Page 32 of Silas's Sweetheart

By the scent of the man, he was an omega, and Ziggy bristled at the way he eye fucked Silas.

The urge to tell the other omega to keep his fucking eyes off Silas got him biting hard on the inside of his cheek as he took his seat. Only when he was sitting did Silas look at him.

Gone was the laughing man. In his place was this stoic hardness that hid all of Silas’s thoughts from Ziggy. “Jacob is filling in because of illness, so can you catch him up with where you are up to on the project?”

“Of course,” Ziggy said with exaggerated politeness. He plonked the iPad on his knees and offered the file he had to Jacob, giving him a smile that didn’t touch his eyes. When he took it, Ziggy flipped open the top of his iPad.

The other man didn’t so much as look at him when he explained the logistics of what they’d set up and instead made cow eyes at Silas.

It was going to be a very long afternoon if the shithead continued to wind him up.

Hours later, a very tired and pissed off Ziggy hated how his prediction had come true. Only it had worsened when Silas had offered to take Jacob out to dinner, and he wasn’t forthcoming in asking Ziggy to join them.

He seethed all the way home. “Dick,” he muttered. “He’s an utter dick!” He slammed his front door, dropping his work bag on the bench by the door he used instead of a hall table. Dragging off his jacket, Ziggy flung it on top of his bag. Heading straight for the counter where he’d left a half bottle of red wine, he grabbed it and a glass from the cupboard, stomping to the couch.

He plonked himself down, placing his glass on the low, hand carved coffee table he’d found at a flea market, and took the cap off the bottle. Pouring half a glass, he reconsidered his mood and filled it to the brim.

Fuck it!

Fuck Silas Starling.

Bottle on the table, he grabbed the glass and downed half of it. The liquor swirled through him, the lunch he’d eaten hours ago doing little to stop the effects. He sat forward and put the glass back down before he gave in and finished it. Drinking himself into oblivion was really not the answer, was it?

He took a deep breath, leaning back into the thick cushions, staring unseeingly at the room.

What were his options?

Could he carry on the way things were?

His gut clenched at that. No, he most definitely didn’t want to carry on with this weird tension between them when it affected their working relationship, which had not been tense since the first conversation about what they wanted.

I warned you this was a mistake.

You don’t need to keep reminding me. We don’t know what caused this issue, so stop harping on.

Not knowing what had made Silas act like a dick towards him was driving him nuts.

So what was the answer?

Confronting the issue was what he should do. Yet to do that, he needed to have five minutes alone with the man in question. One who was most definitely avoiding that at all costs. So where did that leave him?

His phone alerted him to a message and he hated how his heart skipped a beat before he saw it was from Frey. He refused to acknowledge the disappointment it wasn’t from Silas. They didn’t message often, but when they did, it was often flirty with Silas wanting to know what he wanted him to order for them for their office trysts.

He opened the message, sighing dejectedly.

The stuff you suggested I buy has arrived. Are you sure I’ll need a dildo this size?The picture that accompanied the message was of Frey holding a dildo in front of him, wearing awide-eyed look of speculation at the tape measure next to the ten-inch dildo.

He chuckled, his good humor returning.

You’ll want that and bigger.He hit send and waited, seeing the dots appear.

Frey was nothing like the flirty fox he pretended to be. He hadn’t actually had sex with anyone, even though he intimated a lot that he had. He’d fooled Ziggy, and that didn’t happen often. He was good at reading people.

Then why wasn’t I able to read this change in Silas? See it coming?

Questions he’d found no answer to, no matter how many times he asked himself.

Thinking about Frey and the dilemma he’d offered to help out with was easier. Something awful had happened in Frey’s past that caused him to act the way he did. It was why Ziggy offered to help Frey through his heat. It had nothing to do with sex and just a genuine need to help a friend after learning their story. Ziggy had a big heart and had no issue offering his support to others. His past left him with the desire to never let others feel alone, like he had.

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