Chapter 10 #2
He did his best to shove Giorgio to the back of his mind as he drove the last bit home.
Instead of thinking about his former boss, he let his imagination run with images of floral patterns and garments suited to a Cornwall country wedding.
Maybe he could draw inspiration from Mrs. St. Ives and her mid-century style for his fall collection.
“You look like you had a good weekend and were thoroughly debauched,” Art greeted him almost as soon as he walked through the family door into Hawthorne House’s east wing. He had a thick pile of old documents of some sort in his hands.
Ryan jumped more than he should have. “What are you doing here on a Sunday?” he asked. It made no sense that he would feel like he’d been caught doing something wrong. Or maybe like someone would catch the two of them together, and then he’d be doing something wrong.
“Your mum rang,” Art said. He held up the yellowed pages he carried as he walked by Ryan’s side to the staircase. “She found some old letters from the fifth Countess of Felcourt talking about the gamekeeper’s cottage fire.”
“Oh?” As glad as he was to see Art the moment he came home, a nagging sense of unease followed him upstairs to his flat.
“Yes, it seems like the countess was newly married to your great-great-great-etcetera-grandfather at the time. They’d been having trouble conceiving, and she’d decided to throw a house party to distract herself.
There was an argument, and your great-great-great-etcetera-grandmother ended up huffing in the gamekeeper’s cottage. ”
“Sounds like they overcame their fertility problems,” Ryan said with a smirk as he pushed open the door to his flat and hauled his bag inside. No one ever had a reason to lock their doors inside Hawthorne House.
Art laughed. “They did, obviously.” He put the old letters carefully on an end table near Ryan’s door, then followed him on to the bedroom. The subject changed immediately when he said, “Did you and our sweet boy have a good time?”
Ryan put his bag down on the bed, then turned to find Art grinning at him like the imp he was. He sent him a flat look that was meant to be scolding, but turned gloating instead. “Yes, we did,” he said.
“I knew it,” Art said, leaning against the bureau and crossing his arms. “So? Tell me all the details. Is our boy as lithe and sensual as I’ve always imagined him being?”
The heat of memory spilled through Ryan. His imagination conjured up all the things Art would have loved to see, the lines of Graeme’s body, the sheen of sweat that had broken out once they’d got going, the shape, size, and taste of Graeme’s cock, the way he groaned like he would sob when he came.
“It was lovely,” Ryan said with a smug grin.
“Well?” Art demanded when Ryan turned back to the bed to unpack. “Details, man. I want to know everything.”
“I’m sure you do,” Ryan said, unzipping his bag and starting to pull things out.
Art was immediately behind him, his arms encircling him and his growing erection pressed against Ryan’s backside in no time.
“Tell me everything, darling,” he purred, reaching one hand up toward one of Ryan’s nipples and the other down, like he would slip it under the waistband of his jeans. “I want every sweaty, sticky detail.”
Ryan sucked in a breath, lust racing through him.
They were alone in his apartment. He had actually remembered to shut the door behind him.
No one in the family had been in the hallway when they’d come in.
Not a soul would know if he stripped off, threw Art on the bed, and tangled with him.
He still had a buzz in him from not coming that morning when Graeme did.
But there was that nagging feeling that to indulge in Art so soon after being horizontal with Graeme was wrong.
He turned in Art’s embrace and settled his arms around the man’s waist, trying to break through whatever boundary kept holding him back to enjoy his friend. “It was lovely,” he said. “And that’s all you need to know.”
Art made a mock frustrated sound, and because he couldn’t help it, Ryan slanted his mouth over his, dampening the sound with a kiss. Art responded strongly, moaning and kissing him back like he hadn’t had sex in ten years, which was blatantly not true.
The temptation was all-consuming. Within seconds, Ryan went from thinking there was no way he could get naked with two different men on the same day to tugging at the hem of Art’s shirt so he could grip his bare flesh.
“Yes,” Art said, pushing him back until his legs bumped against the edge of the bed.
“Tell me all about it. Recall the whole thing in detail while I slobber all over you and swallow you deep. Did you fuck him or the other way around? I bet it feels so good being buried deep in our boy’s tight arse. ”
Ryan gasped at the thought, wishing he’d remembered to take lube to Cornwall. “No lube or condoms,” he managed to pant as Art went for the fastenings of his jeans.
“That’s alright,” Art said, loosening Ryan’s jeans enough to slide his hand in and around his cock. “I always have some with me.”
Ryan clamped a hand around the back of Art’s head and crashed his mouth against his. Maybe this was what he needed after all. Like his dad had said, he could date both of them. No one would judge him. No one would laugh at him for turning his back on the fashion world.
That jarring thought came at the same time as his phone buzzed in the sagging pocket of his jeans. For a split-second, the vibrations against his arse coupled with Art’s hand doing wicked things to his dick nearly made him lose his load.
Sense rushed in by the second ring, and Ryan broke apart from Art and reached for his phone. “It might be Graeme,” he panted.
“Yes, please,” Art said, removing his hand from Ryan’s cock but staying flush against him.
The call wasn’t from Graeme. That would have been enough for him to toss his phone aside and continue with what he was doing, but the name that flashed up on the screen was so unexpected that he answered the call out of pure surprise. “Hello, Adam?”
“Ryan,” his fashion-world friend Adam replied, excitement in his voice. “It’s good to hear your voice again. How’ve you been?”
Ryan’s mouth dropped open, and he glanced at Art, whose face and reddened lips were less than a foot away, and said, “I’ve been great. How are you?”
“Fantastic,” Adam said in his slick, New York accent. “Listen, I’ve got exciting news for you, and I don’t want to drag it out, because you’re going to need all the time you can get.”
“Um, alright?”
Art must have sensed there was more to the call than met the eye. He eased up slightly, leaning back and watching Ryan with a curious look.
“You know I’m on the board curating London Fashion Week this September, right?” Adam asked.
“Yes, and congratulations for that,” Ryan said, fighting the twist of longing and the flash of sheepishness that hit him. “You worked hard for that position.”
“I did,” Adam said. “And what good is finding yourself in high places if you can’t help your friends?”
“Nothing, I guess,” Ryan said, his heart beating faster.
“So here’s the thing,” Adam went on. “We’ve had a drop-out for September’s show. Teague Underhill has had to drop out to help their mom through a cancer diagnosis.”
“That’s terrible,” Ryan said. “Poor Teague. Do they need anything?”
“They need you to take their spot on the runway,” Adam said.
It took a second for the impact of those words to settle in.
“I beg your pardon?” Ryan said.
“I’ve got you a spot in London Fashion Week,” Adam said, sounding triumphant. “Can you put together a spring collection in time?”
Ryan’s jaw dropped. He was struggling to design a fall collection for February as it was. There was no way on earth he could have a complete collection designed and constructed by September.
On the other hand, this was it. This was the chance Giorgio had denied him to launch his own line and step out of the shadows of that manipulative old wanker. And it was the sort of chance that only came along once.
“Yes!” he said, head spinning and stomach feeling sick. “Yes, of course I can come up with a collection. Just send me the details and let me know what I have to do.”
“Perfect,” Adam said. “I’ll put you in the line-up right now, and we’ll have a more extensive call this coming week to discuss things.”
“Thank you,” Ryan said, sinking to sit on the bed as Art let go of him and stepped back. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”
“Actually, I do,” Adam said, laughing.
They said their goodbyes, then Ryan ended the call and let his arms drop like a ragdoll. He looked up at Art, his mouth still hanging open.
“Everything alright, love?” Art asked, affection and concern in his expression.
“I’ve just been offered a spot in London Fashion Week,” he said breathlessly.
“That’s wonderful!” Art laughed, jumping onto Ryan’s lap with his knees on either side of Ryan’s hips. “You’ve been working on that fall collection for as long as I’ve known you.”
He tried to kiss Ryan, but Ryan held him off.
“It’s not for February,” he said. “It’s for September.”
Art leaned back, staring at him. “That’s two months.”
“And I don’t have a damn thing for it,” Ryan gasped.
“But you said yes,” Art pointed out.
“I had to,” Ryan said, starting to feel hysterical. “This is a chance of a lifetime. How could I say no?”
Surprisingly, Art scooted back and stood again, offering Ryan his hand. “Well?” he said, waiting for Ryan to take it. “You shouldn’t be fooling around in bed. You need to be down in your studio, designing the hell out of a collection. Right now.”
Art was right, but it made Ryan’s head spin. He’d just been handed everything, all the things, he’d ever wanted. All at once. With no time to enjoy or possibly even accomplish any of it.