Page 115 of Burning for Alexander
Guests mingled with a blend of curiosity and suspicion while Alex’s great-granny greeted each arrival from her perch near the large but cold fireplace like a benevolent monarch, wineglass in hand, and her wife, Irene, busied herself with introductions that somehow felt more like chess moves than polite conversation. The undercurrent of purpose was palpable, though cloaked in charm and candlelight.
“Yet,” Alex said softly, as if he were tasting the word for possibility.
“Hm?” I murmured as we reached the open bar. “What do you want, baby? Wine or beer? Ginger ale?”
“You said you didn’t have a wedding bandyet.”
I shrugged. “There’s no rush. Whenever you’re ready. White or red? I think I’m going to have a bourbon.”
Alex yanked my hand and pulled me off to the side. I shot the bartender an apologetic smile and followed Alex to a secluded spot against the wall. “What is it? Oh, there’s Jett. I still can’t get over how much the two of you donotlook alike at all. I blame the mistaken identity on my head injury.” A point I’d made before, but every time I saw Jett now, it bore repeating.
When we’d met each other at Christmas, Jett had laughed his ass off. “Man, I should have scooped that silver fox!”
Alex had gone semi-feral. The possessive, claiming sex we’d had that night remained in my top five highlight reel. Maybe it was because it had been the first time I’d bottomed for him, but it might have also been because seeing Alexander Marian that hot and jealous at the same time had made me see fucking stars when I came. He never failed to light me up inside.
Case in point. At the edge of the mingling crowd, he gripped my necktie and pulled me close, which only served to make my dick hard.
“Baby, if you’re trying to get me to focus, you’re being too bossy,” I murmured.
“Are we getting married?” His voice sounded breathy and strange.
“Uh, not today. But yes. Surely that’s understood. Unless you don’t want to? In which case, I’m going to still need a verbal lifelong commitment from you of some kind. But there’s no rush.”
Alex’s face broke out in a wide grin. “I love you.”
I smiled back and looked around at all the men starting to take their seats at the various large round tables. “I know. And thank god because your great-aunt and great-granny scare the fuck out of me. They’re ruthless. I don’t think I would have made the cut for this thing.”
“Can we leave early and have wild animal sex in our hotel room?”
I focused back on him in confusion. “I thought that was a given, too. That’s how we celebrate things, remember?”
Alex laughed, but I was serious. It was how we’d celebrated when the asshole judge who’d harassed Tavo had ended up on the other side of a judge’s bench, and when the Timber renovations had finally been completed, four months after the fire, so that Tavo and Drew could move in to the rabbit warren. It was also how we’d celebrated when Alex’s beloved Diet Coke had gone on a two-for-one sale at the grocery store last week.
One of the things I loved best about life with my firebug was that we were committed to celebrating the hell out of every day we were together… and, let’s be honest, we’d take any excuse to have wild animal sex.
We finally moved to the bar to order our drinks before finding our seats at a table off to the side. The name card placement—and the appearance of Tommy and Foster—had made it obvious we were at the boring couples’ table instead of any of the many fun singles’ tables.
“Welcome to the old folks’ home,” Foster said with a wide grin. “Aren’t you glad you’re not single?”
I reached out for a fist bump. “Fuck, yes.”
Foster and Tommy had quickly become some of my closest friends. Alex and I got together with them regularly back home in Legacy, and Ella was usually part of that regular crew also. In fact, she’d recently brought my own Cody McMasters along to one of Tommy and Foster’s backyard barbecues out at their cabin on the SERA campus.
I’d tried hard not to interrogate Cody about it, but I could tell he was goofy for Alex’s big sister. Unfortunately, Ella herself was playing it close to the vest.
As the meal began, Foster leaned over and whispered made-up stories about several of the men in attendance.
“He’s a bull rider,” he said, tilting his head toward a clean-cut guy with tidy blond hair who was wearing an expensive suit. “Masquerading as a tech bro.”
Alex leaned over from the other side. “He’s actually a tech bro masquerading as a tech bro,” he murmured. “Total douche, too. He dated a guy I went to college with.”
“That one,” Foster said, pointing with his butter knife at a man with a quirky smile and messy man bun. “Snuck in without an invitation. He’s doing an exposé on dating in the twenty-first century. He’s straight as an arrow.”
Four minutes later, Man Bun snuck his hand onto the lap of the man next to him.
“Whomp, whomp,” Tommy said. “Sorry, babe. You’re not that good at this.”
Foster met Tommy’s eyes and winked at him. “You saying a straight man can’t have his horizons broadened, Doc?”
