20. Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty
Adrian
I ’m done talking to Mason Burnett about the pictures I’ve taken for Trailhead, the little V had told me about him both accurate and far from the entire story. But before I can return to Beau and my drink, I see Jake on my stool, and I pause where I stand in the middle of the room, my lip ready to bleed. I don’t want to interrupt something that’s almost certainly fallout from the other night, but I can’t stand here either, caught between one thing and another. Then I notice Riley stepping inside from the beer garden, a couple of empty glasses in their hands, and they motion me over as soon as they see Beau and Jake talking at the bar. Their question, though, is about the conversation I just finished.
“Everything okay with that?” they ask, their gaze dancing over my shoulder to where I assume Mason is still sipping at something sweet .
“I think so, yeah. You recognize him at all? He’s been in here before.”
“He came the day you and Beau met with Darren to talk about the West Hollywood promo.”
Of course, Riley remembers. I do and I don’t.
Before I can say anything else, we’re both watching Beau and Jake, and clocking the unforgiving line of Jake’s jaw and the quick and stubborn shake of Beau’s head and the two fists pressed to the bar like something bad will happen if they lift them from there.
At least Beau’s not likely to make Jake choose between fucking and fighting.
Riley takes a half step closer to me. “They’re two of the best people I know. They’ll say what they need to say and none of it will be something they regret later.”
“It’s about me.”
“Of course.”
“Should I go over there?”
“If you thought that was a good idea, you would’ve done it by now,” Riley points out. “You’re hesitant when it comes to the things that you need—not about the things anyone else does.”
My mouth opens, closes, and opens again before I find a polite reaction to that. “You really do pay attention to everything that happens around here.”
Riley shrugs. “It’s better for me that way.”
I nod and think back to every interaction I’ve had with Riley since last summer—back when Beau and Levi danced and I barely took my eyes off the two of them, but still paused to talk to the one person who seemed genuinely interested in why I was there—and I realize how often a million other things were happening around us.
“You focus on people to help block out the rest of the noise,” I say. “It can get overwhelming in here, so you catalog the things people say and do just to help you filter the rest of it. Piecing together the things they feel is an even better distraction.”
“That part’s not something that comes easily to me—the feelings. I don’t understand them like other people do, but I get to practice it here. And yes, it helps keep the rest of it out of my head.”
Just before walking away, Jake presses a kiss to Beau’s cheek as smoothly as V had, and it bothers me that I still envy that easy affection. Maybe while Riley practices understanding feelings, I can practice how to express them to anyone I’m not actively fucking. Right now, I accept the way they nudge me with their shoulder—something that feels as important as anything they’ve said out loud—and I rejoin Beau at the bar.
“Riley assured me that you and Jake are fine, regardless of whatever just got said about me,” I start, pausing just long enough for some of the drink I’d left behind. “Anything you want to add to that?”
“Nope.”
“Are Jake and I fine?”
“You’d have to have a longer conversation with him about that, and just giving him some time to get to know you might be the better way to go.”
I take another drink, longer this time. “He thinks I don’t give a shit about you.”
“To be fair, you tried pretty hard to not give a shit about me,” Beau says.
“Tried and failed.”
“Well, yes, I’m fuckin’ irresistible. Everything probably looked pretty bad for a while, though.”
“Jake’s the only one who seems to be holding it against me.”
Beau holds up a hand and starts counting on his fingers. “V probably figures it’ll save her the trouble of smackin’ me upside the head if you do it for her. Noah likes to pretend he doesn’t understand gay drama, even if he definitely does. Riley is brilliant, so—duh. And Darren is Darren.”
I have no idea what that last part means, but I’m kind of over the whole thing and will deal with Jake another day. I plan to be around for plenty of them, and maybe Beau’s right about time healing this particular wound. Besides, I have other things on my mind.
“So—” I clear my throat and start again. “The guy I was talking to is Mason Burnett, and he owns an art gallery in WeHo.”
Beau flinches, but he covers it well, and I almost think I imagined it when he responds. “One that we hit up when we handed out bar promo.”
“Yes. And V was sort of correct that he stopped by for a drink because of it, but also, he’s been here before. That day we met with Darren, and all of you were betting on the couple that came in.”
“Ah, the first date.” Beau grins and twists enough to look over his shoulder at where Mason is shooting pool with half his shirt unbuttoned. “He’s not with that guy now, is he?”
“Nope. They hit it off that night, and then mutually ghosted each other afterward,” I shrug. “But V was also only partially correct about why he wanted to talk to me. It was about the pictures I took, but not the ones we used for any of the promo.”
I look around the room, and when Beau follows my lead, I know he’ll understand quickly. In the end, the promotional material we distributed consisted of very traditional marketing photos, all dancing and drinking and riding a bull and shooting pool like Mason is now. I wanted everyone to see the fun they could have if they drove up here for a beer or two, and I know attention spans aren’t high for that sort of thing. People will glance at a shiny picture and then move on, so I kept it simple. Just enough for Trailhead to catch an eye or several.
But I had all those other pictures from the night of our photoshoot—the ones I wanted to take to satisfy my own creative urge—and they didn’t go to waste. I made large canvas prints from them and helped Noah hang my work among rainbow flags and metal Jack Daniels signs, my vision admired by V and surrounding us tonight.
Bold fingertips against tattooed skin.
Heavy-lidded longing from a couple of tables away.
A wet tongue seeking a wayward drop of alcohol.
A timid hand combing another person’s hair back from their forehead, so much like the way Beau touches me that I ache every time I see it. I think I could get him to touch me like that now, but I’ll wait for later tonight to fall apart in his arms.
“Okay, so he doesn’t want you to help him with marketing his art gallery?” Beau asks.
“Nope. If anything, he wants to help me . And without even knowing how much I need that right now.”
Beau flinches again, though it’s even less noticeable than the last time. “What’d he say?”
“Basically, that my talent is wasted on free drink cards and karaoke night flyers. When I mentioned family portraits and engagement shoots, he laughed and said my talent is wasted there too, unless I’m capturing a lot less of the traditional bullshit and a lot more of all of this.” I stop and wave my hand at the walls, then lose myself in my drink for a few seconds. “He thinks I should consider getting a storefront and lean into selling prints like these.”
“Prints like the ones you framed for your own place.”
“Exactly. He said he’s into the intimacy of them. He went on about all the places that sell pictures of landscapes or celebrities or architecture, and he’s got nothing against those, but he thinks there’s a market for my stuff because there aren’t enough studios with that kind of focus.”
“And you’re not competition for him?”
I shake my head. “Not really. His art is more—erotic than intimate? Definitely bold where my stuff is subtle. And paintings versus my photography. But if there are people who like both, it wouldn’t be difficult to refer back and forth.”
Beau takes a deep breath. “So, you’re considering it?”
“I’m laughing at it, mostly,” I admit. “I mean, I’m pushing it just by keeping my shitty little studio when I could work at home. I’ve always been extremely fortunate to have the savings I have, and I know that, but now that I’m paying rent on my own, with no second income—”
“You’re already at your limit and getting rid of your studio just to replace it with a store would be a bad idea.”
“Yeah, a place in WeHo would cost a lot more than what I’ve got now.”
“Same goes for Venice or Santa Monica.”
I blink slowly, looking for the reason Beau is adding to the list of places I could go. “Yes, they’d be expensive, too.”
Beau plays with the label on his bottle, and I hold my breath. “I went there today.”
“To Venice and Santa Monica?”
“And to WeHo,” Beau says. “It’s why I was late. I got out of work early, grabbed dinner and walked around there a little, then I took a peek at the beach.”
“Because?”
“Because I had the same idea Mason Burnett had. A less knowledgeable version of it, I suppose, but the point was the same. You’ve been unhappy, and I wanted to make it better.”
“By giving me a bunch of dreams I won’t be able to chase for a while—if ever? Beau, I—” I stop, tensing when hope and fear collide with enough force to knock my heartbeat into something uncomfortable.
He reaches for me—reorients himself entirely, maybe—but it’s my turn to flinch, and I see how much I hurt him with it before he fights back.
“A minute ago, you were half-considering it and half-laughing about it. Why are you mad at me for wanting you to have everything he already suggested?”
I don’t have an answer to give him when about four or five are caught in my throat, and my only immediate response is to throw back the rest of my drink to wash everything down. Riley’s got an eye on us, I think, and maybe it would be best if I ran to them for help, but I need fresh air and I need Beau to stay where he is this time around.
“I need a minute,” I choke. “I’ll be back, I promise. Don’t—I’ll be back for you.”
A kiss is the only thing I can give him before I go, the warmth of my mouth reinforcing my plea. And at least Jake can see that much before I run out on Beau in front of everyone.
The night is crisp and I’m grateful for it, and when I find Beau’s truck in the parking lot, I climb into the bed and press my back against the cab, my head in my hands. I’m overreacting to things that should be nothing but good for me, and it makes no sense when I waded through years of the bad to get here.
Beau wants to know why I’m mad at him.
I want to know, too.
On a very basic and probably stupid level, I think I wanted him to laugh at what Mason had said to me. I wanted Beau to do his quiet southern charm thing and drag me back down to earth with all the practical reasons I can’t spend money on a storefront in exactly the place—or places , as Beau pointed out—where my photography might be appreciated the most. My heart pounded as Mason came at me with a combination of wild arrogance and sincere praise, but I was ready for Beau to settle my pulse into something normal and easy and unafraid.
Instead, he’d confessed that he wants a future for me I’ve barely considered wanting for myself, and I’m hurt and scared and proud and falling hard when there are things I still haven’t properly mourned. I want to sell my work in a little store, and I want Beau at my side when I do it, but even without a weight on my finger, something has me pinned in place, nearly unable to breathe.
Beau’s trying to fix me again, and I’m a little too close to suffocation.
I sit there for a long time before I figure how much of it I want to do alone, the breeze raising goosebumps beneath the shirt I’m wearing until it’s enough to force me to decide my immediate future, if nothing else. Going back to my own bed tonight would be easy. Half-expected, even. But it’s not what either of us deserves, and I already know I’ll follow Beau to his apartment if he’ll still have me.
But I also think we need to talk.
After another minute or so, I land back on my feet and hurry toward the obnoxious barn doors I’ve grown to love. Inside, I take a quick look around to find Mason still at the pool table and Riley returning from the beer garden again and Jake chatting with the couple sitting next to him and Darren leaning over the bar to laugh about something with Beau. I’m grateful for that—the laughter—and I approach slowly just so I don’t interrupt.
Of course, Darren has probably been keeping watch, and he misses nothing about my careful steps forward. I assume he’s as protective of Beau as Jake is, but he has far less room to talk and doesn’t try now, gesturing to my empty coaster instead.
“You want another? And yes, he’s on his second beer, in case that helps with your decision.”
I glance at Beau, like Darren has any reason to lie, and when I get a nod, Darren moves away to make my drink. Neither of us says anything until it’s been delivered and I’ve taken more than a sip or two, but I’m sitting closer than before and I’m glad.
“I want to have this drink with you.” I sigh, and it’s enough to raise Beau’s eyebrow. “No, I do. I want to have this drink and sit too close and kiss you just because—”
“But?”
“No, there’s not a but . More like an and . I want to do those things, and I want us to go back to your place afterward so we can talk. I’m not mad at you and I don’t want to fight. There’s still a lot going on in my head, and there has been for a while, and I think maybe it would be good to sort of dump it on your living room floor.”
Beau studies me, his eyes almost too dark to read under the brim of his hat. “And then you’ll stay with me ‘til morning?”
“What’s for breakfast? ”
“Sex and waffles, probably.”
I laugh, and I hope everyone at the bar sees that, too. “Then I’ll definitely stay ‘til morning.”
Mason, Darren, Riley, V, and even Jake stop by during the rest of round two, quick goodbyes from three of them and general nonsense from the other two. Beau and I do just as I wanted, remaining annoyingly pressed together, my mouth at his neck as much as my Jack and ginger allows. And then we stand and stretch and fall into each other without having a reason to, my hands tucked into Beau’s back pockets when I kiss him again.
“Home?” he asks, and I pretend I don’t tremble at the sound of a single word.
“Please.”
Maybe Beau trembles at that one.
The drive is as easy as expected, and I’m only surprised when we walk into the lobby to find the elevator working. It feels wrong, and I stay quiet about it because I don’t think I could begin to explain why, but I’ve never once taken anything other than the stairs to the second floor, and I haven’t decided whether the change will make things better or worse tonight.
And then the coward in me doesn’t have to.
Beau’s hand is at my back when he guides me toward the stairwell where we first kissed, and for a moment, I wonder whether we can postpone the rest of our lives just to do it all over again. But time will tell and it marches on and wiser men swear it heals all wounds, so we’re upstairs and into his apartment before I can think about it any more than that .
“You want another drink?”
I’m a few steps behind him, still by the door where we’ve left our shoes and keys and whatever, and it takes me a few seconds to process the question.
“No, I—water, actually. Water would be great.”
He nods and turns his back on me while I get settled on the couch. My hand brushes against the blue fabric, so obviously soothing until Beau brings two glasses over and we leave them on the coffee table without drinking from them first. Then I practically climb into his lap and kiss him because I need to remind both of us that this is where tonight begins and ends.
Beau meets me there without question, his mouth open for mine before I can demand it, and my hand is in his hair because his hat is finally out of my way. We’re both a little needier than we want to be—or maybe just in all the wrong ways—but there’s a gentleness that makes it okay for now, and we give ourselves the time to take what we need before we finally settle back down. When I slide away, Beau readjusts us entirely, turning until he’s resting against one arm of the couch and I can fit between his legs, my back to his chest and his beard against my temple.
“You can yell at me, but I’m gonna hold you while you do it, and I’m gonna say I’m sorry first.”
“Not yelling, Beau.”
“Still sorry, Adrian.”
I snort at the use of my name, mostly because it feels like a long time since he’s used it. “Okay, fine, what are you sorry about?”
“I knew I shouldn’t be looking at these big career changes for you. Even if you’ve been unhappy, it wasn’t something for me to take on, and I shouldn’t have spent the afternoon drivin’ around to find options you might not even like. But I got stuck on the idea and did it anyway.”
“Yeah, you did,” I agree. “But I think you’re only half right on what you shouldn’t have done. Because you shouldn’t have looked at big career changes for me— we should have. And you shouldn’t have driven around to find options I’d probably love—”
“ We should have,” Beau finishes.
“Us.”
Beau’s deep breath lifts us both before we fall together. “Is that still what you want? Apart from the whole decision-makin’ thing? You want us?”
“You don’t?”
I don’t believe it even as I say it, but Beau does me the favor of not laughing directly into my ear, only the slightest vibration of whatever he suppresses passed from his body to mine.
“Pretty sure all of Trailhead knows I want us.”
“It was a big deal when I left the PR firm. A huge financial risk to throw away steady money just to follow a dream. So many people thought I was crazy to put passion above logic, maybe especially because I don’t exactly exude that passion. I’m cold and distant and practical. I like when things make sense. And nothing about me wanting to take pictures instead of collecting a ridiculous paycheck made sense.”
“But you did it,” Beau says, swallowing hard enough for me to feel it. Like calling myself cold doesn’t sit well with someone who’s felt me when I’m on fire. “What helped you take that chance back then?”
“Levi.”
He swallows again and takes my left hand in his. “I don’t think I realized you two were together when you left the firm.”
“Yeah, it was early on, but I was always tense, and he was—not. I know now that it was never that simple, but whatever you saw when you danced with him—I think it was the same. That energy that makes you believe in things, even when life has tried to teach you anything but.”
“He smiled that smile, and you took a leap.”
“He did, and I did,” I say, as quiet as I can be before I go on. “And it’s why I think I need the ring back. His ring.”
Beau is silent for so long that I’d think he’d fallen asleep if it weren’t for the way his thumb keeps brushing over my finger, back and forth, back and forth, like he’s about to ask a genie to make a wish come true. I’ve hurt him, and I know that, but I won't rush to explain anything until he’s ready to hear it, and I think I should at least wait for his hand to be still against mine.
In the meantime, I use my free hand to help wrap his right arm around me because he shouldn’t doubt that I need him close, and I nuzzle against him as well as I can until he asks the question made important by the way I made us both suffer for months.
“Are you going to wear it again?”
“No. It wasn’t mine to begin with and it’s not mine now. I haven’t figured out what to do with it yet, but it can’t stay here. It can’t stay with us.”
“So, we’re back to the conversation about us?”
“We never left it,” I huff. “But I think part of what I realized tonight—or have been realizing for a while—is that it’s all tied up together. My career and Levi and the dreams I have and how fucking afraid I am. I was brave for a split second, and then I got stuck for years because I didn’t know how to do it again without him being the one to encourage me.”
Beau nods, and I relish the soft scrape of him. “You were stuck with the relationship and your job, and then when he died, you wore the ring and stuck yourself with grief and guilt.”
“And I don’t want to be stuck anymore, but I also can’t have you be the reason I’m not. Or at least not the only reason I’m not. I can’t let you make me brave for another split second, and then lose myself all over again. I want us, and I want to do so much of this together, but I have to make choices for me. I don’t want to look back in another ten years and realize I’m living with the same mistakes. I don’t want to look back and realize that—one more time—I forgot to make my own choices at all.”
“Okay, so what happens now?”
“We can run the numbers on all of it—rent at my studio versus rent for something bigger and better, and whatever else it would take to get set up—and see what it would take to get me there,” I tell him. “We can drive around WeHo, Venice, Santa Monica, and probably a few other places, and I can talk to Mason again—”
“Oh, we’re on a first-name basis, are we?”
I almost turn around at that, but reach back to pinch his side instead. “If you think he’s hot, just say so.”
Beau laughs. “Not saying a word, love.”
“Anyway,” I continue, dragging the word further than its three syllables would suggest. “If I decide it’s what I really want, then I can probably bail on the studio sooner and book extra portrait sessions and weddings and run the business from home. That would give me a chance to save up some money and prepare canvases and framed prints and the inventory for both.”
“So, we’ve gotta do some math. And then wait for the math to equal something more than zero.”
“Exactly. But right now, I think we should head to bed because I’m looking forward to things that have absolutely nothing to do with photography or math.”
Beau takes my hand in his and very slowly begins to tease me with a touch that leaves him groaning. “And what is it that has you so excited?”
“Sex and waffles.”