Chapter 9

NINE

Chapter Nine—Cullen

Cullen didn’t often panic. He prided himself on being the kind of guy who kept his cool, the guy who was able to assess a stressful situation and keep things from going sideways. And when situations did end up upside down, he was the guy his friends came to for help.

He took one look at Jude and realized nothing about the current situation was under his control. Jude looked… flattened, the carefree man of the past few days gone and the old, cold Jude back. Shit, shit, shit—did Jude think Cullen still had feelings for Dean? He needed Dean to go away, now.

Cullen turned to his ex-lover. “Dean, you’re not welcome here. You need to leave.”

“Dude, I just got here, and we need to talk.” He moved toward Cullen, and Cullen raised his hand to stop him.

“We have nothing to say to each other. Why aren’t you at home with your new wife? I’m assuming you didn’t bring Hannah with you?”

As he spoke, Cullen glanced around for his jeans and t-shirt, spotting them on the back of the couch. Snatching them up, he turned away and maneuvered the jeans on under the towel, doing his best to hide his junk from Dean’s prying eyes. Once his shirt was also in place, Cullen spun back around to face the enemy.

“Well?” He prodded.

“She’s at home. I told her we were going snowshoeing.”

“But we’re not. Dean?—”

Motion to one side caught his attention. Jude had his coat on and was slipping on his impractical shoes.

Jude lifted one eyebrow when he noticed the men looking his way. “I’ll just leave you two to—whatever this is.”

Before Cullen could react, Jude flung the door open and was striding across the yard to his car.

“Now that that guy’s out of the way...” Dean leered at him and Cullen had to really wonder what he’d ever seen in the jerk—why until now he hadn’t realized Dean was a complete tool. Dean lurched forward, grabbing Cullen’s shoulders and leaning in to kiss him. Dean’s lips were clammy and wrong, they didn’t fit right against his own.

“What the actual fuck, Dean? Get off me! What do you think you are doing?”

Wiping his lips with the back of his hand, Cullen shoved his ex-lover away just as he heard the sound of Jude’s tires crunching on the snow as he backed out of the driveway. Damn. The roads were shit. Jude had little experience driving in conditions like this. There was another storm on the way, but over the past few days, the temperatures had warmed just enough for ice to form in the shadows, making it all completely treacherous. Worry rose in his gut.

“You know you want me.” Dean smiled but it didn’t mean anything to Cullen anymore.

Cullen took a deep breath as he scrutinized his ex; he did not want to deal with Dean’s bullshit while Jude was out on the road, hurt and maybe angry. “Dean, listen to me. Hear my words. I. Do. Not. Want. You. Did ? Yeah, but it’s over between us. Done. You chose Hannah and you chose the life you are living now. What did you think I was going to do? Welcome you with open arms? Let you use me to cheat on your wife?”

Dean had the grace to at least appear slightly ashamed, but not nearly enough to satisfy Cullen.

“I… I thought we’d just, you know, keep doing our thing.”

“Jesus Christ, Dean. Do those vows you said mean nothing?” Cullen looked up at the ceiling and prayed for the patience to explain to Dean in little words he would understand that they were forever over. “Is Hannah poly? If so, that’s great for you, but I’m not, Dean, I am gay and I am attracted to one person at a time, it’s the way I was built. We are over, done. And frankly, after this stunt, I don’t know if our friendship can be saved either. Get out of here and have a nice life.”

“You don’t mean that.” Dean looked stunned, as if these were the last words he expected Cullen to say.

“I do, Dean. I really, really do.”

Through the still open door Cullen saw vehicle pull across the driveway, and for one hopeful second Cullen thought it might be Jude returning, only to notice his Uncle Shay’s profile in the driver’s window, Dean swiveled to see what had grabbed Cullen’s attention.

“Why is your uncle here?” Dean asked.

“I really have no idea, but I’m tired of surprise visitors. Go move your truck since you’re leaving anyway.’

“But—”

“Get. The. Fuck. Out.” Cullen’s teeth ground together around the words as he clenched his fists, fighting the urge to hit the other man. Really, what did he ever see in this jerk?

Dean finally seemed to get it; he grabbed his coat and shrugged into it, saying, “You’ll regret this. You’ll come crawling back to me.”

Through the front window, Cullen saw Shay clomp across the snow. Cullen wanted Dean gone.

“I won’t. Get out.” He pointed out the open door.

“What’s going on?” Shay asked as he reached the cabin’s front porch.

“Nothing, Dean was just leaving and never coming back.”

Cullen and his uncle stood shoulder to shoulder by the hot tub, watching as Dean climbed into his truck and backed out of the parking area. Once he was on the road, his truck fishtailed slightly on the icy lane before he straightened out and drove away.

“Do you want to tell me what that was about?” Shay asked.

“Not really.”

His uncle shot him The Look. It still managed to make Cullen answer despite himself.

“Dean wanting his cake and to eat too, or whatever.”

“Mmm, never liked that boy.”

Cullen glanced at Shay. They were similar in height, weight and build, but where Cullen had inherited some random Nordic genes, giving him blonde hair and a kind of bronze skin tone, Shay was dark—dark eyes, black hair (now sprinkled with gray), and an olive skin tone from their Celtic ancestors. Still, they both managed to look like Delacombes.

“I don’t suppose you spotted a black Volvo with temporary plates headed the other direction?”

“No?”

Shay raised his eyebrows, but Cullen didn’t explain further. He and Jude hadn’t had time to define what they were doing; it had only been a few days. Was it the beginning of something or merely a fling? To Cullen, their connection felt real. Which said something about his so-called feelings for Dean. Obviously, he’d mistaken lust and loneliness for something more. With Jude it was something more, Cullen knew it, but they needed time to get to that place where they could talk about it. Cullen had the feeling talking about relationship stuff was not one of Jude’s strong points.

“Why are you here?” Cullen suddenly asked.

“Can we?” Shay gestured towards the cabin.

“Sure.” Cullen stepped backward, allowing Shay to lead the way inside.

Jude’s things were strewn all over the living area, his laptop propped open on one of the end tables. Cullen thought, hoped really, he’d come back, and Cullen could explain about Dean. Yes, he should probably be pissed that Jude had assumed the worst and just left. But, after the past few days of getting to know him, Cullen knew Jude didn’t trust easily, that he didn’t think he had much to offer a romantic partner.

While Shay peeled off his puffy jacket and unlaced his boots, setting them to the side of the fireplace, Cullen glanced around, seeing that Jude had been in the midst of making breakfast. A lump settled in the base of his throat.

“Fucking Dean.”

“No doubt about that. I drove up here because I couldn’t get through on your cell.”

“Yeah, no signal for the past couple days. To be honest, I probably wouldn’t have checked it anyway.”

“Mmm, well.” Shay moved across the room to perch on one of the stools. “The rental management company contacted me yesterday to tell me they’d been hacked and that not only had the cabin been rented for the entire month of January by some guy name Jude Collins, the rental proceeds had disappeared into some hacker’s bank account.”

“No way,” Cullen exclaimed. “That explains a lot, everything really. You do know who Jude Collins is, right?”

Shay nodded. “Of course I do. Did he show up? I figured he’d been hacked too, and it was all a front.”

“Maybe, I guess. But he did show up, that’s why I asked if you’d seen a car.”

“He was here?” Shay looked at him closely, seeing more than Cullen intended, like always. “What’s he like?”

Cullen groaned and dragged his hands down his face, hating that Dean had shown up and the outside world had crashed their party.

“He arrived a little bit after I did. At first, he was an asshole about me being here, but it was the night of the big snow and I wasn’t going to shove him out in the storm. Do you want some coffee or something?” Cullen needed something to do with his hands, something to distract him from Jude’s absence.

Shay nodded and, while Cullen filled the Keurig and then waited for it to heat up, he ended up telling his uncle everything—how he and Jude had ended up really connecting regardless of their differences, and had been pretty much living in their own pocket universe for the past week. OK, he left the sex parts out, zucchini notwithstanding.

“He’s smart, Shay, and funny, and quiet and shy. He’s nothing like everybody paints him to be.”

“People rarely are. You, for instance, are smarter than you like people to know.”

“Whatever.” Cullen dismissed his uncle’s words.

“Speaking of which, have you heard back from Evergreen Industries?”

“I haven’t exactly been checking my emails and Evergreen said they wouldn’t be getting back to me until at least the end of the month.” Cullen wasn’t banking on anything from them anyway. It would just be another dead end, and Cullen would have to start all over trying to convince CEOs his idea was not only viable it would pay for itself.

Shay sensed Cullen’s mood, saying, “I’m proud of you, Cullen, I know it’s been a hard road recently, but I want you to know I’m proud.”

Cullen hated that he soaked up his uncle’s praise like a fucking sponge. “Well, it’s not a done deal or anything.” Evergreen Industries was the company that dealt with most of the waste produced by the smaller communities in northwest Washington. Cullen had designed a process he believed would revolutionize recycling and how reusable waste was managed, keeping more of the reusable in the region and also remaining cost-effective. Evergreen had seemed excited when he’d sent in his proposal months ago, but who knew?

“Mmm.” Shay raised one eyebrow, silently letting Cullen know he wasn’t buying what Cullen was selling.

Tired of talking about himself and the job he wasn’t going to get, Cullen took the conversation back to more pressing matters. “Fuck, Shay, Jude stormed out of here when Dean was spouting off. I’m worried, he knows nothing about driving in snow and ice.”

“We could drive around? I don’t know that it would help if we don’t know what direction he’s gone in. But it’s something.”