Page 38 of A Quiet Man

Tomas, Auden, Justin, and Asher were the only people wearing coats. The rest seemed completely comfortable in jeans and t-shirts. Riley, his arms bulging even bigger than normal, was flipping burgers on the grill while kids roamed around hungrily, helping to set up the picnic table in between starting rough-and-tumble wrestling matches for their fathers to referee.

Justin, carrying two side dishes towards the picnic table, stopped when he saw Tomas's besotted smile. He handed the dishes to a kid with a quick word about putting them on the table and walked over to join Tomas.

Tomas wiped the smile off his face and straightened up, bracing himself for Justin. What wonderfully rude remark would he manage to get out today? He'd been nice so far, but Tomas wasn't lulled by that.

Justin did a good job of at least outwardly looking friendly as he came to stand beside Tomas. "I gotta say, I'm relieved."

"What, that I have a boyfriend?" Tomas felt like laughing, a hard sort of laugh, but he kept it in. Of course Justin was still jealous and distrustful of Tomas and Riley's friendship. Of course, because he was an asshole.

"Well." Justin looked slightly abashed. "That, and, clearly, Riley's not your type."

Tomas could have laughed in Justin's face. Instead, he turned back to watching Noah and Auden interact. Auden was down on the ground now, playing with the boy, oblivious to the possibility of getting his jeans muddy. Tomas loved him so.

"I'm not sure I have a type. And you should trust your husband more, even if you don't trust me. You know he loves you, and he's the most loyal guy in the world."

"He loves you, too," said Justin. "It's taken me a while to know how to deal with that. I..." Here he hesitated, then seemed to force himself to go on. "I haven't had a lot of non-sexual love in my life. It's hard to see it in others and actually believe in it. Even you two."

Wow. That was kind of sad, and far more vulnerable than Justin usually let himself be around Tomas. Tomas waited a moment, just to be sure there was no zinger follow-up, no little dig or rude implications or insults. Then he said, "That's a shame."

"Yeah," agreed Justin.

Tomas could actually picture that, and in a way it humanized Justin for him. The go-getter, the guy with the strong personality who always put in a hundred and ten percent and tended to rub people the wrong way. He wouldn't have had a lot of friends growing up, and even fewer in the cutthroat world he'd entered as an adult, police work at a high level, what with his tendency to call out idiocy, go where nobody else wanted to go, and refuse to cover for incompetence. That, and he'd changed jobs frequently. Yeah, he hadn't had many friends on the force.

"How's Asher doing?" Tomas asked cautiously. To outward appearances, he was just one of the boys, except that he was dressed as warmly as the other non-shifters.

"Pretty well, considering," said Justin. "He really looks up to Riley. He shares classes with Carson, and they've become protective of each other."

"Oh. Good," Tomas said, feeling witless and tongue-tied as he tried to figure out what that meant. Did he mean they kept each other from being bullied? Or was it a budding romance? He didn't want to ask.

"Kids aren't as quick to pick on someone who has a wolf for a buddy who could slam you into next week if you trip his friend in the halls," Justin said grimly. Clearly, he was more involved in his kids' lives lately, if he was finding out these things. "Not that I'd encourage Carson to slam anyone into next week. But it helps to know he could."

"Yeah," agreed Tomas. He wondered if he was supposed to suggest a topic now. He wondered how soon he could leave the conversation and go stand next to someone else, or perhaps eat something.

"So," said Justin. "You've taken a shine to Cody." He said it reproachfully.

"We've become friends, yes," Tomas said cautiously. Was this the newest angle of attack?

"He thinks you're wonderful, and you don't even have to work together."

Ah. "And you and he do work together," supplied Tomas. "And you wish he thought you were wonderful." It startled him to think of Justin being jealous of his friendship with Cody. 'He thinks you're wonderful' probably translated for Justin into mentioning his name once or repeating something he'd said. Since Justin tended to be jealous anyway, he'd probably blown it up bigger than it was in his head.

"It would just be nice not to be outclassed by you constantly. I'm not sure if Cody finds me intimidating or what, but he seeksyouout."

Tomas shook his head. "You need to stop being jealous of me."

Justin sighed, deflated. "You have a way with shifters that I never will."

"Did you two get off on a bad foot or something?" Cody hadn't said anything about that, and he probably would have. He and Tomas had opened up to each other about a lot of things so far, and Cody didn't seem the type to hold back about it if he was having issues with Justin. If nothing else, he'd have liked to have someone to commiserate with him.

"No. But it's a continual blow to my self-esteem to realize there will always be things I struggle at, while you're a natural. I've been unfair setting you up as someone to measure myself against. I know that, and I'm working on it."

"Good," said Tomas. "Listen, what you said to me on the phone the other day. I think you actually didn't mean to insult me that time. So, yeah. I guess I jumped the gun."

Justin's smile was wry. "Does this mean you're ready to forgive me for being a jerk to you?"

Tomas hesitated. He didn't want to be honest here, but honesty seemed to slip right out of him. "Not really. At least, I don't think I'll ever trust you. You've turned on me too many times, and you're too good at it. But I'd like to be able to get along with you, for Riley's sake."

He shrugged awkwardly. Talking with Justin always made him feel inadequate, pissed off, or both. Today, it was just inadequate. The truth was, he couldn't forgive and forget Justin's treatment of him in the past, and he was always braced for it to continue, or, worse, be aimed at Auden, and thus even more unforgiveable. Most likely, he was too sensitive. He generally was. Even so, it was the truth: he didn't trust Justin or like being around him. There were no up sides and lots of down sides.