We Found Love (27 page)

“I love it when you talk butch to me.”

“You’re a dirty old lesbian. Have a good one, girl,” he said, ending the call before she could respond. He grimaced when he noticed a small black—or what used to be black—Kia pull in front of the bay.

“Give me just a minute!” he yelled out as he dialed the number to the part store. As quickly as he could, he placed an order for the headlight he needed. He yanked his button-up Morgan’s Brothers shirt over his undershirt and started doing up the buttons.

“Sorry, man,” he said as he walked out of the office. “Had to call the part store up the road and get ’em to deliver something.”

Finally he looked up, holding out a hand for a shake, and came up short. He stood still, rigid enough to break if someone thumped him on the back. Could it really be? No way. He was hallucinating. Maybe he’d fallen back in the bottle and was too drunk to remember.

Surely this wasn’t Riley standing here. In Denham Springs. He looked like Riley, only his skin was lightly bronzed, cheeks slightly fuller. His biceps were a bit fuller as well, lickably more formed. His dark brown hair had strands of light copper where the sun had tinted it, and it was also longer on the sides, curling just at the sideburns and above the ears. Maybe Riley had an older brother.

“Hi, Hunter.”

Hunter dropped his hand to his side, blinking stupidly. He swallowed audibly. “R-Riley?”

Hallucination Riley rubbed his hand over his nape like Real Riley did. “Surprise….”

“Surprise?” Hunter knew he sounded dumb, but…. What do you say when your heart is exploding, your brain is melting, and reality is starting to look more like a fun-house mirror?

He took a step closer, reaching out a slightly shaking hand to touch Riley. Real Riley. Real Riley who was standing right there. In his shop. “Riley,” he said hoarsely.

Riley nodded and took his own step forward, Hunter’s palm flattening against the warm, solid planes of his stomach. Hunter’s body started shaking like it hadn’t since he was going through alcohol withdrawal.

“Riley,” he said, barely a whisper, moving his hand up to palm Riley’s soft cheek. “How?”

“I wasn’t sure I needed to come here.” Riley sucked his bottom lip between his teeth, worrying it as if he were trying to think of the right thing to say. “I didn’t want to mess anything up for you. You seem to have it good, and I… I don’t know.”

“Mess…. Mess what up? I don’t….” Hunter dropped his hand and blinked a few more times, expecting Riley to disappear each time they opened again. “Did you escape?” It was a dumb question…. But…. “Did you?”

Riley smiled. “Did we go to the same Hartfield?”

“Yeah.”

“And you think I escaped that place?”

Hunter couldn’t help the sardonic look he shot Riley’s way. “You did have a key to this whole wing we weren’t supposed to go to.”

“Well….”

Suddenly something occurred to Hunter. “When did you get out? How?”

“Two months ago. Not too long after Bubba—” Riley frowned. “—I mean Shane, killed himself. It was messed up, and I knew I needed to get the hell out of that place.” He shook his head as if recalling some monumental torture. If it had anything to do with group or therapy, Hunter sympathized. “I knew I had to save myself, that I was the only person who could do it, that if I didn’t I would end up like Andy and Shane. I don’t wanna die, Hunter. Not like that. I wanna be all old and shit, gray-haired and happy. You know?”

Hunter nodded dumbly. He felt numb, slowly coming back to awareness. “Two months? You didn’t want to see me?”

Riley scowled. “That’s all you got from all that?”

“No.” Hunter stepped into Riley’s space. “No, not at all.” What the fuck was leaking? He felt something dripping on his face. He looked up to see if maybe he’d stepped under an air-conditioning vent. Air-conditioning vents that didn’t exist.

Riley reached up a cautious hand and wiped Hunter’s cheeks, hand coming away wet. “Don’t cry, Hunter.”

Crying? He was crying.

“I missed you.” Honesty. That’s what he had, all he could process. The simple truth behind the words making an inhuman gasping sound escape him. He didn’t even think, just slumped forward, forehead falling to Riley’s shoulder, and let out a gasping, silent cry. He wrapped his arms around Riley’s waist when he felt Riley’s arms wrap around his shoulders, fingers digging into his back.

Hunter could feel Riley’s face when he rested it on top of his head. “Oh my God, Riley… I….” He couldn’t find words. He’d not given up hope. He’d never had it in the first place, too scared to even try to hope. He hadn’t even dared ask that this moment may happen for fear he’d develop the tiniest seed of hope.

But…. He popped his head up and backed away quickly. “What does this mean? I can’t do this…. Not if….”
What if he’s not ready? What if he’s not here for love, just a friend? What if it was just that place and that time?
His thoughts were so jumbled, every fear he had for this moment attacking him at once.

“I don’t know.” Riley searched his face, those dark eyes stealing Hunter’s breath. “I know I don’t want to have to say good-bye again. Last time… wasn’t pretty.”

“I can’t. If that’s what gonna happen…. You can’t come back and then go away. Okay? If…. No, I just can’t. I don’t—”

Hunter’s rambling was cut short by Riley’s lips stealing the sound. It wasn’t the kind of openmouthed, tongue-in-face kiss that led to doing things they’d only done in the forbidden wing, but a simple, chaste press of lips. And yet, Hunter couldn’t stop his eyes from closing and his body sinking into the blessed memory of all their intimate times together.

Even Hunter’s mind was blessedly silent as he wrapped his arms back around Riley. When their lips parted he was scared to open them, scared to make his brain function again. He pressed their cheeks together and breathed in Riley’s scent. Gone were the smells of antiseptic and hospital shampoo. In place of those morbid aromas were fabric softener, car air freshener, and the soft underlying smell that was overwhelmingly familiar, the scent that was all Riley.

“Hunter?”

“Hmm?”
No. Don’t. Don’t make it stop. Don’t make me open my eyes.

“Hunter, look at me.”

“No.” He didn’t even give a shit if he sounded like a recalcitrant child. He didn’t want this to end, not if it was the last time for them. “No, Riley. Just… stay with me. Okay? For right now, just….”

“Hunter,” Riley started, pushing Hunter back. Hunter’s surprised eyes popped open and took in Riley’s reddened eyes and the tears that matched the ones Hunter had to be sporting. “Any way, however you want me. I still have shit to do, still have to get my feet under me, but I’ll stay here with you. Well, not here. I live in a halfway house, and I have to check in until the doctor says—”

Hunter stopped Riley’s nervous rambling with a kiss of his own. A smiling, happy, crying-through-laughter kiss hello. A kiss hello. No more good-byes. “God, no more good-byes, please.”

Riley laughed into the kiss as well. “No. No more good-byes.”

They hugged, trying to fold into one another. “Hey, Hunter?”

“Yeah?”

“Wanna go somewhere magical?”

Hunter leaned back and looked at Riley questioningly. “Where’s that?”

“A real date. You know, with real food and real music?”

Hunter felt like his face was going to split from all the grinning. “I think we can handle that.”

“Thank God, because that line could have been really cheesy.”

“Oh, it was. You’re just lucky I like you so much.”

“Yeah?”

“No.”

Riley blinked this time. Hunter let him sweat for a minute. “Um. Okay.”

“I probably actually love you.”

Riley blinked again. “What?”

“Yeah, I love you.”

“You’re a bastard,” Riley growled, smiling again. “And I love you too.”

Hunter could have flown away then and there. But they still had too much to do for him to check out now. He grabbed Riley’s hand and pulled him into the office, slammed the door shut. He pushed Riley to sitting on top of the desk and kissed him. Hard.

“I love you.” Kiss. “I love you.” Lick. “I missed you so much.”

Riley’s breathing was shaky. “I missed you too.”

Hunter stopped and held Riley’s face with both hands. “I’m so happy for
you
that you’re out. I have to say that. So fucking proud of you.”

Riley’s eyes slid away. “Yeah, well….”

“No, listen to me….” Riley brought his eyes back to Hunter. “I’m so proud of you. I knew you’d do it. I’m sorry it took so much to get you there, but I’m so glad you did it.”

Riley smiled fondly at Hunter. “Me too, Hunter. Me too.”

Chapter 26

“Y
OU
’
RE
TOTES
hot. Jus’ sayin’.” Chad snapped his fingers, smirking at Riley through their reflections in the mirror. He had his pointy chin perched on Riley’s shoulder. “That manual labor thing is workin’ for you.”

“I need to look good for this. Besides my work clothes, he’s only ever seen me in that shit they make you wear at Hartfield.”

“Well, if he doesn’t swoon over this, then there’s something wrong with the boy.”

“No.” Riley turned around, and Chad backed away. “There’s not. He’s… pretty damn incredible.”

“He must be. You get all dreamy-eyed every time you talk about him. It’s cute. In a puppy-love, high-school-crush sort of way.”

“Shut up.” Riley gave Chad a playful shove.

“Anyway, I got a hot date of my own. Gotta go.” Chad waved his fingers in Riley’s direction. “Toodles,” he said before sashaying out of the room like a runway model on speed.

Chad could be pretty exhausting most of the time, but he’d been someone Riley felt comfortable talking to.

Riley stuffed his wallet in the back of his faded denims, then ran his hands down over the black V-neck Chad had borrowed from some chick on the other side of the house. She wasn’t a tiny girl, but her shirt turned out to be the perfect size for Riley, hugging his chest and hugging his waist. It didn’t leave much in the way of Riley’s build to the imagination. He finished up the look with some black boots he’d scored at the army surplus store. For his means, the whole ensemble came out pretty rockin’, and he hoped Hunter appreciated the effort too.

It’d been a few days, two to be exact, since he’d last tasted Hunter’s lips, since they’d shared three very serious words with each other. But Hunter hadn’t left Riley’s thoughts, not for a second. As he’d trimmed back the hedges of a mansion’s backyard, he’d pictured Hunter diving into the pool, then coming up with beads of water glistening on his skin. As he’d driven back home after work those two nights, he’d imagined Hunter riding alongside him.

One day.
When they both had their shit together and were free of the bureaucratic crap that came with being a patient at Hartfield, then they could enjoy things like coffee in the morning or showers before leaving for work. They could have dinner before climbing into
their
bed together.

Now,
that
sounded magical.

The entire ride to Hunter’s shop, Riley thought about all the things he’d ever wanted to say to Hunter, things he could never vocalize because he never knew how or he’d been afraid of being abandoned by another person he cared about. There was so much, like how meaningful it had been for Hunter to turn down sex that first night, or how no one had ever cared enough to chew his ass out like Hunter had. None of that really needed to be said anymore, though. It had culminated in a simple “I love you.”

He parked the car and didn’t hesitate to kill the engine, thanks to Travis’s Midas touch. Mr. Fix-It was a natural, and not just with cars. Riley didn’t even want to think about where he might be right now had Big Scary not told him to get his shit together and talk to Hunter. Sad truth, he’d probably still be sitting under that tree, spying as Hunter hugged up on the wrong guy.

He said another silent thank-you to the heavens for sending Travis out to his car as he raised his fist to knock on the door.

Riley shifted back and forth on his feet, wringing his hands behind his back as he waited for Hunter to answer. It didn’t take long. Thank God, because every second he stood in front of that door was one more frazzled nerve.

Oh, but when Hunter opened that door and stood beneath the hanging light, haloed in white gold, the clouds could’ve parted for the choir of angels singing from above. Hunter was more gorgeous than Riley had ever seen him, could’ve ever imagined seeing him. The deep blue shirt brought out the crystalline sparkle in his light blue eyes. It faded into black jeans that abruptly ended at black flip-flops.

“Hi,” Riley breathed, letting the single syllable slip out on an exhale.

“Hey,” Hunter said, beaming at Riley. “You look good.”

Riley’s face heated. Warmth surged from his heart to his groin. “You’re looking good too. Much better than hospital chic.”

Hunter’s rumbling laugh was gentle and comfortable. “Yeah, I’ll say it’s pretty awesome seeing you…. Like that.” Hunter leered shamelessly, waggling his brows. He leaned in and gave Riley a peck on his lips. “Ready?”