Chapter 9
NINE
For the first week after walking out of that hotel room, Van spent half his time at Off Beat checking the crowd for Joshua.
It kind of pissed him off—not that he never saw Joshua, but that he was looking at all.
Van didn’t do that. He didn’t look up and hope that the next bronze-skinned, dark-haired hottie would be the one he’d walked away from.
He didn’t spend his nights wondering how awesome a three-way with Joshua and Benji might have been.
Nope. Not Van Fucking Holt.
He didn’t fucking pine for other people.
Not that he was pining. Hell to the no on that shit.
Except he kind of was.
The first time Melody asked him about his impromptu overnight trip to Virginia Beach, he’d snapped hard enough for her to drop it.
Then he’d felt awful for being such an asshole and bought her the yellow floral sundress she’d been eyeing.
As an apology, it worked. He still didn’t want to talk about it, and neither Emmett nor Lincoln brought it up at work.
And it wasn’t as if his newfound obsession messed with his job performance, exactly. Maybe he flirted a little less, and he wasn’t as attentive to his customers as he should have been, but he still made decent tips, and no one complained.
Didn’t stop Beatrice from cornering him in the staff break room before he went on shift the following Saturday night, though. A tall and busty woman with thick, curly hair, she easily kept him penned near the lockers.
“Okay, what’s wrong with you?” she asked.
“Nothing’s wrong.” No one else was around, but he still felt obligated to whisper, despite her speaking at regular volume.
“Don’t tell me nothing’s wrong. For the last four years you’ve been a cocky, walking erection in this place, so who’s this sad, flaccid guy tending my bar?” She always did have a way with words.
“I’m fine, Bea.”
“How’s your blood pressure?”
“Steady, okay? It’s not my damned heart.”
She held his gaze for a long moment, probably trying to decide if he was lying or not.
Beatrice knew all about his battles with hypertension and adult-onset diabetes in his early twenties, brought on by poor health and a pitiful diet thanks to his existence as a professional, penniless hobo.
She also knew he was one bad decision away from a goddamn heart attack, which was why he ate well, did yoga, meditated, and only drank on rare occasions.
He’d told her all about it when she’d hired him almost five years ago.
She’d respected his honesty and the hard battles he’d won with his health.
So, yeah, a little mothering wasn’t unexpected if she even remotely thought he was off his game.
Didn’t mean he wanted to talk about it.
“It’s not my health, okay?” he added. “I’m sorry if I’ve been a little off this week.”
She frowned. “Something happened, clearly.”
Actually, nothing happened and that’s part of the problem.
Sometimes he hated Emmett for telling him about Joshua’s boyfriend.
Maybe if he’d kept his mouth shut, Van would have gone through with the hookup and gotten it out of his system.
Except that was stupid, because Benji had shown up at the house that same night, so catching Joshua having sex with another guy would have complicated things even more. Maybe beyond repair.
It was better that Van stay the hell away from their relationship.
So why couldn’t he stop thinking about both of them?
“No way,” Beatrice said. “You’re kidding me.”
Van blinked hard. “What? What did I do?”
“Van Holt, are you actually, finally in love?”
He startled so hard his elbow banged off the lockers behind him. Fire lanced up his arm. “Fuck!”
Sasha, who’d been halfway through the door, turned and marched right back out.
“Okay, maybe not in love yet, but you’ve met someone.” Beatrice squealed like a teenager, red curls flying around her face. “Oh my God, who is it? He? She? They?”
Van huffed in response, because he had no real ability to lie to Beatrice. “Look, I met someone I’m interested in, but he’s in a relationship that is newly exclusive, so that put the brakes hard on anything happening.”
“Oh. Well, that sucks balls for you, but you’re a good man for not interfering no matter what your dick tells you.”
He’d always thought of Beatrice more as a big sister than a mother-figure, but it was still weird hearing her talk about his dick.
With a few minutes still before they opened for the night, he gave her a brief overview of last weekend’s trip and the real reason for his calling out of work.
Getting the pair to make up, and then watching them be so drunk and adorable together.
“But Sunday morning, things got super-weird. I’m honestly not sure whose idea it was, but they were both kind of intimating that they’d be open to including me in a threesome.”
Beatrice’s eyes went wide. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. But before anyone could actually ask, I kind of made my excuses and bolted.”
“You ran?”
“Yes?”
“Well, that’s not like you at all.”
Van leaned against the bank of lockers, not caring that a lock was digging into his back.
“It would be too damned complicated, Bea. They were in an open relationship for three years, and had only closed it the day before. Plus feelings were already involved, so a threesome would have made things worse.”
Her expression softened. “You have feelings for both of these boys?”
“I’m hella attracted to both of them, and I really enjoyed hanging out with them. It hurt walking away, even though it was the right thing to do. So, yeah, I guess I have feelings for them.”
Music from the VJ booth began thumping through the walls, signaling opening time.
“Did I do the right thing?” Van asked.
“I can’t tell you that, honey, but I’ve never heard you second-guess yourself before, not about anything. That should tell you something.”
With a sad smile, she left the break room.
More confused than ever, Van gave himself a moment to settle his jumping nerves and focus on his job, then went to join Sasha behind the bar.
Somehow, his conversation with Beatrice freed Van’s nerves over last weekend, and he was able to relax into his job again.
Flirting like usual, slinging drinks, joking with the regulars.
His life returned to some semblance of normalcy, and nothing remotely bizarre happened until the last Friday in September.
Melody cornered him right outside of their apartment bathroom that morning, a towel around his waist and his hair still wet from the shower. “I need you tonight,” she said.
His dick gave a small stir. “Oh yeah?”
“Not like that, Mr. Once and Done. You’ve already had me.”
He pretended to grump. Their night together had been a lot of fun, but he didn’t think about her in a sexual way anymore. She was too good of a friend now. “Okay, then why do you need me on a Friday night?” And how on earth did she know he had the night off with no actual plans?
“Come to a party with me. Adrian invited me. It’s Emmett’s birthday. He’s turning twenty, so Lincoln is throwing him a birthday party at his house, but I don’t know any of Lincoln’s other friends that well, or who’s going to be there.”
“So you and Adrian are still seeing each other?” he asked.
“Casually, yes.”
“And he knows, right?”
“Yes, he knows.” She huffed and folded her arms over her small breasts. “He was surprised but accepting, and we’re taking things slow.”
“As long as he’s good to you, I won’t have to beat his ass senseless.” He’d never quite gotten over the need to hunt down and put a serious hurt on the guy who’d assaulted Melody and put so much fear into her pretty eyes. She lost a bit of that every day as she continued to work and see Adrian.
“My hero. So, the party?”
He grumbled a bit. “Yeah, fine. It’s not like I have anything better to do.”
“Gee, thanks for the support.” She poked him in the chest with a painted nail. “And if Joshua’s at the party, behave.”
“Hey! What do you think I’m going to do? Jump him in the bathroom? He’s got a boyfriend.”
“Still. You were a growly bear for a week after you helped them get back together.”
Instead of denying it—because what was the point?—he slipped past her and angled toward his bedroom door.
“Seven o’clock!” she said as he shut the door behind him.
Van had made some spectacularly bad decisions in his life, especially those first four years after leaving home.
Choices that had ruined his health and nearly killed him once, before he got his life under control.
Going to the party tonight had a chance to either be a fun, stress-free evening . . . or one of his worst decisions ever.
Time will tell.
“Melody invited who?” Joshua’s voice had gotten a little too high, but he couldn’t help it. He stared at Lincoln from across the kitchen island, which was burdened with all kinds of assorted snack foods.
Lincoln slowly arched one slim, blond eyebrow. “Van. From Off Beat. They are friends, you know.”
“I know, I just—” Just nothing. Joshua had avoided going to Off Beat unless he knew Van wasn’t working. He needed to play off their connection as a fluke, something felt by two lonely people, one of whom wasn’t lonely anymore. He had Benji.
But that same gossamer thread that bound him to Benji, even when they weren’t in the same state, lingered in the periphery of Joshua’s vision, linking him to Van.
It both enraged him and intrigued him, and he didn’t know which was worse.
So, he stayed away. And unless he came down with a sudden case of food poisoning, temptation would be in the same room with him tonight.
Lincoln frowned at him. “Don’t tell me you think the hook-up-that-never-was is going to make it awkward to see Van tonight. I figured after his Love Doctor schtick, you guys would at least be friendly.”
“We are,” Joshua said. “I mean, we will be. It’s not a problem.”
“Good. And it isn’t as if this will be an intimate, six-person party. Other people are going to be here.”
“You know other people?”