Page 28 of Burden of Proof

Swiping through my profile to my videos, I clicked the comment and when I saw the username, my heart immediately skittered to a stop.

CEH13

Closer to the camera next time, Jay.

It was clearly an order, and once my heart kicked back into a survivable rhythm, my blood burned a hundred times hotter than before.

I’d completely forgotten that he’d subscribed and knowing it was the middle of a workday and he’d immediately stopped whatever he was doing to watch my video sent a thrill up my spine.

Against my better judgment, I flipped back to the hookup app and his ignored messages.

Lincoln.

I tapped my finger against the screen, somehow knowing if I did reply, there was no going back.

What do you want with me?

I closed my eyes and hung my head over the edge of the bed, my search for a toy abandoned. My phone vibrated an incoming message, and I dropped my hand down in front of my face to see what Hunter had to say.

I don’t know.

What do you want with me?

I don’t know.

What a fucking pair.

I meant closer to your face, by the way. I didn’t get to see on Friday. I want to see.

“Nope,” I said out loud, throwing my phone out of reach. “Absolutely the fuck not.”

I abandoned my quest for content, muted all my notifications, then fucked off down to the beach until it was time to meet Smith at his apartment for our shopping excursion. He lived in an apartment downtown, a stylish loft with exposed ducts and concrete everywhere. I thought the whole thing was horribly bland, but I supposed there were people into that kind of thing. It actually reminded me of something Marshall wouldlike, if Marshall was in his twenties not his forties. How Hunter’s taste was so far off from the two of them, I’d never know.

I lingered near the door while Smith changed into something more comfortable, then I followed him down to his car and let him drive us the few blocks to the grocery store. The ride was quiet until we parked, and he turned the car off and grabbed the steering wheel, making no move to get out of the car.

“What’s wrong?” I asked, grateful for a distraction.

He swallowed hard, and I reached over, grabbing one of his hands off the wheel and pulling him toward the center console. He fought me at first, but eventually I got him into my arms and kissed the top of his head. It was the same thing I would have done to Silas, the same thing I told Smith to expect. Instead of pushing away, he melted into me a little and sighed.

“No one was affectionate like this when I was growing up. I don’t know how to…”

“Receive it,” I said.

He nodded, and I smiled into his hair. “Just like this.”

Smith let me hold him for almost five minutes, which did as much for him, I think, as it did for me. My arm fell asleep, but I wasn’t going to pull away until he did. Finally, Smith groaned and extricated himself from my arms, rubbing at his eyes and doing his best to cover the blush on his cheeks.

“You’re just like that all the time?” he asked.

I shrugged. “It’s nice, right?”

“Yeah.” He cleared his throat and made quick work of getting out of the car.

It was fine.

I was committed to being friends with the youngest Covington brother, which meant waiting him out until he became comfortable with the only kind of friend I knew how to be. Unfortunately, the three orgasms his older brother had givenme and the ignored order in my pocket hung between us like an invisible axe blade.

There was no good way to tell Smith I’d hooked up with Hunter, and maybe even no reason to tell him if I wasn’t going to do it again. Maybe the best course of action was to wait until I figured that part out and then tell him. Silas would know what to say, but that would also involve telling Silas that I’d hooked up with not one, but two of his boyfriend’s brothers.