Page 51 of Just A Little Love

“Here’s the thing,” Anders said in his most logical tone. “None of this makes any sense. Gabe had you over to his apartment, right? He introduced you to his friends. He had paperwork in your name sent there from the city. If he intended to make you a side piece, he'd have kept everything separate from the rest of his life.”

“Maybe he’s that much of a creep.”

“Or maybe some creep is living in his apartment, and he doesn’t even know.”

If Anders had been with me, he'd understand. Whoever that guy was, he belonged in that apartment, and I did not. It was evident from his lack of surprise that he expected my entrance. And when he called me boy? Yeah, he knew exactly what his boyfriend was. Husband? Whatever they were to each other, there was an understanding. No one stays that chill when you find out your significant other was messing around on the side if there isn’t an agreement.

I leaned back against the couch, determined to hold back the tears threatening to spill over. They didn’t listen and tracked down my face instead. I felt gullible, but I can't quite explain why. I thought I’d found a love-at-first-sight scenario, and what I got was, well, nothing, I guess. Seeing Gabriel wasn't necessary, so it was a no-harm, no-foul situation. We’d retreat to our separate corners, and that would be that.

Anders’ refusal to bash Gabriel with me was pissing me off, though. He was supposed to be my best friend. Why was he givingGabrielthe benefit of the doubt? It was disloyal.

“Anders, I need you to get on board with this bashing.” Damn it, he had that thoughtful look of his again. NO. I need anger. And rage. And righteous indignation. I needed him to be mad with me. This was not asking too much.

“Rory, platonic love of my life, you are an idiot.”

In the twenty-two, maybe twenty-three, years we’d known each other, he had never called me that. Not even when we were kids and fought about whatever dumb shit kids fought about.

My phone interrupted the spiral.

Daddy: Hey you, did you get the papers? We can FaceTime, and I’ll walk you through them.

There was no way in hell I’d answer that phone. His ass was to be left on read from now until forever.

Daddy: Bunny?

Read, asshole.

Daddy: I must have gotten the time zones messed up. You’re probably in class. Sorry to interrupt. Text me when you’re free. Miss you!

On fucking read.

Since Anders refused to join my pity party and hate Gabriel with me, he left after I finished most of the bottle of wine. I spent my evening gathering every scrap of little paraphernalia I could find and collected them all in a trash bag. There was no reason to keep anything. Who was I going to play with? Jakob was Dadd-no, goddamn it, he wasn’t my Daddy. I refused to use that word with him. He didn’t deserve it. Jakob was Gabriel’s friend so that friendship was trashed too.

Daddy: Hey, is everything OK?

Daddy: I’m getting worried.

Daddy: Rory, what the fuck is going on?

Jakob: Rory, are you okay?

Chapter 28

Gabriel

Ispent fifteen hours on a flight waiting to speak with Rory. Before yesterday, everything seemed fine. And then nothing. Complete radio silence, and I hated not knowing what was going on. Jakob reached out, but he didn’t get a response, either. Jakob said he asked Anders if Rory was okay, and he only said that I’d need to talk to Rory about it. I didn’t want to put Jakob in the middle of anything, so I didn’t ask for Anders’ number.

The good news was Rory wasn’t dead in a ditch somewhere.

The bad news was he ignored me.

My two weeks in London were a whirlwind of site visits and meetings. As often as I’d been there, I’d yet to play tourist there. From the back of my cab, I imagined what it would be like if Rory had been with me. My downtime would have been spent visiting castles, the Circle Theatre, and, hell, we'd have gone to all the damn tourist traps too. I would have loved all of it, so long as Rory was with me. And now I couldn't even get him to answer a text.

As soon as the wheels hit the tarmac, I tried to call Rory, but once again, there was no response. I wanted to go see him and ask him what the hell was going on, but I had gotten the hint that he wasn’t interested in what I had to say. But I knew me, and I knew it would only last until tomorrow. There was no goddamn way I’d let it go without knowing what the hell was going on. Being back on the same continent, in the same city, and not being able to touch him was physically painful. It felt like a boulder was sitting on my chest, and I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to sleep for a year.

I grabbed a cab at the airport and headed directly home. Nothing was going to be solved by planting myself on Rory’s doorstep tonight.

“Good Evening, Mr. Alves. Will you or your friend need anything this evening?”

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