Chapter 6

6

CALEB

With the lights on everything feels too real. The sticky t-shirt in my hand, the heat in my cheeks, the uncomfortable knot forming in my stomach. Not regret, but something more like longing. I want to know this man. Graham. Beyond the hurried kisses and hidden hand jobs.

“Shit,” I whisper as it all hits me. I’m scared. I’m worried I’m going to ruin this, and judging by the look on Graham’s face, I just did.

He backs away and forces a smile as he quickly bends down to gather his clothes. Cool air starts to pour into the small space through the vents on the ceiling, and instead of relief, I miss the sweltering heat. Goosebumps cover my arms and fill my chest with a familiar emptiness.

The elevator jumps and Graham grabs the rail with a small yelp that is adorable as hell.

“Sorry about that,” the man calls through the crack of the door. “We got the generator up and running. Just give me?—”

The doors slam shut before he can finish his sentence and the elevator jerks again.

With my heart in my throat, I stare as Graham quickly throws himself together.

“I…” He laughs and shakes his head as he fumbles with the buttons on his shirt.

I can’t help my silence as I watch him. God, I want to be in a hotel room with him. I want to be his date to this wedding. I want to be the guy who gets to help him get dressed and straighten his bowtie.

“I guess this is it?” he asks, and I try to answer him, but everything I want to say is still stuck inside my chest, wrapped tightly with years of fear and hiding. “This was fun. You should… let yourself be happy, Caleb. Every now and then.”

The smile he gives me is sweet and brilliant and it loosens my tongue. Under the bright lights it’s hard to form a coherent response, but my confusion and panic fades as Graham’s eyes fall to my mouth, and I find courage in the memory of his kiss.

“I wish things were different. I want…” I rub the back of my neck and choke out a humorless laugh. “I don’t know.”

“Let’s not make this awkward, yeah? We had a weird, yet eventful and sexy experience. It all feels very… Vegas.”

“ Very Vegas.” I take a small chance and straighten his bowtie, granting myself another wish. His breath hitches as he meets my gaze. Graham looks put together in his suit, but the flush in his cheeks lingers, the messy, misplaced strands of his hair fall over his forehead, and the slight burn on his chin from my stubble, all of it, evidence we’ve left behind. I’ve left a mark, and something inside me has shifted. I can’t take it back. The parts of myself that I’ve hidden, that flame I’ve kept extinguished tears through me like a wildfire burning my senses in its wake. “What if I don’t want this to be it?”

“Caleb.” Graham raises his hands, resting his palms on my bare chest, sending a shiver down my spine. I should pull away. The door could open any second. I didn’t even have a shirt on, for Christ’s sake. But I can’t make myself move. “It doesn’t have to be.”

“I don’t know how to do this.” I rest my forehead to his, exhaling an annoyed breath. Why can’t shit be simple like it is for everyone else? “I don’t do this.”

“Then don’t.” He shrugs and I pull back enough to look into those soft hazel eyes. “This doesn’t have to be anything more than what it was. A hot, sexy hook up. But if you want more…” His hand slides up my chest and rests against my neck. He smiles as his thumb traces the line of my pulse. Can he feel how fast my heart is beating? “Maybe we can meet up later after I’ve completed all my Best Man tasks, or maybe we can exchange numbers and just see what happens. Maybe we’ll meet up and maybe we won’t. I can’t make that choice for you. All I know for sure? Is that we only have another minute or two before this hunk of metal starts to move, and I want to kiss you again.”

“Yeah?”

“I like you. And maybe you like me too? I’ll make it easy for you.” He pulls out his phone, and I miss the heat of his touch immediately. “Give me your number, and I’ll text you when I’m free later, and we’ll see what happens. We can just text if that’s all you want, or maybe there will be blow jobs. It’s up to you.”

“Blow jobs?” My head tips forward with a low rumbled laugh. “That’s one hell of an elevator pitch.”

“Well, I told you I’m a good salesman.” He quirks one perfect brow. “So, what do you think?”

“I think…” Leaning in, I kiss the corner of his mouth. “I think I’m sold.”

The elevator hasn’t moved yet, and I should probably thank whoever is listening for small favors, for the time we already had, but I deepen my kiss. Graham’s mouth seals over mine, our tongues taking one last quick taste, and the only thought rolling through my head is how at home I feel in my own skin. It’s a rare feeling, and as he moans into my mouth, I bask in it.

“Are you sure?” he asks as he pulls away and I nod.

I take his phone from his hand and type my number into his contacts. It’s reckless, and I’m not sure what all I can offer him beyond this moment, this weekend, but I’m tired of denying myself.

You should let yourself be happy.

I want that more than anything.

“I have dinner plans with some of my teammates tonight, but?—”

“I’ll text you later, and like I said, nothing has to be set in stone. We’ll see what happens, okay?”

“Okay.” I kiss him again, a quick peck on the lips just as the elevator starts to move. My phone slides across the floor with the motion, and I bend down to pick it up, grateful I didn’t forget it.

Graham is smiling at me when I’m standing straight again, and it’s infectious. My lips tug up into a huge grin. “What?”

“I just sent you a text,” he says as the doors slide open to the fourteenth floor. There’s a crew of firemen standing in the hallway, and they all stare at my shirtless chest with a mixture of confusion and humor.

“What? It was hot as hell in here,” I offer as an explanation, and one of the guys blinks a few times, recognition widening his eyes.

“Wait, aren’t you the goalie for Colorado?”

I press the button for the nineteenth floor and pretend like I’m not the guy he knows I am. “The who?”

“You look just like?—”

“Caleb Burnside?” Graham says as he steps off the elevator, and holds the doors open with his arm outstretched. “I know, right? It’s uncanny, really. Too bad, though, it would have been quite the story if I was stuck in an elevator with a real NHL player.”

Something like disappointment flashes in the fireman’s eyes as I fight to repress a laugh, but Graham’s smug smile almost does me in.

“Oh, well, damn… That’s unreal, you look just like?—”

“Don’t you have a wedding to get to?” I interrupt and focus on Graham, ignoring the annoyed look on the other guy’s face.

“Shit… I do.”

“Go be a best man…”

“Talk to you later?” Graham asks with a secret smile.

“Definitely.”

“Definitely,” he whispers, lowering his hand, and as the doors slide shut his eyes never leave mine.

Once the elevator starts moving again, I try to check the text he sent me, but my phone is dead. I rub the back of my neck again, my grin so dopey my cheeks hurt, every second of what happened running through my brain like a filthy movie. Fuck. I can’t believe that happened. And when I’m finally back in my room, it all feels like a dream. The only thing grounding me in reality is the jizz-stained shirt in my hand and the promise of a text waiting for me on my phone. I drop the t-shirt next to my luggage and immediately plug my cell into its charger. Staring at the little lightning bolt on the black screen, I hesitate.

Maybe we’ll meet up and maybe we won’t.

We can just text if that’s all you want, or maybe there will be blow jobs. It’s up to you.

I can’t make that choice for you.

I leave the phone on the desk, my heart in a chokehold, as I decide I need time to think. I strip out of my clothes and jump in the shower, dissecting every word, every touch until I’m hard and aching all over again. I take my dick in my hand and stroke myself slow and hard, thinking about Graham’s lips on my neck and his fingertips on my skin. I close my eyes and wish myself back into that small box of time, where the heat was too much, but I was myself and feeling, and I… I coat the tile with my release, breathless with dissatisfaction and wanting. This is my life. This is who I am. I don’t get to have what I want.

The thought grates me and I shut off the water, pushing open the shower door harder than I mean to. It hits the wall and I cringe waiting for the glass to shatter, sighing with relief when it stays in one piece. I towel off and dress, all the while staring at my fucking phone like it might detonate and obliterate this room, and every fucking excuse I’ve conjured up in my head of why I shouldn’t do this.

I can’t make that choice for you.

I sit at the end of my bed, glaring at my reflection in the mirror. Who the fuck is that guy?

He’s a coward.

“Fuck that.”

I don’t have to decide my whole life right now. I don’t have to decide whether or not I want to come out across the front page of every sports news magazine tonight. I can meet my friends for dinner and meet another friend for blow jobs. I’m in fucking Vegas, and who I choose to hang out with means nothing in the grand scheme of things. No one is watching my every move. No one probably even fucking cares. Jesus, I’m so self-centered. It’s one night, and then maybe… Just maybe. That’s all this is, and even if tonight is all I get, at least I had the balls to finally take what I want for once.

Standing, I walk over to the desk with purpose, and when I open my text messages and filter down to the one from an unknown number, I bark out a laugh. He’d sent three messages. One with a simple “This is Graham.” And another with an eggplant emoji that says, “What? I’m a chef. I like vegetables.” And the last one, “You choose?”

“Christ.” I scrub my palm down my face and plop back down on my bed, grinning like a fool again.

I close the text app and open up his Instagram channel and watch the last video he posted. I already watched it on my plane ride here, but this time it’s different. I know what his hands feel like, and that his lips taste like sugar.

There’s no going back.

It’s just one night.

Nothing too heavy, just see what happens.

I want this.

Let yourself have a little joy.

I open up my texts again and exhale as I type with shaking fingers.

Me: I think I choose…

My thumb hovers over the eggplant emoji, but God, that doesn’t feel right either. I want whatever he is willing to give. I want him. I click back to the keyboard and type out three words.

Me: I choose you.

Thank you for reading ELEVATOR PITCH! We hope to revisit their story in 2025 in order to expand it. Fingers crossed but we never knows what life will throw at us. In the meantime, follow us on social media.

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