“We should clean up,” he said into the dark space in front of him.
He felt Evan press up on his elbow to lean over him. “What’s going on?”
“Just thinking.”
Evan’s laugh was a silent warm breath on Jonah’s shoulder. “I noticed that. What about?”
“I think I may need a shower.”
As soon as he started to move, Evan pulled him back. “Jonah, please tell me.”
Jonah settled on his side again facing away. “Kelly and Paul I guess.”
“It bothers me too.” Evan said. “They’ve been together since I was in college. And last I knew, they were going to get married in Iowa—or maybe up here.”
Jonah couldn’t help it. At the word married, his body went rigid, and Evan had to have felt it. “Really?” It was a stupid thing to say, but it was all Jonah could think of.
“Uh-huh. Remember when it passed in New York?” Evan pulled a piece of hair off Jonah’s face and smoothed it back.
It had been a hell of a party. They’d only been dating for three months, but it had seemed important enough to drive down to the capitol and make their way into the capitol building with the rest of the anxious crowds as the voting came to a head. The explosive joy when it passed had them hugging and kissing like any of the couples who’d been waiting for years for the right to marry. Evan had pulled back to look at Jonah with those eyes that seemed to always be smiling at him and said, “Who knows? Maybe someday.”
It had been easier then to think about it as then, with it so far off in the distance and everyone happy and yelling and crying. Easy to laugh and say back, “Sure, someday. Just think of all those gifts.”
“I remember. I’m gonna go clean up a little. Want me to take the rubber?” Jonah rolled off the bed.
Chapter Seven
Evan woke and reached for Jonah, but his side of the bed was empty, the sheet cold. Evan shot upright and checked his watch. It was almost ten o’clock. He never overslept like this. But last night, watching Jonah yield, then come apart for him had kept Evan buzzed with energy long after Jonah was out cold. Even after falling asleep, Evan had kept reaching for Jonah, needing to feel the warmth of him, smell his skin.
His plan for the morning had been to blow Jonah into a mellow mood, then find out what had him so prickly and maybe figure out what had prompted him to write up that list. Now the day was shot. He had maybe two hours before the rest of the family descended for Christmas Eve. By dinner, there’d be nineteen of them, plus any other guests. Not exactly space for intense private communication—with or without a blowjob.
He might as well shower and shave and dress for the day. When he reached into the top pocket of his suitcase, digging for his belt, his hand closed around a square box.
Of course, Kelly’s rings. Evan had promised not to tell anyone, even Jonah, so the rings had been safely hidden until just before they left the house.
He took the cardboard out, opened the velvet-lined jeweler’s box inside. Kelly hadn’t wanted to mail order them and risk ruining the surprise, and he hadn’t trusted the quality, had asked Evan to get them at a jewelers. Poor bastard.
It was hard to hate Paul; he’d become like a second brother, blended into the family seamlessly. Evan knew it had freaked Jonah out too.
Evan snapped the lid shut. Jonah had been really weirded out when Evan had mentioned Kelly and Paul getting married. As if he were taking it personally. As if—
The last thing that had happened before Jonah started acting jumpy was wrapping that present for Matt. Jonah had said he’d run out of tape, which was in Evan’s desk, which had held—Evan closed his hand around the box.
Kelly’s rings. Jonah had found Kelly’s rings and thought Evan was going to propose? Evan replayed the conversation from last night in his head. Yes, that was exactly what Jonah had thought. And his reaction was to make a bucket list, like marriage to Evan equaled the death of a sex life?
First of all, if Jonah had been wanting to do any of that stuff, why hadn’t he come to Evan with it? He’d never once indicated he didn’t like things the way they were, though he’d clearly been holding back. Jesus. Evan loved Jonah. He loved the playfulness and impulsiveness that made Jonah who he was—downright irresistible. But sometimes Evan really felt the five year age gap between them, felt like the only grown-up in the relationship and that pissed him off.
They were going to talk about this right the fuck now.
But when he got downstairs, the house was quiet, though the driveway was full, his sister Caroline’s minivan behind April’s, Natalie’s VW bug parked at the curb. He came into the kitchen to find only his baby sister Natalie and April sprinkling bread crumbs over the top of two giant baking dishes full of macaroni and cheese.
“Where is everyone?”
“Thank you very much, Evan.” His sister smacked the back of his head then kissed his cheek. “Everyone who isn’t one of the two indentured servants assigned to make lunch went to the park for some sort of sporting adventure involving a football.”
“Jonah too?”
Natalie nodded. “He would be included in the everyone who isn’t us, yes, brainiac.”
“Thanks. Caroline managed to get here early.” Evan had never really understood his sisters’ love-hate relationship.
“Notice she still didn’t get drafted for kitchen duty,” Natalie complained. “Caroline said TJ and Eric wanted to show off the game system they got from their other grandparents. And see their cousins,” Natalie said. “And you know how Mom is with her brand-new firstest granddaughter.”
Evan tuned out the start of Natalie’s sibling rivalry rant entitled “Mom Loves Caroline Best Because She Made Babies Including the First Girl,” stepping around her to the fridge for a glass of juice. He preferred kitchen duty to child care any day.
“Poor baby, you look tired,” April said. “Maybe something kept you up last night.”
“Or someone.” Natalie grinned.
“There was all this pounding and grunting next to my wall,” April said with wide-eyed innocence. “Did you hear it, Evan?”
“Shut up. Why didn’t anyone make more coffee?”
“Ooh, cranky-pants.” Natalie started in on him. “I thought sex was supposed to put guys in a good mood.” She pulled the coffee filters down from the cabinet.
“Where’s the boyfriend du jour, Nat? Rick or Nick or something? Didn’t he earn the trip?”
“You know where the coffee stuff is, big brother. And fuck you very much.” Natalie walked out of the kitchen.
“What?” Evan looked at April. “What was that about?”
“She caught him cheating or almost cheating or something. And she’s been with him for almost the whole year, Evan.”
“Well, how am I supposed to know? No one tells me anything.” Not even his own damned boyfriend.
He took his phone out to text Jonah with a We need to talk, but the whole thing was giving him a headache. And Dad’s cousins and uncle would be here soon, loud and burning a hole in the liquor cabinet, doing their best to live up to an Irish stereotype. There was only so much drama one Christmas Eve could handle.
Before he could put his phone away, an email notification pinged. He opened his in-box, grateful for the distraction—until he read the subject header: Firstbaby has updated his profile on M2M.
He’d met Jonah on that hookup site, though after the first few times with Jonah, Evan hadn’t used it, and he sure as hell hadn’t known that he still had Jonah’s profile linked through email. If it hadn’t been for today’s date on it, he’d have thought it was a glitch, some old message stuck in cyberspace. Under the picture which showed Jonah from bright grin to the top of his treasure trail were the same facts, except that the new update showed him as “interested in BDSM.”
Th
e screen wavered as rage blurred Evan’s vision for a second. He held himself tight, fighting the muscles that wanted to explode in hot possessive insanity. Smash the phone, fling the carafe into the wall, and if nothing else, drive back to Saratoga to pack up Jonah’s shit and put it on the curb.
So maybe they’d never explicitly covered the don’t-fuck-around topic when Evan had asked Jonah to move in fourteen months ago, but Evan was sure they’d covered that last night. And this update was from today. Jonah was more interested in updating a hookup site with his kinks than in updating the man he lived with.
“Where are you going?” April asked.
“For coffee.” Evan forced the words past his clenched teeth.
Evan was already outside the back door when April came up behind him. “Wait. Take Caroline’s keys. She’s got you blocked in.”
“Fine.” Evan turned to face her.
April took a step back. “What happened?”
“Nothing. I just want some damned coffee without two lumps of family drama.” He grabbed the keys from her hand.
“Do you want me to—”
“It’s just a cup of coffee, April. I’m taking Caroline’s Odyssey. I don’t feel like dealing with moving the cars around.” And driving his sister’s car would keep him from driving all the way back to Saratoga to throw the bastard out.
* * *
A post on Jonah’s M2M profile landed in his in-box while they were walking home from the park. Reading it had made it hard to walk. His cheeks burned with more than the cold, the heat coloring his throat and down into his neck.
Kelly bumped his shoulder. “Evan must give good text.”
Jonah realized he’d stopped moving. “Um, yeah.” And now the burn had more to do with guilt than with the images that post had stirred. It wasn’t really cheating, though. More of a kind of a “see what there was.” Not like he’d act on it. And Jonah had been bored.
April’s six-year-old son Connor had been tackled by his brother during the game and to end the resulting epic tantrum, Jonah had offered to walk him to the playground. There was only so much “Watch me, Jonah” of sliding and monkey bars antics Jonah had the patience for and he’d kept thinking about how hot it had been last night when Evan had taken charge.
So the post was only like asking for information. A personalized search-engine. Talking about Kelly and Paul had made it clear acting on this kind of stuff had to stay just a fantasy.
Staring down at the M2M response, Jonah knew he would never do anything about the offer in graphic black and white with a color photo for emphasis. It was more like watching porn than actually cheating. And he kept on telling himself that as he jerked himself off in the shower with the words of that post echoing in his head.
If you ever find your way down to the city I’ll show you I know how to take care of boys like you. That cocky grin won’t last long when I’ve got you chained and spread open for me, when I set your skin on fire with my leather. I’ll make you take it all and you’ll love it.
The post included an image of a dark-furred chest, thick cock rising from between leather chaps, a rough-looking hand with inked knuckles wrapped around the base. Jonah imagined that rough hand on him, the feel of the leather chaps against his ass—after his skin had been licked by a flogger—and came so hard he staggered and slammed his hand against the wall.
Evan and Kelly were playing video games with their nephews in the family room when Jonah came back downstairs. Evan’s mom chased him out of the kitchen when he offered to help. That left him trapped in the den with the more hard-drinking family members, Caroline’s silent husband and a football game between two colleges he’d never heard of.
So maybe he checked the post a few more times, looking for some kind of distraction, wondering what would happen if he posted back to 2top4u.
“Here, Paulie, have another one.” A glass of whiskey was thrust into his hands.
“That’s Jonah,” Evan’s dad said quietly.
“Oh, sure, Jonah, the other one’s whatever.” That came from Evan’s granduncle.
Jonah put the whiskey on an end table, certain it wouldn’t go to waste and stood. “Mr. Murphy?”
Four men looked up at him. “Um, Charles?” Jonah addressed Evan’s dad. “Would it be all right if I used the computer?”
“Sure. Go ahead.” Evan’s dad waved him on.
It was in a drop-down desk in the deserted sitting room, not exactly private, but Jonah wasn’t as interested in the M2M site as he was about where the post had come from. If you ever find your way down to the city suggested New York, with surprisingly good grammar and spelling for an internet hookup site.
He couldn’t get a complete fix on the IP address without his own software, but he could do enough checking to get a general idea, which put 2top4u in northern New Jersey. The picture of course, could be faked, and this could be some pasty chicken-skinned eighty-year-old messing with him. It didn’t really matter. Since it wasn’t going to happen. It was just a way to figure out if this was something he needed. Hell, maybe he could get a tip on how to bring it up: “So You Want Your Boyfriend to Tie You Up: Tips from the Experts.”
He cleared the history and cleaned up the registry to make sure nothing had slipped in to the Murphys’ computer while he was poking around, then took out his phone to leave a private post on 2top4u’s profile.
Supposing I did get to the city, how do I know you’re for real?
The answering post pinged back after lunch while Jonah was helping with the dishes. He took the trash outside to read it in privacy.
Isn’t the danger part of what gets you hot?
Jonah tucked his phone away and stared into the yard.
He felt warmth behind him before he heard Evan’s voice. “Our reputation has been sullied.”
“Huh?” Heart in his throat, Jonah spun around quickly. “I didn’t—”
The protest faded as Evan raised his eyebrows and offered a half smile. “My sisters and April have challenged the gay men to some kind of dancing video game. Are you ready to defend the honor of homosexuals everywhere?”
The men won on points, though Natalie had the highest individual score. She’d clearly played before. Kelly could move like he didn’t have a spine, which inspired some awkward feelings, since Jonah was already overdosing on guilt.
The girls blamed Caroline for dragging them down. “Yeah, you try those moves after three kids.”
“No one made you have them,” Natalie sniped back.
Jonah didn’t remember last Christmas or even Thanksgiving being this tense, but then last Christmas, Paul had been there with a joke or a story that defused whatever sprang up. After dinner, the six of them played a board game while Evan’s mother accomplished the astounding task of arranging sleeping quarters for nineteen in a four-bedroom house.
During the game another argument burst out between Evan’s sisters. It might be only his second Murphy Christmas, but he’d heard this argument from them last year, something to do with a TV show they’d watched obsessively years ago.
“If it had been anybody but Madison,” Caroline started.
“It doesn’t matter, they were broken up at the time.” Natalie yanked the box of question cards away from her sister.
“I don’t think he knew what that meant to her,” April added.
“Of course he did. That’s why it was Madison. He did it to get back at her. That’s why it was like cheating.” Caroline picked up the dice and shook them in her hand.
“He didn’t remember—” Natalie began.
Kelly cut her off. “Not to denigrate my entire gender, but I think you’re giving the guy too much credit for using his upstairs brain. If an opportunity presents itself and he’s unattached, well...” he leaned back to make sure they were the only ones in the dining room, “...a
hole’s a hole. Sorry, Caro.”
All three of the girls made a face at him with April adding an “Ew, thank you for the image, brother.”
Kelly shrugged.
“Six years of this, for God’s sake, like they were real people.” Evan waded in, but instead of the calm finality Jonah was used to in Evan settling an argument, his voice shook with emotion. “They were broken up. Whatever fucking happens after a breakup is not cheating, no matter who the fuckee is. Now can we finish the game before dawn?”
“Lighten up, Evan. It was just a TV show.” Caroline tossed the dice onto the board.
“I’m done.” Evan pushed away from the table.
Caroline and Natalie stared at his retreating back, but Kelly and April fixed their gazes on Jonah. As if he knew what had set Evan off. Jonah spread his palms and shrugged. Evan in this mood was not something Jonah wanted to decode. He’d finish the game and give him a chance to calm down.
It was more than an hour before the game wrapped up. In the dark of their bedroom, Evan sat up as Jonah closed the door.
“Sorry if I woke you,” Jonah whispered.
“I was awake.”
“Oh.” Probably not calmed down then.
Jonah hadn’t done anything wrong. Yet, his conscience whispered. Still, he hadn’t so much as touched another guy since that first night with Evan almost two years ago. And he hadn’t wanted to.
Jonah stripped and sat on the edge of the bed. “Everything okay?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
Jonah chose his words carefully. “You got a little intense.”
“Growing up with two sisters plus April made me really glad I’m gay,” Evan said dryly.
There wasn’t a lot of room in the double bed, but after Jonah had settled under the sheets, he found Evan managing to keep a few inches between them.
Preserving that distance, Jonah rolled on his side to face Evan. “Kelly seemed better today.”
“Yes, I’m sure he’s completely recovered from losing the love of his life.” Evan turned onto his back.
Jonah let those words sink into his head. Evan didn’t throw that word around a lot. In fact, despite the whole he-has-wedding-rings-in-his-desk thing, Evan had never once told Jonah he loved him, was in love with him, whatever. Jonah was pretty sure he had said it to Evan. Maybe not directly, but ways like “I love when you cook me dinner,” or “I love what you do to me in bed,” but considering that Jonah also said with frequency how much he loved a song or his phone, Evan might not have taken it the way Jonah had meant it.
Wish List Page 5
