Chapter 30
Declan, Present
It’s been two weeks now.
His boyfriend.
I’m his boyfriend.
And nothing seems to be falling apart.
Yet.
I try to get rid of the feeling. That dread, telling me that everything is going to go wrong.
And for the most part, I do. But it lingers somewhere in my mind. Not always loud, but present nonetheless.
“Can you do cool letters like you have on your nails?” Gwen looks up at me with her cute little five-year-old face as I cap the pink nail polish I’ve been using to paint her nails.
I’m at some nice Italian restaurant with Landon’s family plus Simmons, his coach slash mentor slash father figure.
Graduation is next week, so Simmons wanted to take them all out to celebrate.
And of course Landon invited a few other people.
His BFF, me. His psycho boyfriend, Grant.
And his other friend, Javi, who has yet to make an appearance.
Landon leans over me, shaking his head at his younger sister. “Gwen, he already did a nice job of painting them pink for you.” He sits back up and diverts his eyes to me. “You don’t have to do that.”
I shrug at him on my left and look down at my nails that spell go away.
I was bored and decided to experiment with painting letters.
They look messy as hell, but I tried my best. “I don’t mind.
” I look back over to my right at Gwen’s pleading eyes, tapping my chin and pretending to think.
“Hmm. I think I could do that. What do you want them to say?”
“Danny sucks,” she replies with a smile on her face.
Their brother, Danny, whips his head in our direction from a few seats down. “You’re a monkey butt, Gwen.”
She gasps loudly. “You are so mean! That’s why you suck. You’re always in a bad mood ever since—”
“Shut up!” he bellows back from down the table.
A weird hush falls over ours and all the surrounding tables. Simmons’s brow pulls down from the head of the table, a seat in between him and Danny. “Danny, are you okay, bud?”
Danny glares back in response, quickly looking away and crossing his arms.
The blonde woman sitting next to Simmons rubs his arm affectionately when he looks back at her with a mixture of bewilderment and agitation.
I bump my shoulder against Landon’s. “Hey. Who’s that?” I jerk my chin in the direction of the mystery woman as she flips her hair, absently tapping her long red nails against the wooden table.
“Oh, that’s Sarah. I think she’s his girlfriend.
” When I make a confused face at him, he explains.
“Well, they’ve been seeing each other for a while now.
Actually, she was the girl he went on a date with when you came over to hang out with me at his house that one time.
So it seems like they kind of are. Together, I mean.
But he gets all weird when I ask him if she’s his girlfriend. ”
I nod my head in understanding as I take Gwen’s left hand and start to paint a D on her pinky with black nail polish I pull out of my bag. I knew Gwen would want me to do her nails tonight, so I brought options. “So he’s one of those commitment-phobe guys?”
Landon frowns. “I don’t know. I guess. It has been a while, and he really seems to be dancing around any type of label.”
“Danny says that Sarah is a bitch,” Gwen says matter-of-factly and not at all quietly.
I immediately lose all composure, falling into a fit of snorting laughter while Landon chastises Gwen for cussing.
“I didn’t say it.” She points down the table at Danny. “He’s the one who said it.”
“Well, he was bad. Don’t repeat it.”
She nods like that makes total sense. “Yeah. He sucks. I told you.”
Thankfully, Simmons and Sarah don’t seem to hear, too busy talking in hushed tones to each other at their end of the table.
Danny is back to glaring at them, and when Sarah leans in and whispers something that makes Simmons throw his head back and laugh, Danny scoots his chair back with a loud screech, quickly walking away toward the back of the restaurant.
Landon lets out a long sigh. “I better go check on him. I swear I wasn’t this moody at thirteen.” The last part is muttered under his breath as he gets up from the table and disappears after Danny.
Once Landon’s chair is empty, it reveals the person sitting on the other side of him.
Grant looks at me with a blank, boring look.
“Yuck,” I mutter as I roll my eyes and paint the last letter of Gwen’s beautiful saying. But after thinking for a moment, I decide to say something to him, because for some reason, I think he might be the only one to understand. “You see it, right?”
His face becomes even more bored. “That Danny is obsessed with Simmons?”
“Yes!” I exclaim. “Finally someone else gets it.”
He nods back at me. “Yeah. Landon doesn’t see it.”
“Of course he doesn’t. Landon’s too sensible of a person to realize when someone is acting crazy. Which I guess is how he ended up with you.”
His brow lowers, but then a slow smile crawls onto his face. “I may be crazy, but I still got Landon and that’s all that matters.”
I purse my lips. “Well, I suppose that’s nice in a weird, psychotic way.”
“Just like you and Javi are batshit crazy too and you still found each other.”
I straighten my spine and look away. “I don’t know what you mean.”
He laughs. “Okay.” Then looks away and across the table from me. “What’s up, man? We were just talking about you.”
Grant stands to shake Javi’s hand as he takes his seat opposite me, giving me the tiniest glimpse of his half-smile before sitting. “All good things, right?” he asks in his smooth voice that instantly sends a shiver up my spine.
Grant leans back in his chair. “Just that you’re psychotic.”
Javi smiles lewdly at me. “At times.”
We haven’t officially told anyone that we are together. I mean, Landon and Grant obviously know despite us not saying anything out loud. Javi and I never had a conversation about waiting to announce anything. And neither of us has brought it up.
For me, it feels too fragile.
I would love to be completely trusting of it all. To think that this time is it—no bullshit to derail the good thing we have going.
But the truth is, I’m just not certain of that yet, and I’m too desperate to hold onto what we have to take any chances.
I look away from both of them and start picking at the salad that was just placed in front of me by the server.
Javi and Simmons have lost themselves in a boring conversation about football. Player stats and passing yards or some shit. When I suddenly feel a foot running up my leg. It shocks me enough to make me bang my knee against the tabletop, rattling the silverware and glasses.
Everyone at the table turns their attention to me as Danny and Landon return and take their seats.
“You okay?” Landon asks with a look of concern on his face.
“Yeah. Yep,” I answer curtly and awkwardly.
He watches me a second longer, but then turns away and starts speaking quietly with Grant.
The foot keeps creeping up. It makes heat rush my veins, which is so stupid. It’s a fucking foot. A shoe, even. It actually should be disgusting because where the fuck has his shoes been?
But my body does not seem to care in the slightest as my dick plumps up the higher his foot travels.
I look across the table at him. He looks completely unbothered. His face stoically enthralled as he continues his dumb football conversation with Simmons while his long-ass legs are doing all this stretching under the table.
The foot disappears. My body sags in a slightly depressive way. But this is better. I don’t need him to be riling me up while we’re out in public and with our friends.
But then it returns, only this time, he gently presses it right into my crotch. All my pleasure receptors jump into overdrive and a loud squeak flies out of my mouth.
Everyone looks at me again, so I try to turn it into a cough, banging on my chest a few times and throwing more squeaks in there. “Sorry. The salad… went down… uh… down the wrong pipe area.”
No one seems to buy it, least of all Landon who leans over and whispers, “Are you high?”
I shake my head at him and he backs off just as Javi stands up, excusing himself from the table to use the restroom. Giving me a pointed look as he walks off.
I push my salad around the plate for a few moments, telling myself that I’m not an animal in heat and that I don’t need to go get fucked in a public bathroom.
But after about five more seconds, I realize that I am basically an animal in heat because I’m getting up from the table.
I’m about to walk away when I notice that Grant and Landon are staring me down and smiling. “What?” I ask in an irritated voice.
“Where ya going?” Grant asks.
“To the restroom,” I say slowly for them. “Is that okay with you two?”
“It’s a single bathroom, you know. You’ll have to wait until Javi comes out,” Landon says as he tilts his head at me.
“Okay. Then I will go wait there.” I don’t let them get any more words in, acting super annoyed as I spin away from them.
“Hope you have a nice time,” Grant calls out.
I look back to glare at them and they both wink at me. Pretty much simultaneously which is creepy and makes me feel like they need to not hang around each other so much.
I speedwalk to the back of the restaurant and find the door to the bathroom—a little nervous that maybe I misread his signals and the door will actually be locked or something.
But it’s not. It gives way and I walk inside to find a ridiculously sexy Javier, leaning back against the sink with his ankles crossed. “Hello, munequito.”
I stand there stupidly. The door is still open and everything. Hypnotized by his lustful gaze as he briskly walks toward me and shuts the door.
He quickly flips me around, slamming my chest against the door and pressing the lock button.
His body blankets mine, digging his erection into my lower back. I’m already fucking panting for him to split me open and he’s barely touched me.