Page 19 of Finding You

…Right? He couldn’t just wake up and be into men. Lane had called himself straight before Bowen, but he readily admitted to having had feelings for men before Sana had come along. Dallas had never felt like this before.

Not once.

He found men attractive plenty of times, and yeah, a little sexy in porn, but he’d never wanted to be with a man. He barely wanted to be with women. This was his brain being ridiculous. Foolish. Weird.

He swung his legs over the side of the bed and headed for the shower to clean himself up. He felt oddly empty and unsatisfied, which shouldn’t have been a surprise. Jerking off never really did much for him. In fact, he’d never been a particularly sexual guy.

When he and Katie had first gotten together, it was good. It was hot, and he felt wanted, and he’d wanted her back. But it hadn’t lasted. By the time he caught her in bed with another man, they hadn’t had sex since the positive pregnancy test. And he hadn’t even really wanted it.

So what the hell could all this possibly mean?

It was Saturday, and while Kylen had agreed to meet up and talk things over—because he really was happy to go along with the ruse for as long as the poor bastard needed it—he cancelled at the last minute. His gran wasn’t doing very well, and Dallas’s heart bled for him.

They’d stayed up talking until Audra woke up for a diaper change, and then he’d put her to bed and passed out with his phone in his hand. The shower helped get his blood flowing, but it didn’t erase the strange, heavy feeling that had settled over his limbs.

He needed to tell someone about this. He just didn’t know what he was going to say.

Throwing on sweats, Dallas walked into the nursery and found Audra standing up, holding the railings of her crib and gnawing on the top. They’d covered it with teething-friendly silicone, so he didn’t panic.

Instead, he swept her into his arms and bounced her until she giggled.

“Thank you for letting me sleep, pumpkin.”

“Dadadada!”

“Mm. That’s me. Have you said mama yet?”

“Daaaadadada.”

He grinned to himself, viciously hoping it was driving his ex up the wall as he laid her down to change her. She kicked her feet but didn’t put up a fight as he got a fresh onesie on her, then a little pair of pants to protect her knees.

He snagged his phone on the way to the living room, then set her in her crawling space before turning on his coffeepot and checking his messages. The last one to Kylen was unread, and Dallas hoped the poor man was getting some sleep. His life was chaos at the moment, and his family wasn’t helping.

Kylen hadn’t given him too many more details, but some was enough. The man was on the edge of burnout, and Dallas hated there wasn’t more he could do to help. Though he supposed playing boyfriend with family was a step further than most people would have taken it.

And maybe it should have been creepy. Under any other circumstances, he would have been terrified. But something about it made him feel good. Like Kylen had wanted to feel safe, and the first name that came to mind was Dallas’s.

His hands began to shake as he was overwhelmed with that feeling again—the strange, unfamiliar, alien one. He didn’t like it.

He fumbled for his phone and hit Lane’s contact, pulling up their last text thread.

Dallas: Are you at work today?

Lane: When am I not?

Dallas: Can I come see you?

Lane: Sounds serious.

Dallas: Call it panic. Do you have time today?

Lane: Eleven-thirty. Bring me my baby.

Dallas quickly texted a photo of Audra in her morning outfit, then grabbed his coffee mug and attempted to caffeinate himself as much as possible. He had things to ask—questions that were plaguing him and ones that he wasn’t sure he’d get an answer to. Whatever he was feeling, none of it was simple.

It was confusing. Headache inducing. And he might have been on the verge of panic, but luckily, he had friends who loved him and who would quickly talk him down.

Dallas was not surprised in the least when he walked up to the bar at Lane’s restaurant and found Frey there nursing a very tall iced tea. He turned on the barstool, and his face broke out into a huge grin.

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