The Boss

Chapter 10

Chaz

Eyes clenched shut, a sticky mess in my boxers, I couldn’t stop the guilt hitting me like a damned tsunami as the exhilaration of release faded.

Shelly had embarrassed the fuck out of me and made me feel like a piece of shit.

And Jamie had been there ready and waiting to take the sting of her words away with the comfort of his arms.

Once there?

Temptation had overridden my better sense, and I’d caved to my desire for Jamie, thinking that finally tasting his mouth would reveal it’d only been the forbidden aspect of having my straight best friend that had drawn me to him. I should have realized that was bullshit. After learning he was into guys, I’d been twice as desperate for his touch.

There would be no simple quenching of my thirst for Jamie.

I’d made a shitty error in judgment, giving into my lust like this. But regret? Never that. Having his mouth on me and finding release together had been the single best moment of my life. I couldn’t imagine how much better it could have been without clothing separating us.

“What are we doing, Jamie?”

I rasped, my heart hurting even worse now than before I knew what his tongue stroking along mine felt like.

Jamie clung to me as tightly as I did him, as though reluctant to let go. “What we should have been doing since middle school.”

My pulse still thrummed, and I swallowed hard, pressing my face into his neck again. The scent of soap and the underlying musk of my best friend filled my nose. He’d skipped out on that new cologne he’d worn at the welcome home party, so he smelled exactly as I’d remembered, same as when we’d gone camping.

This—this right here is perfection. A dream come true.

Shelly snored especially loud before making smacking noises with her lips like she always did when she’d had too much to drink and crashed for the night. My wife. The woman who deserved my loyalty, and I’d failed her yet again.

Could I be any more selfish?

My eyes stung. “This isn’t right.”

“Please don’t say this was a mistake,”

Jamie begged quietly, snaking his hand from between us to clutch me closer.

“It definitely wasn’t smart,”

I tried again, still unable to pull away from him.

“I know,”

he whispered.

“My vows?—”

“Goddamnit, Chaz.”

Jamie stepped back abruptly, my entire front chilling. A shiver rippled through me as I met his gaze. “That woman does not love you,”

he hissed, pointing toward where Shelly snored with every inhale. “It’s obvious as fuck you’re both miserable. I won’t ask why you’re still with her because I know you refuse to fail in your Dad’s eyes. Is she seriously not aware of all that bullshit? Hmm? You never shared that part of you with the woman who agreed to wear your ring?”

“No,”

I answered honestly what we’d already talked about beneath the stars while camping. “I’ve only ever wanted to protect her. Shelter her from my trauma since she had enough of her own.”

“She’s your partner!”

Jamie whisper-hollered. “Made a vow to have your back, to stand beside you, same as you did with her. She’s supposed to be your oak in the storms of life when you falter!”

Only one person had ever been that for me, and it sure as fuck wasn’t my wife.

My throat tightened, and I blinked a few times to keep tears from welling in my eyes. Difficult didn’t begin to describe the situation I’d put myself in by playing with fire. But Jamie was right. I refused to fail even worse than I already had in this stolen moment with him. This shit ended here. Now. “I think you should go.”

“Chaz.”

I shook my head, taking a step backward rather than throwing myself at him like I longed to do. “Please.”

“Fuck.”

Jamie lifted his hand to rub over his face but hesitated, inhaling deeply over his palm—and groaning.

Heat rushed through me as I became aware of the wet mess inside my jeans and how he’d cupped me through my orgasm. He flicked out his tongue, running it along his fingers as though searching for a hint of my cum.

My mouth dried as I watched him, dick once more swelling. “For the love of God, Jamie, please,”

I rasped, on the verge of begging him to drop to his knees and get a proper taste of me.

He lifted heated blue eyes to mine. “I’ll be waiting, Chaz. Always.”

I worked my throat as he spun on his heel and showed himself out the kitchen door rather than the front before shutting it quietly behind him.

Knees weakening, I slid to the floor and leaned against the cabinet, my face in my hands. The stickiness inside my boxers was uncomfortable as hell, but I couldn’t be bothered with seeking comfort of any sort. Felt like I didn’t deserve it, that I ought to sit in the mess I’d made of myself—literally and figuratively.

Even if I had the balls to tell my parents that Shelly and I wanted a divorce, we couldn’t afford to separate. We’d sold her mom’s house to pay for her room at the nursing home, and the bit of savings we’d scrounged together back before marriage had been the down payment on our small ranch house outside Pippen Creek’s southern end.

Lawyers would have to be involved because no way would Shelly allow me to escape with little more than the clothes on my back. We both had vehicles in our own names. Her old Camry piece of shit and my truck had seen better days a decade ago, and we’d been milking them for all they were worth. She would demand the house and everything in it, even though she couldn’t afford to pay the bills that came along with the responsibilities of living on her own.

I wouldn’t be able to buy again or even afford rent after she wiped me out. I could always stay at the shop because I sure as fuck wouldn’t move in with my parents. A cot in the office would work as a place to sleep, but the lack of shower and full kitchen would make for a miserable existence.

Will I have to buy her out of the business?

The thought made the blood drain from my face and heart race to the point I swore it would tear from my chest.

Her name wasn’t on the loan or listed in my filed paperwork, but the equitable distribution law would be in her favor. I might have to sell the business I’d bled for, but even then, I would probably only get what I still owed my father for the loan.

If that, because the fucker hadn’t budged from the ridiculously high percentage rate he’d wanted in return for lending me the cash.

“Shit.”

I tipped my head back and slowly exhaled until my lungs emptied.

I was thoroughly fucked, and not in the way I dreamed of with Jamie.

“Wish I could sleep here and never wake up,”

I whispered to myself, on the verge of tears over the bleakness of my existence.

Shame for wishing for death rose up to choke me, and always the fighter, I forced myself to my feet and dragged my ass into the living room.

Shelly sprawled on the couch with her head at an awkward angle, her glass on the floor, wine sloshed across the small rug. At least it was white and couldn’t stain.

Annoyance and disdain caused my mouth to curl into a grimace at the sight of her drunkenness. An asshole partner would have left her to sleep through the night and wake with a crick in her neck.

But I wouldn’t quit, even though every part of me except for my pride pushed for me to move on and at least attempt to be happy while living broke on the streets. I would be Pippen Creek’s first homeless citizen.

Lips in a thin line, I cleaned up that mess and maneuvered her dead weight into my arms to carry her back to the bedroom. She continued to snore in my ear, and I carefully laid her on her side of the bed. She rolled, smooshing her face into the pillow, but didn’t wake.

Hands on hips, I watched her sleep.

Everything about my life hadn’t panned out as I had once hoped for. Hell, I couldn’t even find something positive in my reality.

Except for Jamie, the one I’d denied. He’d left me like I’d told him to, and I hated that even more.

My throat tightened again, and I turned from my wife, guilt like slimy tentacles slithering through my veins and making me feel like a piece of shit covered in flies. I needed a rainstorm to wash away the stench of failure.

I showered, scrubbing the evidence of my infidelity down the drain, refusing to think on how a single make-out session could change a man’s existence.

But I couldn’t.

Bed made, I had no choice but to sleep in it. There would be no easy way out, no miracle that ended in a happily ever after. As teens, we all used to joke about marriage being a ball and chain.

How fucking true that had ended up being.

Regardless of our actions being wrong, Jamie’s kiss had felt like the key to freedom from those shackles. The memory would always remain, something to remember in my darkest days.