Page 35 of Blown

Steve’s smile pulled so tight it might have been a grimace. Jake didn’t really care. He felt like he was defending his territory, and he was going to do it without holding back.

“Nally says you and Rafe go way back,” Jake said, shifting to grab Steve’s attention. Rafe had turned slightly to the side to engage with a guy who danced with even more exuberance than he did.

“We do,” Steve said. “We gowayback.” His words said one thing, but his tone was as much a declaration of dibs and intent as it was possible to get.

“That’s nice,” Jake said. “Rafe and I met at the Corning Museum of Glass, when we were both artists in residence. I’m sort of a big deal in the glass world.”

“Is that so?” Steve moved closer to him, like the two of them were either in a dance-off or about to grind right there in front of everyone. “How big a deal?”

“Did you see the latest issue of Art Digest?” Jake said, putting on his smuggest look. “They did an entire profile about me and my latest collection.”

“Fancy that,” Steve said, losing his smile.

“Yeah,” Jake said, grinning harder. “Plus I just sold a piece to the Met for a quarter of a million dollars. When was the last time you sold something you’ve made from scratch for a quarter of a mil?”

Steve frowned and lost his rhythm. As much as Jake felt like he’d scored points in the competition for Rafe, his stomach twisted hard over the way he’d done it. He was supposed to be giving up lying. It didn’t matter what some guy in a club thought of him. Rafe had already committed to helping him, and he trusted Rafe not to go back on his word.

It was Steve he didn’t trust.

“All that money is going toward our wedding,” Jake said as casually as possible. “We’re thinking a spring wedding, but the way immigration laws are over here, we might need to make it sooner.”

“Wedding?” Steve stopped dancing entirely. Rafe noticed something was wrong and stopped dancing as well. He stepped closer, his expression questioning. “Are you marrying this bloke?” Steve asked him.

“Um.” The syllable was barely audible over the music, but Rafe didn’t need words to give Steve the answer he was looking for. His expression did it all.

“You agreed to come out tonight with me, but you’re engaged to this guy?” Steve raised his voice and jerked his thumb at Jake.

“It’s a long story,” Rafe said.

That was it. Steve shook his head and immediately left the crush of dancers.

“Steve, wait!” Rafe called after him, chasing him over to the bar.

“What did you do?” Nally asked just behind Jake’s shoulder.

Jake twisted in surprise. He hadn’t noticed Nally approaching him. “I just mentioned to Steve that Rafe and I are engaged.”

Nally shook his head and rolled his eyes. “I knew you were only coming here to cause trouble.” When Jake smiled broadly in reply, Nally laughed and said, “You’re on your own now. I’ve got bigger sausages to fry,” before turning back to the guys he’d been dancing with.

Jake grinned, then dodged around the guy trying to pull him into a dance to follow Rafe and Steve to the bar.

“—told me you were engaged,” Steve was in the middle of telling Rafe with a scowl. “It would have saved us a lot of time.”

“I’m sorry,” Rafe said. “It’s all pretty new, and we’d made this date before the engagement happened.”

“You could have told me the other day, at the Renaissance Faire, and saved us both the trouble,” Steve said, pulling out a credit card to pay his tab on the unit the bartender held out to him. “What did you think was going to happen here tonight?”

“Not this,” Rafe said, almost too quietly to hear, as he rubbed his face.

Steve laughed and shook his head. “Bye, Rafe,” he said, sticking his card back in his wallet. “Maybe I’ll see you sometime after the wedding.” He sent Jake a withering look, then turned to go.

“Well, that was awkward,” Jake said, sliding into the stool across from where Rafe had just sat heavily.

He expected Rafe to glare at him or tell him off. He wouldn’t have been surprised if Rafe gave him the finger and left the club the way Steve had. Instead, he gestured for the bartender and ordered a drink.

“Do you want anything?” he asked Jake.

Jake opened his mouth to say he couldn’t, he was six months sober, or to make up some other story to hide the fact that he had no money, but he thought better of it. “I can’t,” he said. “I’m broke.”

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