Page 18 of Summer Catch

“If you couldn’t tell, I don’t spend a lot of time here,” Kieran said as he popped the lids off, setting one in front of Jon, lounging against his kitchen counter, his long, lean body drawing his eye irresistibly.

Jon raised an eyebrow. “And you think I spend a lot of time in my place?”

“Well. No. Probably not.” Kieran hated how self-conscious he suddenly felt. Of course Jon didn’t care that this place felt like a stranger’s house. Jon had been to the bar, which was his real home, where everything that mattered lived.

“I think we both work too much,” Jon said, sounding amused by this. “Maybe we should try to work a little less.”

“Always a good goal,” Kieran said. And it was. He did try. But why would he want to be alone in his place when he could be at the bar, with his friends and his employees? Surrounded by the pleasant background noise of his successful business? Maybe if he had someone to share that alone time with . . .

He was still trying to figure out how to broach this subject when Jon set his beer down on the counter with a decisive click.

“You wanna know my goal? I keep wondering how much of this beer I need to drink before I can come up with a reason to kiss you again.”

Kieran laughed so hard he nearly snorted his beer. “You know, you could just do it.” Jon was the head coach of the Condors—so confident and in-control most of the time—but he looked downright sheepish.

“I already did it, it’s your turn now,” Jon said, and he was grinning now too. Probably at how ridiculous they both were, standing here, drinking beers they couldn’t care less about, when they could be kissing again.

Kieran didn’t need another invitation. He set down his beer and walked right over to where Jon was standing. Cupped his face in his hands and kissed him the way he’d wanted to on his front stoop.

Their tongues brushed together as Kieran pushed him up against the counter and they devoured each other. Jon’s hands were gentle but insistent as they wrapped around his waist and he pulled him in closer and then closer still.

If Jon was having any uncertainty or second thoughts about kissing another guy, Kieran wasn’t aware of it. He’d been hoping to keep some distance because Jon was definitely not used to having a hard dick rub against his own, but the moment he reeled Kieran in close enough to feel it, he groaned in the back of his throat.

That was the turn-on of the fucking century.

If Kieran hadn’t been sure this kiss was heading into bedroom territory fast, that would have sealed it.

But one of them was going to have to keep an even head—clearly it wasn’t going to Jon, who was kissing Kieran with the kind of all-in abandonment that made him hard as a rock and aching in his jeans. So he pulled back, both them breathing hard.

“Shit.” Jon’s exclamation was unsteady. His pupils dilated. His fingers tightening around Kieran’s waist.

Kieran stroked the back of his neck, the surprisingly soft skin there. “Yeah?”

“Does it make me uncool to admit I’ve thought about that a lot?”

Kieran chuckled. “Only if it makes me equally uncool to confess that yeah, I thought about it too. More than I should admit to.”

“You tried to hit on me the first night we met. Not so much of a surprise.”

“Maybe I wasn’t hitting on you.” Kieran tried to play it coy.

“No, you were. And you should’ve. I just . . .I got stuck worrying that maybe . . .well, that I was misreading myself and then worried I was misreading you, and I didn’t want to do that. Not when you’d become a friend.” Jon’s honesty always blew Kieran away, but that confession made him even more sure that the patience he’d employed, even as hard as it had been, had been the right tactic.

“You had to figure some stuff out. It was okay you weren’t sure, right away.”

Honesty blazed in Jon’s eyes. It was even more beautiful than the honey brown color that had entranced Kieran from the first moment he’d seen it. “In case you didn’t realize it, I really like you. As a friend. As more.”

Kieran had a feeling he should probably be embarrassed at how fast he kissed Jon after that. Or how they stumbled backwards from the kitchen to the living room, Kieran taking the couch and Jon not even hesitating for a moment before he climbed right on top of him.

“This is hot,” Jon gasped, one kiss sliding into the next, minutes lost to the scorching give and take of their mouths.

Kieran had given up on trying to keep his cock away from Jon. He was hard. Jon was definitely hard, and God, had he been hiding that under all those staid, Sunday School khaki pants?

He was gonna go out of his mind if he didn’t get to see, if he didn’t get to touch.

But he wasn’t going to be the one to push them further. Instead, he kept to what Jon had established, hands sliding over clothes, exploring each other with long, lingering touches as their mouths fused together.

Then Jon slid a hand right up the front of Kieran’s shirt, the sudden feel of skin-to-skin electrifying him, a full-body shiver engulfing him.

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