Chapter 13 Oliver
Oliver
I can’t stop watching Nicholas Cavallero stare at Wilson.
Twenty-three times so far tonight. I’ve been counting from behind the bar while butchering a mojito that the woman at station three is going to regret ordering.
Nicholas is posted near the east corridor, doing his job, scanning the crowd, and checking corners.
Every forty-five seconds, his gaze swings to wherever Wilson is standing.
Wilson is handling a bachelorette party that’s getting progressively louder near the dance floor.
He’s got that expression, the flat mouth with the eyes doing all the work and the bride-to-be keeps apologizing for her friends while Wilson waves her off with a patience that would surprise anyone who doesn’t know him.
I watch Nicholas navigate the group from across the room. His mouth twitches. His glasses catch reflections of lights across the floor when he tilts his head, tracking Wilson’s path through the crowd.
Wilson feels it. He won’t admit it and he’d bite my head off if I pointed it out but his shoulders shift when Nicholas’s gaze lands on him.
His spine straightens by a fraction. His chin lifts.
The rigid set of his jaw loosens for just a second before he catches himself, adjusts his collar, and moves to the next table.
Forty-five seconds later, Nicholas looks at him again.
I abandon the mojito to the other bartender. Lorenzo is reviewing something on his clipboard near the office door, my whole body leaning into my Beta’s space. He lowers the board briefly to grant me a kiss, savoring my lips until I pull away. “Yes, baby? To what do I owe the pleasure?”
“Tell me you see this,” I murmur, my voice barely above the music. “Tell me you’re watching what I’m watching.” I wave my hand in the general direction of Wilson.
Lorenzo’s gaze flicks to the floor, finding Nicholas first, then tracking to Wilson, then back. He watches for a full minute. “The chemistry is obvious.”
“Obvious? Twenty-three times, Lorenzo. I’ve watched him reorient his entire body toward Wilson twenty-three times tonight.”
“Of course you counted.”
“And Wilson.” I grab Lorenzo’s forearm. “When Nicholas looks at him, his whole body relaxes for half a second before his brain slams the door shut. I’ve never seen him do that with anyone except us.”
Lorenzo’s pen taps twice against my clipboard. “What are you suggesting?” he asks.
“That we invite Nicholas for a drink after close tonight. All four of us. Let them be in the same room without a crowd between them.”
Lorenzo’s gaze drifts to the floor, where Wilson is collecting empties from a high-top. “Wilson’s had a rough few days,” he murmurs.
“Which is exactly why we do this gently. I’m not pushing. I’m opening a door.”
He quirks an eyebrow. “Your version of opening a door usually involves removing the hinges.”
“I’ll be subtle.”
Lorenzo looks back at me.
“I’ll be subtle-adjacent,” I add.
His mouth twitches as his hand finds the back of my neck, a quick squeeze that sends warmth down my spine. “Talk to Nicholas first. If he’s uncomfortable, we drop it.”
“Deal.”
I watch the shift wind down. Last call comes and goes.
The floor clears in that usual slow drain.
Nicholas moves through the club on his final sweep, checking restrooms, and guiding the last patrons toward the exit with the easy authority that makes him so good at this job.
Some part of me is ecstatic that this could work.
The other part is selfish because I quite liked having Nicholas in our bed.
His hands are really, really good.
Nicholas’ path brings him past the bar where I’m loading the last rack of glasses, and I step into his line of fire before he can reach the front door. “Nicholas. Hang on a sec.”
He stops, hand already reaching for his jacket draped over the hostess stand. Up close, the amber of his scent is stronger, filling the space between us. “What’s up?”
“Stay for a drink. We’re closing up but Lorenzo’s opening something nice, and it’d be good to decompress. You’ve been pulling a lot of shifts lately.” I would be more suspicious if Wilson weren’t here for him to ogle.
Nicholas’s eyes drift over my shoulder to where Wilson is wiping down the back bar. He watches him for a beat, something careful moving through his expression. “Does Wilson know you’re asking?”
And there it is. His first concern isn’t what we’re drinking or when we’ll go.
It’s whether Wilson is okay with it. My chest aches at the question, at the gentleness packed into those five words, at the way this enormous Alpha stands in the doorway of a club he could buy twice over and his only concern is whether one Beta is comfortable.
“I’ll talk to him. If he’s not up for it, no pressure. You can grab a drink with me and Lorenzo and head out whenever.”
I watch Nicholas’s gaze flicker back to Wilson.
His jaw works behind that easy smile. “I don’t want to make things harder for him, Oliver.
Whatever’s going on with Will, the last thing I want is to be the reason he—” He stops, his hand tightening on his jacket.
“I’ll stay. But if he needs me to go, I go. No questions.”
“I know.” I squeeze his arm. “Grab the booth near the back. I’ll bring the drinks.”
I know Wilson spots me before I’m within ten feet. He sets down the rag and crosses his arms, the defensive posture he defaults to whenever he senses I’m about to push.
“No.”
“I haven’t even said anything.”
“Your face said it. Whatever you’re about to ask, no.”
“Nicholas is staying for a drink after close. You, me, Lorenzo, Nicholas. Four people in a booth drinking something I’ll absolutely ruin because Lorenzo won’t let me near the good bourbon unsupervised.
” I keep my voice as light as possible, hands visible at my sides, posture as unthreatening as I can manage while standing five feet from Wilson, whose walls are already rebuilding.
“He asked about you first, by the way. Before he said yes. His exact words were ‘Does Wilson know you’re asking?’”
Wilson’s arms tighten across his chest. “That’s… Oliver…”
Fuck, this isn’t working.
“He also said if you need him to go, he goes. No questions.” I lean my hip against the bar. “Wilson, the man’s standing at the door of this club and his only concern is whether you’re okay. That’s not someone who’s going to push.”
Something shifts in Wilson’s face, a crack in the armor that’s gone before I can fully read it.
His gaze drifts over my shoulder to the booth where Nicholas has settled, jacket draped across the seat, glasses off as he cleans them on his shirt hem.
Without the glasses his face is softer, more open, and Wilson’s eyes linger for a second too long before snapping back to mine.
“One drink.”
“One drink.”
“And if I leave, nobody follows me.”
“Nobody follows you.” I hold up my hands. “Scout’s honor.”
“You were never a scout.”
“And you’ll never prove that.” I grin. He doesn’t grin back, but the corner of his mouth surrenders to a small lift for a moment.
Later, the four of us end up in the back booth with the house lights dimmed and the sound system off, a bottle of bourbon between us that Lorenzo poured because, as predicted, my Old Fashioned attempt earned praise from Nicholas as “creative” and condemnation from Wilson as “a crime against citrus.”
Lorenzo’s arm stretches across the back of the booth behind me, his body angled toward the center of the table, exuding the relaxed authority of a man on his own turf.
Across from us, Wilson sits as far from Nicholas as the booth allows, hands wrapped around his glass.
Nicholas claims a careful foot of space between us, cleaned glasses perched back on his nose, bourbon untouched while he talks.
And he talks, something our little end of the evening rendezvous hardly allow. We fuck, we might fall asleep together with me in the middle because Lorenzo and Nicholas share but never each other and then we resume our daily lives. But this version of Nicholas? I like him. A lot.
He’s funny in a way with his dry, self-deprecating, full of jokes so bad they loop back to charming.
He recounts a property deal gone sideways, a misidentified load-bearing wall, a client convinced a gazebo was structurally essential, and I actually hear Lorenzo laugh.
My beautiful beta who treats laughter like a finite resource he’s conserving for retirement laughs.
Wilson doesn’t react the same but he’s very obviously listening.
His back stays rigid against the booth, glass held in both hands, but his eyes never leave Nicholas’s face.
When Nicholas gestures with his left hand, Wilson’s gaze follows.
When Nicholas’s voice dips into the softer register he uses for the punchline, Wilson’s grip on his glass loosens by a fraction.
Halfway through the second pour, Nicholas jokes about his glasses fogging up in sewer-grate steam during a site visit, and I watch Wilson’s mouth do the twitch, the almost-smile he smothers before it can fully form.
But this time it holds for a full second of Wilson Ashford’s guard dropping enough that I glimpse the man underneath. Nicholas sees it too; his whole body pivoting toward that almost-smile, his scent deepening in response.
Lorenzo’s fingers brush the back of my neck, signaling that it’s time to wrap up before Wilson reaches his limit.
“I think that might have been the last pour,” Lorenzo says, reaching for the bottle. “Then we lock up.”
Nicholas drains his glass and stands, shrugging on his jacket.
He looks down at Wilson, who slides out to just let Nicholas through before sitting back down, still gripping his empty glass.
Nicholas’ hand lifts toward Wilson’s shoulder, then stops, pulls back, and redirects to his own collar.
The aborted gesture is so careful, so achingly restrained, that I have to look away before my face gives everything away.