I shook my head. “I’m sorry, too. For how it happened, I—”
“You didn’t do anything wrong.” He sighed. “Really, you didn’t. It was stupid to lie to you. It was stupid to get mad about the magazine.”
“You didn’t owe me the truth. We were strangers.” But those words felt wrong. And they sounded wrong.
He knew it too, the way his eyes softened. “Were we really?”
I didn’t answer.
“Are we now?” he whispered.
I smiled. “I don’t let strangers do to me what you did.”
He paused. “But those guys . . .”
I barked out a laugh. “Honestly, while I was outside this room, I was already trying to think of ways to get rid of them.” I shrugged. “Had a moment of weakness back at the bar. Or maybe it was loneliness.”
He raised his hand and cupped my face. “I’m sorry.”
“Stop saying that.”
“Look, about that question . . . I’ll answer, but I don’t want to look at you when I do.”
I frowned. “What?”
“Just . . .” He wriggled with intent, and this time I let him go. He rolled onto his side, his back to me, and then scooted until our skin met again, his back to my front. He took my arm and wrapped it around his waist. And then he sighed.
I snuggled in behind him, my nose in his hair at the nape of his neck. “This okay?”
He nodded. “So. Modeling.”
“You still have that underwear?”
He smacked my hand where it rested on his stomach. I huffed a laugh into his neck.
“I left home at eighteen and took a bus to California. Worked odd jobs—including bartending—and went to as many modeling castings as I could. I started getting jobs. And then more jobs. And . . .” he paused. “It was great. For a while. It was fun and I got to wear cool clothes and meet cool people and then . . . it wasn’t fun anymore.” He played with my hand, fingering my knuckles and picking at my nails. “I had never been so great about eating. About my weight. I always obsessed. And modeling exacerbated that. No one really pressured me, but everything the photographer said got twisted in my brain. I was convinced they all thought I was fat. Or that my pectoral muscles were uneven, or my abs not defined enough.”
“Baby,” I said softly. And he shivered, his legs moving restlessly.
“I’d look in the mirror and I’d compare myself to every other guy I saw. I mean, I was surrounded by perfect-looking men. I internalized that in a way that wasn’t healthy. I know that. Just because I understood what my mind was doing didn’t mean that I could change it. I stopped eating. I counted calories. I worked out until I almost passed out.” He sighed. “My agent wanted me to get help, check myself into a program. But I didn’t want to do it. And maybe what I did was running away, but I think this was a time when running was the right thing for me.”
I took my hand off his stomach and threaded our fingers together, raising our joined hands and pressing a kiss to our thumbs. “Do you regret it?”
He tucked our hands under his chin. “I don’t regret the years I modeled, and I also don’t regret leaving. It was a great career but . . . in the end, it wasn’t for me.”
“Did—Do your parents know?”
His ears reddened as the blush crept across his face. “They were the ones who called my agent and asked her to convince me to get treatment.” His words were bitter. “They can never stop meddling in my life. They always think they know what’s best, but they don’t know.”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered into his neck. “So why did you keep this a secret from me?”
His fingers flexed in mine, and then he rolled over, so we were on our sides facing each other. He stroked the stubble along my jaw. “Well, you’re kind of a ninja.”
I barked out a laugh. “A ninja?”
He grinned at me. “Yeah, you kinda have this Aw shucks, I’m just an ol’ Southern boy thing going on. All harmless and unassuming and easygoing. But you’re persistent and thoughtful and so damn hot that before I knew it, I was attached to you.”
My grin faded as his fingers trailed down my neck and ran over my collarbone. He watched his fingers for a minute, than raised his gaze to my face. “That’s why I didn’t tell you about me. I was keeping my distance. I thought you’d just be . . . a ride. Just a guy with a car who kept his mouth shut and let me wallow. But you didn’t, you bastard. You bought me yogurt and flirted and took care of me and called me ‘baby’.” I grunted as his fingernails dug into my skin. His eyes narrowed. “And you did it all without me knowing. I didn’t know until I tried to walk away from his hotel. And every step was like trying to walk with weights tied around my ankles.” He shoved his face into my neck and gripped me closer. “I had to come back.” His voice was muffled against my skin, and I wound my arm around his waist. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay.” I rubbed his back and kissed the damp hair at his temple. “It’s okay.”
He pulled back and blinked at me. “I came back.”
I smiled. “Yeah, you did. You came back.”
“Will you . . . still take me to the ocean?”
I nodded. “Of course.”
His face relaxed and he snuggled into me tighter.
***
I woke the next morning, naked, with the sheets twisted around our bodies. I was sweating from the body heat, because Riley’s body was coiled around mine. I had to piss, but Riley was like a boa constrictor because the more I squirmed, the tighter he held on.
Somehow I extricated myself from his clutches and used the bathroom. I was a little sore from the previous night but it was a good sore. Because it reminded me that Riley was back, that he’d not only not rejected me, but flat-out claimed me.
Off-limits. I smiled. I sure as hell was off-limits.
Riley had rolled onto his back, his one arm bent at the elbow, a loose fist in the pillow above his head. The other rested on his stomach. The sheet had slipped low, so I could see the top of his pubic hair. I tugged the sheet lower, revealing his half-hard cock to my gaze. I crawled between his legs and pressed a kiss to his inner thigh. He shifted and mumbled. I licked at his groin and a small gasp escaped his lips.
I bent down and sucked the tip of his cock in my mouth. He’d tasted me and I wanted to return the favor. Hell, I craved it.
As I sucked, he began to harden further and then his hand gripped my shoulder. “Col,” his sleep-roughened voice said, “Fuck.”
I let his cock slip from my mouth and met his eyes. “Suck.”
He blinked at me. “Huh?”
I smiled. “Not fuck. Suck.” And then I took him down my throat to the root.
He didn’t last long. It was morning, and I suspected that other than last night, it’d been a long time for him. It had been for me. He came on a deep sigh, shooting down my throat. I let him slip from my mouth, then I crawled up his body and collapsed beside him. “Good morning.”
“The best morning,” he said, breathless. And I laughed.
***
We booked another night. The hotel was expensive but we didn’t give a shit. I’d have time to pay off my credit card. I couldn’t relive this day. Talking and laughing in bed with a naked Riley. Showering together. Eating room service while we watched bad cable movies in oversized robes.
Riley ate his salad methodically, one small bite at a time, in the way I now knew was a conscious decision.
“So . . .” I chose my words carefully. “How do you plan to deal with this . . . eating disorder?” He flinched at the words and I bit the inside of my cheek, forging on. “That’s what it is, right?”
Riley kept his eyes on his plate, swirling his fork in the leftover fat-free vinaigrette dressing. “I hadn’t thought it all through yet.”
I decided to press. “What was your plan? When you were at that gas station, trying to get a ride . . . did you have a plan?”
He looked up at me, his jaw shifting back and forth. “No solid p
lan. No. All I knew is that I wanted away. I left most of what I owned in my apartment and told my roommate to sell it.” He put down his fork and laced his hands in his lap. “I wanted to see what else was out there. I moved from West Virginia to California and all I knew was that I wasn’t happy. I didn’t want to work and I didn’t want to eat and what kind of life was that?” When he looked at me, his eyes were wet.
I grappled for words, because I didn’t know what to say. I had never felt like that. I had a family who loved me, and while I might have been a shitty college student, I didn’t hate my life or my body. And hell, I loved food. So I just shook my head. “I can’t imagine that was a good life.”
He stood up quickly and walked over to the window with his back to me. “So I set off on this road trip to simplify and to find something that made me happy. Hell, made me feel anything, really.” He turned around slowly and leaned back on the window. He crossed his arms over his chest and stared at me where I sat on the bed, cross-legged with an empty plate in front of me. His gaze roamed my face and his brows furrowed, studying me in a way he hadn’t before. Then he shook his head and snorted softly, a smile twisting his lips. “I thought the Grand Canyon would make me feel something, or the sweat lodge. Or watching the sunrise.” His eyes closed, like he was revisiting a memory, and when he opened them again, they were a warm chocolate color and his cheeks were flushed, and his lips had taken on that sultry smirk that made me hard. Untying his robe, he walked toward me, a saunter in his gait, and when he reached the bed, he dropped the robe at his feet. “You wanna know what finally brought everything into focus?”
I sucked in a breath as he put a knee to the bed and prowled toward me on all fours, a naked, pale panther.
I leaned back on my hands and spread my legs. “What?” I whispered, licking my lips as he came closer, his hair slipping over his eyes.
He knelt between my legs and parted my robe roughly until it hung off of my shoulders. “This guy who talks like a hick, always has a toothpick in his mouth, and who’s hung like a horse.”
I didn’t get a chance to ask any more questions after that, and Riley didn’t either, because my cock was in his mouth, and I shoved a pillow over my face to muffle my cries.
***
Later that night, I was on my back in bed. Riley lay on his back, perpendicular to me, with his head on my chest. I was comfy and content and I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to get up.
Riley lazily swung the tie on his robe, and I ran my fingers through his hair. “Is this dyed?”
Riley rolled his head to the side so he could look at me. “My hair? Yeah. They wanted brown hair for my last job.”
I brushed a lock of hair off his forehead. “Tell me about modeling.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Well, it was a big part of your life, right? So I want to know about it. I don’t know . . . Tell me about the weirdest job you had.”
Riley turned his head and stared at the ceiling, biting his lip as he thought. “Well, I modeled for about five years, since I moved out to California when I was eighteen. At first, it was anything I could get until I found an agency that would take me. Then the work was steadier. It was still an odd job. I mean, my schedule was crazy because I had to fly to different places quickly.”
“But never the Atlantic Ocean, huh?”
He didn’t smile like I expected him to. “No, never the Atlantic.”
I grabbed his hand and threaded our fingers together. “Okay, go on.”
He squinted his eyes, then widened them. “Oh! So this one job . . .” He rolled his eyes. “It was so dumb. Seriously. I get mad when I think about it, although I guess it was kind of funny.”
I poked him in the side. “Yeah? I need to hear this, then.”
He rolled onto his side, his head on my chest. “Okay, so the ad was for bedding—like sheets, okay? And the whole concept of the shoot was that I was a vampire. So I slept upside down. But I loved these sheets so much, I wrapped myself in them.”
I wasn’t sure what my face looked like, but I’m sure it was something resembling What the fuck, because Riley started laughing. “I know, it’s so weird, right?”
“Sounds like some advertising intern snuck into a meeting.”
Riley laughed harder and wiped his eyes. “Okay, so I’m hanging upside down, right? They had these ankle harnesses with attachments on this bar. Well, basically all the blood rushed to my head. It wasn’t comfortable at all to hang upside down for that long. And on top of it, I had this sheet wrapped around me. But they wanted it all . . . I don’t know . . . artsy looking. So it was supposed to billow around me.”
I widened my eyes. “Don’t even tell me. Did they blow a fan on you?”
Riley started laughing again, and I did, too, so his head bounced on my chest. “That fucking fan!” Riley sputtered and I curled into a ball around him, tears streaming from my face as I pictured him hanging upside down, looking windblown from a fan. “I had nightmares for weeks about getting stuck in a windstorm in that damn sheet. I don’t care how high the thread count was.”
I was practically howling. “Oh my God, Catwalk, I need these pictures.”
“No!” he whined. “They were so bad. I think they used them somewhere. I told my agency I didn’t want to know, and I never wanted to see them again!”
“What’s the name of your agency? I’m calling them right now.”
Riley shook his head and zipped his lips.
“Aw, come on.” I shoved him playfully.
He smirked. “I’ll never tell.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re no fun.”
Riley crawled up the bed and then plopped down on his side, facing me. “Okay, I told a funny story. You tell one now. Tell me about your parents’ barbecue restaurant. What’s it called?”
“Patty’s BBQ.”
“Who’s Patty?”
I shrugged. “I dunno.”
He started laughing again, and I followed. It was like we couldn’t stop once we got started.
“Why the hell is it called ‘Patty’s,’ then?”
“My parents thought it sounded good.”
He rolled his eyes. “Oh my God.”
“Okay, so funny story . . .” I tapped my chin. “Oh! We had an issue when I saw the movie Babe at a cousin’s house.”
Riley’s eyes widened.
“Yeah, it was bad. I was . . . four, maybe. And I knew we ate ham and bacon and barbecue but I didn’t know exactly how we got it. So I watched the movie and put two and two together in my little four-year-old brain and was pretty horrified. So I started crying and told my parents that they were cooking and eating Babe. It caused all kinds of problems for months until my parents got me to understand the food chain.”
“I would have turned vegetarian.”
I raised my eyebrows. “My parents don’t care that I’m gay, but vegetarianism is a mortal sin.”
Riley laughed.
I pointed at him. “It’s not funny, man. I would have been cast out. Shunned. I would have been an embarrassment to the Hartman name.”
He reached and stroked the stubble on my jaw. “Poor baby. I’m so glad you got over that trauma.”
I scowled at him. “Babe should come with a warning label.”
“We’ll work on getting that done.”
“You’re mocking me.”
“Never.”
I huffed and he smiled, then lunged at me, wrapping all his limbs around my body as I rolled onto my back.
He pulled his head back so I could see his face and the warmth in his eyes, the utter contentment, was just about the greatest gift I’d ever gotten. It was worth being mocked.
It was worth everything, holding Riley in my arms. He leaned down and brushed his lips against mine. I kissed back.
And I wondered if this would always be enough.
***
Landry,
So I’d made this list, ya know? A list of things that I thought . . . would make me fee
l. That would make me remember that I’m alive. And that it’s good to be alive.
Nothing has worked.
But you know what did? Slipping my tongue between Colin’s lips. Running my fingers over his chest. Brushing my lips over the soft skin on his inner thigh.
His face when he came.
For once, in years, I felt alive. I felt.
And I don’t know what to do about this. Because . . . I thought I’d fail. I was so prepared to reach the ocean and that would be the end of all this.
And now, I’m not so sure. Because I want again. Because I’ve never been happier. Because Colin is everything.
I wish you could meet him. I think you’d like him, Landry. You and I could talk clothes and Justin and Colin could talk sports. What do you think? Could that be our future?
—R
Chapter Twelve
“Please?”
Riley was looking up at me from his crouched position with big eyes, his mouth set in a slight pout. If he even wobbled that damn lower lip, I was calling him on it. I wondered if models took acting classes, because Riley was laying this on really thick.
I looked at the dog huddled beside Riley. And I don’t know what it was; maybe it was the dog’s deep brown eyes, or the way his ribs were showing underneath his dark gold coat. He licked his lips and stared at me with a high-pitched whine in his throat.
Riley stuck his lower lip out also and mimicked the dog’s whine. I scowled at him, but he didn’t back down.
“Ri, what the hell are we going to do with a dog? We’ll look up a nearby shelter, all right?”
Riley’s face immediately changed, the pleading look gone, replaced my grim determination. He rose swiftly to his feet and pointed down at the dog. “We will not take this dog to a shelter.”
I wouldn’t have been surprised if Riley stomped his foot, and the thought made me want to grin. I didn’t, because I thought that would have really pissed off Riley. He was still talking.
“Most motels take dogs, and if not, we can sleep in the back of your big-ass Jeep. He needs to know he can depend on someone right now.”
I propped my hands on my hips and hung my head between my shoulders. We’d been driving along just fine. I was whistling to some song on the radio and Riley was staring out the window at this deserted section of Texas highway. And then he’d plastered his face to the window and yelled that he’d seen something.
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