Page 107 of The Rehoboth Retreat
I hesitated for half a second, then yanked the door open.
And there he was.
Miles Whitaker. Standing on my porch at nearly two in the morning like a tragic gay Hallmark movie got drunk and wandered into a Vogue editorial shoot.
His usually pristine hair was tousled, his eyes glassy and rimmed red. His face—flushed and vulnerable. His jaw tight, like he was trying to hold something in but failing miserably.
And there weretears. Not dramatic, heaving sobs—just quiet, steady rivers down both cheeks, catching the porch light and making him look both completely wrecked and painfully beautiful.
My entire body went still.
He didn’t say anything right away.
Neither did I.
I just stood there, barefoot in a hoodie, looking at the man I’d kissed on a dance floor, confessed to on the beach, and then promptly ran away from like the emotionally constipated dumbass I am.
And then—
“I’m so lost, Hudson.”
His voice cracked, and my knees nearly buckled.
“I want to move on. I want tomove forward,” he said, wiping his cheeks quickly like that would make this less intimate. “I never thought I’d feel this way about anyone again, not after Owen. But you… I’m falling for. Hard. And fast. Just like you said. Just as you are. And it scares the hell out of me.”
Fuck.
I couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t joke. I justfelt.
And before my brain could even sign off on it, my arms were around him.
I pulled him in tight—his body folding against mine like it had always belonged there. His face pressed into my neck, warm and damp. I held him like he might disappear. Like, maybe I would.
“You came back,” I whispered.
“I didn’t know where else to go,” he murmured.
I rested my chin on top of his head, swaying slightly on the porch. “Well. You’re here now. Which means either the world’s ending or I get a second chance to not completely fuck this up.”
He let out a small laugh, muffled by my hoodie.
“I vote for option two,” he said.
I kissed the side of his head. “Good. Because I was really hoping to redeem myself before sunrise.”
We stood like that for what felt like a small eternity—just breathing each other in. His cologne had faded into something even better: a mix of ocean salt, summer air, and Miles’ own scent. Something real. Something raw.
I pulled back just enough to see his face.
“C’mon,” I said, gently. “Let’s drink something stupidly expensive and sit by the beach like we’re the psychologically mature gays we pretend to be.”
He nodded, eyes still shiny, and followed me in.
I padded into the kitchen and opened the wine chiller, bypassing the whispering proseccos and bitchy rosés, reaching straight for the crown jewel: a 2012 Sassicaia Bolgheri. It cost more than most people’s wedding bands and had the body of a Fellini film—brooding, complex, and unapologetically Italian.
Miles blinked at it. “That’s a very expensive bottle of therapy.”
“Yeah, well, it’s either this or I start screaming into the ocean again.”
