Page 15 of Fire
I come up behind him and see his hands tense on the sink when he senses me there.
“About last night…”
His shoulders slump. “Can we not talk about this,” he pleads.
I want to reach out and turn his body around so he faces me, but I know better than to touch him. “I don’t hate you,” I tell him.
“You should,” he says in a small voice.
“I have a few names engraved on my hate list, but yours isn’t one of them.”
“You sure about that?”
I let out a low chuckle laced with an unhealthy shot of bitterness. “Believe me when I say they did worse than shrieking at me and accusing me of sipping soup too loud.”
Evan tenses, and I know he’s flashing back to seeing my stomach the other day. “That makes it even worse,” Evan says, fully turning around. “You deserve more than me backing everyone else’s shitty behavior.”
“What I deserve, especially with my past, is debatable. Don’t bother with saying sorry to me, kid.”
Evan flushes, puts his hands on his hips, and glares up at me in a move I really wish I didn’t think was so damned sexy. “I’m not a kid. I’m twenty-four years old, and I owed you that apology. I just wish it hadn’t taken all that tequila-fueled courage to be able to give it to you.” His hands go to his stomach. “Trust me, I really wish it hadn’t.”
I notice his pale face and red eyes, which signal he’s suffering from the hangover I’d warned him about.
I immediately go to the fridge and get two more water bottles, a croissant, and then three extra-strength painkillers.“Here,” I say, putting everything on the counter next to Evan. “Down these all at once, eat the croissant plain, and you should feel better in no time.”
He looks at me strangely, like he’s not used to anyone taking care of him, but gives an “I can’t feel any worse than I do right now” shrug, and follows my instructions. By the time he’s finished the croissant, he’s looking like he's on the mend.
Setting the water bottle down, a look of grim determination comes over Evan’s face. “You deserve a do-over on my apology now that I’m completely sober.”
“I already told you?—”
“No, you’re getting the real deal because I left some things out that really should have been said.” He runs his hands across his face. “I’ve been a total asshole to you, and you haven’t deserved it. And yesterday—well, yesterday, I went beyond asshole and trespassed into creep territory.” He takes a deep breath. “Yesterday, you were just trying to stop me from putting myself in danger, and I got all caught up—caught up in?—”
“Caught up in what?” I ask carefully.
“I shouldn’t have sunk to my knees to—to—” His face goes maraschino cherry red. “To blow you. I shouldn’t have put you in the awkward position to reject me.”
“Reject you?” If the position he means is rock hard and dying to put my cock in his pretty mouth, he doesn’t deserve full blame for that. I was right there with him. I start to tell him that, but Evan rushes on.
“Yeah. I know Grave and Dream coming over kept you from having to go through that. It was messed up to think that, even for a second, you could have wanted that from me, considering how I’ve treated you.”
Not wanted that from him? Is he fucking kidding me right now?
“Evan—” I start. It’s unfair to him to let him think he was the only one playing with fire, but he interrupts me before I can tell him.
“Please let me get this out. No matter what your sexual preference is, I know it’s not a guy who’s screamed at you and called you names all week. I was all worked up and horny, and I shouldn’t have used you to burn off my frustrations. It was wrong.”
Burn off his frustrations. While I’d been fighting off giving in to the seismic attraction I feel toward Evan, he’d just seen me as a convenient cock. It shouldn’t feel like a shiv in the gut to hear him say it, but it does.
Stop it. It’s just physical attraction. Like you told Grave, you don’t really have feelings for the guy.
“Can you forgive me?” Evan asks, his eyes huge while he awaits my answer.
I should admit my attraction to him to put us on even ground, but that might make things worse. And in the end, I need to establish a stable and professional relationship going forward that puts Evan’s safety at the forefront. We need a fresh start.
I put out my hand, and Evan regards it suspiciously.
“Hello, we haven’t met before. I’m Luca Doran. I’m going to be your bodyguard.”
