Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Canary Yellows & Midnight Blues
GABE
Elijah Sager looked like a movie star walking onto set. Sunlight shining through the window splashed onto his light brown curls, highlighting the soft curves of his pink lips, the shining green specks in his hazel eyes.
Fucking hell. He was beautiful. In every way possible.
And he made it seem effortless. Like he’d simply rolled out of bed, grabbed a clean black T-shirt and crisp blue jeans on his way out the door, thrown on a light gray jacket, hopped in his car, and shown up here.
By the look of surprise he had on his kissable face, I could tell he hadn’t expected me to show up here.
“Hey, Gabe,” Dylan said, completely oblivious to the shell-shocked Eli he walked past.
I greeted him and Chris. Eli was last. He reached out a hand, and I clapped it with mine, pulling it close to my chest as we hugged.
It was a brief moment of contact that was powerful enough to rattle the very ground I stood on.
I swallowed, trying to contain the primal instinct inside me. All I wanted to do was drop Eli to the ground, bite the back of his neck, and fuck him until I had him shouting my name and begging me to come.
Was it because the full moon was only a few days away?
That had to be it. Not all shifters were influenced by the cycles of the moon, but wolves definitely were.
Full moons would cause an involuntary shift into our were forms, and it had been noted that moods fluctuated in the days leading up to the transformation.
Some experienced an increase in anger, others in sadness, some in euphoria.
And me? Guess I ended up extra horned up.
Chris must have picked up on Eli’s surprise at seeing me here. He put a hand on my shoulder. “Gabe’s always talked about loving photography. Figured I’d invite him too. That’s alright?”
Eli blinked away the surprise. He went back to looking relaxed as he nodded.
I noticed that his neck had flushed slightly pink.
“Of course. The more, the merrier. Is this where we sign in?” he asked, pointing at the sheet that had “Check-in for Burlington Photography Meet-up” printed in big, bold letters across the top.
He was flustered. Was it by me?
I nodded, smiling. “It is.”
He followed my eyes and pursed his lips. “Right, duh.”
Eli was cute when he was pushed a little off-balance.
Just from observing him through practice, he seemed like the kind of guy who always kept things pretty chill, controlled.
He had a tendency to beat himself up over things—that was apparent in how he’d overanalyze his mistakes during our video reviews and would apologize to the team for things that weren’t even his fault—but there was a stronger, more confident core that seemed to drive him.
He fascinated me.
“So you found this meet-up?” I asked Eli as we approached the main group.
“I did.”
“I had no idea you were into this.”
“I’m a man of many secrets.”
Oh, buddy. If only you knew the secrets I held.
Eli chuckled. “Besides, we haven’t had much of a chance to talk, so how would you have known.”
“Let’s fix that,” I said, pausing a couple of steps away from the group. My gaze locked with his. “I want to get to know you.”
It hit me that we were in the middle of a crowded coffee shop. I could hear Dylan introducing himself to the crowd. Could they hear me? I cleared my throat. “As a teammate.”
“Right, yeah,” Eli said. “Totally.”
We awkwardly integrated ourselves with the rest of the people who had come to the meet-up.
A guy named Richie Bayne was the organizer and took the lead introducing himself and a few of his friends.
He explained that there’d be about thirty minutes here of chatting before they split off and handled different photography projects picked out of a hat.
A good number of people had brought their cameras.
I had my Canon hanging off my neck. I noticed Eli had a Nikon in his hands.
“How do you like that model?” I asked him once the group started to disperse into smaller clusters. I motioned toward a cozy table painted pink, partially hidden between two of the biggest and most luscious ferns I’d ever seen.
“Oh, I love it. I’m a Nikon guy. My first ever real camera was a Nikon D7500. I still have it, actually.” He looked down, and for a second, I thought he was checking out my chest. “How do you like that one?”
Oh, right. “I’m actually not sure. I sold my old Mark II, and I kind of regret it. I’m not liking how the photos look.”
“What aren’t you liking?”
“Something about the white balance always feels off to me. And they tried making the interface simpler, but it’s pretty fucked.”
Eli held his hand out. “Mind if I look?”
“Sure,” I said and passed it over as we reached the table.
He stood by my side and turned it on. He navigated through the admittedly simple but annoyingly sparse controls.
There was a setting buried under ten others.
“This here,” he said, lifting the camera up.
I leaned in. His strawberry-sweet scent filled me with a need that nearly knocked me to my knees.
“That’s the Kelvin temperature, and you can fine-tune it.
It’s different than the other white-balance toggle.
More specific. And then, of course, you can fix anything else in post, usually. ”
I was impressed. He knew his shit. Clearly knew more than me. “Thanks,” I said as he handed my camera back. Our fingertips touched. I sucked in a breath. The sweater I had on kept me warm, but it didn’t account for the intense heat I began to feel.
Fuck. This was the kind of ache I thought I’d somehow managed to avoid for most of my adult life.
I never felt this kind of need—this magnetic pull—toward another person before.
It was how I’d been able to get on with life on my own.
I didn’t feel the need to get to know someone, to figure out ways I could be in their vicinity for as long as possible, soaking in their presence.
That’s how Eli made me feel, and I’d only just met him a few weeks ago.
It had made me consciously avoid him during locker room moments or warm-ups.
If we were working out at the same time, I’d pick a machine or bench far from him, but still in a spot where I could keep an eye on him through the mirror.
Occasionally checking him out when he wasn’t looking.
Drinking up his physique as he sweat and grunted and lifted and stretched.
But why? Why was I scared of this feeling?
Because it’s with Elijah.
A man. Someone who would need me to come out.
Could I reckon with that? My gut told me no.
That my need to keep as low a profile as possible was one with the weight of the shifter population behind it.
How could I set that aside? It wasn’t me being selfish.
No, it was the opposite. If I threw all caution to the wind, said that my wants mattered more than the safety and secrecy of shifters all around the world, then that would make me selfish.
Eli smiled at me, and my entire body stiffened. I couldn’t quite pinpoint what it was about it, but I was certain that Eli had the most beautiful smile known to mankind. It was charming, disarming, and alluring all in equal measure.
Fuck, I just want to grab him by the back of his neck and kiss him.
“What kind of photography do you like?” Eli asked.
We were sitting at a small round table in the corner of the cafe.
The two massive ferns flanked us like security guards.
It did feel a little like the VIP area. We were secluded, the rest of the group dispersed around the cafe.
Dylan and Chris had both gotten into an animated conversation with Richie, although it sounded like they were talking to him about hockey and not photography.
“I started on sports photography, and that’s still my true love. I’ve been experimenting lately with food photography, but I think it’s the speed that I like most with sports.”
“That makes sense. I enjoy photographing wildlife. Sometimes my subject could be as slow as a box tortoise or as fast as a dove-tailed hawk.”
“Well, you came to the right spot for that.”
“Oh, I know. I’ve already seen like five wolves.”
My stomach dropped right out of my ass. I almost had to excuse myself to run to the bathroom so I could stuff it back in.
“Really?” I said, my throat feeling tight.
“Yeah. I mean… I don’t know if it’s the same one. Probably is. I’ll have to try and photograph it the next time I see it.” Eli paused and looked out the window. The vein in his neck pulsed. “Is Burlington known for having a big wolf population?”
“They’ve been seen around, yeah. But I wouldn’t worry. They’ve never hurt anyone.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. I had to get off this conversation. Fast. “Uhm, so, uh, what’s your favorite color?”
He looked as thrown off by that question as I felt by asking it.
Shit. I meant to ask him his favorite lens, but all I could focus on was getting him off that whole “odd number of wolf sightings around here” topic. It didn’t help that he smelled so damn good. My brain had misfire after misfire after misfire.
“Mine’s blue,” I offered.
Eli chuckled. “Yeah, but what type of blue? I know it sounds hokeypokey, but just kind of think about it for a second.”
I looked around the room for some inspiration. “I guess midnight blue. Something rich and dark. Like a night only lit up by a full moon. And maybe a galaxy or two.”
“There we go.” He smiled widely. “My first photography teacher in high school had us drill down on those things. Everyone else found it annoying, but I kind of found it fascinating. He wanted us looking at all the details.”
“It makes sense. I guess when I’m looking at my photography, I’m focusing more on the bigger picture.” I paused and smirked.
“Pun intended?”
“Fully intended.” We both had a chuckle. “So then what’s your favorite color? Be exact.” I cocked my head and grinned at him.
“Canary yellow.” Eli crossed his arms. His biceps bulged against the black T-shirt. “Its HEX code is four three—”
“Okay, okay, I got it.” We both laughed, the rest of the cafe beginning to fade away.
…Which was exactly what made it all snap back into focus.
I was getting distracted, letting my guard down. This looked awfully intimate for a meet-up meant to be about cameras. If people glanced this way, they’d be hard-pressed to say if they were looking at a friendly chat or a first date that must have been going extremely well.
I glanced over at the group. Chris and Dyl were still chatting with Richie. Dylan mimed using a hockey stick to hit a puck through a goal.
I didn’t want to do this, but I felt like I had to.
Because if I didn’t, then I knew I’d spend the entire afternoon sitting with Eli, talking about nothing while wanting to learn everything I could about him.
“We should probably see if Richie needs to be rescued. When those two get started talking about hockey, they never stop.”
Eli nodded, but I couldn’t help but notice a look of slight disappointment. Was he enjoying this time together as much as I was?
And was that even more reason for me to force some distance between us?
No.
It was a singular thought that blasted into my head.