No Sacrifice Page 44

  While they chatted, Patrick watched the others as they talked to Chance. Devin gave Chance a few shrewd looks that made Patrick more than a little nervous, and Tutu’s expression was knowing when her dark eyes darted between him and Chance, but neither Devin nor Tutu said anything. Patrick hoped it stayed that way. He wasn’t worried about Tutu—he didn’t think she’d cause trouble. But Devin had no such reservations, and Patrick had to work to keep from actively panicking over the possibilities.

  He noted with minor amusement that Alana couldn’t seem to look away from Chance. She didn’t say much, just worked on a knitting project she had going, but her deep brown eyes that matched Patrick’s kept shooting sideways glances. Patrick was grateful Quinn and Alana were home this year. As the only two siblings who’d been understanding after the explosion over the summer, Patrick hoped they’d be a buffer between him and Devin, should Devin decide to start poking at the wrong things.

  Luckily, Patrick managed to dodge dropping the divorce bomb on his family that night. He confirmed only that he and Emily hadn’t gotten back together—wording that part very carefully—then made excuses that it was late and they needed to bring in the suitcases. Quinn and Devin joined him and Chance to get the bags, and Patrick had his first surprise for the week.

  “I hope you two don’t mind sleeping together,” his mother said as they came back in.

  It took everything Patrick had to keep from dropping his suitcase on his foot. “Uh, Mama?”

  She frowned. “Well, we don’t have any more bedrooms. With Quinn, Dev, and Ali here… unless you’d rather sleep with one of your brothers? Or you could take the rollaway I put in your room and give Chance your bed, if you don’t want to make him sleep on it.” She shrugged. “I just didn’t think either of you wanted to sleep on the couch.”

  It took a full minute for his mother’s words to sink in. Rollaway. “Oh, uh no, that’s fine, Mama. We’ll make the cot in my old room work. Thanks.”

  When they got up to the room and Devin and Quinn had left, Devin shooting Chance an unreadable glance that made Patrick uncomfortable, Patrick closed the door, then flopped on the bed in relief. “I just about had a heart attack.”

  Chance chuckled. “You and me both. Well, this is good news. Will they come in during the night?”

  Patrick shook his head. “She stopped doing that the first time she walked in on me masturbating when I was thirteen. Hasn’t opened the door without knocking since.”

  “Well, then, maybe we can still sleep together,” Chance said thoughtfully. “I could make up the rollaway, mess it up so it looks like I slept there.”

  “I’d love that. It’s bad enough I can’t touch you the rest of the day.” Patrick sighed.

  Chance grinned and dropped a kiss on him. “Good. Well, then, let’s get ready for bed. I’m beat. It’s….” He paused to look at the clock, then apparently tried to do mental math. “Uh….” He shook his head. “It’s…. Fuck it. Late in LA.”

  Patrick chuckled. “Yeah. And don’t expect to lose the jet lag. We’ll get over it right about the time we head home.”

  Chance groaned. “Figures.”

  The clock on the bedside table said it was only a little after five local time. Patrick lay in the early-morning quiet, wrapped tightly around Chance, grateful for the ability to do so. He thought the trip might be a bit easier to deal with if he knew he’d at least be able to sleep against his lover at night. Not that he relished keeping his hands to himself during the day, but as he was far from ready to come out to his family, he didn’t have much choice.

  He brushed a kiss over Chance’s back, pausing to inhale the spicy scent.

  “Good morning, baby,” Chance murmured.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  Chance shook his head and turned around. “You didn’t. If we were in LA I’d be up already. You know that.”

  “Yeah, true. Good morning to you, a ghrá.” He smiled up at Chance. “I’m so glad we could sleep together.” They settled in against each other, and Patrick hissed when his hard cock brushed Chance’s. “I swear it never used to be this bad back when I was still sleeping alone. Maybe sleeping next to you isn’t the best thing,” he muttered.

  Chance chuckled. “Maybe we’ll just have to do something about it.”

  “I wish we could.” He pointed to the wall above their heads. “That’s Mama and Da’s room.” Then he pointed at the wall on the other side of the room. “And where Devin’s sleeping. He used to share this room with me until I left. Then he cleaned everything out that was mine.” He paused to chuckle. “Then Mama cleaned the whole thing out for guests. Anyway, I’m so glad we don’t have to share a room with him now.”

  Chance nodded. “That would be uncomfortable. Which reminds me… I love that we can share a room but… doesn’t your mom even suspect what we are?”

  Patrick shook his head. “I don’t know why, but I don’t think Noa or Devin told her I’m bi. She didn’t mention it even once on the phone all this time. Now, she could just not want to believe it.” He shrugged. “And if that’s the case, which I suspect it is, she’s just seeing what she wants to see—that you and I are friends and only friends.”

  “Ah, yeah.” Chance nodded again. “That makes sense. Well, I’m grateful for it. I’ve gotten used to sleeping next to you. I don’t know how well it’d go if I couldn’t.”

  “Yeah, I know what you mean. I don’t know that I ever really got used to sleeping next to Em. I mean, I’m sure I did in the beginning, you know. But I certainly got used to sleeping without her again, especially after being in LA for the show. But you… we’ve been together for long enough now that I doubt I’d sleep well without you.”

  “Well, not that I’d wish you poor sleep, but that makes me feel good to hear.” Chance leaned in and kissed him, just a light, soft brush of lips.

  Patrick closed his eyes and melted into it. Though it wasn’t particularly heated, he reacted to it anyway and rocked against Chance, causing a groan. “God, I want you,” he murmured. “But….” He sighed. “There is no doubt in my mind that they’d hear everything.”

  Chance made a face. “That would suck, so, no, I guess we won’t be doing anything.” He paused to chuckle again. “May end up having to masturbate in the shower. I haven’t had to do that since, uh, high school.”

  Patrick laughed, then slapped his hand over his mouth to muffle it. “Oh God,” he managed when he had control of himself again. “We really are acting like teenagers.”

  Chance grinned. “There are worse things.” He kissed Patrick again, and when they broke apart, Patrick sighed.

  “I am going to have to abandon you a bit today.”

  “Oh?” Chance asked, raising his eyebrows.

  Patrick nodded. “Unless you want to go with me. I have to do a bit of shopping. I left my mom and sisters for the last minute. My brothers are easy—gift cards to Amazon or iTunes and they’re happy. My sisters? Yeah, not so much.”

  Chance chuckled. “I usually send Vannah and Mama a specific gift. If I send Gareth anything, it’s a gift card, like I send Darcy. The kids are so young I send Vannah money and ask her to buy them something from me. That usually works. I have no idea what they’re into at any point in time.”

  “I do the same with my nieces and nephews. They’re all different ages, and none of them are boys near Avery’s, so I can’t even go by that. The teenagers are easy—they like money. Everyone else?” Patrick shook his head. “No clue.”

  “Yup.” Chance frowned. “I’d like to get gifts for your family. Would you help me pick something out?”

  Patrick smiled. “You don’t have to, but I will. Maybe you can help me on Vannah and your mama.”

  “Sure, though you… right,” he said, shaking his head. “If I’m going to, you’ll want to. Maybe we could go together for Mama’s and Vannah’s. I thought something from here would be kind of cool. Mama’s always wanted to visit Hawai’i. I can’t send her here, but maybe
I can send her something from here.”

  “Do they like jewelry?” Patrick asked. “That’s what I’m getting for mine, and there’s a cool store over in the mall that’s all about island stuff.”

  Chance nodded. “It’d be perfect.”

  “Good. That’ll make things a lot easier.” He made a face. “Stores won’t even be open for a few more hours. I hate jet lag.”

  “No doubt. I’m always late for everything when I’m in Atlanta. We’ll have the opposite problem here. Oh, well. Maybe we can at least get our showers out of the way early.” Chance sighed.

  Patrick nodded. “Yeah, since we’ll want to take slightly… longer… showers than usual.”

  With a grin Chance kissed him again, then rolled to sit up. “I’m not sure it’ll take all that long.”

  Patrick snorted. “I don’t think that’s anything to brag about.”

  Chance replied by throwing a pillow at him.

  The shower went a long way toward helping Chance feel better able to face Patrick’s family. A little bit of conditioner, a mental picture of Patrick naked, hard and ready for orgasm, and a few minutes had him painting the tile wall in his cum and struggling for breath.

  And feeling much more relaxed and ready to face all of the Tearneys.

  Not that he was afraid of them or worried about what they’d do or say to him. But he was concerned about what Patrick might get if any hints of their real relationship got out. He didn’t know how he knew, but he had a feeling the Tearney family was a ticking bomb, just waiting to go off.

  And he did not want to be the detonator.

  When Chance went back to the bedroom, Patrick was sitting on the made bed, waiting, hair wet and obviously out of his own shower. Chance must have had a puzzled expression because Patrick grinned. “There’s another shower over on the other side of the kitchen. Da put it in back when the girls started to hit their teens. They had a fit at the thought of sharing a shower with us boys.”

  Chance chuckled. “Yeah, Vannah hated sharing a bathroom with us, but she had no choice.”

  Patrick nodded. “I remember. Well, coffee?”

  “Please.”

  Patrick stood and paused to kiss him. Chance pulled Patrick in, unable to resist touching and holding one more time before he had to keep his hands off. It did him good to feel Patrick cling a little too.

  When they pulled back, Chance left a light kiss on Patrick’s forehead. “I love you. Remember that, okay?”

  With another nod and a sigh, Patrick stepped back. “I love you too. No matter how, uh, hands off I am. Okay?”

  Chance smiled. “I understand, remember? Now. You need coffee. Come on.”

  Chance was impressed with how big the house was. Patrick gave him a very short tour as they walked through. He’d seen the living room—and the huge tree—the night before.

  Patrick pointed out the dining room, noting that, though it looked formal, it really wasn’t, and they spent a lot of dinners in there. A huge fireplace took up nearly half of one wall. Glass-fronted shelves full of china flanked the stone hearth. A long sideboard in a matching warm wood Chance didn’t recognize faced the fireplace. Between the two, stretching almost the entire length of the room, a table with—Chance paused to count—twelve chairs took up most of the rest of the space. A chandelier of glass and brass provided light, and french doors opened onto the patio behind the table.

  “Wow” was all Chance could manage. He imagined his mama would be thrilled with a dining room like that.

  “Remember that most of this house was passed down. Mama was the fourth generation to live here. I’m the fifth. My great-grandfather built it—and much of the furniture here. Our—uh, the bed in our room, all the bookshelves in the house, this furniture…. In fact, Mama and Da have had to buy very little except for a kitchen table. Because, uh, Dev, Flynn, and I broke the last one they had.” Patrick blushed.

  Chance couldn’t let that go. “How did you break it?”

  “Fighting.” He sighed. “Dev was teasing me about the play I was in. Flynn joined in—he was one that used to pick on me for playacting when I was little—and, well, I got kind of mad.”

  “I don’t blame you.”

  “Yeah, so I swung, Flynn returned it, then Dev crashed into me, knocking me into the table. Mama about tore our heads off. More because we broke the table and got blood on her floor, I think, than because we were fighting.” He chuckled. “Anyway….”

  “Mama used to do the same with us. She knew Gareth and I were gonna throw punches now and again. For her, she just made sure we didn’t leave blood all over the place.” He grinned. “I got Gareth once. Didn’t break his nose like you did, but he had a nice black eye for a while.”

  Patrick chuckled. “I’m sure he deserved it.”

  Chance smiled as they turned out of the dining room. “Yeah. It was some phobic BS. I don’t even remember anymore—typical of him.”

  They stepped into the kitchen, and Chance had to pause. “Huge” didn’t begin to cover it. It looked like something from Top Chef or some other show. The stainless-steel appliances would have made his mama drool. The island stove had six burners, the oven consisted of two sections plus what looked like a warming drawer, the refrigerator had to be more than twice the size of what they had at home, and that didn’t even touch the small appliances everywhere.

  He shook himself out of his stupor as Patrick moved over to the coffeemaker on the counter next to the sink. After retrieving two mugs from a cabinet, he poured and handed one to Chance.

  “Thanks,” he mumbled, feeling a little bit like an idiot for staring so. Compared to where he grew up in the tiny house in Atlanta, Patrick had grown up in luxury. He knew they’d inherited most of it and all that, but it still seemed like a lot to him. He felt every bit of the country bumpkin he’d been accused of being on more than one occasion.

  “So, I told you that Quinn’s a chef, right?” Patrick asked as he leaned against the counter. Chance nodded. “He’s got a place over in Honolulu that’s kind of famous in the city. Anyway, they won some kind of award, and Quinn got the opportunity to be a spokesperson for this kitchen place. Since he is, as Mama says, a confirmed bachelor, when they offered him a kitchen as part of the payment, he gave it to Mama.”

  “Damn right, I’m a confirmed bachelor. Not interested in marriage.” Quinn walked in from the other side of the kitchen. “Morning, Chance, Shorty.”

  Patrick growled, and Chance chuckled. “Shorty?”

  Quinn grinned. “That’s what I’ve always called him. He’s always been shorter than me.”

  Patrick’s dark eyes shot sparks. “You were always older.”

  “And now we’re fully grown and you’re still shorter than me.” Quinn snickered. “Don’t mind him—he’s just jealous of my height.”

  Quinn was tall, taller even than Chance. If he had to estimate, he would have put Quinn at well over six feet, possibly pushing six and a half. With his blue eyes and blond hair, he could have passed as a sibling to Chance.

  “I am not jealous. I’m perfectly happy with my height.”

  Chance couldn’t let that go. “That’s not what you tell me.”

  Patrick glared at him. “Some best friend you are.”

  Chance laughed. “That’ll get you back for this morning’s comment.” Patrick’s scowl deepened, but while Quinn’s back was turned to the coffeemaker, Chance winked, and Patrick shook his head, then smiled.

  Just as they settled in at the table, Patrick’s sister, Alana, came in and got her own cup.

  “Entire family of coffee drinkers,” Patrick said. “I blame Mama. She cannot start a day without some.”

  Alana sat next to Chance. “It’s true. It’s all Mama’s fault. Good morning.”

  “You feelin’ okay, Ali?” Quinn asked, peering at her.

  Alana shrugged. “I didn’t sleep all that well. Strange bed. I should have just gone home last night, but Mama wanted me to stay.”

  “No work tod
ay?” Patrick asked.

  She shook her head. “The shop closed on Sunday until after New Year’s Day.”

  Patrick frowned. “I hope the mall’s still open.”

  Alana nodded. “Yeah, don’t worry. They know some of us are lazy bums and wait until the last minute.”

  Patrick pulled her hair, and Chance laughed. “What do you do, Alana?” Chance blinked when she blushed and wouldn’t look straight at him.

  “Uh, crafts. I co-own a shop with my best friend down in Honolulu. We have crafts made with local materials and Hawai’ian themes. The tourists love it.”

  Chance sent a puzzled glance toward Patrick, who gave him a “tell you later” look.

  “Yeah, I waited until I got here. So sue me. We have shopping to do when the stores open.”

  “You’re not going without breakfast,” Patrick’s mama said. “Good morning, Chance. I hope you like macadamia nut pancakes.”

  “I can’t say I’ve ever had them, but I’m sure I will, ma’am.”

  “I said call me Mama. Quinn, Alana, give me a hand.”

  With a bit of grumbling, they got up, and Patrick shifted over a seat.

  He was snickering. “I think Alana’s got a crush on you.”

  He blinked at Patrick. “Are you kidding me?”

  Patrick shook his head. “Nope.” He glanced over at his mom and siblings, then leaned in a little farther and dropped his voice. “And I have never been so glad you’re gay. Especially since she is a female version of me.”

  Chance grinned and, also keeping his voice low, replied. “Now you know how I felt.”

  Patrick nodded. “Indeed. Except, at least, you’re not bi.”

  “She is pretty.”

  Patrick stared at him. “Are you going straight—or bi—on me?”

  Chance laughed. “Not hardly. But just because I prefer outer genitals doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate a pretty woman.”

  “What are you two whispering about over there?” Quinn called.