Chapter 18
Chapter Eighteen
Mason
I was drunk.
Not tipsy. Not buzzed. Properly, undeniably drunk at eight o’clock on a Monday night, sitting alone in my apartment with an empty bottle of Macallan on the coffee table and another one open beside it.
The same scotch I’d told Caroline my father loved. The same scotch I’d been using to numb myself since I got home from the office.
It wasn’t working.
Beau had called out sick, so I’d spent the entire day quietly flipping out.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
Beau’s words played on repeat in my head, had been playing on repeat since Saturday night when he’d said them on that terrace. Each repetition felt like a knife twisting deeper.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
Loving. Present tense. He loved me.
And I’d just stood there. Frozen. Panicking. Unable to say the words back even though they were right there in my chest, choking me.
I poured another drink with shaking hands.
The weekend had been hell. Radio silence from Beau except for a single text on Sunday-
I need some space. Please respect that.
So I had. I’d respected it. Given him space. Stayed away. And spent two days spiraling in my apartment, replaying every moment from the party.
Paul’s calculated smile as he positioned us under that mistletoe.
The crowd gathering, phones out, everyone watching.
The panic that had seized my chest, making it impossible to breathe.
Beau’s face as he deflected, protecting me even as I was hurting him.
Patsy reading Paul the riot act.
And then the terrace. God, the terrace.
You’ve been weird all week, Mason. Distant. In your head.
He’d been right. I had been. Ever since lunch with Caroline and Scott, I’d been spiraling, questioning everything I thought I knew about my father, about myself, about what I was so afraid of.
We can’t keep doing this. The hiding. The pretending.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
I drained my glass and reached for the bottle again.
My phone sat on the coffee table, dark and silent. No calls. No texts. Nothing from Beau since Sunday.
I’d thought about calling him a hundred times. Texted and deleted messages over and over. I’m sorry. Please talk to me. I love you. I’m scared. Don’t leave me.
But I hadn’t sent any of them. Because what was the point? What could I say that would make any of this better?
I want to move forward.
That’s what I’d told him on the terrace. And I’d meant it. I wanted to move forward. But wanting something and actually doing it were two very different things.
The problem was I didn’t know how. Didn’t know how to be the person Beau needed me to be. I wanted to be the man who could kiss him under the mistletoe in front of the entire firm. The person who could hold his hand in public.
The person who wasn’t terrified.
I thought about calling Caroline. She’d been texting all weekend—How are you? Want to grab lunch? But what would I say?
Hey, remember how you said my father would surprise me? Well, I’m gay and in love with Beau Thatcher, and I just ruined everything because I’m a coward.
I laughed bitterly and took another drink straight from the bottle. My phone buzzed, and my heart leaped—Beau—but it was just a work email. Something about some fucking stupid depositions being rescheduled.
I set the bottle down and dropped my head into my hands.
This was it. This was how I was going to lose him. Not with a bang but with silence. With me sitting alone in my apartment drinking expensive scotch while the best thing that ever happened to me slipped away because I was too fucking scared to fight for him.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
“I’m letting you,” I said out loud to the empty apartment, my voice rough. “I’m letting you, Beau, but I just don’t know how to show it.”
But that was the problem, wasn’t it? Beau was tired of my hiding. Tired of being my secret. Tired of waiting for me to be brave enough to choose him publicly, not just in private.
And I couldn’t blame him. Weeks of stolen moments in supply closets and keeping a careful distance at work. I’d taken everything he offered while giving him nothing in return except anxiety and uncertainty.
Beau deserved better.
He deserved someone who would kiss him under the mistletoe without hesitation. Someone who would hold his hand at office parties. Someone who wasn’t ashamed.
I wasn’t ashamed of him, but I was ashamed of myself. Of my fear. Of my inability to be honest about who I was.
My phone buzzed again. Another work email. This one from Patsy’s assistant about a meeting tomorrow at ten.
Tomorrow. Tuesday. Another day of pretending everything was fine while I was falling apart.
I looked at the bottle of Macallan, then at my phone, then at the empty apartment around me.
This was my life. This was what I’d chosen. Safety over honesty. Comfort over courage. Fear over love.
And it was going to cost me everything.
* * *
Tuesday morning, I showed up to work with a pounding headache and the grim determination of someone who’d decided that if he was going to be miserable, he might as well be productive about it.
Beau had called in sick. Again.
Lisa told me when I asked—casually, like I was just a concerned colleague—and her expression made it clear she knew exactly why Beau wasn’t there.
“He’s fine,” she said, her voice cool. “Beau just needs time.”
“Right. Of course.” I nodded as if that made perfect sense. “If you talk to him—”
“I’ll tell him you asked.” She walked away before I could say anything else.
So, Beau was avoiding the office. Avoiding me. Taking sick days rather than face me across a conference table.
I couldn’t blame him for that either.
The morning dragged. I sat through Patsy’s meeting barely hearing a word, responded to emails on autopilot, reviewed documents without retaining anything. My mind was somewhere else entirely.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
At lunch, I grabbed a sandwich from the café downstairs and ate it at my desk, not wanting to risk running into colleagues who might want to make small talk about the party. The last thing I needed was someone asking me about the mistletoe incident with a knowing smile.
I was halfway through the sandwich when voices drifted from the hallway outside my office. The door was cracked open, and I heard two women talking as they passed.
“—so awkward,” one of them was saying. A paralegal, I thought. Jennifer? Jessica? “I felt so bad for them.”
“I know! Paul was being such an ass.” That was definitely one of the secretaries. Michelle, maybe. “Did you see Mason’s face? He looked like he was going to pass out.”
My hand froze halfway to my mouth.
“And Beau just deflected so smoothly. Like he knew exactly what to do.” Jennifer-or-Jessica lowered her voice, but I could still hear her. “Do you think...?”
“Think what?”
“You know. That there’s something going on between them?”
Silence. Then: “I mean, they’re always together. And they seemed really uncomfortable under the mistletoe.”
“Because Paul was being a dickhead.” One of them giggled, and my stomach clenched.
“Maybe. Or maybe...” A significant pause. “I’m just saying, they’d make a cute couple.”
“Michelle! You can’t just—”
Their voices faded as they moved down the hallway, leaving me sitting at my desk with my sandwich forgotten and my heart racing.
People were talking. Speculating. Putting pieces together.
Of course they were. Paul had made sure of that with his little stunt. And my reaction—my obvious, visible panic—had probably confirmed every suspicion.
How long before it wasn’t just two people in a hallway? How long before it was the whole firm? Before someone said something to Carter or Patsy? What if Beau got dragged into office gossip because I couldn’t keep my shit together?
I pushed the sandwich away, my appetite gone.
Beau had been right. People were going to notice. Were already noticing. And when they did, we’d need to have answers. Needed to be on the same page about what we were, what we wanted, and how we were going to handle it.
Except we weren’t on the same page.
Beau wanted more. Wanted us to be real, public, acknowledged. God, he wanted me to be brave enough to claim him.
And I wanted that too, damn it. I wanted it so badly. But wanting and doing were different things, and I’d spent so long being afraid that I didn’t know how to be anything else.
I can’t keep loving someone who won’t let me.
My throat tightened.
I was going to lose him. Not because he didn’t love me—he’d said he did, or at least implied it in the most heartbreaking way possible—but because I was too much of a coward to love him the way he deserved.
Unless I made a choice.
I pulled out my phone and stared at it for a long moment.
Caroline’s words from lunch echoed in my head. I think he’d surprise you. If you ever needed to tell him something important.
My father. The man I’d spent my entire life trying to impress, trying to live up to, trying not to disappoint. The man I’d assumed would be horrified if he knew the truth about me.
The man who watched football with Scott’s husband and never mentioned it. Who was marrying a woman whose best friend was gay.
What if Caroline was right?
And more importantly—what if I’d been using my fear of his reaction as an excuse? A reason to stay in the closet, to keep Beau hidden away, and to avoid being honest about who I was?
I looked at my phone again, then at the empty doorway where those women had been talking.
I couldn’t control what people at the firm thought or said. Couldn’t stop the gossip or the speculation. But I could control this.
Before I could talk myself out of it, I texted Dad-
Can I come by tonight? Need to talk to you about something.
His response came almost immediately-
Of course. I’ll be home after 6. Everything okay?
Yeah. Just need to talk.
See you then.
I set my phone down and took a shaky breath.
I was doing this. I was actually doing this.