn’t. Why did you change your mind?”
“Because Chris and his friends gave me a concussion. They held me under the water and almost drowned me,” Jamie said succinctly. “You would rather saw off your arms than do that to anyone. Especially me, I think.”
The truth of what happened that day was so offensive that they took a moment to crystalize in Marcus’s brain. When they did, he went through several stages of grief in the matter of ten seconds—denial, pain, anger, depression, acceptance—and then he added his own. Rage.
Marcus turned away from Jamie and let out a roar, sending the ferocious sound down the dark, empty boardwalk, his hands clenched into fists at his side. He turned in a circle, looking for an outlet for the white-hot wrath and before he knew it, he’d kicked out one of the wooden rungs that made up the railing.
“Tell me his last name, Jamie,” he said through clenched teeth. “I’m going to kill him.”
“Hey.” Jamie shoved him from the side. “My brother went to prison for my fucking mistake. You think I could stand it if you went, too? Enough.”
“Your mistake? You didn’t do anything. You…” Marcus stopped to catch his breath. “Oh God, Jamie, I’m like him all over again, aren’t I?”
“No,” Jamie said firmly, cutting a precise hand through the air. “Weren’t you listening earlier? The two of you couldn’t be more different.”
“Except we’re both closet cases who want you too much to stay away.”
“Fine. Except that.” Jamie closed his eyes for a second. “Marcus, you’re a good man. You would never hurt me or lash out like that. Ever. The only thing you have in common with Chris is you’ll only be with me behind closed doors. And that makes me feel like I did when I was thirteen. Like I’m wrong. I respect myself enough to not let that happen again.”
The wind went out of Marcus’s sails. One minute, he was ruled by anger and the next, he was deflated and numb. “I hate my
self for doing that to you.”
“I don’t even hate you for doing that to me,” Jamie said. He pushed off the railing and held out his hand to Marcus. “Friends, okay? We’re in the wrong time and place, but we’ve got being friends and I want to keep that.”
Marcus put his hand in Jamie’s and felt the dance of electricity climb his arm. “If I kissed you right here, out in the open, would it make up for anything? Pushing you away last night or not being ready for the real thing?”
Jamie’s breath came out in a rush and he started to take back his hand, but Marcus held on. Let go. You’ve done enough damage. But Marcus was also painfully aware of the fact that tomorrow when the sun came up, things would start down a strictly platonic path with Jamie and he wanted one more touch. One last time. Wanted to show Jamie he respected and valued him, even if they were standing alone in the dark. At least they weren’t behind a closed door.
“One time only,” Jamie rasped, stepping closer. “Okay?”
Marcus ducked his head slightly and caught Jamie’s mouth on a shared groan, their hips meeting and pressing at the same time as their tongues. He stumbled into Jamie, his hands tracking down the other man’s back to grip his ass in both hands, jerking Jamie up against him. Groin slid along groin and rested. Fuck. Their tongues wrestled, heads slanting one way, then the other, Marcus’s blood rushing straight to his cock. Stiff and aching as he was, though, the organ in his chest was in the most agony. It squeezed and gasped for breath. How could this be the last kiss when it felt like the beginning of everything? He couldn’t get enough, couldn’t get enough—
Jamie pushed at his chest and broke the kiss, falling back a step and panting. Marcus was in the same condition and battling the urge to dive back in for more. More. More. But Jamie must have seen the hunger in his expression, because he shook his head. “Come on. I’ll get us an Uber, drop you off on my way.”
In silence, he did just that.
And as Marcus stood outside his building ten minutes later watching Jamie drive away, he wondered how the hell he’d survive never kissing Jamie Prince again.
At that moment, it felt like he wouldn’t.
CHAPTER TEN
Jamie stared out at the sparkling Atlantic, wondering—not for the first time—how the beach could at once be the most serene place on the planet and the most violent. He’d spent enough summers lifeguarding to know how much pleasure people derided from the sand, the surf, the sun. Families created memories around the base of his chair. Farther out, past the break, vacationers skimmed along the blue on jet skis or boats. In the blink of an eye, it could change, though. A storm could roll in, an undertow could begin without anyone knowing, a rescue might take place. A fight could break out.
Growing up, Jamie had been no stranger to altercations. His father owned a bar, for chrissakes, one that had been far rougher once upon a time. He’d seen his fair share of bloodied faces and drunken arguments. Blessed with their father’s temper, Rory was constantly getting into scrapes at an early age, which meant Andrew and Jamie stepped in and threw their own punches when it was necessary to defend their younger brother.
Compared to what happened to him six years ago on this beach, those fights had been so innocent. Over dumb shit, like perceived slights. Nothing like the hate-fueled attack he’d experienced first hand not a hundred yards from where he sat. Jamie could still remember seeing Chris approaching on the beach and kind of being exasperated. Jesus, this guy again? There’d been little to no chemistry to begin with and an awkward amount of time had passed since they’d spoken. Why show up at his job?
That’s when he’d seen Chris’s friends—and he’d known. He’d known based on their disgusted expressions that this fight wouldn’t be innocent, like the ones he’d grown up with. There were too many of them to fend off, they were visibly intoxicated and Jamie was their intended target. For the first time in his life, he’d been in danger. If Rory hadn’t shown up and stopped them from raining blows down on Jamie and holding him under the water for longer and longer periods of time, their hatred could have been the last thing he ever saw.
Thank God it hadn’t been. Thank Rory, really. He’d sacrificed his freedom to defend Jamie and that was a debt that couldn’t be repaid. Every time Jamie got the notion to take a vacation in the summertime, to explore the world he read about in books instead of lifeguarding, he remembered that Rory had spent two years behind bars—and Jamie needed to be around to make sure it never happened again.
As he’d said last night, Marcus and Chris were nothing alike. Nothing at all. But Jamie couldn’t help but feel like putting some distance between himself and Marcus had been the right thing to do for his family, as well as himself.
Jamie was so deep in thought, he didn’t notice his oldest brother coming down the beach at first, even though Andrew’s arrival might have been precipitated by two dozen feminine sighs of appreciation that took place around Jamie’s lifeguard chair.
Jamie had known this encounter was coming. Which was precisely why he’d skipped breakfast this morning and snuck out the side door with a bagel in his mouth.
He should have known his brother would find a way.
With a sigh, Jamie leaned back in his seat and observed the arrival of the Prince elder. His ever present clipboard was carried loosely at his hip, Ray-Bans hiding eyes that were identical to Jamie’s and Rory’s. They never strayed to any of the girls fawning over him as he walked past on the beach. As usual, Jamie’s brother was immune to any kind of attention, unless it came straight from a certain girl next door.
“Hey,” Andrew said, coming to a stop at the bottom of Jamie’s chair. “Talk to you for a second?”
Jamie smirked and hopped down from his perch. “Sorry I took the last bagel this morning.”
“What? Oh yeah.” Uncharacteristically distracted, it seemed to take Andrew a moment to regain his train of thought. “Jiya didn’t make it for breakfast, either.”
“Really?”
Andrew coughed into his fist. “Have you noticed her acting different lately?”
“Nope, same old Jiya.”
“Huh.”
“Oh, except for the blind date her parents set her up on. She was a little irritated about that.”
Andrew dropped his clipboard and it stuck straight up in the sand. He didn’t even appear to notice the pages flapping in the breeze. “Date? Jiya?”
That had been a pretty mean way to inform his brother of Jiya’s foray into the dating market, but frankly, Jamie couldn’t take it anymore. His brother had been infatuated with Jiya since they were kids and refused to make a move. Not to mention, his brothers were vastly different humans. Rory needed to be handled with kid gloves when he came to Jamie for advice. Andrew required a straight up kick in the ass.
And Jamie was in the perfect mood to give him one.
He still had Marcus’s whisker burn on his jaw and cheeks from last night and…fuck it, he was as raw on the inside as hamburger meat. Their conversation last night had taken a turn he didn’t expect and he’d been forced to relive that evening from so long ago. He’d gone home last night feeling like an exposed nerve, not only because he’d talked about Chris. Out loud. For the first time in years.
No, Jamie was exposed because he could no longer pretend he hadn’t fallen for Marcus. He missed him when they were farther than two feet apart. Even the distance from behind the bar to the entrance where Marcus checked IDs had stretched last night. And God, that had been before that kiss on the boardwalk. That completely unrestrained kiss that had given Jamie a glimpse of what a relationship out in the open with Marcus could be like, before ripping it back. Marcus might as well have branded him in the center of his chest.
While Andrew sputtered and tried to form a sentence, Jamie massaged the bridge of his nose and counted his breaths. What planet was this? Jamie Prince, scholar, was all twisted up and angst-ridden over a CrossFit enthusiast with a naked lady arm tattoo. This was bullshit.
And he couldn
’t deny his heart squeezed every time he thought of the tortured way Marcus looked when he climbed out of the Uber last night.
Now, feeling eyes on his back, Jamie sighed and turned around, waving at Marcus where he sat in the closest chair, which he’d requested this morning from Andrew.
Marcus’s chest puffed up and he waved back.
This summer was never going to end.
Part of him—obviously his masochistic side—didn’t want it to.
“Who is she going on a date with?”
“I didn’t catch the lucky man’s name.”
“When was this?”
“Saturday night.”
“And you’re only telling me now?”
“It’s Sunday.” Jamie tilted his head to the side. “What would you have done about it, A? You can’t play house with Jiya forever. It has always been the two of you. Andrew and Jiya. But…she genuinely thinks you’re just friends. Why would she believe any differently when you’ve never asked her to be more?”
Andrew closed his eyes, his voice coming out strangled. “You know why I can’t.”
A chill settled on Jamie’s shoulders and both of them looked around the beach on reflex, making sure nobody was in earshot. “The three of us are the only ones who know about Dad. That’s how it’s going to stay.”
“Yeah? Wait ten seconds then look over at the boardwalk.”
Jamie reared back with a frown at the unexpected order, but did as his brother asked, going about it casually as possible. It took Jamie a few beats to figure out what Andrew was attempting to call his attention to. Leaning up against the railing, there was a familiar man in a police uniform. Jamie recognized him from the bar.
