Page 72 of The Quarterback
Wes picked his way through the candle tins on tiptoe. His cheeks were flaming, and he refused to look at Nick’s bedroom door. “Should we go back to our room and wait for her to leave?”
“Nah.” Justin winked. “Let’s cook them breakfast. We’ve got to meet her sometime, right? What better time than now?”
Wes was still flushing as he went to the fridge. “I think your dad was planning on making breakfast for her, too.” He pulled out a bottle of champagne, a package of bacon, a new carton of eggs. “Breakfast in bed?”
“More like brunch, at this rate.” Justin snorted. He took the bacon and eggs and grabbed a frying pan. “Leave the champagne on the counter. I’m sure he’ll want to drink the whole bottle when he sees we’re here.”
Wes was the color of ocotillo flowers, cheeks and neck as red as red could get. He cleared his throat and set the champagne down, then started scooping the burned-out tea lights into a huge pile at the end of the kitchen island.
Nick’s bedroom door opened. Wes’s eyes flicked to Justin.
Carton of eggs in his hand, Justin leaned into Wes. He arched his eyebrows and tried not to have such a shit-eating grin on his face. God, it was going to be fun to tease his dad about this—
Colton walked out of his dad’s bedroom.
There were hickeys on his chest.
Bruises in the shape of two hands—ten fingers—on his hips, rising above the low-slung waistband of his boxers. No, not his boxers. Justin’sdad’sboxers. Ones he remembered his dad opening on Christmas morning, one of those gag gifts that dads got every year. He recognized those boxers.
But Colton was wearing them. Why was he wearing those boxers? Why was he in Justin’s dad’s bedroom, especially after—
“Colton?” Wes’s voice was thin. High, tight, strangled.
Justin looked from Colton—he has hickeys on his chest—to the scattered candles and then back.
He dropped the eggs and screamed.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Nick racedout of his bedroom, chasing the scream that had cut through his condo.Colton. Was he all right? Though that hadn’t sounded like Colton’s voice. It had almost sounded like—
He slammed to a halt. Time stopped. The world jerked sharply to the left, and he stumbled.
Justin and Wes faced him and Colton. A carton of eggs lay shattered on the kitchen floor. Wes’s eyes were as big as dinner plates, and he stared at Colton, motionless.
Justin was nearly hyperventilating.
Oh, God, it wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Wes and Justin were supposed to get home next week. He had days, he’d thought, to figure out what to do. What to say—to Colton, to his son. When he’d watched Colton sleep last night, he’d thought that, that weekend, he was going to tell Colton how much he meant to Nick. What their summer had turned into for him, and how, even if Colton was going to move on when his real life restarted, Nick would cherish these memories for the rest of his life. He’d cradle them in his heart forever.
He couldn’t, wouldn’t ask Colton to stay, though. He wasn’t arrogant enough to think Colton would pick him over football and a life of fame, and he was too much of a coward to hear Colton say that to his face. Better to let Colton go gracefully, leave him with the good memories, than leave him with the image of Nick asking for something Colton couldn’t give.
Even if together they could shake the stars, and even if, when Colton fell asleep in his arms at night, Nick knew that what they’d become had gone far outside the boundaries he’d tried to scribble around his heart.
Whatever was going to happen with him and Colton, he was supposed to have had a week to figure it out. One week, one hundred hours, at least. More moments when Colton was his, when he could look at Colton and think,I cherish him, and for right now, he cherishes me.
One week until he had to decide what to tell Justin. He’d punted that decision, that conversation, waiting for Colton to pull the plug and call an end to their affair. If they were over, Justin didn’t need to know.
But theyweren’tover—not yet—and Justindidknow. Right now.
“Did you guys…” Wes spoke first. He sounded like he’d been choked. His huge eyes bounced from Colton to Nick and then back to his best friend. “Did you guys have a threesome?” He asked the question like he was asking if Colton was pregnant. Like it was impossible, but so was what he was seeing, so he had to ask. “Is there a girl here?”
Nick dragged in a breath—
“No, Wes,” Justin spat. His voice was as hard as a diamond, as brittle as old glass. And certain. Justin knew. God, heknew. “I know what it looks like when someone getsfucked.” He pointed at Colton, at the bruises Nick had left on his hips.
“Justin,” Nick started.
Justin twisted. Faced him.
