Chapter Eleven
chapter ELEVEN
E than was holding Beau for all he was worth, and he didn’t want to let him go.
Not that he would let him know that.
For some reason, he didn’t want to stop touching him. Had they been somewhere private, somewhere they didn’t risk any sort of interruption, Ethan would’ve pushed Beau further. Gotten even closer. Held on longer.
Somewhere in the deep, dark recesses of his mind, Ethan knew there was something he was forgetting. He was pretty sure it had something to do with the distance he’d been hell-bent on maintaining. However, there was something about Beau’s hesitance that had rattled him. An innocence maybe. Or maybe he was just caught up in Beau’s reaction. He seemed genuinely floored by what was happening between them. Ethan felt it too, and since he had more experience in this area than Beau, he knew without a doubt that this connection they had established was rare.
He would agree wholeheartedly with Beau—what had just happened between them was unlike anything Ethan had ever felt before. And as far as intimacy goes, they had merely shared a kiss. Several actually. But those kisses had rocked him to his very soul. For him, a kiss had never been more than a means to get to the final encore. Except with Beau. With Beau, a kiss was so much more.
And now he was holding Beau in place, wanting to beg him not to move. Not to walk away. As much as he had previously denied his desire for him, Ethan was immersed in a desperate need that bordered on insanity, and holding on was the only thing that he could do to keep himself from shattering into a million pieces.
When Beau’s warm hands came up and flattened against his, Ethan dropped his forehead against the back of Beau’s neck, relishing the warmth that penetrated him. He didn’t know if he’d ever felt like this. Not with any man he had been with. Including Gavin. Although there was an underlying hunger that couldn’t be ignored, the comfort was what lured him in.
For the first time in a long time, Ethan felt like he could breathe. As though the weight that had been resting on his chest, making it difficult to draw air in, had finally been lifted. Not only was it an amazing feeling, it also scared the shit out of him.
“Can we get out of here for a little while?” Beau asked, breaking the silence.
The question surprised him. The idea of being somewhere alone with Beau, for even a little while like last night, was the most appealing offer he’d had in quite some time. Ethan lifted his head and released Beau, waiting until he turned to face him. “What did you have in mind?”
Ethan watched Beau’s throat work, his Adam’s apple sliding sensually down and then back up as he swallowed hard.
“Somewhere . . . I don’t know. Somewhere private, maybe.”
Now it was Ethan’s turn to swallow around the lust that had tried to escape as soon as Beau said the words. Not wanting to risk what might come out of his mouth, Ethan nodded.
Grabbing his keys from the small office, Ethan followed Beau to the door, his heart picking up a strange pounding rhythm that he felt as well as heard.
Once they were outside, Ethan turned to lock the door only to be stopped when he remembered the toolbox still sitting on the flatbed wrecker. He’d left it on the truck the night before, only because he had completely forgotten it was there, what with all the evading Beau he’d been doing during the day.
“Think we should get the toolbox down first?”
“How about we just drive the wrecker inside?” Beau suggested.
Good idea. With one of the heavy-duty bays empty, the wrecker would easily pull inside without a problem. Reversing his direction, Ethan went back inside to grab the wrecker keys and tossed them to Beau while he went to the controls that would open the bay door.
Several minutes later, Beau had the wrecker pulled inside, and Ethan closed the door behind him. Both anxious and nervous, he turned to face Beau, wondering if things had changed in the last few minutes. Had Beau come to his senses? Ethan damn sure hadn’t, but he’d realized when it came to Beau, he didn’t think clearly most of the time anyway.
“You still looking to get out of here?” Ethan asked, trying to remind himself that this was Beau’s idea. Not his.
Beau’s devilish grin sent sparks shooting through his veins. “Yeah.”
“What did you have in mind, Bennett?” he asked, trying to sound more confident than he felt. The intense craving that burned like a roaring fire threatened to drop him to the floor any second, and he seriously needed to get his mind on something else quickly or he’d run the risk of thinking this through.
Just when Beau was going to say something, the sound of tires on gravel brought Ethan’s attention up short. There, with the absolute worst fucking timing in the world, was Zane, hauling ass toward them like the cops were on his ass.
Once the truck skidded to a halt, Zane climbed out, approaching them with a mischievous grin on his face.
“What’s up? Y’all taking a vacation or what?”
Something like that , Ethan thought but didn’t say a word.
“Did you get your stuff from Dillinger’s yesterday?” Zane asked Beau.
“Yeah.”
“Thanks, by the way, for helping with that,” Zane said to Ethan before turning his attention back to Beau. “I would’ve come, but I was due for my weekly ass-ripping from Travis.”
Beau laughed, but to Ethan’s ears, it sounded strangled. Like he wasn’t comfortable.
Beau nodded to Ethan. “He came to the rescue.”
Ethan watched the interaction between Beau and Zane. Given how long the two of them had been friends, practically able to complete the other’s sentences, today their easy camaraderie seemed slightly off. He couldn’t help but wonder whether that was because he was there or if it was something he just hadn’t picked up on lately.
“Where’re you two off to?” Zane asked, glancing down at his watch.
“Nowhere,” Beau said hurriedly.
Well, there was his answer. Beau obviously didn’t want Zane to know what was going on here. Ethan should’ve been relieved because he damn sure didn’t want his brothers—or anyone for that matter—in his business. The reminder that Beau was just now experimenting with the part of himself that he recently discovered was a slap to the face as well.
And an enormous reminder that Ethan was getting into something he would likely regret in the future.
Without giving it another thought, Ethan turned around and unlocked the office door. Returning to work was his only option at this point. He didn’t want to see Beau. Didn’t want to think about what had just happened between them or what he wanted to happen between them. And it wasn’t like Ethan wanted his brother to know that he lusted after Beau anyway.
What the fuck was wrong with him?
For half a second, he’d actually embraced who he was, not caring whether he hid himself from view or not.
Fuck.
Beau was getting to him. In ways Ethan wasn’t ready to embrace. And Ethan knew he should just be grateful that Zane’s horrible timing might’ve just saved him from a world of heartache that he wasn’t at all ready to experience.
BEAU WATCHED ETHAN disappear inside the shop, but he didn’t make a move to go after him. Not with Zane standing just a couple of feet away.
“What’s going on?” Zane asked, clearly picking up on the tension.
“Nothing,” Beau said, obviously too abruptly because Zane’s dark eyebrows launched up toward his hairline as he looked back at him skeptically.
The heavy-duty bay door opened, revealing the wrecker and his toolbox still strapped down. “You keeping that here?”
“For now. I didn’t have anywhere else to store it.” Beau wasn’t sure whether Ethan was still going to let him work for him, so he tried to sound as nonchalant as he could.
“You could’ve called me,” Zane told him.
“I tried.”
As though he didn’t believe him, Zane grabbed his phone, thumbing through the screens. “Sorry, at that point, I was probably trying to dislodge Travis’s boot from my ass. It wasn’t pretty, and the rest of the day sucked ass,” Zane answered with a frown. Glancing over at the truck and then back to him, Zane asked, “Need help getting that down?”
No. “Yeah.”
Beau fell into step with Zane, trying to pretend that nothing had happened between him and Ethan. It wasn’t like he had to try hard, since Ethan had managed to disappear entirely. Looking around as he moved to the control panel on the wrecker, Beau finally spotted Ethan when he walked around the side of the truck. Ethan’s muscled legs were sticking out from beneath one of the Walker Demo trucks parked inside.
“What happened at Dillinger’s?” Zane asked as he climbed up onto the truck to work on getting the tie straps unhooked from the bed.
“Work slowed down. They let me go.”
Beau certainly didn’t want to let Zane know that he’d nearly ripped Ricky’s head off because the guy was a spineless dickhead.
“What the hell are they gonna do now?” Zane asked, the exasperation evident in his statement. “It ain’t like Ricky’s gonna pick up the slack.”
“Who knows,” he answered easily. “Ralph said Ricky wasn’t working because he didn’t have anything to do.”
“ Riiiiggghhht . And I hear right now there’re subzero temps in hell.”
Beau laughed. That’s what he loved about Zane. They’d been friends for so long, and the conversations were easy between them. Even if Beau wasn’t big on talking to most people, he found he could talk to Zane. Hell, he’d even managed to confront Zane after they had...
Shit. Beau didn’t want to think about that. Not right now. Not with Ethan just a few feet away.
Making his way around to the rear of the wrecker, Beau gently nudged Ethan’s foot as he passed him by, wanting desperately to regain that connection they’d shared just a little while ago. He knew Ethan didn’t want his brothers knowing his business, but Beau was at a point in his life where he was tired of pretending to be someone he wasn’t.
If there was even the remote possibility that he would find what others around him had been finding lately, Beau didn’t give a shit what other people thought of him. And he knew that Zane would support him. At least he’d like to think he would. The only issue he could imagine Zane having would be if Beau went and fell in love with his brother. And it wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that Beau fell in love with a man.
He knew Zane loved his brother, but Zane had made the comment that he thought Ethan was a player. That he was cold. Beau knew better. Sure, from the outside looking in, that’s the picture Ethan painted for everyone else, but in recent days, Beau had noticed a different side to Ethan. One that he knew most people never had the opportunity to see. Even his own family.
Beau and Zane made quick work of getting the toolbox down from the truck. After pushing it over into one of the far corners and out of the way, Beau relocated the wrecker back to its parking spot outside. When he returned, he found Zane crouching down at Ethan’s side, a disturbing scowl on his face.
Before they realized he was back, Beau eased outside again, listening to the conversation, which seemed to be escalating at a rapid pace.
“Mind your own fucking business,” Ethan growled, the sound of the backboard he used to ease under the trucks rolling across the concrete floor.
“He is my business,” Zane disputed.
“You don’t even know what the fuck you’re talking about,” Ethan bit out, his voice sounding louder. Beau figured he was probably standing face-to-face with Zane right about then, but he had backed up just enough that he couldn’t see inside.
“Look, I don’t give a damn what you do, or what Beau does for that matter, but I do fucking care if you’re playing with him.”
The silence that followed Zane’s statement was deafening.
“Back the fuck off,” Ethan finally said, his words low and intimidating.
“I plan to. But I’m serious, E. Don’t fucking hurt him.”
The sound of boots scuffling on concrete echoed in the shop, and Beau turned the corner just in time to come face-to-face with a scowling Zane.
“Everything okay?” he asked, trying to act as though he hadn’t heard what they’d just said.
Zane smiled, a gesture that seemed incredibly forced. “Good. I’ve got to run some errands. You want to meet up at Moonshiners later tonight for a beer?”
Beau managed to keep from looking over at Ethan, but he wasn’t sure how. “Let me get back to you on that. I’ve got to take care of something this afternoon.”
Zane looked over at Ethan and then back to Beau. After nodding once, he took off. It was clear from Zane’s reaction that he knew something was going on. Beau wondered whether they’d been that obvious. Then he wondered whether the fact that Zane sensed there was something between them would send Ethan back into hiding.
There were plenty of questions and not nearly enough answers, but the only thing Beau knew for an absolute fact... he wasn’t about to let that happen.