by E M Lindsey
Spencer drove straight to the clinic and let himself in the back. It was after hours and none of the staff or volunteers were around. Flicking on the lights, he went into Rusty’s kennel. He was a grumpy cat who wouldn’t tolerate other cats. He’d lost the tips of his ears to frostbite, his tail was crooked, he had a snaggle tooth, and he loved Spencer.
Spencer sat on the floor and Rusty came to him, purring. He held the cat to his chest and finally allowed himself to cry.
Chapter 24
Max makes amends
It had been two weeks since the storm in the mountains. Two fucking weeks, and Max couldn’t get the memory of Collin’s rough voice or Spencer’s delicate fingers out of his mind. It bordered on obscene, the level of fascination Max had with trying to recall the night they’d spent holed up together in Collin’s cabin, but what else did he have to do? Back in the real world, he was alone, sitting in a house devoid of half its previous contents. Every empty corner was a stark and painful reminder of just how much he’d lost in the past month.
They hadn’t exchanged phone numbers.
Spencer had wanted to, and Max had shrugged him off, and Collin hadn’t done anything to stop either of them from ruining...well, from ruining whatever the thing between the three of them had become.
Was it even anything?
They’d been trapped in a cabin during a storm. It had been cold. Scary. They’d taken comfort in each other, emotionally and physically. And then the sun came out, the rain dried up, and real life waited for each of them. They were all so different. Where could either Collin or Spencer take up space in Max’s life now that his life wasn’t in the mountains?
In the early hours of Saturday morning, Max lay awake in bed. He scratched his fingers down the side of his face, painfully aware of how much he missed the rough slide of Collin’s stubble against his jaw. He grabbed his cock and jacked himself off with a tight fist, but he couldn’t stay hard. He ached to go back to the mountains, back to Collin, just one time. One more kiss. One more fuck. One more breakfast of beans on toast.
His cock was still soft, bendable in the tight grip of his hand, and he closed his eyes with a frustrated grunt, turning his attention to memories of Spencer.
Spencer. His sweetheart.
Their sweetheart.
With his pale, smooth skin, and his wide and eager eyes. Spencer covered in sweat and cum. Spencer, curled up in a blanket with Robert and Dudley. Spencer tucked so sweetly between him and Collin,.. and there it was.
His cock grew thick against his palm, pulsing in time with the beats of his heart.
He thought about the two men—so drastically different from each other—who in such a short time had made such an indelible mark on his heart. He remembered the heat of their combined attention, the smell of their arousal, joined together and thick in the air of Collin’s dark bedroom.
Max pulled an orgasm out of himself, but it was lonely and sad and empty, and he begrudgingly dressed and walked down to his car before he had time to stop and think about what he was doing.
If he was taking the last two weeks this hard, he knew there was another person who would be dealing with it worse.
Spencer.
And Max didn’t have a phone number, because the day they parted, he’d been so wrapped up in his own confusion and want and heartache, he’d shied away from Spencer’s pleas to keep in touch.
Max locked himself in his car, unsure of where to start, but he knew Spencer ran a cat rescue or cat sanctuary, or cat something, and he struggled with the small screen of his phone, googling until he’d narrowed down a short list of places in the surrounding area that might be the one he was looking for.
The first two were misses, and Max stopped at a gas station for an energy drink and a pack of gum before getting back on the road. The next three were also misses, the middle one being dogs and not cats, and the fourth one also having rabbits, which while adorable, was not anything Spencer had mentioned.
Max trudged back to his car and plugged the address for the last place into his nav. As he stabbed out the street name, his fingers trembled. He knew, just knew, deep in his gut, that this was the right one. He knew he’d find Spencer at Purridise, and he was two blocks away when he had the terrifying thought…
What if Spencer didn’t want to see him?
Max parked his car and wiped his sweaty hands on the front of his jeans and looked into the window of Purridise. He didn’t see Spencer, but that didn’t mean he wasn’t there. He was probably in the back with the actual cats. Max laughed to himself, thinking about Spencer cross-legged on the floor, tiny little kittens crawling all over him.
A new feeling surged against his sternum, and he forced himself out of the car before he changed his mind. When he pushed open the door to the rescue, a young girl with faded green hair and a fresh undercut looked up at him with a broad smile.
“Can I help you?” she asked by way of greeting.
“Uhm, I’m looking for Spencer.”
The girl squinted at him, and Max braced himself for another negative response. He puffed out a breath and ran his hand through his hair, turning back toward the door.
“Sorry to bother you,” he said. “Never mind.”
“Did you not need him?”
Max stalled in his tracks.
The audacity of the question tore a rough sound out of his throat.
Did he not need him?
Max hadn’t thought so, but the past two weeks had proven him a liar. He wasn’t about to tell this kid that, though.
“Is he here?” Max asked.
“He’s in back with the kittens. Were you here for happy hour?”
“What’s happy hour?”
“Every Saturday from ten to eleven is happy hour. People come in to hang out with the cats we have here. You know? Give them some pets and affection. Then everyone is happy. Feline and human.”
Max swallowed thickly. Spencer would have something like that. It seemed to Max to be the most natural and expected thing in the world for Spencer to do. Always thinking about other people, making sure their needs were met.
It was exactly what Spencer had done when he’d walked away from Max and Collin in the parking lot. At the time, Max had thought that was what he wanted, but he knew now it wasn’t. More importantly, he understood how much it wasn’t what Spencer had wanted, but he’d done it anyway.
“Can you show me?” he managed to ask.
The girl pointed to wooden saloon doors behind the counter.
“Back through here, second door on the left.” She held one of the doors open, and Max managed to make his way around her and to the door in question.
It was closed, but there was a window in it. Spencer’s back was to him, and he laughed as a cat crawled up his side, kneading against his skin. There was no one else in the room. Just Spencer and four cats. Max grabbed the doorknob, but he couldn’t open it. His palms were so sweaty, he couldn’t get a grip on it.
The door rattled at his first failed attempt, drawing Spencer’s attention. He looked over his shoulder, broad grin faltering when his eyes landed on Max through the glass. Spencer looked like he’d been kicked, and maybe Max had kicked him before he’d said goodbye, he didn’t know for sure.
Max raised a hand, giving Spencer an awkward and unmoving wave through the window, all the while hoping Spencer couldn’t see the tremble that rattled all the bones in his wrist. Fuck, was Spencer going to leave him here? Awkward and silent in his apology? Could he at least put Max out of his misery and send him away, or yell at him, or anything more than staring at him like he was a ghost?
Max’s chest ached from the disappointment that colored Spencer’s features, and Max slowly lowered his hand, turning away. But before he made it back to the saloon doors, though, Spencer was there.
“Max?”
Max stopped walking, frozen in place.
“What are you doing here?”
“Looking for you,” he answered without turning around
.
“How did you find me?” Spencer was behind him then, and tentative fingertips pressed against the small of his back before skirting away. The touch was so fleeting, Max couldn’t be sure it had ever happened. He reached behind him, finding Spencer’s hand nowhere in reach.
Max turned around and looked down.
“There’s a lot of cat rescues in this city,” he offered with a lopsided shrug.
“Yeah.” Spencer chewed on the inside of his upper lip.
“I’m sorry,” Max blurted.
Spencer studied him, another silent appraisal that had Max wanting to crawl out of his skin, then Spencer said softly, “Come on, then.”
He turned and retreated back to the happy hour room, and Max obediently followed, his steps feeling lighter than they had in weeks. He followed Spencer into the room and closed the door behind them. It smelled overwhelmingly like disinfectant and cat litter, but he didn’t care because he was here. Spencer gracefully folded himself back down onto the ground and held out his hands for the cats.
“Come on,” he repeated, and Max came to sit beside him, albeit much less gracefully.
He didn’t know what to say so he said nothing, and one of the kittens sniffed cautiously at his knee. He reached out and pet the wee beast on the top of its head.
“That’s Buttercup,” Spencer said, his words tight with tension.
“Who are the others?”
“Dumpling. Pete. Marigold.” Spencer pointed to the other three cats.
“Alright.”
“What are you doing here?” Spencer finally asked, looking up at him with sad eyes.
“Looking for you.”
“So you said, but why?”
“I can’t stop thinking about you,” he admitted.
Spencer frowned slightly and stared down at his lap. “Alright, and what?” Spencer straightened his shoulders, all traces of the frown gone so quickly, Max couldn’t be sure he’d seen it there in the first place.
“I, uhm…” He didn’t know.
“Right.”
“I wanted to apologize,” Max blurted. It wasn’t really what he’d come to do, but it needed to be done. “I’m sorry for not telling you about Trent. Sorry for being the way I was when we parted ways. I just...I figured you and Collin were better for it than I was.”
“He doesn’t want to be with me.”
“That’s wrong.”
“You don’t want to be with me either.” Spencer leveled an accusatory glare at him.
“Wrong.”
“Then why did you act the way you did in the parking lot?”
“I was stupid. Scared.”
“Of what?” Spencer raised a brow.
“Jesus, you don’t pull any punches, do you?”
“It’s been a long two weeks.”
“I know,” he agreed. “That’s why I’m here.”
“Come to rescue your damsel in distress, then?”
“You’re not just mine.”
Spencer licked his lips. “Have you...have you spoken to Collin, then?”
“No. I’m not here for anyone besides myself, but I know the things I think about when I’m alone, and it’s never just one of you.”
“Really?” Spencer’s brows pulled together.
“Really.”
“Oh, thank god.” Spencer jumped up and cats flew everywhere. With a quick flail of his arms, Spencer was in Max’s lap, the hands Max had thought so long and hard about cradling his cheeks.
Max caught him, Spencer’s weight surprisingly heavy and solid in his lap. He wrapped his arms around Spencer’s back and pulled him close, burying his face in the slender arch of Spencer’s neck.
“Kiss me, you big, grumpy idiot, then let’s figure out how to find our man.”
Chapter 25
Collin's men come home
With a sigh, Collin eased down into the grass and ran his free hand over the small swell of the goat’s belly. He could feel the kids inside, squirming, preparing for birth as they stretched their mother’s womb to what would eventually be near breaking point. She had a few months to go, but not an eternity.
“This is above my pay grade, mate.” He squeezed the phone between his shoulder and his ear as the goat nuzzled into his palms.
Chaz snorted a laugh. “You asked for this, you know. You wanted to keep her.”
In truth, keeping the pregnant goat had been a fit of madness in his depression spiral. In the weeks that passed since Spencer and Max disappeared from his life without contact info, or a real goodbye, he hadn’t been himself. The tour company shut down, his guides found other jobs, and Chaz and his partner had arrived with a trailer to load up the remaining goats so he could transport them to his friend Bowie’s farm.
All of them, except Robert and the pregnant one Chaz’s partner, Raf, had called Morticia, thanks to her silky black coat. “She’s definitely an Addams,” he’d said, and Collin couldn’t disagree. Morticia hadn’t gotten along with the rest of the herd, and she spent most of her time on the fringes, totally alone. He felt that, deep in his bones, “You should keep her,” Raf said, and Collin caved too easily.
He should have said no, of course. He should have turned both Robert and Morticia out to the new farm along with the herd of Arapawa, but something about turning out the pregnant, rejected female had left him with a sour stomach. He was starting to panic now, though, with the buyers closing on the land, and he had to find somewhere to live—with two goats, two on the way, and a flightless duck.
Two goats, a flightless duck, and an aging Englishman who knew how badly he’d fucked up when the two people who actually made him feel something had walked away and he didn’t stop them.
“Collin?” Chaz’s voice had gone soft, and Collin dragged a hand down his face.
“Sorry. It’s been a day. How are things with you and Raf? And L.A.? And how are the goats?”
“Bowie said the herd settled in with the others, no issues. LA is the same as always, and Raf and I are...as perfect as ever,” Chaz replied, and his voice took on the dreamy quality it always did when Collin asked.
Of course, he knew there was more to Raf and Chaz’s relationship than he let on—Collin wasn’t a fool, and he wasn’t a prude. But he saw the way Raf quietly commanded Chaz, and the way Chaz easily submitted. He saw Raf’s possessive touches, and heard whispers of, “Your Grace” when Chaz addressed him where he thought Collin couldn’t hear it.
They didn’t talk about it, of course—didn’t need to. Collin could hear it in Chaz’s tone, could see it in the way Raf and Chaz looked at each other. They were both where they were meant to be. They were both happy.
It left him aching with envy, because he could have had that—love, contentment, perfection. It was everything Grant had never been, could never be, but Collin was a stupid, stupid man, and he’d let it go.
“I should ring off,” Collin said after another bout of awkward silence. “I need to get Morticia and Robert back into the barn, then I have to finish packing.”
“You decide on where you’re heading? You know you’re welcome in L.A. if you need somewhere to crash,” Chaz reminded him.
Collin knew—he knew and he appreciated it, but L.A. wasn’t for him. It was too like London. It was busy, and loud, and it didn’t feel like home; it felt like existing. Leaving this bit of land his father had given up everything for felt like losing a piece of himself, and he didn’t want to do it so he could get lost in a crowd again.
“I have a couple of options. There’s this place not too far from here, Cherry Creek. They’ve got some property out there and I think the goats would like it.” He rubbed his hand over Morticia’s body one more time, then pushed to his feet.
“And the other?” Chaz pressed.
The other was one Collin didn’t want to acknowledge because it was more proof he’d been letting the loss of Max and Spencer drive him mad. Three days after his home sat desolate, empty, and silent, Grant called. Two in the morning, and Collin had
been wide awake and just stupid enough to answer.
“Why do you sound like your dog has died?” Grant asked with a laugh, then sobered quickly. “Bugger, has someone else died?”
“No.” But it felt like it at the time. Hell, it felt like it now. “Just a bad month. Getting ready to close on the land sale. Trying to sort out where I’m going from here.”
There had been a long silence, and then an uncharacteristic softness in Grant’s tone Collin hadn’t heard in years. “You could always come home.”
Collin’s response had been automatic. “This is my home.”
“Is it, though?” Grant’s challenge cut him to the quick, and he didn’t give Collin a chance to retort. “You did what you said you were going to do. You got everything sorted, pulled your brother out of another fire, and you’re done. I...I miss you. A lot. Now that the preserve’s gone, what do you have there waiting for you, Coll?”
He hated that the answer was nothing. It could have been something, if he’d been braver, stronger. Instead, like the way he’d let his marriage just fall to pieces, he let Spencer and Max walk away from him. “It’s two in the morning, Grant. I can’t do this with you.”
“I’m only saying, it might be time to come back to where you belong.”
That was the end of the conversation, but the words had been rattling around in his brain since Grant uttered them. Going back to England felt like a hundred steps back, but the aching void left behind by the short time he had with Max and Spencer—his brooding ball of angst and his sweet darling—was enough to make him consider it. He didn’t love Grant anymore, hadn’t for ages, and wouldn’t again. But… he was better than nothing, wasn’t he?
“There isn’t another option,” he finally said to Chaz, and he did mean it. Grant had been sending house listings and short emails, but he knew deep down he couldn’t go back down that road. His bones ached, knees quaked just a little. His age was creeping up on him, and peering into the void of mortality was yet another harsh reminder of what he’d let go. “I’ll talk to you soon though. Say hi to Raf for me.”
