26. “I drink to thee”

26

"I drink to thee"

Now

The sound of the doorbell jolts me from sleep. I stumble downstairs in nothing but a pair of sleeping shorts, thinking unpleasant things about Ian and his team and renovations in general. It isn't them. It's Romeo. I can't tell if he's slept in the few hours since I saw him. His eyes are glassy and still a little red, but they're clear. He's dressed in a pair of khaki shorts and a white T-shirt, and he has a cup of takeout coffee in his hand.

He holds it out to me and says, "I brought you a coffee. Thought you might be tired."

I can't stop the smile that takes over my face, so I don't even try. "Aren't you tired too?"

"I am. I'm beat."

"Where's your coffee then?"

He grins sheepishly and goes pink from his neck to his ears. "I, er, I guess…I guess I just wanted an excuse to take another look at your face."

Fuck me. The things that makes me feel .

He's still grinning and holding the cup up. I take it from him and take a sip. It's heaven. Strong and sweet but not too sweet.

I raise the cup to Romeo in a silent salute and drink again. He's watching me with a soft, mushy look on his face, which is doing things to my heart. Somersaulty, head-over-heels, set-a-match-to-your-life kinds of things.

"Want to share?" I offer.

He takes the cup and has a sip.

It's almost nothing. It's silly at best, but this little interaction makes me happier than I've been in years. Without thinking, I lean down and plant a kiss on his lips. He takes me by the back of the neck and kisses me back with meaning before we realize the front door is still open and we're in clear view of our neighbors. We stop as suddenly as we started, and I crane my neck left and right to ensure nobody saw.

"Get in here," I say, kicking the door shut and pinning him against the wall once he's inside.

He offers me another sip of coffee, and I take it.

It's better than good.

It's perfect.

It's my exact order.

A triple shot of shaken espresso with oat milk and a pump of salted caramel syrup .

"How did you know this is my drink?" I ask.

"Lucky guess," he answers, not holding eye contact.

I offer him another sip, and when he reaches for it, I pull the mug away. "No, seriously, how'd you know?"

He goes even pinker than he was earlier. "I kind of follow your socials. You post a lot pics of your coffee, you know that?"

"Which socials?"

He's so pink now his neck looks mottled. "All of them."

"Is that right?"

He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, looking more uncomfortable by the second. "I know it's not cool, I-I know that. It's just…"

"What's your alt account name?"

"I'd rather not say."

"Tell me," I say, digging my fingers into the precise spot on his side that makes him shriek with laughter.

"No."

"Tell me." I hit the spot again.

"It's dumb." He laughs, thrashing from side to side, trying in vain to bat my hands away from him.

"Tell me." This time, I'm serious, and he can tell.

"Promise you won't laugh?"

"I mean, I don't know. How dumb is it? Because if it's like mild to medium on the dumb scale, then sure, I promise, but any dumber than that, and I'm afraid I can't be held accountable for my…"

"It's ILTTD2, okay? There. Are you happy now?"

"ILTTD? What's that?"

He takes the cup from me, has a long sip, and then holds the cup up near his face, obscuring his mouth from view. He looks different now. Serious, almost scared. Shy boy spilling secrets.

"ILTTD stands for…fuck, I can't believe I'm saying this aloud." He rolls his eyes as he psyches himself up. "It stands for I Love Thee Thou Doth, okay?" He squirms and looks away, trying not to smile but smiling from ear to ear nonetheless. "Are you happy now? I told you it was stupid. I was in a bad place when I made the accounts."

"I love thee thou doth. That's your alt account handle?" My voice lilts up at least two octaves. "You love me mou moth?"

"Oh God, no. That's awful, Jude. Don't say that again, okay? Don't say that to anyone who isn't me. There's a limit to how much one can butcher the language and get away with it, even you. I'm serious."

It's the kind of laugh that starts with an explosive gust that almost doubles me over and escalates quickly until my lips are peeled back and I'm not sure if I could get my face back to normal if my life depended on it .

"Oh God," says Romeo, laughing too. "I forgot what you're like. I mean, I knew it was bad, but I forgot just how bad, you know?"

When I've managed to calm down to a splutter that no longer poses a serious risk of making coffee spray out of my nose, I take a sip of coffee and hand the cup back to Romeo. He takes it from me and sets it on the console table to his right. His hand drifts up and long, graceful fingers curl into the hair that leads from my navel to my cock.

He's close to me, close everywhere, hands on my chest, lips on my lips.

"I do, okay?" he whispers. "I love the fuck out of you."

Every good feeling in existence expands and blooms in my chest. I'm light. For the first time in years, my feet aren't made of stone. I'm floating, flying, suspended by nothing but the fluttering beat of my heart.

I take Romeo in my arms and hold him as tightly as possible. He struggles a little, but only because he's trying to get closer to me.

I breathe him in and neither of us moves until the doorbell rings again. This time it is Ian. I let the guys in, and then Romeo and I head down to the basement without saying a word. The door closes with a soft snick that's quickly followed by the sound of a deadbolt sliding into a latch. It's a sound that may as well be a match dragged over sand and powdered glass. Friction and heat. Red phosphorous changes to white and the air in the room ignites.

He has his hands in my pants in under two seconds, and two seconds after that, said pants are knotted around my ankles. We don't make it to the sofa. We fall to the floor and roll around on the kilim rug my mom bought in Morocco. I stroke his cock through his shorts, feeling it lengthen and harden under my touch. His lids slide to half-mast and he hums into my ear as he curls his hand around the base of my dick. We stroke like that, slow and dreamy, until saliva pools under my tongue.

"Want you," I pant. "Want you in my mouth."

Romeo has the same idea. "No, me first. Need it, Jude…need to taste you."

It takes us a lot longer than I care to admit to work out that there's a way for us both to get what we want. I swivel around, lying on my side on the floor, and ungracefully shove as much of his dick into my mouth as I possibly can. He does the same. It's instant bliss. A salty burst in my mouth, the ridge of a thick, blunt head pushing my tongue down and hitting the back of my throat. Warm lips forming a vacuum around my dick, swallowing me whole.

I paw at his ass as I bob my head, kneading soft flesh in both hands, prying his cheeks open and tracing a line along his cleft. He sucks my dick gently. Softly, softly, then hard, not stopping for air. Not stopping at all.

I pull off with an audible pop of lips and lick a broad stripe from his crown all the way up the haphazard veins that lead to his balls. I take one and then the other into my mouth, tonguing sensitive flesh gently as he moans around my cock. Each sound sends rumbling tremors through me. Tremors that grow and expand, stretching me and making me swell in ways I didn't know I could stretch or swell.

I lick the tips of two fingers and run them over his opening. It pulsates under my touch and unlocks a different, deeper sound. I roll him onto his back, kneeling on either side of his head, and pull his knees back to his chest so I can see him. All of him. Smooth, creamy skin darkens where it puckers. I circle him gently. His hole is puffy and a little swollen from where I've been, and sweet Jesus, that turns me on.

I run my tongue along the seam that knits his balls together and don't stop until I'm eating his ass. I lap at his crease, teasing and nudging it open with my tongue. He sucks me in earnest now. Frantic. Hungry. Not soft. His hands claw at my thighs, nails raking my skin as I thrust into his throat .

I don't just feel like I'm floating now. I'm not just weightless. I'm tense. Full. Full to bursting. There's pressure everywhere. In my dick. In my balls. In my face.

It's everywhere.

It's too much.

I can't contain it.

I can't.

And then, I'm catapulting through time and space.

Romeo keeps sucking. He doesn't stop until the pleasure is blinding, and even then, he keeps on. It's never-ending. The end of one story. The start of a new one.

Before my body has jerked and spurted the last of its pleasure into him, I start stroking his dick like I mean it. Smooth skin travels up and down sinew and steel. I watch, transfixed, as his body stiffens, hips arcing off the floor, and his meatus opens. Thick, hot ribbons of semen hit the back of my tongue.

It's heaven.

For once, it's not heaven and hell. It's just heaven.

We sleep where we lie, waking sometime later and starting all over again. At some point, he goes upstairs and returns with an apple and a bottle of water. While he's gone, I drag myself onto the sofa, stretching sore muscles and using my fingers to iron out a crick in my neck .

Romeo opens the water and drinks half of it before offering the rest to me. He kneels on the floor and watches quietly as I drink and eat, circling his hand tightly around my shaft as he tugs life back into my spent cock.

"I get the distinct impression I'm being fed and watered for the sole purpose of getting me ready to be of sexual service to you," I tease.

He gives me a filthy smile. "History has shown that we both have a couple of major blind spots when it comes to each other, my friend, but in this case, you're reading the situation dead right."

I drop the bottle and apple core onto the side table, and he gets to his feet. He rifles through his shorts till he finds the lube. He gives it to me and turns, arching his back just enough to provide me with the access I need. The sight of him like that, his naked golden skin and tan lines, back curved, ass offered sweetly to me, is almost enough to make me start crying again.

Instead, I kiss the back of his thighs and draw lines with my tongue where his ass and legs meet as I slide my fingers into his heat. I'm as gentle as can be, and he accepts the intrusion with only the softest sighs.

When he's ready, he straddles my hips and holds me by the root as he lets gravity bring us together. He runs his hands up and down my chest, taking a pec in each hand and squeezing hard. My biceps and triceps are next. Then it's my pecs again.

There's a base hunger in his eyes that makes them look dark.

"How did you do it, Tiger?" He looks pained, unspeakably beautiful, teeth clenched, lips parted in a grimace as he posts up and down on my cock. There's a slight easing as he slides up and a slow, grinding squeeze as he slides down. "How the hell did you go and get hotter? How? You were already so fucking hot. Nearly lost my mind when I saw you in the store… Didn't know if I wanted to kiss you. Or kill you. Wanted to kill you…wanted to kiss you… Couldn't tell which… Just knew I wanted you."

He rolls his hips in a way that makes us both moan and leans down to kiss me. I card my fingers through his hair, holding on, keeping his face close to mine, stamping this moment into a memory I'll keep forever.

It's the kind of sex that stops and starts, changing from slow to furious and circles back to two bodies moving together leisurely again. It's making love, not fucking. Being close to each other, not orgasm, the only goal.

Eventually, when we've spent every drop we have on each other, he lays his head on my chest and doesn't move until I soften and slip out of him .

The big, shiny white elephant stands in the corner of the room, stamping its foot and growing larger and louder as the minutes tick by.

Lexi's voice and the collective experience of people far more sensible than I am whisper, "Men don't leave their wives for their mistresses."

Hours have passed.

It's late in the day.

Somehow, we've managed to spend most of the day curled up in each other. Upstairs, I hear Ian and the team packing up and getting ready to leave. Romeo dresses quietly, each garment putting more and more space between us.

I put my shorts on, and Romeo looks away as I tie the drawstring. When we're both dressed, we sit on the sofa and face the TV.

"Do you love her?" I ask, unintentionally borrowing someone else's voice.

He's quiet for several seconds, and though I'm not looking at him, I hear his jaw click twice before he answers.

"I do love her," he says eventually, and my heart drops so hard I'm not sure I'll recover. "But not the way a man should love his wife." Air fills the void in my lungs, but it's shallow and shaky. "I thought I would. At times, I even thought I did. I was fucked up and infatuated with her when we met. I'm not going to deny that. I mean fuck, she's impressive. I couldn't believe a woman like her would want a guy like me. I thought I'd get over you and my feelings for her would grow into love. I swear I did. I wouldn't have married her if I didn't. I'm an asshole, but I'm not that kind of asshole. It's important to me that you know that."

"I do know that," I say quietly. As much as what he's said is a relief, I need to know more. Pick, pick, pick . Rip, rip, rip . "Does she love you?"

He's thoughtful as he mulls the question over. "I mean, yeah, I'd say she loves me as much as it's possible to love someone you don't really like. Someone you don't know. She's going to be pissed and hurt, Jude, I know that. Divorce isn't in her five-year plan, but she won't be surprised, not really. She knows I'm not happy, and while she'll never admit it, I know she isn't happy either. I irritate the shit out of her. She belongs with someone strong and ambitious. Someone who knows where their car keys are and who's absolutely positive what day of the week it is. Someone who'll fight with her because they care enough to, you know? We've talked about separating in the past, and recently, it's been coming up more. I sleep in my old room more often than in the main bedroom with her. It upset her at first, but recently, I've started to think she prefers it. I'm not saying you aren't a big factor in my decision to leave. You are. Of course you are, but you're not the only one."

After Ian calls out to let me know he's leaving, Romeo and I head upstairs. It's late afternoon, not yet evening, but the light is already changing. Bright, glaring rays have grown muted and long. Romeo checks his pockets. He has his keys but not his phone. He's about to head down to the basement to look for it when I pull it out of my pocket and hand it to him.

"You left it on the side table," I say.

He takes it, shakes his head at himself, and then nods his thanks.

The air between us exists in a vacuum now. Tight and compressed. Under pressure. He turns to leave, and seeing the back of him, his graceful lope and unruly hair, might be the most terrifying sight I've ever seen. More terrifying than watching him walk over to Selby that first time. More terrifying than seeing him wait at the altar for her, and even more terrifying than seeing him in my rearview mirror when I drove away from him after the wedding.

I feel the same now as I did then. Frozen. Paralyzed. Rooted to the spot and completely unable to move.

No.

Not this time .

Not again.

This time has to be different.

This time, I see him go, and I find my voice. It's a voice that's broken and cracking, but it's mine.

" Romeo!" He turns, brows raised in the start of a smile or a question, I'm not sure which. "Come back to me," I plead, fully aware of how pathetic I sound. "I can't live without you, so please , come back to me."

He's back in my doorway in four long strides, and I'm in his arms. He holds me so tightly my rib cage is forced to adjust. When my breathing slows, he brushes my hair back off my face and says, "When I get there, I'm going to shower and pack some clothes, okay? I'm going to tidy up my notes and get Tiger ready, and when Selby gets home, I'll tell her I'm leaving. I don't know how long it will take. She might kick my ass out in under ten minutes, or it could take a while. I'm going to give her as much time as she needs 'cause I owe her that much, at least." I sniff and nod. "But the second we're done, the second I leave that house, I'm going to message you to let you know I'm coming home."

"Home?" I squeak as my vision goes blurry.

He kisses me lightly on the cheek and then on the forehead, cradling my head in his arms as I let myself lean on him. "Yeah, home. "

This time, when he goes, I let him. I watch him walk until the silvery figure of him disappears into the Dark Forest.

I take a quick shower. The water's still cold and tonight it makes me shiver, and then I eat everything I find in the fridge that looks halfway decent. After that, I sit on a kitchen stool and watch the minute hand on the clock above the pantry door creep around in an agonizingly slow circle.

My mind is a dumpster fire. A trash heap. A mess of past betrayals and catastrophic misunderstandings. Thoughts and fears colliding and amplifying. I think about calling Benji and using every curse word I know, and a good few I plan on inventing, and I type several messages to Lexi preemptively asking her to come and get me in case things go badly here. I think of Selby and how what we've done will hurt her, and I hate myself for it. At the same time, I know I'd do it all over again, which makes me feel better and worse in equal measure.

When all the thinking does less than nothing to improve my mood, I scroll through my socials and do an audit of the posts ILTTD2 has liked over the past year in an attempt to numb my brain.

The answer is every single post…except for the ones where I'm pictured with Sam.

For some reason—most likely to do with the fact my mental health could best be described as unraveling rapidly—I find that completely hilarious and start laughing hysterically, only just managing to curtail the outburst before it turns into tears.

The minute hand moves slowly.

Slower than slowly.

It's made a full circle twice now.

It's the worst form of torture I've ever felt.

It's okay, I tell myself for the forty-third billionth time. He was probably packing for the first hour. She's only been home for an hour. Maybe less if she got home later than usual. She had a big day at work. Romeo said so. It could all still be fine. He could still be talking to her. There's no reason to think she's convinced him to stay.

I fight the rampant urge to rush over to Romeo's house to see if Selby's car is there. I manage not to, but only because I know damn well she parks in the garage, not in the driveway, so I wouldn't be able to see it either way. All my going over there would do is make me look as insane and obsessed as I feel.

After several lifetimes worth of catastrophizing, the fight leaves me. I hold my phone in both hands, mind vacant and beaten, and focus every ounce of my intention on willing a message to pop up .

Never having successfully manifested anything in the past, I almost drop my phone in shock when a message alert flashes on my screen.

On my way to you now

A long, strangled sob leaves me as I breathe the words in. I drop my phone on the counter, vision blurring as walls, ceilings, and doorways rush past me.

The dusty, gnarled wings of my heart slowly unfold and expand, stretching out for the first time in years. Their wingspan has increased since the last time they beat. They were downy and soft then. Fragile and weak. Now they're strong. Fully fledged. Fully grown. Battle-scarred but more powerful than before.

There's wind in my face, and I swear, my feet aren't touching the ground.

Streetlights and swings flash past me. White oak trees and a slide set too.

It's dark in the park, but I see a familiar flash of white in the distance. A silvery blue whisp with the shadow of a dog orbiting around him. When he sees me he lets the big bag he's carrying fall from his shoulder, pausing for a second to drop Tiger's bed and everything else in his hands on the ground.

" Romeo!" I yell.

Then he's flying too.

His flight is graceful, long limbs working in concert, a strong up-and-down motion that propels him straight into my wide-open arms.

We crash into each other at speed, and I swing him around, the force of the motion launching his feet into a broad arc as they sail through the air. His heart is racing, beating frantically against mine. When we land, I kiss every part of his face I can reach with my lips and garble nonsensically into his neck.

"Is this real? Am I real? Am I awake? Are you here? Is this real 'cause, 'cause I've had dreams like this before, and they never end well."

His eyelashes are wet, and he's nodding and saying, "It's real," over and over. "I'm here. We're both here."

"Is Selby okay?" I ask when I can.

A shadow passes over his features like a cloud blocking the moon. His bottom lip shakes when he speaks. "She's pissed and hurt, but I was right, she's not surprised. She said she's going to tell everyone that she's the one who kicked me out. I said I was okay with that, which I think may have pissed her off more because she threw one of those wicker baskets at me. It hit me here."

He indicates to his left eyebrow, and I see a dark glint and a fine stream of blood running down to his cheekbone. The sight of him like that, bloody and wounded, is enough to make me violent. I have to consciously remind myself that we wronged her badly to get myself to calm down. "And, and, I told her she could keep the house."

I'm still trying to come to grips with the fact that he's bleeding and I can't do anything to defend him. I've lifted the hem of my T-shirt, and I'm using it to clean him up, so it takes a minute before his words penetrate.

"But, Romeo," I say when they do, "your mom left that house to you. It was yours before you were married. It's your inheritance. It's not community property."

"I know. I do know that, but Selby put a lot of capital into it, and well, let's be honest, I've been a shit husband to her. She deserves to have something to show for the last five years. And besides, it's time. That house stopped feeling like a home a long time ago. I've been living with ghosts, stuck, unable to move on. I've stayed for a lot longer than I should have. I know that now, and I'm ready. It's time to let go."

I wipe his brow gently, relieved to see the cut isn't deep, and I let my T-shirt drop. I'm pretty sure I know what this means for me, but fuck it, after how badly we've screwed this part up in the past, I want to be sure. I really, really need to be sure .

"So, d-does this mean you're mine? For real? Mine to keep?"

Two gentle lines cut into his cheek. "I don't have a lot to offer you, Jude. I don't have much in the way of savings, and I'm pretty much jobless and homeless, so I'm not what I'd call much of a catch." He laughs the slightly unhinged laugh of a man who just took a flamethrower to his entire life. "I mean, I have some old furniture, a bunch of individually crated thrift store art, and a dog that sheds a lot of hair, and that's it." His hands are open at his sides and his smile fades. His eyes meet mine. "All I have to offer you is my bruised, bleeding heart. It's not much, but if you want it, it's yours."

My chest caves and rapidly expands as scar tissue stings and sparks and slowly starts knitting itself back together. I cup his face gently and pull him closer. The balmy night air caresses my skin, heating and cooling it simultaneously, sending a subtle tremor through me. A forewarning. An omen. I'm about to speak my truth.

"That's the only thing I've ever wanted."

He leans in, his mouth open and soft, his tongue looking for mine and sucking it gently into his mouth when he finds it. It's a knee-knocking kiss that makes the ground beneath us feel like it's spinning. We kiss and kiss, gulping down pain and regret and turning them into something different. Drinking each other in, savoring every sip as bitterness turns sweet. Neither of us hiding or in a hurry.

We kiss like men with years of tears to make up for and a lifetime to spend doing it.

When we surface, Romeo looks up and smiles broadly. "Look where we are, Tiger."

We're in the wonky, near-semi-circular shadow Inferno casts when the moonlight hits him. In fact, we're standing right where we were the day we served him mud cakes for the first time and he almost lit Buddy on fire.

"Come on," says Romeo, hoisting himself onto the boulder in a way that makes it look easy, "for old time's sake."

I clamber after him, losing my footing twice, nearly concussing myself in the process. "Jesus, has this become more treacherous, or have I gotten wiser to danger?"

"You're just out of practice."

"And what, you're in practice?"

"Yeah, course I am. I come here all the time." He holds his hand out to help pull me up and glances down, hesitating for a moment and adding, "I still tell Inferno my secrets."

I lie next to him, curling an arm under my head to make myself comfortable. "Really?" I tease. "I thought you said it was just a rock. "

"Oh, Jude." He sighs patiently. "It was never a rock."

We both look up at the starry night sky and breathe so heavily air hisses as it moves in and out of our lungs. I can't speak for Romeo, but to me, it feels like I'm breathing easy for the first time since the day he met Selby. No, before that. Long before that.

"What kind of things do you tell him?" I ask, curiosity getting the better of me.

I expect him to laugh it off, but he doesn't. Instead, he turns his head so he's facing me and his lips are almost touching the stone. He places one hand flat on the rough surface, stroking it as reverently as one would a mythical beast known to have a temper.

"Inferno," he whispers, "I miss him. It's been so long, and I still miss him so much. Why can't I forget him? Why can't I move on?" He flicks his eyes at me as the start of a shy smile makes his lips curl at the corners. He turns back to Inferno, nodding as though the giant rock has spoken. "Oh yeah? It's 'cause we're fated mates, huh? Well, you're a dragon, so you would think that, but I'm human, and that's not how it works for us."

I place my hand over Romeo's and move my face close enough to feel his breath on my lips. "Romeo's right, but he's also wrong," I say to my old friend, the stone dragon. "We may not have fated mates in this realm, but we do have people who are perfect for us. People who were made for us." My eyes sting with tears suddenly and without warning. "We get one in a lifetime. Only one." I lean in and kiss Romeo softly. "We call them soulmates."

He bites back a smile. "Thought you didn't believe in soulmates."

"I didn't. But I was wrong."