Page 68 of Worthy

This isTate Eckhart, as real as it gets.

Tate Eckhart wears expensive suits and has a drawer full of Rolexes.

Tate Eckhart sips scotches older than he is.

Tate Eckhart hasn’t flown coach since he was twenty-two.

Tate Eckhart doesn’t have time for relationships or feelings or reminiscing about past secret liaisons with straight former friends, because Tate Eckhart is all about work, and looking good, and curling guys’ toes with his incredibly honed blowjob skills.

The love of my life is myself… Vices and all.

Fuck it.Tate Eckhartisa vice, goddammit.

Call me shallow as a puddle. It’s fine, I’m good with it. In fact, I should bethankingLance fucking Hardy for ditching me in college. He showed me that falling in love is for the simple, the weak… The people without any bigger dreams or goals. Codependent fools with no aspirations.

I mean… I’m not saying Ilovedhim or anything. I only used the word to make a point.

Whatever.

Thepoint isthat he did me a favor, and now I’m returning it. By ignoring his calls and pretending he doesn’t exist.

And he’s definitely been calling. For days since the lapse in judgement that led to phone sex, Lance has been calling and texting me nonstop. I still have no idea how he got my number…Probably from Kennan, that loose-lipped lush. Either way, it’s irrelevant. I’m not answering any of his obsessive attempts at contacting me, because it’s a dead end.

Whatever forces led us back into each other’s lives were horribly misguided. Even if I thought I wanted a relationship, which Idon’t, I’m too busy. And Lance is too straight. And too married.

And too… He’s just too everything I’m not.

I’m sure he’s stuck on the idea of me back then. That’s the only reason he’s doing this… Chasing after me like he thinks he wants something he definitely wouldn’t want if he saw its ugly, unpolished realness. The Tate from back then doesn’t exist anymore.

Thisis me. And why would someone like him… want someone like me?

My phone ringing distracts me and I shake myself out of my thoughts, peering at the long granny-ash of the cigarette I’ve just been holding for minutes while I stare off into space. Stubbing it out in an ash tray, I pick up my phone and slide open the door from the balcony of my hotel room, stalking back into the air conditioning and out of the stifling humidity of Houston in July.

Noting the name on the screen, which does not sayDon’t be an idiot—the contact name I saved Lance’s number under in my phone—my lips curve and I swipe to answer.

“Sup, bestie?” I pad over to the mini fridge for a bottle of the cold-pressed juice I love.

I’m on detox for the next few days so I can go hard again this weekend.

“Oh, so you still remember me?” Jake deadpans, and I chuckle.

“How could I forget you, precious?”

“I assumed you had… since you’ve been radio silent for days,” my best friend scolds. He does it in a nice way, but still. I recognize the tone well.

Although Jacob Lockwood is the same age as me, he’s always acted more like my protective older brother.And he’s much less grouchy thanhisolder brother.Truthfully, Jake and I couldn’t be more different, but it seems like that’s how I choose my friends. Shakes things up, I suppose. Plus, I like being the wild one of the group. It makes me feel special.

I’ve known Jake and Ben, along with the rest of our close-knit group of friends, since middle school. And I’m the token gay guy. Well, Iwas… Until Ben decided to upstage me and come out as queer.That dude’s always been a show-off.

I knew I was gay from pretty much the time I hit puberty, though I really didn’t start exploring it until I got to college. That’s when I figured out that I love other dicks almost as much as I love my own. And it was during all of that sexual awakening and self-discovery that my other best friend, also known asDon’t be an idiot, chose to swoop in and jack me up.

But again… we’re not thinking about him right now.

“What are you talking about??” I huff to Jake on the phone in between sipping my juice. “I tagged you in that hilarious Instagram reel of the guy pretending to fuck his gas tank with the pump nozzle.”

“Yea, and as much as I appreciate you tagging me in videos of thirst traps on Insta, it doesn’t count as conversation,” he mutters, and I laugh. “I expected a call after Pride. How was Kennan’s party?”

My mind instantly and unwittingly flits to Lance… His big beautiful cock thrusting between my lips. And then of course the image of Jake’s older brother getting railed by his husband, aka my former fling.

---