Chapter 15
WALL
I brING THE gala binder.
There's no gala business tonight. I know that, they know that. But there's no way I'm walking into this building empty-handed with my real reason for being here written all over my face. If anyone asks, this is an official visit.
Nobody's going to ask.
By the time I find his door, my knuckles are white around the thing.
I knock twice, and force my hand into my pocket, the seconds before the door opens drag mercilessly, like they’re standing still. Then, it opens, and I’m the one who’s very, very still.
Theo is standing across from me, naked, unless oven mitts count as attire.
The last time I saw him undressed, the mental image ambushed me at red lights for days after.
But memory has nothing on reality, as he’s just there, answering Patrick’s front door on a Saturday evening, with his cock out, holding a spatula, casual as one can be.
I have time for exactly one peek before the reality of the situation catches up with me. We're standing in a public hallway.
"We're making a frittata!" Theo says. "It's a whole thing."
"You're naked.” My words come out raspy.
Theo shrugs. "Chef's whites are in the wash."
Somewhere behind him, a pan is sizzling. Somewhere behind me is an elevator with a direct line of sight to this door. I grab him by the shoulder, physically move out of the doorframe, and shut the door behind us. The sound he makes in the process lets me know he’s enjoying the manhandling.
Patrick appears at the end of the hall, fully dressed, a dish towel over one shoulder. He takes one look at my face, turns to Theo, rolls his eyes, then looks back at me. “He does this. You’ll get used to it.”
"He was visible from the elevator," I whisper-hiss for no reason.
"Hey, if the neighbors want a look, who am I to stop them?" Theo throws over his shoulder, already walking off toward the kitchen.
The back of him is naked too, so I follow him down the hall at a respectful distance. For about half a second, before I lose my conviction and walk so close I can feel his body heat. Or maybe it’s my body that’s heating up.
The kitchen is clearly Patrick's, everything lined up in neat rows like he uses a spirit level daily, but if I look closely, there’s evidence of Theo everywhere anyway.
A game controller by the fruit bowl, a hoodie over a barstool.
One sneaker lying abandoned under the table, its partner nowhere in sight.
Patrick takes the binder out of my hands. He looks at it, then looks at me. I brace for the comment, but he just sets it on the counter by the fruit bowl and says nothing.
I'll take mercy where I can get it.
He hands me a glass of water before I can ask for one and I drink half of it in one gulp. Patrick watches me do it, but lets that go too.
Idle time is my mortal enemy for the night, and as soon as a few wordless seconds come to pass, the surreality of the situation hits me.
I know why I'm here, they know why I'm here, yet nobody's saying it, so it just hums under everything—under the onions, under the audible breaths.
Meanwhile, a naked man is cooking inches away from an open flame, and I'm supposed to stand here and be normal about it?
"Gentlemen," Theo announces, bumping the oven closed with his hip. "Chef says forty-five minutes."
"Chef said twenty-five ten minutes ago," Patrick says.
Theo grins. "Chef is building suspense."
My mind drifts off to several indecent things that can happen in forty-five minutes and finish my water, while I watch them be.
They move around each other without looking.
A hand on a hip to pass behind, a spice jar handed over before it's asked for.
Weeks of practiced choreography I wasn't here for, running all on its own. Then, there’s me, standing at the island, feeling enormous and extra.
Patrick asks how the drive was. I tell him how it was, without thinking, and I couldn’t repeat what I said if I tried.
Then the timer gets set, and Patrick takes the towel off his shoulder, folds it once, and puts it down, and jerks his chin toward the living room.
The three of us walk like a unit.
"Sit," Patrick says.
There's an armchair by the corner of the table.
My pulse spikes as I give it a passing glance and take the couch instead.
Behind me, Theo makes a small noise that tells me he noticed, and that I'll be hearing about it. He drops onto the far cushion, the mittens still on his hands, folds his legs under himself, and gives me the widest grin I’ve ever seen him produce.
Patrick sits on the edge of the coffee table across from me, elbows on his knees, and takes his time.
"Tonight is an exploration," he says. "That's the whole map. Nobody does anything that isn't asked for. Anything's a no until it's a yes."
None of those words are sexy on paper, yet all of them are working on me anyway. Halfway through, I figure out why. He's thought about this. About me. In advance, carefully.
Being planned for, it turns out, feels a whole lot like being wanted. And it feels fucking magnificent.
"And a stop is a stop," he says. "One word, no questions."
I nod and push my hands under my thighs so they don't do anything stupid.
Theo clears his throat theatrically and waits until both Patrick and I look at him. "Motion to note that he's been staring at your hands for ten minutes."
I have been. They're clasped between his knees, and they're a problem.
"Denied," Patrick says, then looks back at me.
"Excuse-moi? This court is corrupt!"
"We go slow," Patrick continues. "Nothing has to happen at all tonight. We can eat frittata and watch—"
I’m on my feet so fast my vision goes momentarily black. "I've watched enough movies."
Theo presses one mitt to his mouth. Patrick holds my eyes for a moment, and something behind all that calm catches fire and stays lit.
He stands, crosses to me, stops just inside my personal space, and gives me a full second to watch it coming. That's him all over, no ambush, no rush. He shows me exactly what he’s going to do before he does it.
His hand comes up to my jaw, and we engage in a wordless exchange, his left brow arching, me giving him a tiny nod, words obsolete.
The first thing I register is the stubble, something I was not prepared for, scraping against my chin, and I can’t even begin to name the feelings warring within me.
Nor do I have time to name them, Patrick’s mouth already brushing mine, feather-light, before he fully commits.
His lips move against mine, soft but certain, and he drags his thumb along my jaw.
Delight. That’s the feeling that wins the war. And it feels like something I've been waiting for my whole life without knowing it.
He tilts his head and takes the kiss deeper. His tongue touches mine, light and patient. My hand finds his waist, fabric bunching in my fist, and a low sound rolls out of him and into my mouth. Heat shoots straight down through me, and my cock swells up against his hip.
My immediate instinct is to back away, but it only lasts a fraction of a second, until I remember that this is supposed to happen. This is not an accidental, embarrassing boner. This one is worked for.
And what a fucking wild concept.
There's a version of me that would be mortified right now.
He stayed home tonight.
Patrick must notice right away, and, instead of giving me room, he takes the last inch away, one slow press of his body, his weight landing right against my aching cock. I make a pathetic sound against his mouth right when my hips buck up involuntarily, seeking friction.
When he finally eases back, breaking the kiss, my hand is still fisted in his shirt. I look at it, and leave it where it is.
"Okay, my turn!"
A naked weight hits me from the side.
Theo climbs me, there’s no other way to put it.
He hooks one arm around my neck, a thigh over my hip and cups my cheek with the oven mitt, urging me to face him.
He doesn’t need to—it goes willingly and his mouth already crashes into mine.
There are teeth in it. There's laughter in it, spilling straight into my mouth like he couldn't hold it one more second.
And there's skin. So much bare skin, everywhere my hands land.
And they land everywhere, because I'm suddenly holding a naked man who's trying to occupy the exact space I'm standing in.
He grinds against me, zero shame, finds exactly how hard Patrick left me, and pulls back an inch.
"Patrick,” he quips against my lips, sounding pleased. “He's so hard already—"
"Focus," I say, and kiss him again before he can answer. It's the right call. His whole body goes loud against mine, hips rolling, fingers threading in my hair, mitt against my face. Filthy and delighted at the same time.
Patrick’s voice reaches me from a distance. "Bedroom."
Theo drops off me, grabs my wrist with the mitt, and pulls. I go. I’d follow him to hell right now.
The first and only thing I notice when I cross the threshold is the bed, massive, and solid, and neatly made. I get exactly one look at it before Theo plants both mitts on my chest and walks me backward to the foot of it, repositioning me like furniture.
Then he takes the mitts off, slowly, eyes on me the whole way.
This is the striptease, I guess. The mitts are the striptease.
I successfully suppress a laugh, but can’t hold the words in. "Finally," I say. "The man is nude."
He doesn’t miss a beat as he drops them on the floor. "You watched the whole thing."
I did.
My shirt goes first. Theo starts on the buttons and declares war on the third one, cursing under his breath.
While that battle rages on, Patrick comes around behind me.
I feel him before he touches me, heat down my back, and when the last button finally gives, it's Patrick’s hands that slide the shirt off my shoulders.
His knuckles trail down my arms with the fabric.
His mouth is close to my ear that I can feel every hot breath, and goosebumps chase his touch all the way to my wrists.