The following post contains spoilers for my new standalone romance, College Town, which I've placed beneath a cut for safe keeping. If you haven't read the book yet, and don't want to be spoiled, backspace now and come back later. If you're looking for a copy of the book, it's available for Kindle, paperback, Nook, and Kobo.
Tommy’s brows quirk, but he says, “Okay. I was going to find a way to contact you, though. So we could…”
“Talk? Yeah. You’ve said.”
“Lawson. Please.”
“What do you want me to say?”
“Can…” Tommy glances across the alley, pained. When he looks back, there’s a pleading tilt to his brows that Lawson remembers all too well; it doesn’t work as well as it used to, but it hurts to look at. “Can I buy you a cup of coffee?”
Lawson lifts his brows and gestures to the building he’s propped against.
“Fine, a cookie. You always liked the cookies here when we were kids.”
“My break ended two and a half minutes ago.”
“Okay,” Tommy says, huffing a little. “A drink, then, later. Tonight. There’s two dozen bars in his town.”
“You gonna bring the little missus?”
Tommy flinches hard.
“That’s who she is, right?” Lawson presses, though it makes his chest ache, makes his hands tremble where he’s tucked them into his armpits. “The ring’s hard to miss. You guys, like, match or whatever.”
Tommy’s lips press tight together, and two bright flags of color stand out along his high, narrow cheekbones. He looks small; his bespoke suit seems to swallow him a moment. After a moment, he says, slow but firm, “Let me buy you a drink. Just the two of us.”
“What if I say no?”
His chin juts out, an old familiar, mulish angle. “Then I’ll come back tomorrow and ask again.”
Tommy’s voice lifts into a hopeful register. “Can I spend the night?”
Lawson could have argued against a declaration, or a grudging question, but this honest, little-kid, wishful asking…oh boy. He’s not strong enough for that.
“Do you want to spend the night?” he asks, hedging.
“Yes,” Tommy says, simply.
Lawson feels him watching him, the weight of his gaze on the side of his face. Goosebumps break out down his arms, visible thanks to his short-sleeved shirt.
Tommy’s hand lands slow and light at his elbow, and then strokes down his forearm, fire pressure, smoothing the hair in the correct direction. Your choice, that touch says. You can kick me out.
They spent the night together at the mansion, but this is different, and it makes it marginally less terrifying that Tommy seems to know it. The mansion is a non-personal, rented space, not much different than a hotel.
But this is Lawson’s home. This is where he grew up. This is the bed where the two of them learned how to love one another with their bodies, while the house creaked and drowsed around them, and snow drifted up in the windowsill.
Lawson could kick him out. It’s tempting, in a way. But as he’s done since the day Tommy first walked into Coffee Town, he tortures himself with choosing to take what he can get while he can get it, and damn the consequences.
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