Chapter Nineteen

CHAPTER NINETEEN

Colby

F or the first time, things were awkward between them when they woke up the next morning. Colby racked his brain, trying to remember if he'd said something wrong, if he'd done something to make Vince feel like he was changing the rules of what they'd agreed on, if Vince thought maybe Colby was feeling more for him than what Vince wanted, but he couldn't remember anything.

As the days passed, Colby was pretty sure he did feel something different for Vince. The man was his best friend. His favorite person to spend time with. The sex was explosive, the best Colby had ever had, but he felt it deeper than that, to the marrow of his bones.

His heart sped when Vince entered a room. He smiled every time he looked at Vince, or at least, he wanted to smile every time. He often held it back so he didn't look like an idiot, smiling for no damn reason.

Something about Vince was… more , but Colby didn't understand how that could be the case. What if he just got his feelings mixed up because he'd never had a sexual relationship with someone he was so close to before? What if the strength of their friendship was muddling things up and confusing him?

And the truth was, it didn't really matter either way. Vince had made it clear he didn't want a romantic relationship either. He was too hurt from his past with Gregory. And even though Colby felt something different pulsing through him, something vivid and powerful and all-consuming, he was still mixed up on other things. Would he want all the things his family expected from him, even if Vince did? Marriage? Kids? And he still wasn't sure about the farm and everything else. Basically, he was a mess, but then, he'd always been more of a mess than anyone else in his family, hadn't he?

He spent the day working on another batch of beer. Brewing calmed something inside him, similarly to how Vince did. It just felt right.

Vince was at Covington Acres with Holden today. Colby could have tagged along and helped them. They were making some fixes to a large barn where they sometimes held events and where the wedding reception would be held. Holden wanted it perfect for Roe and didn't trust anyone to do the work other than himself. Colby had made excuses not to go, though. He'd needed some time. Plus, his confusing feelings had him unsure. What if Vince got frustrated that he was always around? Considering Vince had been acting strange since the last time they had sex, it was a possibility.

He was still jittery and restless when he finished with his beer, the whole time trying to sort through exactly what he was experiencing emotionally. He went over to his laptop that was sitting on one of the tables in his brewery. He wasn't sure what he was looking for but didn't know what else to do. He pulled up a search and typed in: can a person be incapable of romantic love?

Some of the things he saw made him break out in a sweat. Stuff that made it sound like he was callous, or that it was a sign of certain mental-health struggles. You're broken, you're broken, you're broken , echoed through his head with each word he read, his stomach twisting up, but then, a lot of this didn't apply to him. He didn't fit with everything they were saying, so he kept reading.

And then he saw a word he'd never seen before— aromantic . The hairs on his arms stood up as he browsed the description. Aromantic people, it said, didn't feel romantic love or the desire to have romantic relationships. They could still feel sexual attraction—which had never been a problem for him. There was quite a bit of information out there about it, and while some of it fit, a lot of it didn't. Whether he was aromantic or not, it soothed something in him to not feel so alone, to have a possible name for what he felt that didn't boil down to something being wrong with him.

The whole time he read, he couldn't stop the nagging feeling that a lot of this just didn't fit…because Vince. He was different with Vince. He might not be sure if he was in love with Vince, but part of him wanted to be. Wanted Vince to feel the same about him and for them to wake up to each other every day and go to bed with each other every night. For people to see him in the store and say, How's Vince? Because the two of them were a package deal.

Colby tried another search and another, the tension in his chest growing, frustration gnawing at his insides, until his gaze caught sight of a new word— demiromantic .

He hadn't heard that before either. Part of him didn't want to read what it said and to be let down again, but goose bumps ran the length of him, this feeling bubbling up in his chest that he couldn't explain. He would see what this said, and then if it didn't have answers, he would let it go.

Apparently, it fell on the aromantic spectrum but, he read, a demiromantic person didn't feel romantic attraction to someone unless they had a deep, emotional connection to them. There was also grayromantic, which meant a person sometimes felt romantic attraction, but seeing that didn't make Colby's heart race the way reading about demiromantic people did. So many things began to fall into place. Had Colby ever had a single crush in his whole life before Vince? Because he definitely had some kind of crush on him. Even as a kid or a teenager, Colby couldn't ever remember feeling those butterflies, couldn't remember wanting to be around someone just because of how they made him feel, or wishing he could be with someone he couldn't have. Hell, every time he'd asked someone on a date, it had been because he felt like it was something he was supposed to do. People dated, then fell in love, then got married. Colby had seen people he wanted to sleep with, but he'd never had a crush in his whole damn life…

Until now.

His hands shook as he read on, his whole life forming a picture in his head he'd never had before. The pieces had been a puzzle dumped out of the box, and now they formed a picture of who Colby was. His bond with Vince changed things, their connection, their friendship opening up the doorway to…more.

With Vince.

His best friend, who would never want the same thing.

He slammed the computer closed, pushed out of the chair, and paced the room. On the one hand, it felt good to have a name for it, to know that there were other people like him out there, but on the other, he couldn't help worry that for the first time, he'd fall for someone, he'd want those things he'd been searching for his whole life, and the person he wanted it with didn't feel the same.

Colby grabbed his keys off the counter and went straight for his truck. His chest was too tight again, happiness and worry a cyclone inside him.

He needed to talk to someone about this, and the first person he thought about was Roe, but then all those familiar insecurities bubbled up in him, the ones that weren't fair, but he couldn't help feeling that Roe had been able to make choices Colby hadn't. The world looked at emotions too black or white. The things people felt didn't always make sense, but that didn't make them less real, and it didn't make the person who felt them wrong.

So he drove to Clint's.

He parked his truck and went straight into his friend's workshop where he made custom metal creations.

Luckily, Clint wasn't welding. He was standing at the counter, a metal piece in front of him.

"I think I might be demiromantic and have some kind of feelings for Vince," spilled out of his mouth before he could stop the words.

It wasn't until Clint's gaze darted to the side—where there were some metal flowers, a bigfoot, and windmills—that Colby noticed Deacon standing there.

"Shit." Well, now he'd outed himself to Deacon and let him know something was going on with him and Vince. He didn't care much about that; it was the other parts of him, how he was unsure and what his family would expect, that made him hold back.

"I'm sorry. That wasn't meant for me," Deacon said.

"You don't have to apologize. Jesus, I must have even seen your vehicle out there and it didn't register. You can stay." At this point, why not let him? He'd already shared his truth, and he was so confused, it wouldn't hurt to have another person to talk to. He went over and stood across the table from Clint.

"I'm sorry. I don't know what that is," Clint admitted.

Colby ran a hand over his face, still trying to make sense of this whole day, when Deacon said, "It's someone who needs a deep connection to feel romantic attraction."

Both Colby's head and Clint's whipped in Deacon's direction. It felt…fuck, it felt good, like some of the weight had been lifted off him that someone knew what it was. Made him feel less different. "How… Are you ?" Was Deacon like him?

"Demisexual." Deacon came closer. "It was more sexual for me. I never really understood the draw of sex, except with Patricia and then Grady." Deacon had been married to a woman before he and Grady got together. She'd passed away, and it had been hard on Deke. Colby hadn't seen the light return to his eyes until he'd met Grady. "When I was figuring things out, I did some research and learned about demiromantics."

"I didn't realize it was a thing until today. I've spent…" He rubbed a hand over his face again, emotion clogging his throat. "I spent my whole life feeling like something was wrong with me. I never understood it—the crushes people felt. Watching everyone around me fall in love. And now…"

"Now you're in love with Vince," Clint said. "And even if you weren't, even if you never fall in love with anyone, there's nothing wrong with you."

He hadn't realized it was tough to breathe until Clint said that, didn't realize how much he'd needed to hear it. "Thank you. And I'm not sure what I am with Vince. I'm definitely something with him. I feel more for him than I ever have with anyone else. But I'm fucking scared, man. Part of why Vince and I even started this is because neither of us wanted a relationship, neither of us wanted love. I can't change the game on him now, and if I do, what if I lose him? And I'm even more scared that he will feel the same, and then I'll realize I'm not demiromantic and I'm just confused about my feelings. What if I realize I don't really have it in me to do this and I end up hurting Vince? I would never forgive myself for that. I care about him too much."

"Talk to him," Deacon said. "I had a whole lotta fear when I realized things were changing with me and Grady. I couldn't have gotten through it without talking to him. Vince is a good man. The two of you will work it out together. The only way to do that is through honesty."

Deacon was right, of course he was, but what if… "What if telling him how I feel, or might feel, makes me lose him?"

"Vince would never do that," Clint assured him. And the thing was, Colby knew that, he'd just needed to hear it. "You have a lot less of a chance at losing him by talking to him than you do by shutting him out."

"Yeah, yeah you're right," Colby replied. He knew Vince. He trusted Vince. He could go to Vince with this, and the thing was, he wanted to go to Vince with it. He wanted to share everything with the man who had come into his life and completely changed his world. "You guys are good at this," Colby said playfully.

The three of them laughed. Jesus, he was so fucking lucky to have these people in his life. Now he just had to figure out how to tell Vince that he was maybe falling in love with him.