Follow the River

But it’s also a load of bullshit.

To my core, I feel it. My gut, my instincts, they’re all pointing straight at him, like a beacon in the night, screaming this is it. This is the one you’re meant to keep.

If he’d fucking let me.

Because I’m painfully aware my entire fucking world now revolves around Ciaráin Grady and the someone he speaks of is a fucking crock of shit.

I don’t want someone. I want him.

And hell if I’m willing to sit here and even contemplate the idea of him being with someone else too.

A twinge pricks in the back of my mind when thoughts of Roman start stewing in my brain. The only other man Rain admitted to having an attraction towards.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not so self-important to think I’m the only man Rain has felt something for. That would be completely insane. Even if he was unaware of his sexuality, the straightest of arrows can admit another human of the same gender is attractive.

Still, Rain willingly revealing his past is groundbreaking, and the nosy, competitive part of me is dying to know more about the guy who caught his eye.

I fight the idea for a whole half second before snatching my phone from the nightstand and pulling up my Facebook app.

Yep, I’ve resorted to cyber stalking. Fan-fucking-tastic.

It doesn’t take long for me to dig up Rain’s profile, which seems to be inactive for the most part, as his last post was before he even left Clemson to come to Colorado. Seeing as his privacy settings are basically non-existent, I’m able to scroll through his friends list until I stumble across one Roman Mitchell.

Strange. For some reason, I thought his last name would be Anders.

No, not some reason.

He’s the son of a Pe

It would make a lot of sense for him to have such an adverse reaction to seeing the clip if his two best friends for most of his life had a molester for a father. Especially when Rain himself was a victim of sexual abuse as a kid.

Even still, Roman could have a different last name than his father, so it’s not ruled out entirely.

Clicking on the profile, I’m once again in luck his profile is also public. Or, at least public enough to be able to click through his photo albums. Starting with profile photos, I’m a

Not my type at all, seeing as he’s dressed in a well-tailored suit leaning against a fucking matte maroon Lambroghini Aventador like the rich fuck he is.

Okay, I might be harnessing my i

See? Not jealous at all.

I quickly flip through the photos from the past four years, ones either of him alone or with the same group of four other guys. They’re all good looking, but again, all dressed in suits or expensive as fuck clothing with their fancy cars. One of them even looks a little like my friend Asher.

Overall, none of the images are of interest to me since he and Roman haven’t spoken since Roman left for college in Portland, or at least somewhere close to there.

Wait.

My brain screeches to a halt.

Portland.

That night at the hotel in Portland comes rushing back. Jerking myself to images of him in the shower. Coming out to find him hard as a rock. One of my many proposals to get my mouth on that gorgeous cock of his.

But then…the sudden text message he received and his almost immediate departure from the room after.

He didn’t come back for hours, keeping me up half the night worried out of my fucking mind that something had happened. And when he did finally stumble back into the room well after last call, he was drunk off his ass and completely sex-mussed.

At the time, I thought he hooked up with some random chick.

But now…

Did he see Roman that night?

Unease bites at my stomach, causing it to roll, but I push it down.

No. Rain wouldn’t lie to me when he said he hadn’t seen Roman in years. He wouldn’t lie to me anymore.

Shaking the thoughts ru

Still, for a while, I find nothing except tons of photos of Roman and Siena.

Just as I’m starting to get discouraged, I find one.

I almost flip past it because it’s a photo of a photo, and he’s only tagged in it. It’s some sort of magazine photo. In it, I see Roman. Dressed in a suit, because of fucking course, with his arms wrapped around a man who looks very much the older version of Roman. Same brown hair, just cropped closer to his head, and same dark greenish hazel color eyes. He must clearly be Roman’s father. But here’s the thing.

He’s not Ted Anders.

Okay…so Roman isn’t the son of that fucking rapist. Good to know. Guess I have that piece of the puzzle figured out.

But then, when I arrow over for the next photo, all the puzzle pieces start snapping into place like magic.

Because in the image, another photo of a photo, has four men in it. From left to right is Roman’s father and then Roman himself. And beside Roman, it’s him.

Rain.

Younger Rain, that is. But it’s still Rain in, you guessed it, a suit.

I’ve seen Rain in a suit countless times, but I can tell this one is easily worth thousands of dollars more in comparison. And fuck, he looks sexy, even as teenager, probably about sixteen.

But the fourth man…the sight of him shoots ice through my veins.

Ted fucking Anders.

I feel my blood pressure rise as I take in the four of them, Roman and Rain between the two older men. If I didn’t know Roman was next his father, I’d think the two of them just happened upon the two Pe

But that is Roman’s father.

So that begs the question…why are they taking a photo with Ted and not only the three of them? Why would Roman’s father be introducing them to the other Senator, as if they would care who he is at sixteen years old?

And why the fuck is Ted fucking Anders slinging his arm over Rain’s shoulder like it’s his God given right?

My eyes scan the photo over and over again, searching for some kind of fucking clue as to what the hell is going on inside of it, but I come up short. The photo itself is more grainy than the first of just Roman and his dad, and when I zoom in to check the caption, it’s a blurred, pixelated mess. Looking at Facebook caption, I see it’s a photo from an a

Doing fast math in my head, I pull up Google and type in the name of the gala along with the estimated year and then Ted Anders, hoping like hell to find a digital version of the magazine the image from Facebook was on.