Chapter Five
Instead of chasing after Teagan, Hayden stormed toward the house, ready to kill whoever had made his boyfriend flee the cookout.
Uncaring that this wasn’t even his home, he yanked the door open and barged in.
Hayden came up short when the only person he saw was Liam. But… Teagan had looked so distraught.
Had he been wrong about Liam? Was Teagan right when he’d said Hayden trusted too easily?
“What the fuck did you say or do to him?” Hayden snarled, ready to grab the cast iron from the stove and whack Liam over the head with it. If he’d hurt Teagan in any way—
“I kissed him.” Liam scrubbed his hand over his head, jaw clenched. “Go ahead. If you want to take a swing at me, I won’t stop you.”
Hayden glanced at the back door before taking a step closer. If he needed to kill the guy, he didn’t want any witnesses. “Did you force him?”
“What?” Liam looked as if Hayden slapped him across the face. “I would never force myself on anyone.”
There was an ache in his voice, a pain that lived in the spaces between the syllables. It dawned on Hayden that someone else had accused Liam of the same thing. “Who? Who made that claim?”
“Jackson.” The sheer menace in his voice made the air around Hayden feel heavier.
“A guy I dated for a month. I don’t expect you to believe me after the way Teagan ran out of here, but Jackson was a nightmare on steroids injected with growth hormones.
When I’d had enough of his theatrics, he accused me of—” Liam’s jaw clenched tight.
“Of forcing yourself on him,” Hayden finished for him.
Liam closed his eyes and nodded. “He eventually admitted to the cops he lied, but you don’t exactly recover from an accusation that heinous.” He blinked slowly, as though every pulse of his eyelids fed the fire of his heartbreak. “I didn’t force Teagan to kiss me, Hayden. I swear.”
“I believe you.” No one could fake that kind of raw pain. “We need to go find him. He’s probably beating himself up for kissing you, thinking he’s betrayed me. He’s been through a lot. I don’t know. Maybe you’re exactly what we need.”
Because, so far, Hayden hadn’t been able to get through to Teagan. If his best friend and lover had kissed Liam this quickly without worrying over it seven hundred different ways, it was possible Liam could somehow help Teagan.
Too bad Hayden didn’t know who Jackson was or he’d use the cast-iron on the asshole.
Liam tilted his head to the side, studying Hayden. “He’ll tell me when he’s ready.”
A smile surfaced. “You’re pretty good at this.”
Truth be told, Hayden thought he would be jealous when Liam admitted to kissing his boyfriend. Now that he knew Liam hadn’t hurt Teagan, the kiss kind of turned him on. If he could help Teagan past his guilt, Hayden wanted to see the two kiss again.
Liam gestured toward the back door. “Been watching my buddies. Not in a creepy way,” Liam clarified, as if he needed to alter his confession. It seemed Teagan wasn’t the only one who needed some work. “Learned a lot of what not to do when it comes to a mate.”
“Mate?”
“We should go find Teagan,” Liam said quicky as he ushered Hayden out the door.
That wasn’t suspicious in the least, but Hayden decided to ignore it for now since he had to deal with Teagan.
They found him sitting on his butt, his back pressed against the car.
Heated asphalt warmed Hayden’s knees as he dropped down beside Teagan, who had his face buried against his drawn-up legs like a turtle trying to disappear into its shell.
Behind them, Liam’s boots scraped to a halt, keeping enough distance not to crowd but close enough that Hayden could smell that woodsy scent rolling off him.
“Hey, hon,” Hayden said softly, bumping Teagan’s shoulder with his own. “Want to tell me why you’re sulking?”
Teagan’s voice came out muffled against his knees. “I kissed him. Well, he kissed me. But I kissed back, and my mouth just opened like some kind of betrayal portal and—”
“Your mouth has lips made for corruption,” Liam interrupted, his voice carrying a low rumble that made arousal pool low in Hayden’s belly. “Can’t blame a guy for wanting a taste.”
Teagan’s head snapped up, hazel eyes wide with indignation. “Lips made for corruption? What kind of Victorian romance novel did you crawl out of?”
Relief flooded through Hayden at the spark of sass. Teagan in full panic mode was manageable. Teagan going silent meant real trouble.
“Says the guy with a mouth that could convince saints to sin,” Liam shot back, crossing his arms in a way that made his biceps strain against his shirt.
For a moment, Hayden had a hard time looking away.
“Don’t act innocent when you practically climbed me like a tree,” Liam added.
“Your fingers in my hair, pulling me closer—”
“I did not climb you!” Pink bloomed across Teagan’s cheeks, spreading down his neck.
“You cornered me on the counter with your stupid broad shoulders and your stupid cedar smell and made my brain leak out my ears! That’s not fair.
You’re built like a Greek statue that came to life and decided to seduce mortals for fun. ”
Hayden bit back a laugh. Watching them volley accusations like this was better than guilt and misunderstanding.
“Me?” Liam’s eyebrows hiked toward his hairline. “You’re the one who spread your legs the second I got close. Like you were issuing an invitation with those thighs.”
“Those thighs could crack walnuts,” Teagan muttered. Then louder, he said, “You have hands the size of dinner plates! You grabbed my face like you were palming a basketball. What was I supposed to do?”
“Not make those sexy little sounds that made me want to—”
“Stop talking!” Teagan’s face had gone from red to burgundy.