Page 19 of Aisle Be The Groom (Bristlecone Springs #1)

GRAY

J ust as I was about to leave the room, my phone rang. I’d been so scatterbrained all evening at my impending date with Ozzie I’d almost headed out without my phone, keys, and wallet.

No, not a date. You promised to bring him to watch the local theater production, is all.

But it was kind of like a date, since I was picking him up, taking him, and bringing him back home. If I was lucky, there might even be some kisses. I wasn’t holding my breath. He’d wanted to pretend for one night. We hadn’t gotten a chance to hang out again since we arrived home to spectators. I’d hoped no one would know how late we got in, but Matty and Hudson had been in a heated argument in the yard when we pulled up.

At least Ozzie ran inside before Matty came over, a suspicious gleam in his eyes. Had he seen Ozzie’s fair skin bruised from my hands and kisses, he wouldn’t have been so easily fooled that Ozzie and I had driven to the next town over for dinner after the movies. Ozzie had conveniently not been feeling well yesterday, and I’d only glimpsed him this morning. I’d fought my instincts all day to return to the house early just to see him. Matty was smart and would figure shit out soon if I kept leaving work early.

I picked up the phone and almost dropped it. Carter. Why was he calling? Of all the years I’d prayed for him to call, why then? He never called me. The most I got from him was a voice note, and those were rare.

Had Ozzie told him the wedding was off? He did plan to call it off after what we’d done, didn’t he?

An icy knot formed in the pit of my stomach. I took a deep breath and swiped the screen. “Hey, Carter.” I tried to keep my voice light and steady, a near-impossible feat, given the tightness in my chest.

“Hey, Dad, I’ve been calling Ozzie for the past two days, but he’s not answering. Does he seem upset to you?”

“I don’t think so. Why?”

“It’s just that…”

“What is it, Carter?”

“You’ve got my back, right?”

“Right. What is it?”

“I met a guy here, and things went a little farther than I expected.”

“What’d you mean?”

“You’re not going to make me spell it out, are you?”

Carter had cheated on Ozzie? The rage I felt over his admission was misplaced. After all, Ozzie and I had done the same. Three times. Yet I wanted to knock Carter upside the head. Ozzie was a prize. Despite everything, he was. If my bozo son hadn’t run off to the Caribbean instead of being here to plan their wedding, would he have even thought about me twice?

Ozzie’s question about whether I would allow my friends to make fun of him rang in my ears, and I gritted my teeth. I loathed feeling the way I did, but my son was a prick to his fiancé. If not me, another man who treated Ozzie well would have stolen him away.

“Dad, why aren’t you saying anything?”

“What are you going to do?”

“It won’t happen again. I’ll stay away from him, I swear. I’m just afraid Ozzie saw the pic the guy tagged me in two days ago and that’s why he isn’t answering my calls. Did you notice any change in him?”

My heart stuttered, almost coming to a complete stop. Two days ago, Ozzie had turned down my offer to visit Lawson with me, then changed his mind on a whim. Two days ago, he’d asked me to pretend we were a couple. Two nights ago, he’d lain with me and made me fuck him like he was a single guy.

The puzzle pieces fell into place. It made sense. He’d thought Carter cheated on him, so he slept with me. Last night I’d lain awake for hours, reliving every moment of our time together and thinking it special when it was nothing but a revenge ploy to get back at Carter.

“Look, Carter. If you cheated on Ozzie, that’s for you two to discuss. Leave me out of it.”

Except I was smack in the middle of whatever game those two were playing. Had Ozzie been toying with me that night?

“You won’t tell Ozzie, will you?”

“It’s none of my business.”

“Good, because I’m gonna have to lie about that picture, or he’ll call off the wedding.”

“Don’t be so sure.”

“Yeah, that’s true. After all, if not me, who would want to marry him? I’ll give him a couple of days to cool down, then try him again.”

Son of a bitch. I opened my mouth to tear him a new one, my gut twisting with white-hot anger, but he’d ended the call.

“Ozzie deserves better than you.” My whisper echoed around the empty room, fighting its way through the thick silence before fading into the walls. I paced the floor, my mind racing. Why had Carter called to tell me what he’d done? If I told Ozzie the truth, I would betray him even more than I already had. If I didn’t, how could I convince Ozzie I cared about him?

I rubbed my temples, remembering Ozzie’s laughter and warmth and then Carter’s smirk, which usually preceded some foolish act. God, why the hell had I gotten involved? I knew better than to touch someone’s fiancé, especially the one of my own flesh and blood.

A sharp rap on my door startled me from my thoughts. I straightened my shoulders and stuffed my belongings into my pocket.

“Coming.”

Ozzie stood in the hallway, looking so fucking adorable in ripped black jeans and a cropped sleeveless T-shirt over a fishnet top that left a copious amount of pale skin on display. His blond hair was styled in layers, and his eyes were lined with dark eyeliner, making his blue eyes seem larger and more expressive. His lips were a soft shade of red that matched his shirt.

“Ozzie.” He tilted his head as if in invitation, and I bent toward him.

I jerked back. Ozzie frowned. “Is something wrong?”

Everything since you came into my life.

“Nope. Are you ready to go?”

He nodded. “I’ve been looking forward to this for the past couple of days.” The way he looked at me with his cheeks red, it was like he was telling me he’d been looking forward to being with me.

Of course he was. His fiancé had cheated on him. He felt slighted.

“Well, let’s go.”

Ozzie raised his hand as if to touch me but dropped it back to his side. “Umm, okay.”

We drove toward town with the radio blasting Willie Nelson songs and me gripping the steering wheel too tightly. Beside me, Ozzie nodded to the music, his gaze lost in the passing scenery. The silence hung like a dead weight between us, punctuated only by the strumming guitar and Willie’s mournful voice. He tapped his foot to the rhythm of the song, and now and then, he would hum along.

Too many thoughts were swirling in my head, threatening to explode if I opened my mouth. What if I said the wrong thing? This wasn’t how I imagined our first outing since that night would be—filled with unspoken words and tension.

About a mile from the town, I couldn’t take it anymore. I pulled onto the shoulder of the road, gravel crunching under the tires, and I killed the engine. The abrupt silence felt louder than all the tension-filled quiet before.

“I knew something was on your mind.” Ozzie’s knees bounced. “If you’re worried about what we did—Gray, what are you—”

I cupped the back of his head and slammed my mouth to his. My desperate need swallowed his surprised gasp to prove my thoughts wrong. Ozzie hadn’t hooked up with me out of revenge. He wasn’t like that. I couldn’t be wrong about him.

He leaned into me and wrapped his arms around me, pulling me closer as he kissed me back with an intensity that stole my breath and set my heart ablaze. The kiss was harsh, urgent, a clash of teeth and tongues fueled by our lack of alone time after the last time we’d been together. It tasted like the conversations we’d had in the back of my truck, the shared glances, the desperate touches. It tasted like the truth I couldn’t voice out loud.

We broke apart, panting, our breaths mingling in the small space between us. Ozzie’s cheeks were flushed a beautiful pink, and his eyes sparkled with a mix of confusion and desire. I brushed away a stray lock of hair that fell over his forehead.

“Gray, what’s going on? You’re confusing me. Since we left the house, you barely said a word to me. I thought you regretted what we did.”

“Do you?”

He shook his head. “I know I should, but I don’t.”

I took his hands, brought them up to my lips, and kissed them. “You polished your nails.” I examined the subtle shade of the tan coat. He tried to snatch his hands away, but I held them. “I like it, but wouldn’t you prefer a brighter color?”

“I thought no one would see the tan. It’d be my guilty pleasure.”

I let out a sigh. “I hate how much you feel you need to hide yourself.”

“Not everyone looks at me the way you do, Gray.”

“Do you need them to?”

His mouth fell open. Then he snapped it shut again. “I don’t expect you to understand.”

“Try again.”

“When you’re an XXL, you learn how to not call anymore attention to yourself.”

“Ozzie, I can’t pretend to understand what you go through, but my wish is that one day you won’t feel the need to hide any part of yourself. That you’ll walk through this world just as you are, beautiful and unapologetic. You deserve to feel confident in your own skin.”

You deserve a partner who’ll tell you that every day so you never forget it.

His eyes welled up with unshed tears, and he blinked rapidly. “Can I be honest with you?”

“Sure.”

“I’ve been feeling more like my old self every day I spend with you. Lately, I realized that…situations and-and some people in my life may not have been as supportive and accepting as they should have been. But you…you’re different, Gray.”

His honesty hit me like a punch to the gut, raw and powerful. This was Ozzie, bare and open to me. Vulnerable.

I wanted to hide him in my arms from the shallow people who had chipped away at his self-confidence over the years.

“I wasn’t always like this, Gray. But the last two years…”

The time he’d been with Carter. It was just as I’d feared. My son had broken his spirit.

I squeezed his hands tighter, my throat tightening with emotion. Was now the right time?

“Gray, I could tell something was bothering you when we left the ranch. What is it?”

I released him and sat back in my seat. If we didn’t want to miss the play, we should get moving.

“Everything’s turning into a bit of a shit show. This is very confusing for me, Ozzie. I don’t know who should have my loyalty. You or Carter.”

“What does that mean?”

“Did you sleep with me two nights ago because you saw a photograph of Carter with some other guy?”

“Wait. How did you know about that?”

A cold shadow crept across my heart. So it was true? “Carter called me before we left. He mentioned it. Said you’ve been ignoring his calls.”

Ozzie stared out the window with his lips pressed together. He gave a tiny shake of his head.

“You really slept with me because you saw that picture of Carter and that guy?” The words choked out of me, thick and slow with a sour taste of betrayal.

“What?” Ozzie jerked his head around. “No, of course not.”

“I’m supposed to think it’s just a coincidence you slept with me the same night you believed my son cheated on you?”

“Well, yes, but—hell, I’m not explaining this right.” He inhaled deeply and let out the breath. “Gray, I’ve admitted to myself how attracted I’ve been to you since you picked me up at the airport. What happened between us in the barn has weighed heavily on my mind, and I’ve thought about it a lot, but I always felt guilty when I consider where things could have gone between us. Seeing that picture of Carter just made me not give a damn anymore. What was the sense of holding back and doing the decent thing when he was obviously not thinking about me in that way? This wasn’t revenge, Gray. It was me giving in to what I’ve wanted to do since we spent the night together in the barn.”

“And you’re sure about that?”

“Yes.”

Silence fell between us, and slowly my lips curved into a smile. Ozzie tiptoed his fingers up my arm and to my cheek. He brushed the back of his fingers against my skin. I turned my head and kissed his palm. “What now?”

He’d put back on Carter’s ring. I twisted the band on his finger.

“I’m not going to marry Carter, Gray.”

“So what do you want to do?”

“I want to kiss you and learn ranch things with you and make love to you.”

“Yeah?”

“Hmm.”

“You know, even if you don’t marry Carter, it doesn’t make this okay.”

“I know.”

“He’s going to hate us.”

“I know I should be upset about that, but the fact that I’m not says a lot. What about you? You’ve always wanted to have a relationship with him. I don’t want to come between you two.”

“I don’t know what will happen. When are you going to tell him?”

“When he gets here. I can’t do it over the phone.”

“Yeah, I agree.”

“Do you think I should ask him to cut his trip short because we have something urgent to discuss? Not that he’d do it anyway.”

“No.” What a complete SOB I was, but I couldn’t help it. Before the shit hit the fan, couldn’t I want some time with Ozzie first to get to know him better? “I know it’s wrong to be together this way when you’re still wearing his ring, but things are going to get ugly once the truth comes out. I just want a few days with you before that happens. Is that selfish of me?”

“No, I get it. I want that too.”

“But we have to be discreet.”

“Of course.”

“We agree, then? You’ll cancel the wedding. And we’ll…date?”

“Sounds like it.”

I squeezed his thigh and couldn’t resist rubbing my thumb over an exposed layer of skin from the rip in his jeans. I wanted to tug them off and make love to him. Later.

“We should go catch the play before it ends.”

“Yeah, we really should.”

But the only movement we made was toward each other.