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With his dry hand, Ba
“I was checking on Rook.”
“Sure you were. I recognize that expression.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Ambrose smirked. “You’ve got it bad.”
“Fuck off.” There was no point in denying it. He barely knew the girl¸ and he was angsting over her more than he had right to. Going into their arrangement, he’d known it wasn’t going to turn into anything long term, but after just one day together, he had the most idiotic crush on her.
Ambrose swept his arms across the water, the heavy black Roman numeral tattoos still looking as new and crisp as the Norse tats on Ba
Doing a few laps helped Ba
“Now, if you’d tell me what you did with her, I could give you a more informed idea about why she’s not returning your texts.” His friend paused, and his gaze sharpened. “You haven’t sent any more texts, right?”
“I’m not telling you anything, perv. And no, I haven’t.”
“Good man. You have to leave the ball in her court now, otherwise you look desperate and creepy.” Leave it to Ambrose to be a smug bastard about women, as though his own love life was healthy and thriving.
“I know that, jerkoff.”
“I don’t think you really know how this works, Ba
Ba
“Well, he’s visiting his babushka, so your sorry ass is stuck with me.”
“I know he won’t be back from Russia for a while, but the next time he goes we have to make sure he gets a fucking Facebook account first. He doesn’t check his e-mail.” Ba
“It’s not like I’ve had, what? A girl blow me off? Try having your sub abandon you after six years.”
“Jeez. Do you need a tissue, Ambrose? Shae left you almost two years ago. You don’t get to play that card every time I have relationship issues.” Sometimes it seemed like Ambrose was just using Shae as an excuse to not get involved in anything serious again. Sleeping with Ba
Ambrose snorted. “Maybe your dick is defective.”
“Fuck you.”
“I think it’s better if we just stay friends. Your defective dick might ruin things between us.”
Ba
As Ambrose got out of the pool, Ba
“Kate called me Master. Twice.”
The levity drained from the room. Ambrose paused in his toweling, and his brows shot upward. “Seriously? That’s an interesting turn of events.”
“Yeah.” Ba
“You co
“It was wild. If she wasn’t new and only interested in experimenting I’d be on her doorstep, trying to convince her to give me a real shot. But that’s not what we agreed to.” He leaned back in the chair, the familiar creak of the rattan a
“Either you freaked her out, or she freaked herself out later.”
“Who knows? She’s not talking to me.”
Ambrose winced. “That face. People write entire country albums about the look you have on your face right now. Did she steal your dog, your horse, and your pickup?”
“If she did, I’d have a legit reason to stay away from her.” Ba
Which would be worse—if she showed up next Saturday, like they’d agreed on, or if she didn’t? Maybe the chemistry was a onetime thing. Maybe the giddy feeling he’d gotten when she’d sat on his lap to watch the movie, and the intelligence and humor he’d seen in her while they talked were all just about him being lonely and deluding himself. He barely knew her, really. Becoming infatuated with her now wasn’t very smart. “Let’s go get me drunk.”
“No drunk dialing her. Deal?”
He walked to the pool’s edge and picked up his phone. Instinctively he checked it, then held it out to Ambrose. “Yeah, you’d better hang on to this.”
His friend shook his head. “Hopeless.”
***
Ba
His dad had been a bit of a workaholic, trying to give them a good life. He wasn’t home long enough to fix anything or mow the lawn, so it’d looked out of place in their tidy neighborhood. He had learned how to do that stuff from Victor, the old man who lived next door. He’d tried to fill in as the man of the house from the time he’d hit middle school. It wasn’t until he was old enough to learn the family business that Ba
Not long after his father had died, Ba
The door was answered promptly by Sha
“Stop!”
Ba
“I’m too old for this, Ba
“Suddenly, this is too undignified for someone your age?”
“I’m fourteen, not six.”
It was difficult not to point out that Rook was about the size Ba
The great room was empty and spotless, other than a collection of Rook’s art supplies and his easel by the bay window. He put the boy down near his workstation and studied the grays and blacks of the bleak winter forest the paper held. Beautiful, in a quiet, sad way. His use of light and shadow were exceptional.
“You said charcoal, right?” Ba