“No. It’s my job to get your network up by Cyber Monday.” Oops. That came out a skosh tarter than he’d intended. The Luddite doubled down on his glare, but Jared only steepled his fingers, tapping them against his twitching lips.
The gesture called attention to his facial hair, and Gideon’s first thought was chin toupee—damn Charlie anyway. He couldn’t help comparing it to Alex’s chin: strong, clean-shaven, square. Completely uncompromising.
Why was he thinking about Alex? Because, Lucy, you’ve got some ’pologizing to do. The thought of facing down Alex and consuming vast quantities of humble pie was almost more frightening than this meeting.
“Gentlemen.” He crossed his legs, channeling Lord Peter Wimsey for all he was worth. “I do apologize for any infraction. Shall we discuss it?”
Presentation, damn it. He could do this.
He’d save his hysterics for later.
For the first half of his shift, Alex avoided Gideon—not hard to do, since whenever they came within three yards of each other, Gideon poinged away like they were opposing magnet poles.
Alex was tempted to lunge at him and shout, Boo! but that would be mean.
By the time his break rolled around, Alex’s mood had gone all the way down the crapper, and he had a killer headache. Maybe a little caffeine will help. He stopped by the break area where the rest of Manny’s crew had gathered, and pumped a cup of coffee out of the thermos.
He didn’t pay any attention to their conversation until Tommy said, “He wore another of those fancy suits again today.”
Only one person would wear a suit to the construction site. Gideon. Alex stirred milk into his coffee and listened more closely.
Cal snickered. “Heard he got called on the carpet.” The guys clinked their mugs together. “Could be the faggot’s days are numbered.”
Alex slammed his mug down next to the thermos, ignoring the coffee that sloshed onto the plywood counter, and turned to face the crew. “Out of line, Cal.”
Cal’s face scrunched up in confusion. “What? Not like we were talking about you.”
“Yeah? Well I’m just as gay. Why do you give him more shit than you give me?”
Bud glanced at him warily. “Are you shitting me? People don’t check you out and think, ‘Damn, that guy’s queer.’ They think, ‘Damn, hope that guy doesn’t beat the crap out of me.’”
“So you only pick on him because he’s weaker? How twisted is that?”
“We pick on him because he’s an asshole,” Cal said. “Besides, you’re one of us. He’s nothing but some fairy consultant.”
“Enough with the fucking F words already. He’s not a consultant. He’s a contractor, same as us. I put up with your shit because if it came down to brass tacks, I could take all of you. Probably at the same time. But he’s on his own. He’s got the same goal we do—to get this project done on time and under budget. If you’re stonewalling him, busting his chops, how’s he gonna get his job done?”
Cal shrugged. “No skin off our dicks.”
“You think? Haynes won’t sign off until the whole build-out is done, and that includes the network.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Show a little respect. If you can’t treat him decent, then stay away. But lay off, all right?”
The guys all stared at their boots, except Dave. “Sure, Alex.”
“Good. Later, guys.” Alex picked up his mug and retreated to his staging area, leaving an awkward silence in his wake.
Shit, he was a fine one to talk. He knew Gideon was out of his depth and floundering, and what had he done? He’d run away because he’d been hurt that Gideon hadn’t remembered him. Wasn’t his inaction and avoidance another form of aggression?
He downed half his coffee, grimacing at the heat, then set the mug down on his workbench. Time to put your skill set where your mouth is, Henning.
He strode off in search of Gideon.
Geekspeak: Call to Action
Definition: A button, arrow, or other graphic element that entices a user to perform a particular action on a web page.
Gideon had managed to maintain his composure during that hideous meeting. Barely. Jared and the Luddite would never know how his shirt collar had felt too small, his face too cold, his chest too hot. Or suspect the hideous lurch and drop in his belly that followed whenever he made an error, as if he were riding an express elevator to the Seventh Circle of Hell.
The shame hadn’t faded when he’d changed into his hideous paisley jeans and retreated to the construction stockade, nor in the hours since. He hadn’t managed to do anything right all evening, assuming there was anything right to do. God, he hated this project.
“Arrgh!” He took off his hard hat and heaved it across the room, narrowly missing Alex, who was walking by. Again.
“Whoa, there. Spring training tryouts are months away. You’ll need to work on your pitching arm if you expect to make the team.”
Seriously? What is it with straight men and sports analogies? “I’ll put that in my calendar. Directly after my caber-tossing workout.”
Alex leaned against one of the exposed metal studs. “Something’s gotten under your skin. What’s wrong?”
Gideon raised his chin and brushed his bangs out of his face. “I committed the unforgivable sin of venturing into the lobby with that stupid hand truck last night. Jared saw me. Somehow T. Harrison Asshole found out, and I got royally spanked today.”
Alex’s eyes popped wide. “You what?”
“Figuratively. I don’t think the Luddite is into anything that interesting.”
“And Haynes let him? What a couple of douche bags,” Alex growled.
“I’m sure Jared didn’t mean to give me away.”
“Are you kidding? Haynes is a total tool. He walks around like he’s got ‘Hail to the Chief’ playing in his head 24-7—probably trying to convince himself he’s really the boss.”
Alex’s words, as well as his disgusted tone, surprised a laugh out of Gideon, even though the results of the meeting weren’t remotely laughable.
“Jared doesn’t— He didn’t—” Whatever. Gideon wasn’t sure how to defend Jared’s lack of intervention anyway. “Regardless of anyone’s inner soundtrack, from now on, the Luddite will present me with a list of tasks for the day. I’m to complete those tasks, and only those tasks, under pain of termination.”
“Luddite? You mean Archambault? He’s never set foot in here. How’s he supposed to put together a decent punch list?”
“Their oh-so-superior consultant feeds him his lines.” Gideon pulled the list du jour out of the pocket of his jeans. “Tonight’s officially sanctioned list includes such technically complex activities as breaking down the empty server-rack boxes.” He picked up the box knife from an overturned paint bucket and clicked the blade in and out a couple of times. “Only problem with that is the server-rack boxes aren’t empty yet because the fricking server room doesn’t have a fricking floor yet, so I can’t assemble the fricking racks. God.”
“Well, we could—”
“And I’ve scoured the build-out, trying to find the thermostat for the server room. If they’re depending on the air conditioning from the main build-out to do the job, they’ve just arranged for a really high-tech convection oven.”
“Gideon—”
“All the hard drives are locked in the Luddite’s office. I’m not even allowed to see the fricking invoice, so I don’t know what kind of drives they are, whether they need enclosures, or whether the racks are appropriate, because considering the holy consultant hasn’t been right about one fricking thing so far, he probably ordered the wrong units. And if I don’t find—”
“Hey!” Alex made a T with his hands. “You need to chill.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“I get that it’s a big deal. That you’re freaked.”
“I am not freaked.”
Alex crossed his arms and raised one eyebrow, and Gideon’s attitude deflated.
/> “Okay, so I’m freaked. But if I don’t finish this job successfully and on time, my ass is cow crudités.”
“Whatever, but . . .” Alex pointed to the box knife in Gideon’s clenched fist. “At least put that down before you hurt yourself.”
“The only task on my approved list tonight is opening boxes.”
“Yeah. But at this rate, you’ll open a vein before you open a box.” Alex eased the knife out of Gideon’s hand.
Gideon took a huge breath. Time to face the muzak. “I’m sorry.”
Alex tucked the knife into his tool belt. “No worries. The blade was retracted.”
“Not about the knife.” Gideon stared at his feet, scuffing the seam in the underlayment with one toe. “I mean about being a dick. Here. At the apartment, both upstairs and downstairs.”
“Yeah, well. Shit happens.”
Gideon peeked at him from under his bangs, and heat jolted through Alex’s belly. “And I mean about not remembering you at first. I do now, though. You were at Lindsay’s birthday party, the summer before she dropped out of college.”
“Hmmm. Guess your data retrieval doesn’t suck after all.”
“My data retrieval is perfect. It’s just highly prioritized. You were there for maybe a nanosecond, and I didn’t have a reason to . . . to . . .”
“Prioritize me?”
“Recognize you. I haven’t seen you in four years. Why don’t you ever come by the apartment to visit Lin?”
“No time. I see her when she comes to the house. Besides, we’re adults. We have our own lives.”
“But she’s still your sister. You could drop by for dinner occasionally.”
“When’s the last time you had dinner with Lin?”
“I . . .” Gideon’s face screwed up like he was trying to do math in his head. “Not for a while. I’ve been so focused on the business, I—I hadn’t even noticed. I only see her mornings and on the weekends now and then, but never in the evening.”
“Next time you manage to catch a couple words with her, ask her why that is.”
“Will she tell me?”
“Probably not.”
“Will you?”
“Hell no.”
“Then I guess you don’t have the right to give me shit about it, do you?”
Alex laughed. Damn, he hadn’t done that for ages. “Maybe not. But that doesn’t make you any less of a clueless asshole.”
Gideon sniffed and lifted one shoulder in a lopsided shrug. “Whatever. I’m sorry though. I should have remembered you, and not only for Lindsay’s sake.”
How off-balance did Gideon have to be to admit he was in the wrong? Alex’s fingers twitched with the urge to put an arm around Gideon and pull him in close. For the first time, he looked vulnerable—touchable, even for someone with Alex’s big, rough hands.
“You know what? Let’s go check the HVAC plans. That’ll at least answer one question, right?”
Gideon’s eyebrows shot up above his glasses. “Really? You’ll help, even after I was a jerk?”
“Water under the bridge, man. Come on.”
Alex checked the main build-out space—currently a forest of metal framing studs with occasional thickets of insulation. Everyone had left the site for dinner break except for the two of them and Manny, who was propping up the wall with his back, his hard hat tipped down over his nose. Manny was notorious for napping his breaks away.
Alex gestured for Gideon to follow him into the office, where the plans were still laid out on the makeshift worktable. He flipped the pages until he came to the HVAC schematic.
“Okay, here’s the server room.” Alex squinted at the plans, running his finger across all the possible points. “Hate to say it, but that room doesn’t have its own controls.”
“What?” Gideon peered at the page. He had on silver-framed glasses today. Jesus, how many pairs did the guy have? “It’s supposed to have a whole dedicated system. It doesn’t?”
Alex double-checked. “Nope. It’s part of the same system as the rest of the build-out. Only control box is here, behind the receptionist station, and that controls everything in the new space, which is mostly office carrels and conference rooms.”
“What is the matter with this consultant? It’s like he wants this project to fail.” Gideon jabbed the plans with one finger. “If we crank the AC up enough to keep the servers from overheating and blowing their little chip brains, icicles will be dripping from those poor analysts’ noses.” He dropped down onto an overturned five-gallon paint bucket. “This is a disaster.”
“Chill. You’ll never accomplish anything in this state. You’ve been bouncing around like a ping-pong ball all night.”
“I prefer to think of myself as a strange particle, thank you very much.”
Alex chuckled at Gideon’s fake-snooty tone. “Strange? Not charmed?”
Gideon goggled at him. “You know particle physics?”
Alex shrugged. “Why wouldn’t I? It’s interesting. I can read, you know.” He unbuckled his tool belt and laid it on the plywood worktable. “You need a break. What do you say we grab some dinner?”
“Aren’t you on the clock?”
“Yep. But I get a dinner break. We’ll hit Double Down.”
“Double Down?”
“Downstairs Downtown. The restaurant in the street-level lobby”
“We couldn’t.” Gideon plucked at the seam of his jeans, and eyed Alex’s work shirt, Levi’s, and work boots, all thankfully free of drywall dust tonight. “We’re not dressed for it.”
Extra added uncertainty. Good—I can work with that. An off-kilter Gideon was way more maneuverable than the haughty standard model. Alex’s mental skin-flick daydreams staged a comeback. “Afraid they won’t let us in?”
“That place is so high-end I’m not sure I’d be well-dressed enough in my best party clothes. Won’t you— Won’t we feel out of place?”
“Get real. This is Oregon. We’ll be fine.”
Gideon followed Alex into the restaurant vestibule, pretending his less-than-elegant outfit was an insouciant fashion choice and not the best he could do. Judging by the sideways glances of the aggressively well-dressed knot of people waiting for tables, he wasn’t entirely successful.
Alex walked right up to the host’s stand and spoke with a raw-boned guy even taller than he was and with more cowlicks in his short, dark hair than any half-dozen kindergartners. Gideon’s fists clenched at his sides, waiting for Tall Guy to hustle the two of them out for breaching the sanctity of its dress code.
Tall Guy glanced over Alex’s shoulder at Gideon.
Here it comes. The boot.
But instead, a sly grin spread over his face and he plucked two menus from beneath the host’s podium.
Alex beckoned to Gideon and, much to the apparent disgruntlement of the others in the waiting area, trailed Tall Guy into the restaurant. Gideon scurried to catch up.
Huh. Maybe Tall Guy wanted to get the nonscenic elements away from prime window space. Gideon slowed to let a woman who reminded him of his third-grade teacher pass by into the restroom alcove. He smiled at her and took a step forward to follow Alex, only to get yanked back into the shadows near the men’s room and enveloped in a toxic cloud of too-much-Polo-Red.
“Are you serious?” Travis’s angry voice was pitched for Gideon’s ears alone, which was either a blessing or a curse. At least no one else could hear it, but Gideon was forced to listen.
“God, Travis.” Gideon pulled his jacket straight. “You’ve got to stop grabbing me in bars. It’s incredibly tedious.”
Travis’s hand tightened to the point of pain on Gideon’s biceps. “Is that Charles?”
“What?” Gideon followed the direction of Travis’s glare. Alex. “No. He’s . . . Never mind, okay?”
“You’re humiliating me on purpose.”
Gideon forced Travis to step aside, smiling an apology at an older man whose restroom route they’d been blocking. “I have nothing to do with yo
ur choice to lurk near toilets.”
“No. I mean showing up with a guy who belongs in a dive out on Lombard, not here.”
Although Gideon had thought nearly the same thing about Alex himself at first, he felt the urge to smack Travis right in the pout. “Listen, Trav. You need to give it a rest. You and I—” Gideon gestured between them like Don Lockwood warding off Lina Lamont. “We’ve got nothing. We never had anything, and we never will have anything.”
“Don’t say that, G. We’re totally compatible. Looks, style, ambition: all the boxes checked. Plus, with your talent and my business contacts, we were pure fricking gold. We connected. We—”
“We hooked up a couple of times. Mutual orgasms do not equal a connection. We’re done. And you need to move on.”
Travis’s mouth turned down like a thwarted teenybopper’s. “Like you have.”
“Whatever. Now, excuse me. I’ve got a limited amount of time for dinner, and I don’t want to spend it staking out the john.”
Gideon left Travis huddled in the corner and found Alex at a tiny table tucked at the back of the dining room. Just as he’d thought. Tall Guy was punishing them for not being properly dressed, hiding them from the rest of the diners.
Gideon sighed and sat down, his knee bumping Alex’s when he scooted his chair in. God, the man’s legs were six miles long. “Sorry.”
Alex nodded at Travis, still moping by the restrooms. “Friend of yours?”
“I wouldn’t go that far.”
“Why not introduce us? Ashamed to be seen with me?”
“No!” Gideon’s face heated, and he was grateful for the dim alcove. He could imagine the cutting remarks Travis would fling at Alex in excruciating detail. I’d have probably said the same things a week ago. A week? Hell, one night ago. God, I’m a douche bucket. He picked up the menu. “But he’s annoying. You already have one annoying guy to deal with. No need to pack the house.”
Alex’s foot bumped his under the table. Damn it, why had the host seated them at a table the size of a handkerchief? He moved his foot away, smiling in apology, and focused on the menu.
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