Page 98 of The Play

Like you could, Jem responded. You’re not that good.

Except that he was. Grant had said so. Deacon knew this was the perfect time, the perfect opening. He should tell Jem about Grant. He wanted to tell Jem about Grant.

But still, his fingers hesitated over the screen.

Maybe this news was too big to break over text.

Jem sent a second text. You guys hanging in okay?

We’re fine. Deacon would’ve said the same even if they weren’t fine. Would’ve said the same if the whole team was currently on fire. The quiet happiness he’d heard in Jem’s voice when he’d told him about his old friend and new boyfriend, Murphy, had guaranteed that Deacon wasn’t going to do or say anything that would make Jem feel like he needed to come back to Charleston right now.

Are you though? That email, Deac . . .

Ugh. Deacon felt another pulse of unwanted guilt.

It was a lot. Did it change anything?

No, he’d been wrong before. This was the perfect time.

I punched a guy in the Pirate’s Booty who said I had Grant’s dick on speed dial.

Deacon could only imagine Jem’s scoff when he read that.

We’re gonna skip over the whole ‘punched a guy’ for Grant and settle on the question of WHEN are you gonna have his dick on speed dial?

How do you know I don’t already? Deacon replied after a nice long pause. Not because he didn’t know what to say. But because it wouldn’t hurt to make Jem sweat it out a little bit more.

DO YOU??????

Deacon barked out a laugh.

I wouldn’t call it that, exactly. More like I’m sitting in his penthouse, only two dozen feet away from a genuine fucking Picasso, waiting for him to finish work so we can have dinner.

Once he’d started, he couldn’t seem to stop. He just word vomited it all up right onto the screen.

So, what you’re really saying is that Mr. G has YOUR dick on speed dial. And now he could hear Jem laughing, the sound echoing in his head.

Fair.

Deacon sent the second text before he could overthink it. But it’s not just the dick, though that’s real nice, I can’t lie. I’m in love with him. And crazy enough, he seems to feel the same way about me.

A second later, his phone buzzed, but it wasn’t with another call. It was Jem, calling.

When he picked up, Jem was still laughing. “You asshole,” he said. “You were really going to tell me all that in a text message.”

“Yeah,” Deacon said, feeling surprisingly bashful.

“God, you’re the worst,” Jem said. “But I’m still damn happy for you, man. You two deserve it. But seriously, crazy enough that he seems to feel the same way about me? He bought a freaking football team for you. He spent nearly a billion dollars for you. Even for a guy with a freaking Picasso on his wall, that’s a big deal.”

“He didn’t do that.”

“Uh, I disagree—”

“He didn’t even know about that email,” Deacon interrupted.

But he knew the truth had nothing to do with the email. The email was only how the rest of the world had found out about Grant’s feelings.

They’d existed, apparently long before it, and it didn’t matter that Grant hadn’t even responded to the email. Didn’t even matter that he’d never seen it.

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