Page 26 of The One Decent Thing

But Rick just chuckled and shook his head. “Well, that’s some shit right there. Most fucked-up story I’ve heard in a while, Aidan.” He held up a finger to tell me to wait, and let another group into the club. The door opened, a burst of something electronic and ear-piercingly loud flowing over me as it did, and then it swung shut again. “Tell you what. I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess you don’t have a job yet?”

I shook my head, trying not to let the bubble of hope low-down in my gut expand and choke me. He couldn’t possibly…but he was.

“Put together the public records of your trial and email ’em to me,” he went on, “and ask that roommate of yours if he’ll come along to have a drink with the two of us in a few days. Let’s say Monday. If his ID checks out and matches that shit, and he vouches for you, I’ll give you a try. I like working the door, but I don’t want to do it every night, and one of my guys just moved away.” I gaped at him in silence like a moron, and he frowned. “Unless you aren’t interested or something?”

“No,” I gasped. “I mean, yes, definitely, yes, I’m fucking interested. I’m just —” I swallowed hard, and my eyelids tingled. Oh, fuck this. Was I about to start crying like a little bitch in front of this big, hard-ass dude who wanted to offer me a job? A job where I’d need to keep my cool, no less? “I’m interested. Thank you.”

Rick grabbed me by the shoulder and gave me a little shake. “You think I haven’t been where you are?” He sounded a lot gentler than I expected, and I forced in a deep breath and got my shit together. He shook me again, harder, and then finished off with a light — for him — punch to my bicep that nearly knocked me sideways. That was going to bruise like a motherfucker. I’d wait to rub it until I was out of sight, though. “Go get some sleep, kid. You’re not gonna get what you came down here for, not tonight. Now get. I have work to do.”

I stammered out more thanks, but he was already turning back to the door, letting one guy out and three mini-skirted girls in. Long, long legs, all smooth and…not checking out girls, hiscustomers, in front of my hopefully future boss. Nope. Not happening. He was right. Fucking someone was off the table for the night.

One quick look later, because goddamn the blonde’s legs were amazing, I was heading up the street, bouncing enough to almost burst into a run. I might have a job. I could pay Sebastian rent, I could buy my own food, I could be apersonagain.

Unless Sebastian was too pissed at me to want to meet with Rick. But no. Sebastian was better than that, and he’d do it, even if he kicked me out of the house.

That thought brought a wave of guilt with it, enough to nearly swamp my incredible high. Shit, Sebastian. He’d been drunk, and Ihadlet Chris drape himself all over me like a cat. Of course, that was mainly because Chris had been drunk too, and I’d been trying so hard to show Sebastian I could be nice to his friends, that I could be unintimidating and comfortable with gay guys touching me and generally chill.

That I could fit into his life as more than a temporary inconvenience.

I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, making a guy in a suit yammering away on his phone swerve around me. He shot me a dirty look, but I ignored him.

Wanting to stay with Sebastian…strike that, stay in Sebastian’s house…no, I couldn’t lie to myself. Stay with Sebastian. I did want to, and that’s why I’d tried so hard with Chris, and I hadn’t even understood my own motives until that moment.

I hadn’t gotten what I’d come for that night, but I was leaving the club with something a whole hell of a lot better: a chance to get my shit together.

And the person I most wanted to share that with? Sebastian, the one person who gave a fuck about me, the one person who’d been there for me, literally and figuratively. I got moving again, heading home as quickly as I could. He actually owed me an apology — for once, he wouldn’t need to put a dollar in the jar — but maybe I owed him one too. And I’d apologize whether I really needed to or not. He was worth the effort of swallowing my pride.

Chapter Thirteen

Sebastian

Aidan had been gone for exactly four minutes — I knew, because I checked my phone like twenty times in case he texted me or something — before I collapsed on the couch and cried. I was the asshole here. I knew it, and Aidan knew it, and instead of yelling at me he’d taken off and left me.

Left mehere. Not leftme. Whatever. Get it together, Seb.I didn’t get it together, but finally the sobs petered out and left me hollow and shaking and numb. A whole year had gone by since the last time I cried like that, and now I remembered why I’d tried so hard to not do that anymore. It sucked donkey dick, that was why.

Was it really so selfish of me to want to keep Aidan to myself? Yes, yes it was. I could allow myself that, though. My therapist — the real one, the one I’d found for myself after I moved out of my parents’ house and got the hell out of their soul-sucking gravitational event horizon — always told me that I could feel all my feelings, it was just acting on them that was wrong, sometimes. So I could feel selfish. I could acknowledge that I hated seeing him and Chris together, and that I wanted his attention. All of his attention.

Being a total bitch about it when he didn’t give me what I wanted was over the line, though. “I can’t control other people’s feelings or actions, only my own responses to them,” I muttered, exactly like Alicia had told me to do. Saying things out loud gave them more power, she said.

Well, this time it just made me feel stupid.

“Maybe I should get a cat, and then I wouldn’t feel like such an idiot talking to myself.” The house rang with mocking silence, and then the fridge motor kicked in and added a reproachful hum. “Or maybe I’d feel even stupider talking to a stupid cat.” My voice was hoarse and thin. I got up and headed into the kitchen in search of a glass of water. I’d need more than one if I wanted to avoid a hangover the next day.

Where had Aidan gone, anyway? He didn’t know anyone — anyone but Chris and Lucas. I squashed that thought the second it reared its dumb-ass head. He didn’t know where they lived, for one thing.

So, just out, like he’d said. That could mean anything, from taking a walk around the neighborhood to hitchhiking to Vegas.

I was glugging my second glass of water, leaning against the kitchen sink with my aching head starting to wobble on my neck from exhaustion, when I heard the front door open and shut. No slamming this time, but I still went rigid. Would he even want to talk to me, or would he go in his room and close the door, close me out?

No, he’d almost certainly go out to the back for a cigarette, which meant coming through the kitchen. But no again, he’d been out walking around. He wouldn’t need to.

A short silence fell, punctuated by the soft thuds and rustles of Aidan taking off his shoes and jacket, and then Aidan appeared in the kitchen doorway. He didn’t come into the room, just braced his hands on either side of the doorframe and looked at me.

Now I had his attention. He wasn’t even blinking. Those deep amber eyes were fixed on me, and he had that neutral mask in place — I had no idea what was going through his head.

I didn’t want to break the silence first, but the suspense was killing me. “Where’d you go?”

Aidan finally blinked, and he laughed a little. “A bar. I went out planning to get laid, but —”

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