Chapter 17
Damon
Igave up trying to sleep hours ago. My mind is a whirlwind of thoughts, emotions, plans, and dreams. I was so close to knocking on Li’s door and just climbing into bed with him.
Lord knows, if the roles were reversed, he wouldn’t have even bothered knocking.
I’d have just woken up with him melting my skin with his body heat.
Will I ever feel that again?
He didn’t mind hugging me in the hot tub where not a single inch separated us, but ever since finding out I’m gay, he hasn’t laid his head in my lap or found comfort in my bed, either, and it’s impossible to feel like I didn’t fuck that part of our relationship up.
It’s been like ten minutes, the rational side of my brain chides. Give him some time.
Bundled in my parka, I sit in the Adirondack chair on the deck, overlooking the abandoned slopes, glass of red wine in hand. The heaviness of the liquid warms my stomach despite the freezing temperatures. Eventually, I’ll find a healthier coping mechanism, but right now is not ‘eventually.’
The stars out here are incredible. It’s so cold, and the air is so thin and crisp at seven thousand feet that on a cloudless night like tonight, I can see across the entire galaxy.
My breath is visible with every exhale, and I silently wonder if my tears will freeze on my face. They haven’t started falling yet, but their arrival is imminent as I allow myself to sink below the surface of despair.
I am so stupid. Of all the people on the planet, how could I have allowed myself to fall for Liam? I can’t imagine my life without him, but having him in my life is going to kill me even faster.
The sound of the sliding glass door moving along its tracks interrupts the stillness of the night as my first tear falls. I quickly swipe it away with my gloved hand, wondering how many more times my heart is going to be torn apart on this trip.
“D?” Liam calls, stepping out onto the deck.
Unable to answer, I raise my glass to signal my location because not answering Liam has never been an option.
“Hey, man. What are you doing out here?” he asks, crossing my field of vision to take the chair next to me.
My idiot best friend is out here in sixteen-degree weather, wearing only plaid pajama pants, a gray long-sleeved T-shirt, and slippers. He doesn’t even have a beanie on, for fuck’s sake.
“Liam, where’s your coat? It’s well below freezing,” I chastise.
“You know I run warm,” he says with a shrug. “What are you doing out here?” he asks again.
“Just enjoying the scenery,” I lie.
“At two a.m.?”
“What are you, the Inquisition?” I say sharply before immediately muttering, “Sorry.”
We sit in silence for a couple of minutes before he begins rubbing his arms. Immediately, I stand and pull my parka off, handing it to him. I still have several layers underneath, including another jacket, but the cold will burrow into my bones much faster now that my thickest layer is gone.
Instead of sitting back down, I move to the railing of the deck because breathing was getting harder with Liam right next to me, and I’m already struggling thanks to the altitude. With emotion clogging my throat, it feels like I’m breathing through a coffee stirrer.
But the distance doesn’t help, because Liam follows me.
And places his hand on my back.
I turn away from him, the beginning of a panic attack setting in. Shit, I haven’t had one of these since the night after I got home from leaving Liam in Boston all alone.
“I’m going to head in,” I say, trying to get somewhere private before breaking down. “Goodnight, Li.”
I make it two steps before his voice pierces the darkness.
“Damon Nicholas Landry,” he barks, all traces of his usual happy-go-lucky demeanor gone. My jaw clenches as I halt my forward progress. “Look at me,” he demands as I lose the battle to pretend like everything is okay.
Everything else fades away. It’s just the two of us in the dark on the side of this mountain, the fresh snow glistening in the moonlight. If ever there was a perfect setting for me to fuck up my life, this would be it.
I’m facing him, but looking everywhere except his eyes as I lose the ability to swallow, and he takes a step toward me.
“Why can’t you sleep? Why are you avoiding me? Why did you get so upset when Vox kissed me? For fuck’s sake, Damon, look at me!”
It’s everything. You are everything.
“It’s nothing,” I rasp, finally bringing my eyes to meet his, hoping beyond all hope that if I can make eye contact, he’ll be convinced I’m fine.
But that plan backfires in a big way when he engulfs me in his arms for the second time tonight. Despite my world crashing around me, my airways open just a little more while in his arms. The tighter Liam squeezes, the easier I breathe.
“The fuck it is. You look like someone just shot you in the stomach and left you for dead.”
That would hurt a helluva lot less than this, I think, keeping my arms firmly by my sides. I can’t fuck this up. I can’t burden him with my attraction because he’ll feel guilty that he doesn’t feel the same way, or he’ll start overthinking every interaction the way I do.
And that’s fucking miserable.
“Talk to me,” he pleads. “Whatever it is, we can get through it together.”
My forehead falls against his shoulder as I mumble into my own parka. “I don’t think we can.”
“Why?” he asks, slightly panicked.
I’ve lost the ability to speak, and my tears are soaking the fabric coating his perfect body—the place I want to melt into and call home every day for the rest of my life.
When I don’t answer, Liam grabs my shoulders and pushes me away from him to study my face, and it pains me to see the hurt in his eyes, knowing I’m the one who put it there.
“Hey, it’s not you,” I say, finding my voice in an attempt to alleviate his fears. And okay, that’s not the truth. “It’s nothing you did,” I correct, reaching up to cup his cheek.
My sweet, precious, oblivious Liam.
“Then what is it?” he asks, begging to be clued in. “It’s kind of hard to feel like it’s not my fault when you can barely look at me, you’re crying literal ice cubes, and not even hugging me back.”
I chew the inside of my cheek as I run through my options.
They all suck.
I can walk away right now, go to bed, and pretend like he made the whole interaction up tomorrow, which is shitty because he’ll feel rejected, and he doesn’t deserve that.
I can tell him the truth and ruin the rest of this trip and our friendship—because there’s really no coming back from thirteen years of unrequited love once it’s out there.
Or I can put on a brave face and lie my ass off—which he’d see right through because he’s Liam, and he knows me better than I know myself most of the time.
In reality, I know I really only have one option.
Allowing my eyes to come back into focus as they memorize every inch of his face, I swallow hard, breathing harshly through my nose, desperate to hold it together. My nostrils flare, and I feel the muscles in my face twitch from the effort of trying to keep my emotions at bay.
“Damon.”
When Liam whispers my name, I don’t just break, I shatter.
Pushing onto my toes, I cup his face with both hands. He doesn’t even flinch because he trusts me, and that makes what I’m about to do even worse.
“I’m so sorry, Li. I swear I tried to stop it,” I say right before I crash my lips against his, unleashing a tidal wave of need, desire, jealousy, hurt, joy, anger, and every ounce of love inside my body.
It all belongs to Liam.
I’m crying into his mouth as I wordlessly beg him not to hate me.
It’s not a kiss full of lust and passion. I’m not trying to climb him or grind against him. I simply crave this connection to him.
I hate that being his best friend doesn’t feel like enough anymore.
He doesn’t stop me, and when his lips part in shock, I selfishly run my tongue along his once before choking out a sob, because he’s fucking perfect, just like I knew he would be.
In another second, I’m gone, moving away from him toward my room so I can sit with my self-loathing in the shower where he can’t hear my cries of anger and frustration.
“The fuck?” are the last words I hear before tearing through the sliding door of the cabin.