The Single Dad and his Soul Mate

by Rebecca James

  Mick gave a half shrug. “It is what it is. I was stupid to have gone out in the alley, no matter what I heard.”

  “What are you going to do when you get out of here?”

  “Keep going. What choice do I have? But I want to move out of Dante’s and Isaac’s house. They’re great, but I feel like a third wheel.”

  “Is that safe?”

  Mick shrugged. “I’ll get a roommate. I can’t live my life in fear. Sooner or later, Kil will get his.”

  I hoped Mick would still be breathing to see it.

  So I changed the subject. We talked about Cooper, and I told him about our outing to the library. “I would have thought there would’ve been some dads there, but I was the only one. I felt out of place, and maybe that’s why Cooper didn’t feel comfortable.”

  “Hey, there’s a group for single dads in Henry. You should try that one out. One of the guys who started it works at the bank next to the shop where I work. We sometimes have lunch. I’m sure they’d welcome you there. Want to put your number in my phone, and I’ll give it to him?”

  Liking the idea of talking to other single dads who were going through something similar to me, I eagerly reached for his phone charging on the table. “Sure. That’s really nice of you.”

  “My code is a lowercase b. For boy.” He winked at me. Or I thought he did. His face was pretty messed up. “Because, you know, I love me a Daddy.”

  I smiled and shook my head as I programmed my number into his contacts. I marveled that he could be so upbeat after what had happened to him. Here he was, lying in the hospital with a gang of assholes after him, and he was trying to do me a good turn.

  “I’m sure he’ll be calling you soon,” Mick said. “His name is Liam.”

  “I’ll be watching for the call,” I promised.

  The door opened and a nurse walked in with a tray. “Visiting hours are over now.”

  I stood. “I guess that’s my cue to leave.”

  “Thanks for coming to see me,” Mick said. “And thanks for the plant.”

  “They grow better if you talk to them,” I said, then felt myself blushing.

  “I’ve heard that,” the nurse said.

  “I’ll come again if you’re in here for long,” I told Mick. “Otherwise I might see you at Dante and Isaac’s. They’ve invited me and Coop to visit.”

  “Great. See you, Flynn.”

  When I returned to the hallway, Isaac and Dante were gone. I waved to the nurse at the station as I passed, then almost swallowed my tongue when I turned around in the elevator and came face-to-face with Matteo.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Matteo

  I watched as a deep blush infused Flynn’s face. My heart was beating a mile a minute. I hadn’t expected to run into Flynn at the hospital.

  “Hi. Uh…visiting hours over?” I asked.

  “Yeah.”

  He gave me a look—like was I getting off the elevator or not—and when I shook my head, he pushed the button for the garage level. I couldn’t stop staring at him. He was wearing a dark blue Henley with beige slacks, and his hair was brushed off his face.

  “You look good,” I said.

  His eyes flicked to me. “Thanks.” He cleared his throat. “You do too.”

  The elevator stopped and the doors opened. I followed Flynn out as several people entered the elevator. Our footsteps were loud as we traversed the smooth cement of the garage.

  I didn’t have a plan. I’d wanted to see Flynn but hadn’t expected to run into him like this. My motorcycle was parked out front, not in the garage. He stopped at a white 2015 Volkswagen Golf GTI and unlocked the doors with his fob.

  “You got a minute?” I asked.

  When he turned to me, his eyes were unsure.

  “Hey,” I said softly. “I only want to talk. It’s been a long time.”

  He nodded.

  I cleared my throat. “Uh. How have you been?”

  “Good,” he said. He wasn’t going to make this easy for me.

  “So, you moved back here, huh?”

  “Almost five years ago.”

  Stunned, I blinked. “Wow. That long? What happened, you didn’t like California?”

  “It was fine.”

  I swallowed. “That guy you went into business with still out there?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Flynn.”

  He met my eyes. “What?”

  “Come on. I just want to talk.”

  “Why? Why now?”

  “Because it’s been seven years. Because I’ve missed you. I can’t believe you’ve been in the city so long, and I didn’t even know it. Why didn’t you get in touch?”

  “What for?”

  I looked away. “I thought we meant more to each other than that.”

  “We did mean more!” Flynn burst out, calm gone. “Goddamn it, Matteo! You were everything to me. How can you say that?”

  Taken aback, I struggled for words.

  He turned to open his car door, and I reached out and grabbed his arm.

  “No.”

  He looked at my hand and then at me. I pulled back, but not before running my fingers lightly over the back of his hand. It felt so good to touch him again.

  Flynn sucked in a breath and rubbed his skin as though I’d bitten him.

  I couldn’t let go of this moment. “Please…can’t we just have a conversation? Please.”

  He looked around, and I quickly added, “There’s a coffee shop next door. We could go there.”

  His nod was reluctant, but it was something. He gestured to his car, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Circling the rear, I climbed into the passenger seat. The interior smelled like him, a combination of the cologne he’d always worn and his shampoo.

  Once, a few years back, I’d been in a gas station with Blaze and Jeo buying beer, and a man had passed, bringing a whiff of that once-familiar cologne to my nostrils along with a swarm of memories that had rendered me breathless. While I’d stood there, trying to bring myself back online, the guys and the rest of the world had gone on as though nothing was any different. It had taken a week or more for thoughts of Flynn to slide back into the box at the back of my mind where I’d kept them locked up.

  Now, in his car, that scent in my nose, I squeezed my eyes shut and swallowed hard, doing my damnedest to stuff those memories back into the box, but it was too late. The night of our breakup loomed behind my eyes.

  He’d told me his plans to leave. It was over. But we hadn’t been able to keep our hands off each other. It had always been like that with us. One touch and bam! There was no going back. And that night, every touch, every caress had said goodbye while my heart had screamed at me to do something to keep him with me.

  The word painful didn’t half describe it.

  “Hey.” Flynn’s voice jolted me to the present, and I realized he’d parked in front of the coffee shop. When I looked at him, tears in my eyes, he drew in a breath.

  I jerked open the door and climbed out of the car into the chilly night air, stalking toward the shop with Flynn scrambling after me.

  Overwhelmed, I leaned against the building.

  “You okay?” Flynn asked from behind me.

  I shook my head, running a trembling hand over my face. Flynn touched my shoulder, and, to my horror, the tears fell harder.

  Flynn tugged me to the corner.

  “Matty?”

  Pressing my lips together, I shook my head. “Don’t you feel it?” My voice broke. “Being with me again?”

  Flynn stared. I turned away from him, breathing deeply, fighting to compose myself. After the first night, when I’d gotten so drunk I passed out and had to have Zeke drive me to the clubhouse and put me to bed while he stayed with Nonna, I’d never allowed myself to mourn the loss of Flynn. How crazy was it that it all hit me now, when he stood in front of me? I needed him to tell me he was as affected by it all as I was.

  “Of course I do,” he said quietly.

  I shook my he
ad again, frustrated I couldn’t stop crying. I wiped my face on my sleeve and stepped farther away from the building into the shadows cast by the trees.

  “Why do you think I’ve been avoiding you?” he asked, following me. “I knew I’d fall apart.”

  I looked at him over my shoulder. “Yeah, well, you’re doing a good job of hiding it.”

  He gave me a small smile. “I think I’m in shock.”

  “What the fuck’s that supposed to mean?” I mumbled, wiping my eyes again.

  “I’ve never seen you cry.”

  “It’s been a long time,” I said, then murmured, “Seven years, to be exact.”

  “Matteo. Please don’t do this to me.”

  I walked away another few steps. If I didn’t get control of myself fast, I was going to start sobbing like a baby and might not ever be able to stop.

  “Look,” Flynn said after a long moment, voice sounding choked. “We can’t do this here. I’ll take you back to your bike, and we’ll go to my apartment. We’ll talk there. Okay?”

  I nodded. I needed this. Even if we never spoke again after today.

  The drive to Flynn’s on my bike gave me the time I needed to pull myself together. When we stopped in front of his shop with the apartment above it, I couldn’t believe for the past five years he’d been a mere fifteen minutes away from the clubhouse. New York City was a vast place, but, somehow, I couldn’t get over the fact I hadn’t somehow known.

  “Cute name,” I said when I stood looking at the sign. “Flynn’s Stones.”

  “Thanks. My friend Gloria came up with it. The store in California had been called Crystallize, which was cool, but I wanted something new.”

  “How come you came back?” I followed him into the building and up the back stairs to his apartment.

  He unlocked the door and flipped on the lights, and we ascended another few steps to the living room. “A friend of mine—Heather?” He looked at me as though I might remember.

  The imagine of a blond, blue-eyed waif who had reminded me of a flower child from an earlier generation came to mind. “With the van and the drugs?” I’d never understood why Flynn had liked her, but he’d always been the type to want to help everyone out.

  “Yeah. She found out she was pregnant and asked me if I wanted the baby. I moved back here and made her get clean.”

  I stared. “Really? And she just gave him to you?”

  “Yes. She knew I wanted a child. She’d been living in her van, and I moved her in here with me. When she had Cooper, she put me down as the father and signed away her rights. Then she picked up and left.”

  “Jesus, just like that?”

  “Yep.” Flynn put his keys in a bowl on the table. “I hear from her once a year at Christmas. Want a drink?”

  “Got beer?” I asked, and Flynn headed into the small kitchen. I looked around at the small, cozy space. A couple of toy motorcycles were propped on on a worn table, and several colorful pillows were stacked in a chair next to a pile of children’s books. When Flynn and I had dated, he’d worked for a financial firm and hated it. He’d lived in a nicer place then, but I could see this was more of a home than that had been for him.

  “Heather knew she wasn’t mother material,” Flynn said when he came back with two bottles of beer. He handed me one.

  “Where is she now?”

  “It’s different every year. Last Christmas it was a small town in Oregon.”

  I followed Flynn to the couch and sat next to him. “And you’ve just been here, working at your shop the last five years?”

  He nodded. I watched his Adams apple move as he drank and then took a sip of my beer.

  “Cooper likes bikes?” I asked, picking up one of the toys. I could feel Flynn’s eyes on me.

  “Likes is too tame of a word. He’s crazy about them. When he saw all the guys’ bikes at Dante’s at the barbecue last summer, he went ballistic.”

  I grinned. “Sounds like a smart kid.”

  Flynn chuckled and shook his head. “He’s nuts about this cartoon show, Ricky Zoom. He’d watch it all day if I’d let him.” He tilted his head. “Tell me what’s going on with you.”

  “Same old, same old,” I said. “Not much difference between me today and the last time we talked.”

  “Still working nights?”

  I nodded. “For the most part.”

  “You hated it.”

  I shrugged. “It’s just a job.”

  “You deserve more. Your voice—how come you never did anything with that?”

  “I sang at the talent show Jeo put on for Rainbow House. Not for money, of course.”

  “I know,” he said softly. “I was there. You sang beautifully.”

  I’d agreed to sing at the talent show as a favor to Jeo. I’d chosen the song I had because I’d hoped Flynn would be there because of Nick. I’d sung I Will Always Love You.

  “I was singing it to you.”

  Flynn closed his eyes and a shiver went through him. I wanted so badly to lean in and kiss him. It took everything in me not to.

  He got up from the sofa, and for a moment I was terrified he’d ask me to leave. He stood uncertainly a moment in the middle of the room before crossing to the bookcase and slipping a CD into the stereo system. I was relatively certain it was the same system he’d had seven years ago. Flynn wasn’t a frivolous spender. If something worked, he wasn’t about to get rid of it. That was how he’d managed to save enough money to start his own business.

  When the first strains of Jeff Buckley’s version of the Leonard Cohen song Hallelujah filled the room, I gasped.

  “Our song,” I said, voice rough. So many memories.

  “I’ve been angry with you,” Flynn said when he’d turned to face me. “It was easier.” He held out his hand. “Dance with me?”

  I was on my feet in seconds. Taking Flynn into my arms, I breathed for what felt like the first time in years. I lived again.

  God, it felt good to touch him. I wanted so much more, but I held him gently against me, respectfully, hardly able to believe he was really there, that this was real, and so afraid he’d pull away from me.

  We swayed to the music, and, turning my head, I again took in the once-familiar scent of him. “I never thought I’d experience a moment like this again,” I said after a moment.

  Flynn relaxed against me and sighed. “I know this is a bad idea. I can’ help myself, you know?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. I know.”

  After a moment, I whispered, “Tell me you’ve missed me too.” I braced myself to hear his feelings had changed.

  Flynn pulled back to look me in the face, still so close I could see each burst of copper flame in his eyes.

  “Of course I have,” he said roughly. “Matteo.”

  My eyes were drawn to his pink lips, and I couldn’t keep myself from pressing my mouth to them. The kiss was warm, soft, and giving, just as I remembered.

  I pulled away, but to my surprise, Flynn chased my mouth and kissed me again, deepening it. I felt some the anger he’d spoken of in the way he roughly pulled me closer and hungrily licked into my mouth. I moaned, and he thrust his erection against my thigh.

  “God help me. God help me, Matteo, I need you.” Flynn fisted his hands in my hair and nibbled my lips before licking over them and then devouring my mouth until I thought I was going to break apart.

  I could only nod in agreement and give him back as much as he gave me. I needed him. I fumbled, struggling to unfasten his jeans. He broke the kiss, pushed them down and off his legs and feet, and then his mouth hit mine again.

  It had been much too long.

  “Bedroom,” he said, voice shaking, and my heart soared knowing he still wanted me, that I wasn’t alone in this emotional torrent.

  He took my hand and led me down the dark hall, my eyes fixed on his smooth, round ass the entire way. A part of me burned for him while another part felt calmer than I’d ever felt in my life. Like what was happening was inevitable.
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  I half expected Flynn to come to his senses and put a stop to what we were about to do. He’d been so resistant to even talking to me earlier. But he turned to face me in the small bedroom and pulled off his shirt, then I watched as he lay down on the bed and tugged off his socks. I somehow managed to get myself moving and out of my clothes, eyes never leaving his body, so familiar yet so changed.

  I joined him on the bed and ran a trembling hand over his defined pecs and abs.

  “You’ve muscled up,” I said.

  “I hit the gym a few times a week.” Flynn ran his finger over my bottom lip before trailing it from my shoulder to my elbow, leaving a trail of goosebumps in its wake. He kissed me aain, our tongues tangling, and I was lost in him.

  “We don’t have to…to do anything more.” I don’t know how I managed the words, I wanted him so badly. But I knew that I’d hurt him years ago and didn’t want to do it again.

  Flynn’s eyes sparked. “We’re not stopping.”

  I opened my mouth to remind him I was the same man I was seven years ago. Nothing had changed. If he hadn’t wanted me then, he wasn’t going to want me now. Instead I said, “Okay.”

  Our mouths crashed together again, and then it was all lips, teeth, tongue, and hands. Just the feel of Flynn’s bare leg brushing over mine brought a shiver up my spine and precum to the head of my cock.

  Hard plastic pressed against my palm, and it took a moment for my addled brain to process Flynn had handed me a small bottle of lube.

  “You look as good as ever,” Flynn said, moving his mouth to my neck and nibbling there.

  “I’m getting old.” I sat up and coated a finger with the lube. Flynn shook his head, tracing the muscles along my sides and back with his long fingers before gripping my shoulders and climbing into my lap, wrapping his long legs around my waist. He kissed me again, and I groaned into his mouth, every nerve alive at the feel of his rigid cock rubbing against mine.

  “Wanna taste you,” I said.

  “Mmm. Want you inside me.”

  I groaned. In some ways it was like all the years had melted away, and we were like we once were at the beginning of our relationship. No separation. No hard feelings. No pain. I clung to that as I kissed along his neck, making my way to the sensitive place behind his ear just to hear him moan.