Chapter 17 #2
Enzo caught a little of his come with his tongue and savored it as he twisted his hand harder around his cock, pushing himself easily into his own orgasm.
It blasted through him, making it easy to ignore his aching knees and his tired back and his probably roughed-up throat.
He gave himself up to the pleasure, wringing the last of it out of him, and then sinking back on his heels.
“That was something else.” Will’s voice was rough, too, and he hadn’t just been deep throating a cock.
“Yeah?” Yep, Enzo’s voice came out as a croak, but he didn’t mind. He’d do it again, in a heartbeat. Will reached down and helped him up, Enzo slumping against the tile wall.
“A perfect way to christen this shower properly,” Will said, eyes twinkling.
“You’d think so,” Enzo retorted. But he’d loved it too. Undeniably. He’d barely had to touch himself to come.
Will raised an eyebrow. And okay, clearly he’d noticed that too. “I was gonna help you out, give you some of what you gave me, but you didn’t even need it.”
“What can I say? You inspire me,” Enzo said casually. But it was more than that, and he knew Will believed it, too.
“I said it, and I meant it, you’re a miracle, Enzo Moretti,” Will said, and then he was kissing him again, fierce and wild.
Will had just wrapped a towel around his waist, believing that nothing could possibly ruin his mood, when his phone dinged in the bedroom.
“I don’t think that’s mine?” Enzo said, leaning over the vanity and spitting in the sink as he finished brushing his teeth.
“I’m gonna order some pizza,” Will said. “And I’ll check when I do that.”
“There’s only Leonardo’s, and his pies are only mediocre. But then you probably already know that,” Enzo said. He ran a hand through his wet curls. It was amazing how gorgeous he looked, even like that. Wet, Will always thought he looked a bit like a soaked golden retriever, but Enzo never did.
Will detoured into the bedroom, and when he grabbed his phone, his jaw dropped at the handful of texts.
One was from Rocco, accompanied by a picture. It clearly had been surreptitiously snapped, the interior of Rudy’s restaurant unmistakable, and sitting in the booth were Will’s parents.
Not sure what you had in mind, but I don’t think it was this, Rocco’s text said. They told everyone in the restaurant. Loudly. Multiple times.
“Shit,” Will exclaimed to himself in a low voice.
The second text was from his mom.
We were halfway to Tybee when we decided the store can wait another day. Grabbed a room in town, and spending the night here. Would love to see you for breakfast, with your fiancé! his mom had sent.
Will’s knees gave out and he collapsed to the edge of the bed.
“What is it?” Enzo said, walking in. “Is everything okay? Did Leonardo’s already close? I keep telling Luca he needs to open a decent pizza place, that stays open later. Some of us aren’t seventy years old and want to eat dinner after five.”
“I . . .you . . .us . . .” Will stammered in a strangled voice.
Enzo frowned. “What?”
Will couldn’t find his words, still, so he held out the phone. Let Enzo look at the damning evidence for himself.
“Shit,” Enzo said.
“Exactly what I said,” Will said heavily. “Your mom knows now.”
“Oh, Stud Muffin,” Enzo said mournfully, “the whole town knows now.”
Will’s knees felt even shakier. He’d been so on board with Enzo’s declaration, imagining that nobody else would find out and it would be easy enough, if things worked out, to eventually make his assertion a reality. And if they didn’t . . .well, that fact would speak for itself.
But he’d never imagined that anyone else would discover the little white lie Enzo had told.
“Has your mom called you yet?” Will asked.
Enzo glanced over at where his phone sat on the charger. It was innocuous, but his look was full of trepidation. “Once she finds out, it’s gonna blow up,” he said. Will noticed he didn’t go over to check it yet. Maybe he wasn’t ready to.
“Not just that.” Will hesitated. Realizing, in real time, that the lie he’d told his parents was not going to hold up. “She’s not going to buy the whole ‘we’ve been texting for months and I knew you were the man for me before we even met,’ because she tried that, and it didn’t work.”
That was true. That story had sufficed for Will’s parents, because they hadn’t known any differently. But Giana had been trying to force-feed Will Enzo’s phone number, and he’d never taken it.
Except. He had.
Once.
“Ugh,” Enzo said. He collapsed on the bed next to him. “I’m sorry. If I’d known they’d be staying . . .”
“You couldn’t have known,” Will said. Reaching out, he patted Enzo’s knee and then squeezed it reassuringly.
He’d put on a pair of tight black boxer briefs, and even though he’d just sucked Will’s brain out of his dick, Will still felt a pulse of desire for him.
Even panicking, face unsurprisingly pale, he was still so freaking gorgeous.
And he was all Will’s.
“What are we gonna do?”
“Well . . .I realized that I didn’t speak entirely accurately just now. Your mom did try to give me your phone number a bunch of times—”
“Ugh, please don’t remind me of that. I’m still embarrassed,” Enzo interrupted.
“But,” Will added pointedly, “I did take it. The last time. And I didn’t tell my parents how long we’d been texting.”
“You said a long time,” Enzo said. Then he smacked him in the chest. “You actually took my phone number and didn’t text me?”
Will laughed. How did he know he wanted Enzo?
Because even in the middle of this situation—admittedly a situation they’d created for themselves—Enzo could still make him laugh.
He wasn’t just a work of art and he didn’t just suck cock like he’d been born to do it, he was so funny, too.
Irreverent and snarky, and always full of surprises.
Will was looking forward to Enzo keeping him on his toes for a long time to come.
“In my defense, I thought you must be ugly and weird if you needed your mom to try so hard to get you a date.”
“Ahhhhh,” Enzo exclaimed in mock frustration, smacking him again. “Embarrassed and humiliated.”
“Good news, Honey Bunny. You’re not ugly or weird,” Will teased. “Okay, maybe a little weird, considering you declared we were engaged and we’ve been dating what . . .a week?”
Enzo buried his face in his hands. “Ugh,” he cried, the word muffled, “what are we going to do?”
“I’m trying to tell you. We brazen it out. Your mom did give me your phone number. Admittedly, only a few weeks before you came to town, but it did happen. I guess we can say that counts as a long time.”
Enzo looked up, skepticism written across his face. “And what, you thought that it was ‘long’ because you’d never talked to anyone else you wanted to meet more?”
“Uh, sure?”
Enzo smacked him a third time, but Will had learned and he caught his hand, cradling it in his.
“You’ll need to sound a whole lot more convincing,” Enzo said.
“I can do it.” Will didn’t want to admit that it wouldn’t even be that hard. It wouldn’t even be that far from the truth.
Maybe if he had texted Enzo when he’d finally taken his number, none of this subterfuge would’ve been necessary. Maybe it would’ve been the truth from day one.
“Alright.” Enzo sprang up and began pacing.
“We can deal with this. We can contain this. It’s entirely possible my mother is going to show up here sometime in the next twelve hours and drag us to city hall—but no, she won’t.
She’ll want a big wedding, the whole town invited.
That takes planning, time. She wouldn’t be able to pull that off right away.
We’ll be able to buy some time, some time to make sure .
. .” Enzo trailed off and looked at Will, surprised like he hadn’t even realized he’d been speaking out loud.
Will realized, a second too late, what he’d been saying. That he’d be willing to get married to Will, with only a little more time to make sure.
Suddenly it seemed very stupid that they were actually contemplating going through with this, and he’d not told Enzo how he really felt.
Because he did love him. He was sure now. Not one-hundred-percent sure he wanted to spend the rest of his life with him, but then, if he had believed that, after only knowing the man for a month, then Will wasn’t sure it would’ve been true.
Not really. Not deep down.
The fact that he wanted to be sure, wanted to know that Enzo was the man for him in his bones, made him believe even more that they needed to be.
That they needed the time.
That they didn’t need to rush anything.
“Or,” Will said slowly, “we could just tell them the truth.”
Enzo’s eyebrows skidded upwards. “Are you serious?”
“Completely. It’s . . .I’m not just . . .
” Will trailed off, clearing his throat.
Enzo was still looking at him that way, almost the way he’d been staring at him from their first date onwards, when he’d supposedly been trying to prove he was head over heels for Will, and honestly, that realization was the reason he kept pushing forward.
Kept talking. Because it seemed very likely that Enzo was actually crazy about him, that none of it had been an act, not from the beginning.
“I’m serious about this. About you. I want this to work out.
And it’s going to be challenging. I’m going to miss you, like a limb, when you go. And I hope you’re gonna miss me too—”
“Undeniably,” Enzo said quietly, seriously, reaching and squeezing Will’s hands.