Just What the Truth Is (5 page)

I knew he was trying to be nice, but I didn’t feel like hearing it. Noah had no right to talk about me to the world, and I was pissed as hell. “Where’s my brother?”

Apprehension and concern etched over Clark’s handsome face. “Look, Ben, whatever it is that’s gotten you worked up, you need to calm down before you talk to Noah. There’s no reason to start something.”

Of course,
I
had to be the one to calm down. I always had to be the one to calm down, or let it go, or make some other accommodation for my emotionally unstable brother. I was sick of it. “Where is he, Clark?”

My teeth were gritted and my eyes were blazing. I was probably as mad as Clark had ever seen me. His shoulders slumped and he sighed resignedly before pointing toward the French doors. “He’s inside.”

I started storming toward the door, but Clark clutched my arm. “Please, Ben. Things have gotten so much better between us lately. I don’t want us to move backwards, and I know you don’t either.”

I noticed that he hadn’t mentioned my brother. Of course not. Noah didn’t give a shit about me. He never had. I had always been the one who’d put in all the work to try to maintain any type of relationship with my brother.

“Noah!” I shouted his name before I’d even had a chance to open the door. “Noah, where are you?”

“I’m in here, Ben.” His voice was coming from the bedroom, so I made my way back there. “Damn, boy. Where’s the fire?”

Noah’s sarcasm was the last thing I needed at that moment.

“I don’t appreciate you telling all your friends that you think I’m… that you think I’m….”

“That I think you’re the only lawyer in Emile City who can’t complete a sentence?” Noah drawled.

“Shove it, Noah. I don’t appreciate you telling people that you think I’m gay.”

There. I said it.

“I assure you, Ben, I’ve told my friends no such thing.”

“Don’t lie to me. I know you told them.” I didn’t want to say anything about Micah Trains, but Kelsey’s comment was enough proof that I knew the truth. “Your friend Kelsey told me.”

Noah sat on the bed, leaned back on his elbows, and crossed his legs at his ankles. “Kelsey told you that I said you’re gay?”

I hated how calm he sounded and that little smirk he wore on his face. “No, she didn’t say it like that. But she thinks I’m gay. Why else would she think that? It’s not like I act gay or anything.”

Noah’s lips tightened and his nostrils flared. He sat up straight. “You don’t
act
gay?”

“What? I don’t. You know I don’t. Nobody can tell. I act completely straight.”

He laughed when I said that. My life was falling apart and Noah was laughing at me. Typical.

“You check out other guys and lust after them. Newsflash for you, Ben, straight guys don’t
act
that way.”

I couldn’t respond to that accusation. It was true, and I was too worn out to argue about it. I collapsed on the bed next to him. “That doesn’t give you the right to talk about me to other people, Noah.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Ben. You’re not on my mind enough to warrant a conversation to my friends about your pathetic life in the closet. Or anything else about you, for that matter.”

“Noah!” Clark’s indignant voice interrupted our conversation. He was the only person alive who could get away with using that tone with Noah without walking away with a limp or a bloody nose. “Please don’t say things like that, sweetheart. There’s no reason to be cruel.”

“Yeah? Well, I think there’s a reason. I’m sick and tired of biting my tongue while he embarrasses himself by parading around all those beards he calls girlfriends.” Noah turned from Clark to me. “Haven’t you had enough, Ben? I don’t understand why you keep hiding who you are.”

“You don’t understand what it’s like for me,” I spat out, hoping the wetness in my eyes wasn’t visible.

“I understand perfectly, Ben. I did it, didn’t I? I came out. And I was a hell of a lot younger than you at the time.”

I rolled my eyes. “Of course
you
did, Noah. But things aren’t as easy for me.”

He shot off the bed and clenched his fists. Clark walked over and stood next to him, keeping a hand on his shoulder.

“Easy?” Noah said incredulously. “You have no idea what I went through, Ben.”

I hadn’t meant to get into this, but now that we were talking about it, no way was I backing down. “I have
every
idea what you went through!” I shouted. “I grew up in that same house, remember?”

Noah opened his mouth to respond but then closed it. For the first time in my life, I had managed to shut my brother up. The angry heat left his eyes, and it was replaced by something else. Understanding, maybe? I wasn’t sure.

It hadn’t been easy in our house. It’s not that our parents didn’t love us, because they did. And money wasn’t an issue—we were pretty well off. But there had always been comments, clear indications of disapproval related to anybody different, especially gay people. Of course, when Noah came out, what had been a lifetime of snide remarks and mutters of disapproval about other people had turned into utter devastation about Noah himself and the reflection his choice had on our entire family.

“I didn’t tell my friends that you’re gay. I wouldn’t do that. I might not understand why you don’t just come out. I might not approve. But I’d never out you against your will.” His voice was quiet and sincere.

I believed him. I wondered once again why Micah thought I was gay. Maybe it was because I had never been married. That could be considered a red flag once a guy was in his thirties. I was already thirty-one.

I felt like I was going to throw up. I couldn’t do that, couldn’t marry a woman. Dating was one thing, but marriage… that meant something. I just couldn’t.

I was sitting on Noah and Clark’s bed, my forearms resting on my knees and my head turned toward the hardwood floors.

“Do you ever wish you were different? You know, that you were straight?” I asked them.

After I posed the question, I looked up at the two of them. They were standing next to each other, sides pressed together. Clark had both arms wrapped around Noah’s waist, and Noah had his arm draped possessively over Clark’s shoulder.

They didn’t need to say a word. I already knew the answer. They were at peace and happy. So happy. I wanted to feel that way more than anything.

I
WENT
for a long run the next morning, hoping to loosen my tight muscles and release some stress. My phone was ringing when I walked back into my condo. It looked like the main switchboard number from my office. Strange. It was Sunday.

“Hello.”

“All right! The cell phone list on the firm directory is updated. Hi, Ben. This is Micah.”

I couldn’t hold back the smile that immediately took over my face. Just the sound of his deep, gravelly voice did that to me. I was so completely screwed. “Hi, Micah. What’s up?”

There was a husky little laugh, and then he cleared his throat and answered. “I have tickets to this afternoon’s Glory game. Fourth row up, behind home plate. You interested in joining me?”

“Seriously?” Was I squeaking? “Ehm, yeah, I mean, yes, I’d love to come with you.”

Oh, God. I did
not
just say that. The man probably thought I was a complete pervert. No, he probably thought it was a normal comment. I actually
was
a complete pervert, which was why my mind had twisted it into something dirty. My entire face was on fire. Thank goodness we were on the phone and Micah couldn’t see me.

“Great. Game starts at one. Give me your address and I’ll pick you up at eleven so we can get lunch first.”

It wasn’t a question, more like an expectation that I would join him for lunch. It should have bothered me that Micah just assumed I would go along, right? What kind of man would want someone else to take control like that? So, yeah, I knew that it should bother me and that it shouldn’t make my dick get hard. Want to guess which one of those was my actual reaction?

“Why don’t I pick you up, instead? You said you live close to the office, so you probably aren’t too far from the stadium,” I said. “No reason for you to drive all the way up to EC North and then turn right around to go back into town.”

He agreed and gave me his address, and then we chatted for another couple of minutes. Just small talk, really, but it was nice. I enjoyed talking with Micah.

After we finally hung up, I had just enough time to throw in a load of laundry and take a long shower. Long because I wanted to take my time relieving my erection. Honestly, if you didn’t guess that was my reaction to Micah’s somewhat domineering personality, then you haven’t been reading carefully. Lost cause over here, remember?

O
KAY
, so before I’d had dinner with Micah Trains on Friday night, if you’d asked me to guess, I would’ve said he was one of those profile lawyers. You know the type. It’s like they came off the lawyer conveyor belt and they have nothing else in their lives except their law practices. And maybe their two divorces.

Anyway, that was before I spent any time with Micah. Now that I knew him a little, I realized there was a lot more to him, and I was really looking forward to spending more time with my new friend. Yes,
friend
. I would keep thinking of Micah in those types of terms—friend, colleague. But not anything more personal and definitely not anything more intimate.

I pulled up to Micah’s house and gasped. It was incredible. Seriously, like something out of
Architectural Digest
. The whole thing looked like it was made of concrete cut into angular slabs. Most were gray, but there was a red rectangle jutting out in the front and a green triangle coming from just under the roofline at an angle. I walked up to the door and noticed the plants arranged in perfectly symmetrical rows. Before I had a chance to ring the doorbell, the door opened and Micah Trains was smiling at me.

“Mister Forman. So nice to see you.”

I scrunched my nose. “Mister? You’re older than me, you know.”

Micah laughed and threw his arm around my shoulder. “I don’t think it’s very polite to call your date old, Ben, but I’m willing to let it go.”

I chuckled nervously, realizing I would have to be very careful. It was just so easy for me to misread any conversation with Micah. My brain’s capability to turn every phrase into something unintended seemed limitless.

We walked to my car and got in. As soon as I turned the key in the ignition, music blared from the stereo. I blushed and reached for the dial, turning it down. “Sorry. I like to sing along to the stereo when I drive, and I’m pretty bad, so I crank it up high enough to drown myself out,” I explained.

He chuckled and his smile reached his eyes, the little crow’s feet on the sides showing. My heart skipped a beat. “Moody Blues fan, huh? Nice. Looks like we won’t have to fight over control of the radio. That’s critical.”

“Just as long as you don’t try to make me listen to Celine Dion, we should be safe,” I responded.

Micah shuddered. “Then we’re all good. As far as I’m concerned, the best way to secure national secrets would be to hide them inside a Celine Dion compilation and put them on the front curb with a sign that says ‘Free—take me’.”

I cracked up and glanced over at him. “You’re a fun man to be around, Micah Trains.”

The look in his eyes softened, and my heart skipped another beat. At the rate I was going, I saw a pacemaker in my future.

“You are too, Ben Forman.”

Chapter Five

I
HAD
never thought of food as something erotic. Don’t get me wrong, I like to eat as much as the next guy. But a meal had always been primarily about filling my belly with a secondary benefit of satisfying my taste buds. That lunch with Micah Trains forever changed my perception of food.

When we’d had Indian food for dinner the other night, we’d shared a couple of dishes, eating them family style. Lunch was different. Micah had a club sandwich with fruit salad. I had a burger with fries and a side of constant hard-on. Seriously, constant hard-on.

It started with the fruit. Micah popped a strawberry into his mouth and moaned. My dick woke up and started paying attention.

“These are delicious. Perfectly ripe. And I think they’re organic.”

Did he say orgasmic? I licked my lips.

“You want to taste one?”

I think I nodded. Hard to remember, really, because I was concentrating on swallowing. Did Micah make moans like that in bed too? Oh, God.

“Here you go,” he said, holding a strawberry up. I expected him to drop it on my plate, but he didn’t. Instead, he smudged it against my lips like it was Chapstick. Or his dick. Yeah, my mind was in total overdrive. “Open up.” I swear, his voice was huskier.

Why I didn’t just laugh it off and swipe the strawberry from him, I really can’t say. Micah told me to open my mouth, so I opened my mouth. He made a final round with the strawberry over my lips. Then he put it on my tongue and waited until I closed my mouth to pull his fingers out slowly. I almost came in my pants.

Micah was quiet for a bit after that. He just sat and stared at me chewing the strawberry. I did my damnedest not to choke under that intense scrutiny.