Page 102 of Cherry on Top

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.

---