Chapter 1

ONE

Chapter One—Cullen

“You what?” His sister-in-spirit whispered loudly, her blue eyes impossibly wide as if she hadn’t heard the story once already.

“I called the number back and said, ‘mine’s 9-inches long and you can suck it.’” And much to his regret, he supposed, the shift supervisor had chosen that exact moment to walk by his cubicle—although the word cubicle hinted there was actual space, but cutbacks had reduced his assigned area to a 3x4 foot zone. Which had been like working in a shoebox for a guy built like Cullen Delacombe; at six-four and two hundred twenty pounds, he hadn’t been able sit in his chair without knocking into the false wall behind him, and he certainly never stretched his legs.

“Cullen, why?” Stacy giggled and sipped her champagne. “I mean, not, why did you do what you did, but why do you work jobs like that? You’re too smart for a job at a call center.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t work there anymore,” he reminded her, sounding more bitter than he actually felt about suddenly being unemployed. After all, it wasn’t the first time, and he had stuff on the horizon.

The shift supervisor, whom he’d loathed at first sight anyway, had stood over Cullen, skinny arms crossed over his chest, and waited for him to grab his personal belongings so the rent-a-cop security could escort him off the premises. What a jerk, as if Cullen was at all dangerous.

And, yeah, he’d been told he was “so smart” his whole life and frankly, he was sick of hearing it. If he was such a fucking genius, he wouldn’t be sitting here right now, best man at the wedding of the man he loved, smiling and laughing as if his heart wasn’t being ripped out of his chest and held up for all the on-lookers to gawp at. He snatched up the glass of champagne the waiter set down in front of him and downed it in one gulp.

Cullen caught the waiter’s eye. “Keep it coming.” The guy nodded. He was cute with long light brown hair pulled back into a ponytail and wide blue eyes, sporting a name tag that read Christopher . The quick wink and small smile Cullen received in response to his request suggested that, at the very least, Christopher thought he was fuckable.

“Hey there.” Stacy patted his hand, her long red nails glittering under the light of the chandeliers. “You have to toast the happy couple in a few minutes. You’re not done with your best man duties yet.”

Thanks, Stacy, for reminding him it was his job to send her brother, Dean, and his bride, Hannah, off to their new life together with all sorts of happy thoughts and good tidings for their future. A pulse of some sharp emotion Cullen didn’t want to put a name to had him taking a deep breath.

Somehow, though, he managed it. A half-hour later, he stood up in front of all the guests and reeled off his (thank god) prewritten and memorized speech.

It was possible he should have eaten lunch, and maybe even breakfast would have helped. But he’d been slightly nauseous all week and hadn’t thought he could keep anything down. Champagne though, that slipped down his throat with ease.

Christopher kept the champagne coming, along with the lingering looks. Cullen danced and played the clown as he always did, managing to keep up his happy face. If he teared up it was because he had something in his eye.

Cullen opened his eyes to a dim light reflecting from a bedside lamp onto the glossy stamped-tin ceiling. One minute he’d been—well, if not asleep, at least blissfully passed out—and now he was wide awake. The wedding and reception played on an endless loop in his head. His misery didn’t only have to do with the pounding of his head or the fact that Dean Kasey had married Hannah Stone, acting like what he and Cullen had had together was nothing. No, it was his whole life causing his stomach to clench.

Other aches and twinges made themselves known. Had he slept with Cute Waiter last night? God. Cullen rubbed his face with his hands and groaned; he was fairly sure he had. Slowly he turned his head to the side, praying there wasn’t a stranger asleep in his hotel bed. The space next to him was empty. Cullen sat up slowly and swung his feet to the carpet, thankful for small miracles.

Evidence suggested there had been someone there fairly recently, or at least one specific cute waiter. Propped up on the nightstand next to his phone was a pad of hotel stationery with “ thanks for the great night, sorry to have to leave but I need to feed my dog” written in an unfamiliar hand. Underneath was a quick signature of “Christopher” and a phone number.

As he stared at the words, wondering what he was doing with his life, his phone lit up with a notification. Cullen grabbed it from the nightstand squinting at the screen. Another groan escaped him as he noticed dozens of notifications when it was barely five in the morning; Christopher’s leaving must have woken him up but the notifications meant he wasn’t going back to sleep.

A couple of empty condom wrappers had been casually tossed onto the nightstand. Cullen shook his head. At least they’d been safe, and with any luck at all none of the other wedding guests had noticed, or cared, that he’d snuck upstairs with one of the catering staff.

He shivered, the morning air cool against his bare skin. Before he checked the damage on social media, he needed to pee, take a shower, and get dressed. Whatever had happened, he knew he would need to be fully dressed to deal with it.

A half hour later, Cullen picked up his phone again and sat back down on the bed to see what he’d done. He winced at what he saw, it was worse than he’d anticipated, his entire feed was full of picture after picture of him draped over Christopher. There was even a video of them dancing together, zero space between their bodies, time-stamped at just before midnight.

“Fuck my life,” Cullen groaned, laying back on the rumpled sheets.

This was not how he’d planned to spend New Year’s Eve, already hung over and recovering from a drunk fuck. And—he’d nearly forgotten—also unemployed and nursing a broken heart.

His phone vibrated in his grip, interrupting his spiraling thoughts. Cullen was tempted to turn it off but instead checked the screen, deciding he deserved whatever punishment came his way, just for being such an idiot.

Instead of a Facebook tag or Instagram notification, it was a text from his Uncle Shay. Technically, Shay was a second cousin or something like that and only fifteen years older than him, but Cullen had always called him Uncle. What the fuck was Shay doing up this early?

The keys to the cabin are in the squirrel. No one’s using it for a while, maybe you should take some time to get your head on straight .

Cullen squeezed his eyes shut and sighed, biting the inside of his lip. Great, the one family member in Cullen’s life whose opinion he actually respected, knew about last night’s debauchery. If Shay was offering up his cabin he must be worried about him. Crap, he hadn’t told Shay he’d been fired, although Shay did know about Dean and had told him that being best man was a bad idea. Cullen honestly didn’t care what most people thought of him, but Shay was an exception. The busy high-powered Seattle attorney had taken Cullen under his wing when he’d been desperate, the only family member to have his back when he’d needed that, and Cullen would be forever grateful.

The longer he considered it, the better the idea of hiding out at Shay’s place for a few weeks, or even the entire month, appealed to him. The cabin was tiny, barely five hundred square feet. A pointy A-frame style structure with the roof extending past the eaves and almost touching the ground. There was a main room, a loft for sleeping, a closet-sized bathroom, and a hot tub just outside the front door. There was no internet and it often had to be powered by a generator in the winter when there was a heavy snowfall over the Wenatchee National Forest. In other words, perfection.

Yes, he replied to his uncle, and then without hesitating, Cullen deleted all his socials and turned off his texting app. He’d pack up and head to Shay’s place and spend some time alone, maybe try to create some reason out of the chaos that had become his life.