Page 45 of Breaking the Ice

But maybe it didn’t matter how or why he talked to Zach. Maybe it was always going to feel like this.

“I just was . . .curious. I . . .uh . . .wanted to know how you’d approach it.” He hadn’t wanted to say goodbye. Walk inside his empty bungalow and eat dinner by himself, with only silence for company.

He craved Zach’s voice in his ear. Deep and rumbling andsure.

“Well, first thing I planned to do was appeal to Ramsey’s need to be right. Let him figure how to help Finn. He likes a challenge; a problem to solve. I’m going to give him one.”

“That’s smart,” Gavin said, wetting his lips as he let himself into the house with his key. His mouth must be so goddamn dry because it was hot out today. “I like that.”

“Yeah? Thought you might.” That teasing edge was back in Zach’s voice, and Gavin wanted to eat it up.

“You’re good at this,” Gavin said.

“Learned from the best.”

Gavin caught sight of his reflection as he walked into his house, on the mirror hanging in the little hallway off the front door and ignored how flushed he looked.

“I’m not the best,” Gavin blustered, even though helovedhearing Zach saying it. Especially like that. “I’m . . .I’m out of practice. Just feeling my way around here.”

“Doing a damn good job of it,” Zach said.

“Doing a better job ’cause you’re here,” Gavin admitted. He didn’t think he needed to say there was no way he could’ve done this job alone, not after all his time in Michigan. He wasn’t even sure he could’ve done it without Zach even if he hadn’t taken so many years off.

They made a fantastic team, working together like they’d never done anything else. Like it hadn’t only been six weeks since Gavin had come to Portland.

Gavin squeezed his eyes shut. Willed his crush to stay contained.

He didn’t want to be the one to fuck this up.

“You wanna get breakfast tomorrow morning?” Zach changed the subject, and Gavin nearly took a heady breath of relief. But he knew it was only a temporary reprieve.

“Yeah, I’d like that,” Gavin said. “Meet at Jimmy’s at eight?”

“Sure,” Zach said. “I gotta go. Need to take a shower and change. Meeting a friend for dinner.”

“Sure. Yeah. See you tomorrow,” Gavin said and hung up almost immediately after Zach had said goodbye. Hating how jealousy curdled hard and tight in his stomach. A friend? Or a date?

Zach was allowed to date. Zachshoulddate.

Why then did it feel like glass being ground in his stomach as he puttered around the tiny kitchen, putting together his own pathetic meal?

He tried to distract himself with a new Jason Stratham movie. It didn’t work.

Gavin went to bed and lay awake, staring at the ceiling.

It was obvious Zach had told him about his dinner not only because he did need to go get ready but also to let him know, gently, there wouldn’t be a late night phone call tonight.

He shouldn’t be so used to them that he couldn’t live without them, but damn it, helikedthem. The phone calls helped Gavin relax. Helped him to empty his mind out of all the stupid minutiae of his day, properly categorize it and then put it away so he could sleep.

When he’d mentioned it to Jon, Jon had only said, “Well, isn’t that what you always did with Noelle?”

He had. Goddamn it, hehad.

It was so fucking unfair to cast Zach into that position. Unfair to Zach. Unfair to Noelle’s memory. Unfair to Gavin, too, if he was really going there.

Because he wasn’t ever going to be able to do it in person. Wouldn’t ever be able to roll over and see Zach’s sleepy face and ask him whatever burning question was eating up his brain late at night.

That was a line he couldn’t cross, no matter how much his body craved it.