Page 56 of The Long Game

Jack smiled. “Yes.”

They atea late dinner at Quigley’s, just like they had a hundred times before. Jack decided it was good to get back on the horse, even if he kept scanning the restaurant for any sign of Babs. They sat at a table instead of the bar, their knees bumping throughout the meal while they talked about the usual stuff, and Grady pretended not to notice Jack was even more vigilant than Grady himself.

At least Jack had managed to get a couple of hours in at his desk that afternoon, happy to have somewhere to go that wasn’t home where he knew Babs could find him. His office, buried in a quiet corner deep in the underpinnings of Moncton Arena, felt safer, which pissed him off.

He followed Grady home after dinner—not to watch the game, not for another beer, not because they had anything in particular to discuss—but for the express purpose of going to bed together.

It was weird. He knew it was weird. But it was also…good.

They jogged up the stairs to Grady’s apartment and went straight into the bedroom. Grady didn’t bother turning on more than one small bedside lamp and they silently stripped down to their underwear and t-shirts in the dim, intimate room. Grady’s eyes trailed over Jack’s legs, obviously curious about the swirls of ink, but he didn’t ask.

Jack took the clean shirt Grady passed him, smirking at how once again he had RCMP emblazoned across his chest, and changed into it once Grady had gone into the bathroom.

He hardly even batted an eye at “his” toothbrush waiting for him on the counter when he joined Grady. Standing shoulder to shoulder while they brushed their teeth settled some of the anxiety writhing under his skin ever since he’d seen Babs.

Climbing into bed was normal. Reaching for each other not even a little strange.

Okay, that was a lie.

It was fucking weird, and Jack knew it, but he couldn’t bring himself to care. He needed this. Hewantedit. The moment his chest bumped Grady’s and their legs tangled together, tension drained from him. He clung, shamelessly, and took a couple of deep breaths, each exhale smothering the anxiety further until it was barely an ember lodged deep in his chest.

Grady’s hand ran down his back, soothing him. When he pressed to the taut muscles at the base of Jack’s spine, Jack wriggled even closer and let out another long breath.

For a few seconds, he was completely at peace—which, of course, was the exact moment his dick noticed he was snuggled up to a beautiful man who smelled fucking delicious and whose long, strong thigh was threaded between his own and pressed up under his balls.

He tensed, but Grady stroked his warm palm over Jack’s shoulders and down his back again, like he could draw that tension away. And damned if it didn’t work—though it didn’t alleviate the erection situation.At all.

Grady didn’t seem to care. He kept rubbing Jack’s back and massaging those trigger points, pulling him incrementally closer each time. Jack tried to ease his hips back, but the shifting of their legs only drew his attention to the fact Grady was having the same problem.

Oh.

Well, if Grady was going to ignore it, then Jack would, too. It was a perfectly understandable reaction, after all, even ifJack couldn’t delude himself into believing this was a perfectly normal thing to do.

But it didn’t have to be normal to be good. It didn’t have to be normal for Jack to feel safe and warm and able to drop that extra edge of hypervigilance he’d been riding for most of the day.

Tilting his head, he buried his nose in the warm, sandalwood-scented pocket of air under Grady’s chin and let his eyes drift shut.

11

Grady buzzed Jack and Colton through the front door and scanned his apartment one more time. They’d crawled into bed so quickly the night before, they’d both failed to set an alarm. When Grady had happened to glance at his phone this morning, he’d practically fallen out of bed and taken Jack with him. Jack, thank god, had jumped into action, throwing on his jeans and dashing out the door to Pathways while Grady tidied his apartment.

He wished he’d had time to make the place more…he didn’t even know. Homey? Of course, he had no fucking idea how to do any such thing, so it was probably better that he didn’t try. At the very least he should have bought some goddamn food, but Jack was solving that problem, too, by stopping at the Dipsy Doodle Dangle Café on the way home. This had the dual benefit of giving them something to eat and buttering Colton up by indulging his caffeine and sugar cravings.

Jesus. He really didn’t feel prepared to become a…well, maybe not a parent. But a…custodial cousin?

Was that a thing?

Even if it wasn’t, it was going to be. Fuck. Hehoped.

The floorboards in the hallway squeaked and Grady bounded to the door like a golden retriever and yanked it open. “Hi! Come on in.”

Colton eyed him from the hallway, clutching the tray of coffees to his chest. “Most people wait until someone knocks.”

Jack’s eyes danced with silent laughter.

Okay, maybe Grady needed to dial it back a little.

“And please tell me you’re not a morning person,” Colton added.

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