Getting Him Back (16 page)

Staring at the ground, he muttered, “Yeah. I guess.”

He glanced up, looking at me from under his bangs, and it made my heart stutter. Damn. I had it bad for him.

“But,” he said, “I had—have someone ready as backup. If after you saw my record and heard the story, you didn’t want to have anything else to do with me.”

He sounded like he didn’t care. Like he expected me to tell him to fuck off and he was just fine with that. And maybe that was the way Wyatt would always be. Expecting the worst because it’s all he knew.

He might think he was fucked because he was in love with me, but I knew I was fucked because I was in love with him. Big-time, stupid love with a guy who was always going to need to be convinced that things didn’t have to suck.

It didn’t matter what he said though, about us not working. Because his actions said it all. He—Wyatt Reese, the disappearing man—had come after me.

I stared back at him. At his heterochromatic eyes, striped hair and sexy pouting lip.

“Let me get this straight.”

He arched his brow and smirked.

I conceded that point. “Or not. So. You plan to collect thank-you blow jobs from your boyfriend for tutoring him in calculus
and
pick up a check from Academic Support for the same work? Now that’s larceny.”

I held my breath waiting to see how he’d take it.

He leaned toward me. “I think you might have been talking to my deaf ear, or else I tuned you out after—”

“Blow jobs?” I suggested.

“No.” He grinned. An honest-to-God grin on Wyatt’s face. He better not do that too often or I’d be fighting off all the snotty fine arts majors. “Boyfriend.”

Epilogue

The first thing Wyatt noticed about having a boyfriend was that he didn’t just have a boyfriend. There was Ethan, and then there was all that came with him. Right now that was five extra people helping him move his shit from Kilpatrick Tower into Hamilton. Getting a single would have been too much to hope for, but Ethan had found an upperclassman whose roommate had decided to move to Oregon after midterms. He’d barely said ten sentences when Wyatt met him, so they should get along.

Blake hadn’t done anything overt, but he’d made enough snide remarks about thieves and felons that Wyatt had been glad when Ethan had said the process for a room change was just waiting for Wyatt’s signature.

Though, he’d miss being up high enough to look out over the campus. Hamilton only had three stories.

“Is that everything?” Ethan asked.

Wyatt looked away from the window. His side of the room was empty, except for Ethan, standing holding Wyatt’s backpack.

“I can take that. You didn’t have to bring all these people to help.”

Ethan’s friend Makayla popped into the doorway. She held his desk lamp and surge strip. They could have gone in one of his two boxes.

“That’s not the point. The point is that Ethan said he would buy us pizza and now you owe us a favor in case we have to move our own shit. I’ll know where to find you on Moving Out Day.”

Wyatt glanced over at Ethan.

“She’s kidding.”

“She is not.” Makayla walked ahead of them toward the elevator. “Not that I don’t like you, Wyatt, but the struggle is real.”

A mercenary attitude and honesty. Wyatt appreciated that in a person. He hefted the last box, the one holding all his textbooks.

“Really, it’s not.” Ethan spoke in Wyatt’s good ear. “Her father is a dermatologist.”

“I love her.” He liked all of Ethan’s friends, though having five show up all at once had been a little unnerving.

Ethan slung the backpack over his shoulder. “Do you say that about everyone who helps you move?”

Wyatt shook his head. “Only if they’re cute too.”

“Like in a picture?” Ethan suggested.

“Nah, I’ve learned my lesson. Pictures don’t talk.”

“Pictures don’t do blow jobs either, though I have to tell you your chances of getting one aren’t looking too good right now.”

“Maybe I’ll blow you instead.”

“Now that’s how you say thank-you for helping you move.” Ethan led the way out of 1208.

Wyatt shut the door behind them. He couldn’t wait to turn over the key. It almost reminded him of getting out of lockup. “How do you say, ‘Thanks for not getting back with your asshole ex-boyfriend’?”
And picking me
, but Wyatt hoped Ethan understood that part without him saying it.

Ethan lit up with that smile. The one that made Wyatt want to believe that things could really work out, just because you wanted them to.

“Easy.” Ethan pressed the button for the elevator. “You say ‘Yes, Ethan, I’d love to come home for Thanksgiving with you.’”

Wyatt felt the floor drop away from him and they weren’t in the elevator car yet. An Ethan with friends was one thing, but parents?

“What’s wrong?” Ethan put his hand on Wyatt’s shoulder. “Shit. I was doing that selfish thing again. You already have plans.”

A spectacular feast from Food Lion takeout in the old trailer home, assuming his mother hadn’t moved without telling him. Agreeing would have been an easy out, but Wyatt didn’t want to lie to Ethan.

“No. No plans.”

“Awesome. So, it’s all settled. You can come home with me.”

Settled.
Yeah.
I
should have offered him a kidney.

* * * * *

Don’t miss the follow-up book to Wyatt and Ethan’s story, coming from K.A. Mitchell and Carina Press in 2016.

Author’s Note

Ethan and Wyatt will be back to share all the meet-the-family drama. I hope you had as much fun with them as I did.

Acknowledgments

Mandy, thanks for the Humans vs. Zombies tip!

Read on for an excerpt of

WISH LIST
,

an erotic male/male novella from Carina Press and K.A. Mitchell

Available Now in eBook!

Chapter One

Tape. Where was the goddamned tape?

Jonah dug through a couple of drawers in the kitchen. He could have texted Evan, but beside the lie Jonah had told about already having wrapped the stupid action figure for Evan’s cousin, he knew what Evan’s answer would be.
Same place it always is
,
babe.

It wouldn’t be such a crisis if Jonah wasn’t already late. Hadn’t promised he’d be ready to go at six? But he’d gotten home late, then he couldn’t find where he’d stuffed the present. Then he’d had to find wrapping paper. Hell, he hadn’t even packed yet.

Jonah’s gaze lit on Evan’s desk, a desk with paper and pens and neatly organized bills, since Evan insisted on quaintly paying stuff like the mortgage and his car with paper checks instead of online. Lately, Jonah had been wondering if someone had taken the sexy, fun guy he’d fallen for and replaced him with a staid sixty-year-old.

Digging through the top drawer, Jonah found a computer printout receipt. That wasn’t like Evan, to get something online that he’d need to hang onto a receipt for, especially not something that looked like it had a bar code on it, like an advance movie ticket. As Jonah got a better look at it he realized it was for a train ticket. Two train tickets. To New York, on December 30. Under that was the printout of a hotel reservation, the Marriott in Times Square. For the thirtieth through the first—New Year’s Day which meant—

Evan was taking Jonah to New York for New Year’s Eve.

Every bit of irritation vanished on a giant wave of excitement. Evan had been hinting about a big surprise for Jonah’s birthday. But this—this was something he’d been dreaming about most of his life. Ever since he made the paper as the first local New Year’s Baby, he’d been telling everyone that the big party was for him. Growing up less than three hours from New York put the biggest New Year’s party in the world tantalizingly close, but somehow Jonah had never made it.

How could Evan have managed to get a reservation? Jonah had heard the rooms were wildly expensive and booked years in advance.

Shit, he hoped he wouldn’t blow the surprise. It wasn’t like he’d been snooping. Once, his mom had taken back the Transformers set that was all he’d wanted for Christmas because Jonah had “accidentally” found it in the closet. This really had been a mistake. Yeah, that excuse hadn’t worked with his mom. Evan wouldn’t be a jerk like that, but Jonah hated the idea of ruining this for him. Evan got such a kick out of the whole present-giving thing, had given him something small every month for the first year they were together.

Jonah folded the papers the way he’d found them and was about to slide them back into the drawer when he saw the box. A jewelry box. Heartbeat loud in his ears, because this really was snooping now, he drew the box out. Why would Evan have a jewelry box hidden in his desk?

Maybe it was something for Evan’s mom, but then why wasn’t it wrapped and ready to go? Jonah had never been particularly interested in jewelry. He had both his ears pierced, but wore only small squares of cubic zirconia now that he had a wear-a-tie job, and a leather and silver cuff he sometimes wore when they were going someplace dressy.

Maybe Evan had decided to give him an upgrade to the real thing. The idea gave Jonah an unexpected rush of warmth in his stomach. A big trip, diamond earrings—Evan wasn’t scraping by, but he wasn’t rolling in cash either. His ad work paid a lot more than Jonah’s IT job with the school district though.

Guilt soured Jonah’s stomach. He’d gotten Evan a few fun gifts, an adventuresome lube that was supposed to tingle on contact, but it didn’t amount to much in the face of the trip to New York and diamond earrings. If he knew what was in the box, he could be ready. And maybe pick up something extra for Evan. He had a few days and a little breathing room on one of his credit cards.

He flipped open the lid. It wasn’t earrings. It was a ring. Rings, actually. Everything south of Jonah’s belt got uncomfortably high and tight until he was damned sure his balls were trying to climb into his body to get away from the scary things in that box.

Wedding rings.

Interlocking bands, one white gold with yellow gold accents, the other the reverse. An arrow over lapping at the point with a diamond to make up the circle of the male symbol made it clear they were intended as gay wedding bands.

The grating, grinding sound of the garage door shook Jonah out of his stare. He slid the box back where he’d found it, shut the drawer and bolted out of the room and up the stairs.

At least he could be sort of packed.

Jonah was stuffing an extra pair of jeans in his suitcase when Evan came in, waving the half wrapped package.

“Thought you wrapped this?”

“Yeah. Ran out of tape. Couldn’t find any.”

“It’s in the left bottom drawer of my desk.”

Jonah couldn’t remember what drawer those rings had been in. He shut his eyes for a second.
Oh.
The top.

“Did you pack a tie for Christmas dinner?”

“Yes, Mom.”

“Just trying to help.”

And Jonah wouldn’t be acting like this if he didn’t feel so guilty and terrified about what those rings meant.

“Sorry. I’m just—traffic—and—I’m sorry I’m not ready yet.” Jonah turned away to zip up the case.

“Babe.” Evan wrapped his hands around Jonah’s neck and pulled him into a kiss, hot enough, wet enough that Jonah forgot what was making him so miserable. “It’s okay. I figured we wouldn’t leave until seven or later. Told the folks not to wait up.”

“Oh.” The fact that Evan wasn’t pissed off, was actually being nice about the fact that Jonah couldn’t get his ass in gear to get anywhere on time, only made Jonah feel worse.

“Yeah. The place was dead so I left early. Figured I’d come home and help you pack.”

“Pack” was what Evan said, but the way he said it sounded like something else to Jonah’s dick.

Great. Now he was guilty, nervous and horny.

Jonah sidestepped the hand reaching for his crotch, heading toward the bathroom to scoop up shaving stuff.

“Did you just blow off sex?” Evan followed him.

“I don’t know. Was that actually an offer?”

Would Evan do it now? Here? Was that the plan? Come home early, fuck, then down on one knee for a different reason? Was the box now in Evan’s back pocket? Maybe Evan was hoping to surprise his family with their—Jonah choked on the word—engagement.

Oh sweet fuck. Evan wouldn’t do it in front of his family, would he?

Evan tipped his lips in a half-smile and arched a brow. “It was. A firm offer.”

Jonah had to backtrack to find the source of the dry humor in Evan’s voice. Usually Evan’s smutty puns made Jonah laugh. And want to jump him.

“Right, well, I was thinking that traffic’s gonna suck the whole way, so we should get it over with as soon as possible.”

“The sex?” Evan’s wry expression didn’t shift at all, but Jonah knew him well enough to read the flash of surprised hurt in his eyes.

“The drive.”

“Fine.” Evan went back into their bedroom and scooped the half wrapped box and Jonah’s suitcase from the bed. “I’ll finish this and load the car.”

Copyright © 2012 by K.A. Mitchell

Also available from K.A. Mitchell
and Carina Press

The Christmas Proposition
Wish List

Coming in 2016

Getting Him Back
sequel

About the Author

K.A. Mitchell discovered the magic of writing at an early age when she learned that a carefully crayoned note of apology sent to the kitchen in a toy truck would earn her a reprieve from banishment to her room. Around the same time, she decided that GI Joe and Ken made a much cuter couple than Ken and Barbie and was perplexed when invitations to play Barbie dropped off. She never stopped making stuff up, though, and was pleased to find out that people would pay her to do it. Although the men in her stories usually carry more emotional baggage than even LAX can lose in a year, she guarantees they always find their sexy way to a happy ending.