Page 40 of Resisting You

Frey looked up at him. It was time to tell someone the truth. “I mean, I haven’t had sex since Jace. I flirt a lot, and people kind of assumed that meant I was out fucking a lot. It was easier to let them think that because they stopped trying to push me into relationships.”

Oz lifted a brow at him, and Frey knew he was being called out for being a total hypocrite because he’d done the same thing to more than one of his friends.

“Yeah, yeah. Pot, meet kettle, or whatever. And it wasn’t like I didn’t try to date after him. But guys are either shitty about me having a Deaf kid, or they’re shitty about me having a kid at all. And the few times I got close to, you know—that—I got soft.” Christ, he hadn’t said that aloud to anyone, not even himself. He hadn’t even thought it until now. He’d just let that be his quiet little secret.

Oz’s face fell. “Oh, Frey…”

“Please don’t pity me. Jace really fucked me up, and it is what it is. But…” He took a trembling breath. “At work, Renato and I?—”

“Dr. Douche? The doctor who signs?” Oz pressed. “The one you hate who says all those shitty things to residents?”

Frey’s cheeks burned hotter. “Yeah. We…uh. Well. You know?”

Oz lifted his brows.

“We hooked up. And it was good. I mean, I can’t stand his fucking face, but it was so good. He knew how to shut my brain off.” He licked his lips nervously. Now that he was admitting it, it was all pouring out of him. “It was like I stopped being afraid of rejection. He’s seen me at my worst and my most obnoxious, and he still wanted to make me come.” He froze. “Fuck, sorry. That’s too much.”

Oz wrinkled his nose but stepped closer. “You’re allowed to have that too. And you’re allowed to tell your friends to stop slut shaming you because one, that’s gross, and two, it’s not true.”

“I don’t want to tell them I’ve been lying,” Frey said. “Even Renato thinks I’m easy.”

Oz wrung his hands, then yanked Frey into a hug and squeezed him tight.

When Frey pulled back, he laughed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Aren’t I supposed to be comforting you?”

Oz scoffed and lifted his hands to sign, ‘I don’t need comfort. I just need some time and some space to deal with it.’

Frey’s eyes widened. ‘I told you that you didn’t need to?—’

‘No,’ Oz interrupted, his sign sharp. ‘Not from you. Not from Rex. From…everything else.’

Frey didn’t know what that meant, but he’d do whatever it took to help. ‘Let me know what you need from me.’

‘Nothing,’ Oz signed, then smiled. ‘Just this. Be you.’

That went straight to Frey’s core. He wasn’t sure anyone had ever wanted him to just be himself. Not ever. Everyone he knew hoped for little changes in him to make him more palatable. Even his friends wanted him to settle down so they could feel more comfortable about his life.

He licked his lips, then yanked Oz into a hug. He chuckled as he squeezed Frey back, then cupped his cheeks and said aloud, “Be happy.”

Frey wasn’t sure how he could, but he was damn well going to try.

And trying to be happy might have been the one thing that led him to the theater that evening. He had a feeling Thursday nights were Renato’s nights for the weird ritual he had. So he drove there again, and his heart skipped a beat when he saw the familiar car in the parking lot. He bought a ticket, then snuck into every theater until he found the man in question sitting in a seat quietly talking to the disembodied voice.

Then everything snowballed.

Frey hadn’t been sure what he was going to do when he got there. He hadn’t planned on provoking Renato—or letting himself be provoked. He wanted answers—why Renato had wanted him, why he’d let him walk away, what this might mean for the future.

Could they work together after everything?

Would he ever be able to close his eyes again and not see Renato’s dark eyes or his full lips giving him commands?

Would he ever be with another lover who made him feel so settled in his own skin?

But none of that happened. He didn’t get a chance to ask anything. Pieces of the big puzzle slotted into place, and he realized Renato wasn’t talking to just some voice in a movie theater. He was talking to the voice of his husband—a man who died somehow and had left Renato all alone.

Frey had changed after his own divorce. He’d lost so much of his spark, of his joy, even if he was still good at playing pretend. His small found family and his son were the only things that could give him a genuine smile these days. And he couldn’t imagine how much more he would have been shattered if the man he loved had died.

It was no wonder Renato hated him and everyone around him.

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