Page 63 of Not Catching Love

“Is it finished?” he asks.

Of course it’s not fucking finished. I huff and join him. “No. That’s the background, and I’m building and layering here to be the forest floor, and this is a stream cascading down over the rocks. Then I’m going to paint a large misty-looking tree kinda leaning through the middle here, with some animals, andthenit will be finished. Maybe. If I don’t get sick of it before then.”

He’s staring for a really long time. “Yeah, I can see it. That’s going to look incredible.”

I hate compliments. I never know what to do with them. There are only so many times you can tell someone that your work is shit before you both start to look stupid. And thanking him for something I don’t believe doesn’t feel right either.

“You’reincredible, Xander.”

I slowly look up and find him watching me.

Derek’s warm fingers find my cheek like they belong there. “You’re so fucking incredible it kills me.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Derek

His expression doesn’t hold the hope I once saw in it, but there’s something close. Something almost afraid to be there, and in my gut, I feel it too. I don’t know what I’m doing, and I probably shouldn’t be heading down this path, but fuck me. Xanderisincredible, and he deserves to know it. He deserves to be told every single day.

“What … what if it didn’t?” he whispers.

“What?”

“What if it didn’t kill you? What if you were just you, and I’m just me, and we’re in a room together with no one else?”

I wish it was that easy. “Ethics are still ethics, even if no one else knows about your choices.”

Xander’s expression darkens. “I understand why they have those rules. I get it. But we both know that we didn’t do anything wrong. None of this is wrong.” His tone has a beggingedge that’s getting me right behind the ribs. “Please. I want to kiss you. Just one time.”

Fuck, there are no words for how much I want that too. For how easy it would be to cup his face and taste his lips. I’ve been half-hard all through dinner with what he’s wearing, but I can resist that. I could resist him dancing naked in front of me. Not easily, definitely not fucking easily, but I’m sure I could.

This though? Xander begging for something Iwantto give him?

This is my limit.

“If anyone found out …”

“They wouldn’t.” Xander steps closer. “I know we can’t have a relationship. I know it can’t mean anything. But this once. What if this doesn’t kill us? What if it’s everything we ever wanted?”

Doesn’t he know that’s exactly what I’m afraid of? “What we have isn’t enough for you?”

“I don’t think I can be friends. I never could.”

“Xander … that’s all a relationship is. Friends who have sex and care about each other. Isn’t two of those things good enough? Sex isn’t everything.”

He’s quiet for a moment before he looks up and meets my eyes. “Maybe it is when you’ve never had it before.”

It takes me a second. “What? You’re a?—”

“If you freak out over that, I’m going to scream.”

“No, I’m not … freaking out. I’m …how?” Xander is one of the sexiest men I’ve ever seen. There’s no way it’s from a lack of options.

He taps his temple. “Don’t know if you’ve heard, but I’m a little fucked-up.”

Instead of telling him he shouldn’t say that, I take his hand and press a kiss to his pointer finger instead.

A breath hisses between his teeth. “Good, but not where I want it.”

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