Accidentally in Love (9 page)
Read Accidentally in Love Online
Authors: Jane Davitt,Alexa Snow
Tags: #Romance, #M/M Contemporary, #Contemporary, #Gay, #Source: Amazon
Tom would be so interested in everything that was happening, that cute frown on his face, his teeth digging into his lip as he concentrated.
Cal panted, the sound harsh, desperate. The fantasies in his head were chaotic as a dream, changing swiftly until he wasn’t sure what was turning him on most, just that he was aroused to the point where even Tom appearing at the top of the stairs wouldn’t have stopped him from coming.
He knew what Tom’s face would look like, coming, contorted with pleasure, but he couldn’t picture Tom’s expression watching
him
come. He could hear Tom’s voice, though, whispering, “Come on, Cal.” And imagining that was all it took. Cal shuddered as he shot, lips clamped firmly together to keep any noise from escaping him.
As soon as the most intense part of it was over, he flushed with shame. What the hell was he doing? Silently, he fastened his pants, stripped his T-shirt off, and used it to wipe the wall and floor clean. After that, he retreated to his room and shut the door—again, as quietly as he could—and got into a hot shower, where he scrubbed his skin clean with a washcloth.
He couldn’t, no matter how fiercely he berated himself, scrub away the sense of disgust he felt. Cal didn’t know what was happening to him, but he knew he didn’t like it.
* * *
The next day, Cal avoided Tom as much as possible, using the excuse of work to keep his door closed. It wasn’t a lie, or not much of one anyway. He always had something to do, but the deadline job had been e-mailed off before breakfast. Not being able to sleep did have some benefits, and the night before he’d used work to distract him from what he’d done—and more importantly why he’d done it.
Tom was important to him. Cal could acknowledge that without hesitation. He’d saved Cal from a nasty situation when he could’ve just walked away, and his clear-eyed appraisal and disapproval of Cal’s behavior had taken guts to voice. Cal admired courage, but that didn’t explain why he wanted to protect Tom when Tom had shown quite plainly that he could take care of himself.
Nothing, absolutely nothing, explained why the thought of Tom sharing kisses and more with another man had turned Cal into a voyeur, consumed by what looked like possessiveness, now that his head was cooler and his dick under control. Jesus, what had gotten into him? Tom wasn’t his. He’d repaid Tom by finding him a date, and it was working out great. Job done, debt paid, and time for him to follow Tom’s example and try seeing someone for more than a single date.
Filled with good intentions, he went downstairs to the kitchen to make a late lunch. Tom was sitting at the table spooning up soup with a pensive look on his face and an unmistakable hickey on his neck.
Shit
. Cal closed his eyes for a moment and fought back his affront that Joe had messed up Tom’s skin like that, bruising it, reddening it, marking it. Cal had left bruises and scratches on lovers himself from time to time, and walked away with his own skin bitten and scored by sharp nails, marks made in the heat of a passionate moment, soon forgotten, unimportant.
Telling himself Tom had probably enjoyed it—hell, it might’ve been what made him whimper, if that small, throat-caught sound had been real, Cal walked over to the fridge.
“You look like crap,” Tom said by way of greeting. “Did you stay up all night on that project or something?”
To tell the truth would have been impossible, so Cal went with the easy lie. “Yeah. Just got it sent off. Finally.” He opened the fridge and looked into it. “What about you? Good night?” He kept his gaze trained at the shelves, not wanting to see whatever might be on Tom’s face.
“The movie was fun,” Tom said. “One of those complicated plots that you don’t care about because things keep blowing up and the hero’s shirt gets ripped open every ten minutes or so.”
Cal grabbed a tomato and a piece of cheese wrapped in plastic. Simple sounded good right then, though he usually enjoyed building up a complex, layered sandwich full of crunch and flavor.
“Sounds like the perfect date-night movie,” he said, forcing his voice to stay casual. He closed the fridge door and set his supplies on the counter. “One you don’t have to pay much attention to.”
Tom didn’t pretend not to know what Cal was asking, which was a relief. “Yeah, maybe it wasn’t so much that the plot was complicated and more that I missed a few key scenes fending Joe off.”
Cal turned the tomato over so that it was resting firmly on the chopping board that was supposed to be put away in a cupboard when it wasn’t being used. It was a rule Tom broke all the time. Cal never followed it either. It was a huge, solid hunk of wood, and it was so much easier to leave it out. He focused his attention on the deep red of the tomato, wondering if a series of photographs of one ripening before decaying would be interesting or hackneyed.
His focus slipped, and like the night before, he found himself picturing Tom on the couch, the whimper one of protest this time. Common sense reasserted itself. Tom wouldn’t whimper faintly if Joe was doing something that he didn’t like. The idea was ridiculous enough that he chuckled aloud.
“It wasn’t funny,” Tom said, a touch of indignation audible. “It was fucking awkward.”
Tom didn’t swear often, so that brought Cal’s head around. “Why?”
“Kissing, fine. I liked that.” Tom frowned down at his bowl of soup as if he’d spotted a fly in it. “And I didn’t mind his hands wandering all over me, because I was doing that to him too. I just wasn’t ready for—” His spoon clattered onto the table, and he looked up, meeting Cal’s eyes. “He wanted to blow me,” Tom said flatly. “Right there on the couch. Jesus, I hardly know him!”
Cal knew he should feel sorry for Tom, but he didn’t. Instead, he felt something that might have been relief, bizarre though that was. “It matters to you that you get to know him first?”
“Yes,” Tom said with admirable succinctness.
“I can see why you’re still a virgin.” Cal held up his hands and tried to look placating. “Hey, no. I didn’t mean it like that. It’s fine—however you are, Tom, it’s fine. As long as it’s okay with you.”
“It’s not.” Tom was clearly moping over the way his date had gone. “I want to have a boyfriend. And have sex.
God
, I want to have sex. Just not with some stranger.”
“Instant boyfriend, just add water,” Cal observed, and Tom sighed.
“Yeah. It’s ridiculous, isn’t it. This part—it’s just too hard for me. I don’t think I was cut out for it. Maybe I’m not meant to have a boyfriend.”
Abandoning his sandwich-making for the moment, Cal went over to the table and sat across from his roommate. “I’ve been thinking the same thing.”
“No, you haven’t. You’re
great
at this.” The look Tom gave him was one of frank disbelief.
“I’m great at having sex with people I barely know.” Cal put his own issues out of his mind, because it wasn’t always about him. “If Joe’s the wrong guy for you—”
“It’s not that I think he is,” Tom protested. “I just don’t
know
. And I need more time to figure it out, and I can’t do that when he’s being Mr. Octopus Grabby-hands.”
“Grabby-hands Tentacle-sucker,” Cal said helpfully, and Tom gave him an astonished look and then burst out laughing. “Sorry.”
“No, don’t. Don’t be sorry.” Tom gasped and laughed more. “You’re horrible. Tentacle-sucker. Jesus.”
“Just tell him,” Cal said. “Tell him you’re not ready for anything more than making out. If he’s a good guy, he’ll give you time. If not, we’ll find you someone who is.” Secretly, Cal found himself hoping that Joe would bail in the face of Tom’s hesitant nature, since he was beginning to believe that Joe just wasn’t good enough for Tom. That wasn’t based on anything concrete, but he wasn’t examining his gut reaction too closely, so he didn’t care.
Tom sobered. “This doesn’t have to be a new hobby for you,” he said. “Finding me a date, I mean. If it doesn’t work out with Joe, I can go back to the club, or another one, and just put myself out there a bit more.”
Cal kept the dismay off his face with an effort. It would be like staking out a kitten in the lion compound. Tom would look like the tastiest nibble out there to some men. Young, naive, unaware of how good-looking he was… Innocence didn’t appeal to everyone, but for some, taking it away was a kick, and they wouldn’t all be happy to accept no as an answer.
“Promise me that you won’t go clubbing without me or Joe.”
“Why?” Tom looked puzzled, not offended. “That place we went to seemed okay. It wasn’t a dive or sleazy.”
“It’s always good to have a backup along.” Cal hoped Tom would take his word for it. “Just in case. Sitting there by yourself sends the wrong message.”
“Well, okay.” Tom gave a shrug that said he didn’t get it but didn’t care enough to argue. “Just don’t feel that you’re responsible for me, because you’re not. And I can take care of myself.”
“I know. I remember.” In Cal’s mind, there was a world of difference between shouting at a man who was kicking your roommate and physically stopping someone you’d been kissing who wanted to take things further than you did. The thought of Tom being in that position was a little crazy-making.
In fact, Cal was beginning to think that everything about Tom was crazy-making, and not in a bad way.
“And I hate this font,” Derek said, pointing at the perfectly reasonable one Tom had chosen for the headers.
“What do you hate about it?” Over the years, Tom had learned that it was easier to ask what someone didn’t like than to spend forty-five minutes offering alternatives.
“It’s boring,” Derek said. “Can’t we have something more—I don’t know—swirly?”
Tom gave him a look. “Swirly?”
“You know.” Derek gestured with his fingers, waving them in the air. “Fancy.”
“It’s not boring; it’s practical,” Tom told him. “You want something that’s easy to read. Trust me, no one wants to go to a Web site for fancy and swirly. They want to be able to read what’s on the page and get the information they’re looking for.”
Derek seemed disappointed. “I don’t know. It’s just kind of dull.”
“What if I changed the color behind the text?” Tom asked, making the change as he spoke. “There, see? Is that better?”
“Yeah, much!” Derek brightened, and Tom went back to work on the rest of the page.
“So how’s Marianne? Getting big?” He’d been doing this long enough that he could hold a casual conversation while he typed.
“Huge.” Derek sketched out a shape that Tom caught out of the corner of his eye. If Marianne’s stomach was really that big, she had to be carrying triplets. Jesus, he hoped not. Maybe Derek’s jitters were down to worry over his wife now that her due date was approaching. “She can’t sleep. Can’t get comfortable,” Derek continued. “That means I don’t get much sleep either.”
Ah
. Tom turned his head and gave Derek a sympathetic smile. “Good practice for when the baby arrives,” he said.
Derek made a sound that was close to a piteous moan. “Don’t tell me that! Our baby’s going to sleep through the night. Marianne’s been researching all these methods that really work. Lighting. Background music. Things.”
What Tom knew about babies would fit nicely on a single screen in a large font. He’d worked in offices for long enough, listening to baby stories, to bet a week’s paycheck that the baby would do what all newborns did and make its parents’ lives hell.
Derek wandered away, and Tom finished up what he was doing. Getting him in to redesign the company’s Web site was a waste of the business’s money in some ways. Tom’s hourly rate was high. The
Beckers
preferred to work with people they knew, though. Tom had a list of tasks that Derek wanted him to clear and was expecting to be in the office for the rest of the week. For one thing, the bakery was adding wedding cakes to the services it provided. To that end, Derek and Marianne had hired two new bakers who specialized in building and decorating wedding cakes. All in all, it meant several new pages added to the Web site, at the least.
“You’re going to need new photos,” Tom called to Derek.
“I’ll get Cal to take them,” Derek said. “He took the others.”
Right
. Tom had somehow forgotten about that. Once reminded, he knew he’d seen Cal’s name in type. “Want me to e-mail him and ask?”
“Sure. Thanks.”
Tom opened his e-mail program, ignoring the electronic
ding
that told him he’d received incoming mail. Most of it was bound to be spam. Fingers moving quickly, he typed a message to Cal.
Hey Cal—
Derek wants to know if you can take photos for their new wedding cake sideline?
—Tom
He messed around with the new main wedding cake page, creating links to the new page that listed the flavors of cake and buttercream icings and another that shared feedback customers had given praising the talents of the new bakers. He was just starting a page for photos when his e-mail went ding again, and this time he checked it.
Tom—
Sure. Tell Derek I’ll call him to set it up. How’s it going?
—Calvin Reece
Calvin Reece Photography
“Cal says sure. He’ll call you to figure out when to do it,” Tom said to Derek in the test kitchen next door, raising his voice so it would carry over the sound of the mixer that was beating batter of some kind. “Something smells good!” It did, like vanilla and maybe cinnamon.
A moment later, Derek stuck his head back into the small office space. “Muffins,” he said. “Want one?” He was holding it in anticipation of Tom’s answer.
“Of course.” He held out his hand. The paper cup cradling the muffin was still warm and slightly greasy, and when Tom took his first bite, it was like heaven. “So good.”
“That’s what we like to hear,” Derek said. Someone called his name from the kitchen, and he gave Tom an apologetic smile and disappeared to deal with whatever crisis had arisen. Marianne usually kept things running smoothly. With her resting in the final weeks of her pregnancy, her ankles swollen, and her blood pressure high, Derek was on his own.
Tom didn’t envy him the additional workload and the stress, though he supposed it would all be worth it when the baby arrived. He liked babies in a vague way. They were uncomplicated and honest. If they were unhappy, they screamed. If they were content, they blew spit bubbles and gurgled.
Deciding that the muffin was a signal for him to take a break, he topped up his cup from the coffeemaker in the corner, filled with a fragrant and powerful brew, and sat down to read the rest of his e-mail. He dealt with whatever spam his filters had missed, taking bites of the muffin every time he saw one that offered to increase the size of his dick and sips of coffee when he saw a hopeful attempt to get him to pass over his credit card details in return for untold millions.
There was one from his parents. After scanning it quickly, he left that to answer later at home. They were fine and wanted to know that he was, no more than that. But if he sent back a single sentence saying that, his mom would call him. Fending off a phone call with a longer e-mail was a good use of his time, as far as Tom was concerned. The phone conversations with his parents tended to end badly and leave him worked up and irritable.
His cell phone, which was sitting next to his laptop on the table, chose that moment to vibrate. He hated hearing other people’s cell phones go off—it always seemed to happen at inconvenient times, and it always irritated him—so he kept his own on vibrate most of the time.
A quick glance at the phone showed that it wasn’t a call but a text message from Joe.
Hey, handsome, it said. Hope you’re having a good day. Looking forward to Thursday night.
Tom had mixed feelings about Joe. On the one hand, he seemed like a really nice guy, and he was certainly good-looking. On the other, it seemed like he couldn’t wait to get in Tom’s pants, which, while flattering, Tom suspected might get old before he was ready to actually get naked with the man. Which meant this was all going to be a waste of time from Joe’s point of view, and it wasn’t nice to lead someone on, even if you didn’t mean to.
Me too
, he texted back. Joe had offered to cook him dinner, which could be an excuse to get him alone. When it came right down to it, Tom enjoyed Joe’s company, and it would have been awkward to suggest that they meet somewhere in public instead.
Another text came in a moment later, which left Tom rolling his eyes. They’d said everything they needed to say, and he wanted to get back to work. Of course, it might not be Joe. He picked up his phone and glanced at the screen.
Did I mention what I plan for desert?
Tom noticed the typo immediately. It was part of his job to spot them, and it was amazing how many companies wrote copy for their pages that included some absurd errors. He decided not to point out to Joe that he needed another s to accompany the first. He wanted the conversation to end, but he didn’t want it to end with Joe mad at him.
No, what?
You plus some chocolate sauce. How does that sound?
Tom put the phone down and picked up the muffin liner. He began to fold it smaller, pleating the slick paper. How it sounded was gross and unimaginative, but Joe was just flirting and that was part of a relationship, after all. He tried to come up with something light and casual to text back. Before he could do it, Joe texted him again.
I’ve been thinking about you naked a lot.
I’m at work
. Tom hit Send. That seemed abrupt, so he sent another text.
Sorry.
Is that your way of telling me you’re not naked like me?
I’m at work. No, not naked
. He hoped that would be the end of the discussion for now. It wasn’t that he didn’t think he’d ever be into sexually suggestive texting. Sometime, sure. Maybe. It just seemed like the kind of thing you’d do to spice things up a few years into a relationship, not before you’d even seen each other naked.
Because he felt like he ought to, Tom imagined Joe naked. He liked what he saw in his mind, but he didn’t feel a particular desire to feel Joe’s bare skin against his own or to touch Joe’s erection.
A wave of confusion and near terror swept over Tom. Was it possible that he wasn’t actually gay?
No, he reminded himself. He’d always fantasized about men, never women.
Sorry
, Joe’s text came back.
You’re not into this, are you?
Biting his lip, Tom tried to decide how to respond.
I’m just busy. Some other time, maybe
. He hesitated before sending it, then hit the button.
Joe responded with a smiley face, so presumably he wasn’t too disappointed in Tom’s apparent lack of an adventurous spirit.
“Hi. Tom, right?”
Tom turned his head and saw a pretty little brown-haired woman in the doorway. She couldn’t have been more than five feet tall.
“Right.”
“I’m Heidi, the new baker. Derek said you wanted to ask me something?”
“Oh, yeah. I wanted to add you to the bios page on the Web site, so I was hoping maybe you could write up something? Just a paragraph or two. No big deal. Or if you weren’t comfortable doing it, I could help.”
Heidi leaned against the doorway. “It’s fine. I can do it. You want stuff like where I went to school?”
“Sure, and whatever else you think people might want to know about you. It can be serious or quirky.”
“I think
quirky’s
more my style.” Heidi pulled the collar of her shirt down to reveal a complicated, colorful tattoo.
“Oh, cool.” Without thinking about it, Tom stood and moved closer. “Wow, that’s amazing. How far down does it go?”
To his surprise, she stepped back, her hands coming up in front of her
to ward
him off. “I’m seeing someone.”
Tom blinked at her. “Uh… Good?”
Heidi frowned at him. “That wasn’t a come-on?”
“From
me
? No.” Tom gestured at her neck. “Your ink’s interesting and there’s obviously more of it, so I was just asking. I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable.”
Heidi relaxed. “No, my bad. It’s just…some guys are jerks, you know? They think if I don’t mind getting needles stuck in me, I’m fond of pricks, if you get what I mean.”
Tom couldn’t help grinning. “I’m fond of them too,” he said demurely.
It was Heidi’s turn to look confused, but only for a moment. “Huh? Oh! You’re gay?”
Tom didn’t share his current doubts with her. Deep down, he knew that they were based in insecurity rather than a genuine concern about his orientation. “Yeah,” he said simply. “No tattoos, though. I’m too much of a wimp.”
“It’s an acquired taste.”
“Unlike your muffins,” Tom told her. “If you’re the one who baked the cinnamon ones, that is.”
“That’s me.” She grinned widely, relaxed again. “I was just following Derek’s recipe, though. I’ve been moving around every couple of years. I went to school, and then I worked at a bakery for a year and a half. After that I was baking cakes out of my house. Now I’m here. I take it you aren’t, usually?”
“I’m just updating the Web site,” Tom explained. “I didn’t design it originally, but I did a pretty major overhaul on it a couple of years ago, and now I check in a couple of times a year, do a little tweaking here and there.”
“Can I have a picture?” Heidi asked.
“On the Web site? Sure. My roommate can take one of you, if you want.”
“He’s a photographer? Cool. I’ll bet you guys make quite a team.” Heidi didn’t seem to mean anything by it. It was just a casual thing to say. From the kitchen, Derek called her name, and she turned her head. “Oops! Gotta run. Talk to you later!”
Tom watched her disappear, and he settled back to what he’d been doing. The bakery was a pleasant place to work. Everyone seemed to get along peacefully, a radio was set on a station that played music Tom knew was current, even though most of it wasn’t familiar to him, and it smelled great. Every once in a while, someone would come in with a cookie or a pastry for Tom to try, and at lunchtime Derek included him in the order they placed with the sandwich shop two blocks away.