A Whole Latte Sass

by Marguerite Labbe

  “Yeah, the first place I invited him to was a BBQ joint.” He gave Lolo a wary look, determined to bring him into the conversation on something he could smile over. “You would’ve loved it. They do all the smoking in-house, and it smells amazing.”

  His grandfather crossed his arms on the table, watching Trask with a penetrating gaze. “You say you’ve had this business about twenty years?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Felipe touched Trask’s hand, felt the tension in him, and wished he could help him relax. All in all, he thought this was going rather well. It might go a little smoother if Trask would volunteer a little more instead of responding or waiting to be asked, but that wasn’t Trask’s way at all.

  “You would’ve been pretty young, about this one’s age.” Lolo turned that penetrating look on Felipe, and he silently cursed his grandfather for putting their age difference right back in the forefront of everyone’s mind. “Where’d you get the capital for a new business?”

  Trask’s fingers flexed. “Inheritance,” he said shortly, tearing apart the bread on his plate into crumbs. “I’d been living here for a couple years, working at whatever I could find, trying to save for it. The money came in handy.”

  Felipe’s mom straightened, her eyes brightening. “So you do have family. How often do you get to see them?”

  Trask went still and shook his head. “No, ma’am, no family. There are those who share my blood, but they aren’t family. And none of us wish to see each other.” At Ratree’s look of distress, he smiled faintly, though it didn’t reach his eyes. “Here in Richmond, I have friends who I consider family. We’ve stuck by each other. Felipe knows Ryan, but I still need to introduce him to Ryan’s fiancée and to Joe.” This time, the smile did warm his gaze. “They will love you, imp.”

  Felipe would like to meet the others who made up Trask’s world. He knew Joe was important to him. If Trask talked about anybody, often it was Old Joe. “Yeah, Ryan’s cool, even if he was super protective of you when I first started asking you out. He seems to have chilled since then.”

  “And you make enough money selling comics to buy and renovate a home?” Donato asked as their meals arrived. “I’d heard that many of the brick-and-mortar stores aren’t doing well. It seems like every comic book store that comes into town only lasts a few years and then it goes belly-up.”

  “Actually, that place by the county line has been there for over a decade,” Felipe cut in. “And that shop is smaller than Trask’s operation. He sells more games than he does comics and has a room in the back where people can come and play.”

  “Richmond is also a good-sized city,” Trask added. “Geeks know where to go to get what they want, and they’re willing to travel a bit to get it.”

  “You get a lot of kids hanging out there?” Lola asked, and her smile widened as Trask nodded. “It’s good for kids to have a community place to go.”

  Felipe’s mom did not look convinced, and she kept eyeing Trask’s tattoos as if they could come to life in front of her. Felipe shot her a quelling glance. His cousin had almost as many tattoos, and it didn’t make her a bad woman.

  “Still, that doesn’t seem like a steady business. Kids hanging out doesn’t lead to sales. Felipe would hang out at his comic shop, but he didn’t have money to spend.”

  Lolo leaned forward with a huff of impatience. “She’s worried. She knows you have a past and wants to make sure nothing illegal is going on while her son is there, but she won’t come out and say it.”

  Felipe straightened, outrage leaping into his throat and strangling him as Ratree leaned forward to level her father with a suppressing glare and angry hiss. Beside him, Trask stiffened.

  “I’ve never dealt drugs, not even when I was using, and I’ve never targeted kids. My place is a safe place for those who come to hang out, and everyone knows my hard rules.”

  Lola patted Trask’s hand again as Felipe struggled to come up with something to say that did not involve a string of curse words. “Felipe would never be with someone who did. A fact that everyone here at this table should remember.”

  Trask gave her a strained smile. “I can see why Felipe talks about you with such love, Miz Madel.”

  “Nonsense, call me Lola,” she said with a pointed glance around at everyone at the table. “Stop poking at them and give them a chance to relax or they won’t be able to eat a bite with all this tension.”

  “I hear you also extend a hand to others who need help.” Felipe’s dad gave Trask an approving smile. “You give back. That’s a good thing.”

  Felipe stared at his dad. Was he coming to Trask’s defense? He knew he’d promised to keep an open mind, but Felipe hadn’t expected this.

  “Felipe is too young and thinking with his hormones to be a good judge of character,” Lolo stated. “I mean, look at his boyfriend. He has no business—”

  Felipe jumped up with an angry growl as everyone nearby turned to look. He was so furious he was shaking as he shook off Trask’s calming hand. “Felipe….” He heard the warning tone from multiple voices and ignored it. It was Lolo they should be warning, not him, but they were happy to keep their damn mouths shut while he ran his mouth on about Trask. Why the fuck did they even bring him?

  “You don’t get a say in who I’m with, Lolo. You’ve never had anything good to say about anyone I dated. I don’t know if it’s because I’m gay or you’re just a cranky bastard, but I don’t care.” The ring of shocked faces staring at him made Felipe squirm inside and only fueled his anger and tongue more. “If I want to have wild, kinky sex with him, that’s my business. If I want to run away and marry him, that’s my business too. I don’t need your approval, your judgments, or your mean-assed comments.”

  Felipe turned his glare on the rest of the table, including his grandmother and Trask. “And I don’t want to hear a damn thing from any of you, because I didn’t curse once.” Then Felipe realized his mistake and clutched his hair.

  “Excuse me.” Trask folded up his napkin and set it beside his plate, and then to Felipe’s astonishment he grabbed his coat and walked away.

  Silence fell over the table as everyone watched Trask stalk out. Felipe stared after him, tears stinging his eyes. Fuck, it was all a crumbled mess and he didn’t know how to fix it.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  TRASK SHOVED his hands in his pockets and leaned against the wall outside. The air hit him with a cold slap that he ignored. Walking out had been stupid. But he didn’t trust himself to maintain a civil tongue, so he’d have to settle for being rude. He could not take another minute of the tension at the table. Too many memories caught him by the throat. He had to remind himself that the situation was different in a hundred different ways from his own family. Their tension came from care, when his parents had never given a damn about anything but themselves and their next fix.

  He laid his head back against the brick and stared up at the stars. And he’d gone down that same road for so long. Even if he pulled himself out, could he blame Felipe’s family for being worried?

  And Felipe. He didn’t know whether to be pleased that Felipe had defended him so passionately or seriously irritated that he’d made such a humiliating scene. But he had to give Felipe credit for reining it in as much as he had. And because Felipe had, Trask tried to let go of the anger gnawing at him. He didn’t need to add fuel to this outrage.

  He turned his head as Felipe came out of the restaurant, waving his arms and muttering curses in a number of languages. “You should’ve told them to go fuck themselves.”

  “I think you did that for both of us.” Trask studied Felipe’s expression, trying to gauge if there was hurt there or just anger, and he caught Felipe doing the same to him.

  “You okay?” Felipe asked, sliding his arms around Trask in a fierce hug.

  “Yeah, it was the tension that got to me, the scene, not their poking.” Trask sighed as a look of discomfort crossed Felipe’s face. That was an expression Trask had rarely seen wit
h Felipe, no matter the outburst.

  “I’m sorry,” Felipe muttered. “He just pisses me off so much. This would’ve been smoother if he hadn’t come.”

  Maybe, but eventually, it would’ve come out. Better that it happened sooner. Trask just wished it hadn’t been in a public place or during a meal. He wished for many things, and he wasn’t sure what he could do to keep them from slipping away. “I suppose we should go back in and see what we can salvage out of this.” Christmas was coming. Felipe shouldn’t be at odds with his family.

  “Oh fuck no.” Felipe stepped away from him and waved his arms again. “If it was just Lola and Dad, hell, even my mom I could handle, but if I see Lolo again I’m just going to go off, and no one wants a repeat of that.”

  Relief washed over Trask, and then he noticed Felipe shivering. “Where’s your coat?”

  Felipe flapped his hand toward the restaurant. “I left it behind. I didn’t think. I wanted to check on you.”

  Trask rubbed his hands over Felipe’s arms and shrugged out of his own coat. “Here.”

  “Where are you going?” Felipe demanded as he turned to go back inside.

  “Grabbing your coat and our dinners,” Trask replied, steeling himself in case there was any further commentary. But better him than Felipe or there would be another scene. Thankfully, he stayed outside. Their waiter was handing Ratree to-go boxes that he assumed contained their food, since everyone else’s dinner was on their plates and Felipe’s coat was over her arm.

  He met the distressed gazes of Felipe’s family as he approached. He could see the apology and embarrassment in Donato, Ratree, and Lola’s eyes. Lolo stared back at Trask with his chin tilted to the same defiant angle that Felipe got. At another time, in other circumstances, Trask would’ve found that amusing.

  “I—” Trask paused, but the right words eluded him. “Felipe’s happiness, his relationship with his family is very important to me.”

  Ratree studied him, searching his face before nodding. She handed over the boxes and Felipe’s coat. “I believe you’ll do what’s right.”

  Lola drew herself up, saying something in a language Trask didn’t recognize, her eyes flashing angrily. He didn’t need to understand. He recognized the tone of a reprimand when he heard one. The table erupted, words sizzling back and forth as Trask slipped away.

  Felipe spun to face him as Trask emerged, and he could see that he’d worked himself up into a furious state again. Trask handed Felipe his coat and caught his hand. “Did you tell them off?”

  “No. Come on, we’ll get sick if we stay out here half-naked. Let’s get you back to my place.”

  “I don’t know why you didn’t tell them to fuck off,” Felipe fumed as they made their way to the truck.

  Trask had been tempted. He hated being judged, hell, even when he deserved it. It got his hackles up every time. And times like this, when he didn’t deserve it, it dug under his skin even more, making his temper simmer. “What would it have solved other than drive a deeper wedge?” Dammit, he hated uncomfortable family situations, hated them with a holy passion. He slid behind the wheel and rested his head back against the seat. “And damned if I can’t see their point.”

  “Don’t you fucking dare take their side.” Felipe twisted to face him. “All I asked was for them to give you a chance, not jump all over you. I don’t care about the twenty years between us. And dammit, your past has made you the man you are today. So yeah, it fucking sucked, and you put yourself in some shitty places, but you got yourself out of them too.”

  Trask shook his head and started the truck. Felipe had his points, but if Trask was a dad, he was pretty sure he’d have serious reservations about a forty-year-old man hooking up with his son or daughter. It had taken him a bit to warm up to Reva, and she was amazing. But he could be protective of those close to him, too, and Ryan was like a brother. So he got it.

  Felipe huffed out a breath and let out a few more choice oaths. His phone rang, and he ignored it. “So you said you inherited the money for the store. Who from? I thought you and your family didn’t get along.”

  Trask sensed that Felipe was asking more out of a need to distract himself than curiosity, but he had to stop dodging the questions or giving only partial answers. Might as well tell all tonight. There was no reason to hold back anymore.

  “My grandmother, but I had to be clean to collect on it. And man, I wanted that chance. I wanted her to see that I could build on what she left me. That I wouldn’t be like my parents. I wanted her to be proud of me. So I found myself a program, got clean, showed up back in Texas a year later with my paperwork, test results. Pissed my old man off to no end. He was hoping to contest her will and take the money for himself.” Trask sighed and scrubbed a hand through his hair.

  “How long did you stay clean after that?” Felipe asked softly.

  “Almost another seven months.” Trask shook his head, his hands tightening on the wheel. “Once I’d bought the place, got everything settled, inventory in stock and the initial flurry of activity was over, I convinced myself that one drink to celebrate wouldn’t hurt anybody. I could handle one damn drink. Goddamn, I was wrong.”

  Trask had zero recollection of the next few nights. “All I know is that I finally came out of it several days later, naked in some damn flophouse, with a shit taste in my mouth, fresh track marks, and too many bruises.”

  He glanced over to find Felipe watching him with wide, solemn eyes. “And a whole shit pile of shame and guilt?”

  Trask nodded. “You nailed it, and I couldn’t face it, so I went right back to using. I couldn’t face her memory, knowing how upset it would make her if she saw me.”

  Felipe caught Trask’s hand and lifted it, studying his knuckles before laying a kiss on them. “Maybe for a while, but you found the strength to fight it back again and again until you were able to say you have almost sixteen years clean. You ever think that your grandmother looked at you and didn’t see a man who kept failing but instead saw the man who kept picking himself up to wage that war again?”

  Trask’s throat tightened to an unbearable ache. He’d never looked at it quite that way, but knowing his grandmother the way he had, yeah, he could see that. Felipe opened up such a wellspring in him sometimes, emotions that had been shunted aside so he could deal with the day-to-day, that the intensity of allowing himself those feelings almost physically hurt. He tugged Felipe to him. “You’re incredible, you know that?” he asked as Felipe wound his arm around Trask’s shoulder. “She would’ve loved the hell out of you.”

  “And I would’ve adored her.” Felipe smiled at Trask. “I’m definitely a grandma’s boy.”

  “I do like your lola.” Trask thought that if given the chance, he’d like Felipe’s grandpa too. They both spoke their minds, that was for certain, and damn the consequences.

  “Well, that settles it. They’re just going to have to deal,” Felipe declared as they pulled up to Trask’s apartment building. “You come over for Christmas dinner. It’ll be fine, you’ll see. They just need to see you around, get used to you. Then they’ll open their minds enough to get to know you.”

  “Oh hell no.” Trask couldn’t think of a worse nightmare while sober. A tense family dinner was one thing. He could see himself agreeing to another after the New Year, but he’d seen enough from Joe and Ryan’s family to know that holidays with a real family were supposed to happy affairs, not awkward, strained ones.

  Felipe stared at Trask, his mouth falling open. “I’m not letting you spend another holiday alone.”

  “That’s my decision, not yours,” Trask said firmly and went on as Felipe looked like he was about to protest. “I am not going to be the chain you jerk between you and your family. I’m not, Felipe.”

  “You’re not my fucking chain,” Felipe ground out. “You’re the man who’s a big part of my life. I mean, you’re looking at houses and….” Trask stared at him in horror. “What? You weren’t thinking of asking me to move in with you
if you get a bigger place?”

  Sharp, panicky claws gripped Trask’s insides. Felipe was twenty steps ahead of him. Trask was just getting used to the idea that he was in love with Felipe, and Felipe already had the rest of their lives mapped out. Trask had been on his own since he was seventeen, and though he’d had lovers before, he’d never shared his life that intimately with them. Damned if Felipe didn’t make him want to try, but this was not a leap he was prepared to take blindly.

  “I think we need to take a step back,” Trask said seriously as Felipe gave him an incredulous look filled with betrayal. “What you want for your life is something I’ve never looked for or wanted. I don’t want to give you a false impression that this is going anywhere more than where it is now. We need to slow this down a bit.”

  Felipe pulled away, his lips tightening into a hard, unwelcome line. “Are you saying that this is just a casual thing between us? Because I’ve done that bullshit, and I’m not looking to take second place again.”

  “There’s nothing casual about you, Felipe. All I’m saying is what we have now is good. Maybe it’ll lead to more, but we’ve only been seeing each other for four months. Your family hates the idea of us as a couple. Some time and space will give you and I a chance to figure out what we want. It’ll give your family time to adjust to the idea of me.” Trask stopped trying to make his argument because the set look on Felipe’s face warned him he was getting nowhere.

  Felipe leaned closer, his eyes glinting dangerously. “Look, I know exactly who I am and what I want, and if you can’t handle that, Mr. I’ve Got This, then that’s your own fucking boggle. Take your space and your time and shove it up your ass.” He got out of the truck, slamming the door behind him.

  “Felipe.” Trask got out as well, watching Felipe storm toward his car waving his hands in the air. Trask could hear his diatribe from halfway across the parking lot. “Come upstairs. Let’s talk. You shouldn’t drive home mad.” He did not like the thought of Felipe walking away hurt and angry.