Chapter 11
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The alternator on the Dodge Grand Caravan was fighting him, and it was winning.
He’d been scatter-brained all week, thinking about how Leo had reacted when he’d told him the kiss shouldn’t have happened.
He’d somehow put into words everything Dawson was too scared to even think, and now it was the only thing he could think about.
“You planning to fix that or just admire it?”
“Bolt’s seized,” Dawson said.
“Yeah, I can see that from the amount of work you’re putting in.” Ethan tossed the rag at him. “You’ve been spacey all week. You coming down with something?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. It’s taking you twice as long as normal to do simple jobs and you haven’t given me shit about the music. I even turned on Olivia Rodrigo just to get a rise out of you and you didn’t notice. That’s not normal, bro.”
Dawson put the wrench on the bolt and turned it. The corrosion gave with a crack and his knuckles scraped the bracket. He didn’t flinch, just wiped the blood on his jeans and kept working.
“I said I’m fine,” Dawson repeated through gritted teeth. The alternative was blurting out that he was gay, which would have the intended effect of shutting Ethan up, but not without consequences.
Ethan watched him for another beat, then shrugged and went back to his truck.
Wyatt came through the shop at four-thirty with the parts order clipboard and a look that meant he was done for the day but didn’t want to admit it. He stopped behind Dawson, inspected the alternator work, said nothing, which, from Wyatt, meant it was fine. He set the clipboard on the workbench.
“Becca’s got a doctor’s appointment in the morning. I’ll be in late.”
“We’ll handle it,” Ethan said.
“I know you will.” Wyatt looked at Dawson. “You closing tonight?”
“Yeah.”
Wyatt nodded and left. His truck started in the lot, gravel crunched, and then it was just Dawson, Ethan, and the hum of the compressor cycling off.
If Dawson was going to come out, this would be the time to do it.
He worried more about how Wyatt would react than Ethan.
The stakes were different with each of them.
Ethan wasn’t likely to go off about how gross it was to think about his brother wanting to get dicked hard, but that didn’t mean he’d be okay with Ethan bringing guys home.
He stayed silent because he wasn’t ready for the inevitable follow-up questions.
Dawson finished the alternator, cleaned his tools, and locked up the shop while Ethan headed out. He sat in his truck in the lot and pulled out his phone. He typed before he could talk himself out of it.
You doing anything tonight?
Leo’s response came in under a minute.
Staring at my ceiling. Thrilling stuff. Why?
Come to The Penalty Box tonight. Seven o’clock.
Why? What’s at seven?
Dawson felt the corner of his mouth pull into a smile. He could tell Leo what he had in mind, but it was really one of those things he’d have to see to believe.
Come find out.
You’re on.
I’ll pick you up. Quarter to seven. What’s your address?
Dawson set the phone face-down on the seat and sat there for a minute.
He’d invited Leo to The Penalty Box on meat raffle night.
He wasn’t ready to come out yet, but he hoped Leo understood that this was him trying.
Dawson wanted to spend more time with Leo, and it wouldn’t be strange for the two of them to be seen together when half the town would be there.
They could just be two friends hoping to win while supporting a good cause.
Dawson pulled into Leo’s apartment complex at six-forty and texted that he was outside. He sat with the engine running, both hands on the wheel, trying to remind himself that this wasn’t a date. There was nothing to freak out about.
Leo came down in an expensive-looking leather jacket, dark jeans that accentuated his strong thighs, and boots that had never touched mud. His hair was perfectly styled as if he was headed for a night on the town, not to the local dive bar.
He climbed into the passenger seat, pulled the door shut, and the cab got smaller. “All right, I’m here. What’s the big surprise?”
“Meat raffle.”
Leo waited, like there had to be more. When there wasn’t, he turned his head and stared. “What in the hell is a meat raffle?”
“You buy a paddle with a number on it. They call numbers. You win meat.”
“You win meat?”
It was cute seeing Leo so utterly confused. “Steaks, brats, bacon. Whatever the butcher puts together.”
“Is this an actual thing or are you trying to screw with the city boy?”
“Place’ll be packed.” Dawson reached across the console and patted Leo’s knee. He wasn’t sure why he did it, but the sharp intake of breath made him want to leave his hand there, maybe move it a little higher just to see how Leo would react.
Leo faced forward again. The corner of his mouth pulled up, and Dawson caught it in his peripheral vision. He shook his head and chuckled. “Wisconsin is like living on a different planet.”
“Yeah, but it’s not all bad.” Dawson wanted to help Leo see that this wasn’t the hell he probably felt like he’d been sentenced to when he was traded to the Stags.
The Penalty Box lot was full, so Dawson parked on the street two blocks down.
It wasn’t cold yet, not really, but the air had turned in the last week, the kind of night where you could smell the lake and the leaves at the same time.
Dawson kept his hand stuffed in this pockets to keep from reaching for Leo’s.
“It’s freezing,” Leo said.
“It’s fifty degrees.”
“That’s freezing.”
“You play hockey. You make your living on ice.”
“That’s completely different. On the ice, I’m moving. Out here, I’m just suffering.” Leo hunched deeper into his jacket. “This is October. What happens in January?”
“You don’t want to know.”
Main Street was empty except for the glow and noise spilling from the bar’s windows. Leo fell into step beside him, near enough that their arms almost touched.
Inside was wall-to-wall people. The heat hit first, then the noise, then the smell of beer and fried food and too many people in too small a space.
Every booth was full. People lined the bar three deep, and the folding table near the back was stacked with white butcher paper-wrapped packages, each one labeled with a black marker.
Kids in Lakeshore youth hockey jerseys weaved through the crowd, selling paint paddles with numbers scrawled on them in Sharpie for a buck apiece.
“I thought you were kidding about the paint paddles,” Leo said, near enough to Dawson’s ear that his breath hit skin.
Dawson shouldered through the crowd toward the bar. Leo followed in his wake, pressed close by necessity, his hand brushing Dawson’s hip twice.
Wes spotted them from behind the taps and grinned. “Hey Dawson. Leo.” He set two beers on the bar without being asked, Dawson’s usual and whatever he’d decided Leo should drink. “You here for the raffle or just hanging out?”
“Both,” Dawson said.
“Smart man. They’ve got ribeyes tonight. Kowalski’s did the packages.” Wes slid the beers forward and glanced at Leo. “Good to see you out.”
“Thanks.” Leo took the beer. His shoulder was pressed against Dawson’s at the bar, neither of them moving to make more room.
Gunnar passed behind Wes with a rack of clean pint glasses, his free hand catching Wes’s hip as he went. Two seconds, maybe less. Wes didn’t look up, just shifted to let him through. Gunnar slotted the glasses under the bar and moved on.
They moved behind the bar without bumping, without checking, like two parts of the same machine. Wes reaching for a glass while Gunnar ducked behind him. Gunnar’s hand again on Wes’s shoulder as he passed, a squeeze that lasted half a second. Neither of them seemed to think about it.
Dawson’s throat went tight. He looked away and found Leo watching him.
Leo didn’t say anything. Didn’t ask. Just held his gaze for a beat, then took a drink and turned to study the raffle table like it required his full attention.
“Come on.” Dawson flagged down one of the kids and bought two paddles for the first round, then handed one to Leo.
Leo held it up and squinted at the number. “How many rounds are there?”
“Depends on how much meat they’ve got.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“Ten, twelve. However long it takes to raffle off all the packs.”
“And I get one shot per round with this thing?” Leo waved the paddle. “Those odds are terrible.”
“They collect the paddles after each round, sell new ones for the next.”
“So if I hate my number, I just wait and hope for a better one next time.”
“You can buy as many as you want each round if you want to improve your odds.”
“Now you’re talking.” Leo flagged down the kid and bought five more before Dawson could stop him. He fanned them out in his hand like playing cards and looked pleased with himself, and Dawson shook his head and didn’t bother hiding the smile.
A kid in a Lakeshore jersey squeezed between them, selling paddles to the group behind, and Leo shifted into Dawson to make room.
His shoulder pressed into Dawson’s chest for a second, maybe two, before the kid passed and the space opened back up.
Leo didn’t move away. Dawson didn’t either.
He took a drink, stared at the TV above the bar, and tried not to think about the fact that half the town was in this room and he wasn’t crawling out of his skin.
No one had even noticed them here together.
“I’m holding numbered paint paddles in a bar in Wisconsin waiting to win pork chops,” Leo said. “If my mother could see me right now.”
“You’d rather be somewhere else?”
Leo looked at him. The noise pressed in around them and someone’s elbow caught Dawson in the back. Leo didn’t flinch. “Nope. I think this is the perfect introduction to small-town life.”
The raffle caller, a guy from the fire department who took the job way too seriously, grabbed the microphone. Half the bar winced at the feedback before he even got a word out.