Page 103 of Perfect Storm
Personally, Levi thought it was the sexiest when Aidan talked this way. If he wasn’t currently on the phone with his brother, he’d be tackling Aidan to the couch. Kissing him and grinding their hips together until Aidan couldn’t take it anymore.
Riley gave a self-deprecating laugh, but Aidan kept going. “No, seriously, Ri. You made the right call. You nearlyalwaysmake the right call, and nobody does all the time. You’re doing a stellar job, and your instincts are spot-on. Trust those, okay?”
Riley said he would and a minute later the call was over.
Aidan glanced behind him, meeting Levi’s eyes. “Sorry,” he said, “Riley just wanted some advice on some plays from their last game.”
“Didn’t you get in trouble with Landry for doing that?” Levi asked.
Aidan pursed his lips as Levi came around the kitchen island, then sank onto the couch next to him.
“Yeah,” he said. “Before. But a lot’s changed since then. I learned my lesson. If Riley wants feedback, I’m always happy to give it to him, but I wait til he asks.”
“Does he?”
“Ask?” Aidan pondered this. “Yeah. I mean, not right away he didn’t. And I get that. We needed that reset time. More me, to see how Riley had grown up and changed. But him too, to tell me when I was being too overbearing.” Aidan laughed, a little self-consciously. “We just both love each other too much, you know? Too many years of it being just us against the world. I love him so much I want to coddle him, and he loves me too much to tell me I’m fucking it up.”
“But now he does, ’cause he trusts you.” Levi wanted Aidan to see that—that yes, he’d fucked it up before, maybe, but that he’d become a better person, so he could be a better brother. Sometimes Levi thought Aidan only saw his initial flaws. Not the changes he’d made with blood and sweat and tears to turn things around.
“Yeah, he must,” Aidan said. He paused and shot Levi a look. “You’re not that sly, you know.”
“Hey, I wanted you to see it and you do. Did you fuck up before? Sure. But you don’t anymore, so stop mentally beating yourself up, okay?”
“Easier said than done,” Aidan said wryly, but still, he’d seen it, which was all Levi was after.
“I’ll just have to keep reminding you.” Levi was not only willing to do it, hewantedto do it.
Maybe that should’ve scared him, but it didn’t.
“I’d like that,” Aidan said, and it felt like more than a friend thing. Felt like more than a “sex pact” thing, for sure. But Levi didn’t want to push. In July, Aidan had been heartbroken over Mo. Maybe he was still heartbroken over Mo. There was a part of Levi that wanted to ask—neededto ask, nearly—but he didn’t,because what if he was? What if Aidan was in love with Mo and Levi was in love with . . .
He cut that thought off hard and fast.
He wasn’t. Hewasn’t.
He absolutely could not be.
That would be insane and very, very stupid, and after witnessing his siblings be both of those things regularly, Levi had done everything he could to avoid following in their footsteps.
“Good,” Levi said, nodding, faking a confidence he didn’t quite feel. “’Cause it’s happening.”
There was a faint vibration noise. Levi dug his phone out of his pocket, but it hadn’t been his. He glanced over at Aidan, who was staring at his phone, sitting on the coffee table, with an inscrutable expression on his face.
“Who is it?” Levi asked. He stretched out on the couch, wondering if he could bait Aidan into playing some video games before they went to bed.
Before they went tobed.
“It’s . . .uh . . .Mo.”
Everything inside Levi clenched hard and tight. A cold ball of dread formed in the base of his stomach, even though he tried to ignore it.
Levi understood that straight peopledidexist, and it was very possible Morris Jeffries was one of them, but the deeper into this thing he got with Aidan, the more outrageous it seemed that you could know Aidan andnotwant him desperately. Maybe Mo had changed his mind.
“Oh.” Levi didn’t know what to say. Wasn’t sure he could keep up the casual pretense.
“It’s nothing,” Aidan brushed off. He stood up and headed towards the bedroom. Every single one of Levi’s muscles clenched. Should he follow? Should he ask if Aidan was okay?Should he ask what Mo had said?Couldhe ask what Mo had said?
He wanted to, desperately, even though he wasn’t sure he should.
