Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
étienne
I limped up the stairs, every muscle in my body screaming in protest.
A bath. That’s what I needed. Hot water and twenty minutes of not moving.
I grabbed sleep pants from my room and headed to the hallway bathroom. I reached for the bathtub tap, then hesitated. Epsom salts. Did Marco keep any under the sink? I checked the cabinet—nothing but extra towels and toilet paper. But Marco might have some in his bathroom.
I headed down the hall to his room, my footsteps quiet. From downstairs, the low murmur of a sports broadcast drifted up. I opened the cabinet under the bathroom sink, crouched down, and rummaged through the contents. Deodorant, extra toothpaste, a first aid kit…
My hand brushed against something wrapped in a towel, shoved toward the back.
I pulled it out, curious what he’d need to keep wrapped up and hidden, and the towel came loose.
Something fell into my hand.
Long. Curved. Thick. Silicone. With a suction cup base.
A dildo.
I froze, my brain stuttering to a complete stop.
Marco had a dildo. Hidden under his bathroom sink, wrapped carefully in a towel like something precious or shameful or both.
Heat flooded my face. My pulse jumped. And before I could stop it, my mind supplied an image—vivid and unwanted and impossible to unsee.
Marco. In his shower. Using this.
My body responded immediately. Traitorously. Blood rushing south, my cock hardening despite the shock, the guilt, the absolute wrongness of thinking about my best friend like that.
Bon Dieu.
I should put it back. Should wrap it up, shove it in the cabinet, pretend I’d never found it. But I couldn’t move. Could only kneel there, holding it, my imagination running wild.
Marco had the book. The gay romance with the sex scene marked. And he had this. Hidden in his bathroom, where no one would find it.
Was… was Marco… gay?
Was my best friend gay, and he’d been hiding it? From everyone? From me?
The dildo was still in my hand, warm from where I’d been gripping it. I stared at it, my mind racing.
I was fully hard now. Aching. My breathing had gone shallow.
The image shifted. Not just Marco using it. But me. What would it feel like? That curve, that size, the fullness of it. I’d never thought about that before—never let myself think about it—but now I couldn’t stop wondering.
What would it be like?
What would it be like if it was a man’s cock?
My hands were shaking. I carefully wrapped the dildo back in the towel, placed it exactly where I’d found it, and closed the cabinet with trembling fingers.
No Epsom salts. I’d come in here for Epsom salts and found… that.
I left Marco’s bathroom and returned to my own on autopilot. I just stood there for a moment, trying to get my breathing under control.
It didn’t work.
I was still hard. Still thinking about Marco, about the book, about the dildo hidden in his bathroom. About the way my body had responded to all of it—immediate and undeniable and completely beyond my control.
I stripped, turned the water on hot, and stepped into the shower instead of the bath. I stood under the spray, letting it beat against my sore muscles.
But the heat did nothing to calm the throbbing in my groin.
My hand moved almost without conscious thought. It wrapped around my cock, and I muffled a groan at the contact, trying to be quiet.
I shouldn’t be doing this. Shouldn’t be thinking about Marco while I touched myself. But the image was burned into my brain now—Marco in his shower, head thrown back, using that toy, lost in pleasure.
I stroked myself faster, water cascading over my shoulders, my breathing harsh in the small space.
What would he look like? What sounds would he make? Would he be quiet, controlled, or would he let go completely?
And what would it feel like if I—if we—
My orgasm hit hard, pleasure slamming through me. I braced my free hand against the tile wall, riding it out, Marco’s name almost escaping my lips before I bit it back.
The aftermath was immediate and brutal.
Guilt crashed over me like cold water. Shame. Horror at what I’d just done.
I’d gotten off thinking about my best friend. My straight best friend, who trusted me, who’d let me live in his house, who had no idea I’d found his most private possessions and used them to fuel my own fantasies.
Except Marco wasn’t straight. The book and the dildo suggested that.
But that didn’t make this okay. Didn’t make it any less of a violation.
I finished washing quickly, turned off the water, and stepped out of the shower. I stood there dripping, trying to make sense of what had just happened.
I’d been attracted to my ex-girlfriend Amelie. That was real. Two years together, and I’d wanted her, been happy with her. That wasn’t fake or confusion or some kind of performance.
But now there was Marco. The book. The dildo. The way it turned me on.
That was real too.
So what did that make me?
Not straight. I couldn’t be straight, not after getting hard reading a sex scene between two men, not after jerking off to thoughts of my male best friend.
But not gay either. Because Amelie had been genuine.
I pressed my palms against the sink and stared at my reflection in the foggy mirror.
What was I, then? Horny? It had been a while. Confused? Going through some kind of crisis? Experimenting?
No. This felt too real to be experimentation. Too intense to be temporary confusion.
A memory surfaced—something I hadn’t thought about in years.
Amelie’s friend, Sophia. She’d come out as bisexual while Amelie and I were dating. I remembered Amelie talking about it, trying to explain it to me because I’d asked questions. Not judgmental ones—I’d genuinely wanted to understand.
“She’s not gay,” Amelie had said. “She’s bisexual. She dated guys before, she’s with a woman now, but that doesn’t make her suddenly gay. She just… likes both. She’s attracted to both men and women.”
I’d nodded, filed it away. It had seemed straightforward enough. Sophie liked both. Simple.
Except I hadn’t really understood it then. Hadn’t connected it with my own experiences. Not really. It had been abstract, academic. Someone else’s identity that didn’t affect me.
But now…
Now it wasn’t abstract.
I’d been attracted to Amelie. I was attracted to Marco.
Both. Not one or the other. Both.
The word settled into my chest, clicking into place.
Bisexual.
That was me.
The realization didn’t bring relief. It brought a fresh wave of panic.
My father… merde. My father would react exactly the same way whether I said “gay” or “bisexual.” It wouldn’t matter that I’d dated Amelie, that I’d been attracted to women. All he’d hear was that I liked men, and that would be enough.
Disgusting. Unnatural. Not in my house.
I squeezed my eyes shut, trying to push away the voice in my head.
This was who I was. It wasn’t wrong or broken or disgusting, no matter what my father thought.
But knowing that didn’t make it easier. Didn’t make the fear go away.
Because even though I could accept this about myself, I still couldn’t tell Marco.
Marco had his own secrets. The book, the dildo, whatever he was hiding about his sexuality. And I had mine now too.
Because I had too much to lose—our friendship, our partnership as teammates, his trust—and the truth could destroy all of it.