Page 18 of Perfect Storm
Okay, so he hadn’t kissed Mo.
Levi shouldn’t be happy about that. Shouldn’t feel some kind of vicious satisfaction that it had beenhim, and not Morris.
But if he’d known that, maybe he wouldn’t have suggested it.
Lie, Levi’s subconscious yelled,you’re a fucking liar.
“Uh, good?”
Aidan’s cock was still pressing into his hip. Still just as hard as it had been when they’d been kissing, so obviously it had been. Levi had been there. It had been a really fucking good kiss. But maybe even more than that for Aidan.
This—and all the whiskey Aidan had drunk last night—was exactly why he’d said a year. Why he’d let Aidan go to bed alone last night.
Because Mo was still lingering between them, unmentioned, but still very much present.
Levi didn’t want to hear that Aidan had been saving his gay kissing virginity for Mo. Or that he’d settled for giving it to Levi, instead.
“Guess you showed me.” Aidan’s voice was rough and dry around the edges.
“Actually,” Levi said, “I thinkyoushowedme.”
Aidan laughed and finally took a step back. The awkwardness—or that weirdly quiet intimacy—hadn’t dissipated entirely, but it was beginning to.
Logan was always telling him that leaping without looking was going to bite him in the ass someday, and it seemed like that had finally happened.
If only it hadn’t happened withAidan.
The doorbell ringing sent Aidan even further away, his eyes darting in the direction of the front door. “That’s gotta be the pizza.” Aidan took off, and Levi nearly wanted to grab his T-shirt, haul him back.
But he didn’t let the desire take hold. Pushed it away, instead.
There was no fucking point in wanting it. Not yet, anyway.
By the time Aidan came back with the pizza, Landry and Riley had arrived in the kitchen, and they were chattering loud and insistently enough that the rest of whatever had just happened between him and Aidan was swept away, like smoke.
Landry was pulling more beers out of the fridge, and suddenly it was easy again. Their brotherly camaraderie back in spades. Riley poking sly fun at Aidan, and Aidan rolling his eyes. Landry slinging an arm over Levi’s shoulders, like he’d been doing their whole lives.
Everything back to normal. Exactly what Levi had been hoping for.
That should have made him feel better. More settled, anyway.
But the truth was, the thought lingered all through dinner, and the movie they put on in the living room, sprawled out with bags of popcorn, completing their cheat day.
What did it mean that he and Aidan could have the hot, almost intense passion of the kitchen and the ease and familiarity of the Banks-Flynn connection?
It shouldn’t be fucking him up that hecouldexperience both, that they could share both sides of a coin, but it kind of was. Why should it even come as a surprise? Riley and Landry had done it. Did it every single day.
But it was different for him, somehow. For himandfor Aidan.
Levi thought about it, still on the couch, as he watched Aidan heave himself up and head off to bed.
“Come on,” Landry said to Riley, “we should head up, too.”
“I wanna finish watching this,” Riley said, gesturing at the baseball game they’d put on after the movie. “Then I’ll be up.”
Levi made a noise of agreement, even though he could give a shit about baseball generally or this game specifically.
He didn’t want to go up to his empty bed. He wanted to slip into Aidan’s bedroom. Wondered if Aidan would tell him to get out, or would wave him in.
