Page 24 of Coming Clean

Those men weren’t Jeremy. They were just someone to get off with. This is different.

Then get over your hang-ups.

If only it was that easy.

“Jeremy, do you want to come with us?” David asked, his tone so snarky he might as well have added, “since this asshole doesn’t.”

"Sure,” Jeremy’s voice lacked the excitement it’d had before.

“Look, I’m just not into musicals, all that random singing and smiling and dancing.”

“You’re not into being seen anywhere with Jeremy either, are you?” David said.

“David.” I’d never heard that cold, angry tone from Jeremy before, and I was glad it wasn’t directed at me.

“What is this, a test?” I’d expected this attitude from David, but I’d thought Sabrina understood how hard this was for me. Having her conspire against me hurt. “Will I agree to go out with Jeremy? Is that the game you’re playing?”

Sabrina looked genuinely shocked. “Connor, you know I wouldn’t?—”

“I thought I did, but that was before you got chummy with Mr. Pushy here.”

David gave me an evil smile. “Now I have my answer, don’t I?”

I pushed back from the table, ready to leave, but Jeremy stopped me with a hand on my arm. “David, that was out of line,” he said.

“Was it? Really?” David asked.

I pulled free of Jeremy’s hold. “I need some air.”

I flexed my fists as I headed for the back porch. I wanted to punch the cocky grin right off David’s face. Instead, I pushed the screen door open and stepped into the night air. I could get in my car and leave, but I’d run from Jeremy once and I’d sworn never to do it again.

Cicadas buzzed and I tried to listen to them rather than the thoughts whirling in my head.

The night had cooled off a little, as much as it did in July anyway, and there was a light breeze.

I took a deep breath, but the air was too muggy to be refreshing.

I gazed out at the purple sunset clouds that lay over the tops of the mountains in the distance.

A sharp whine signaled that the mosquitoes had already discovered me. The fuckers.

My chest was tight with tension. I tried to relax but the tension only grew.

Anger at David, and more importantly at myself, had me ready to punch something.

Why couldn’t I be the man Jeremy needed instead of some fucked-up Marine stuck in the past, worrying about Mario’s opinion when Mario had fallen so deep into his own pain he might never come out again?

The sound of footsteps had me turning, instincts on high alert.

David held up his hands as he stepped onto the porch. “I’m just here to talk.”

I didn’t want to talk. I much preferred a good, rough fight. “You think I’m going to hurt Jeremy and you want to warn me off. Message received.” I gave him a mocking salute.

“Has he told you about Silas?”

I swallowed, and my pulse sped up. My instincts told me I didn’t want to hear what David obviously hoped to tell me. “No.”

David nodded. “I thought not.”

“Why should he?”

He shrugged. “He cares for you. I thought maybe he would’ve shared something about his past.”

“You don’t know me. You have no idea what kind of man I am, and yet you’ve decided I’m bad for Jeremy. Why?”

David sighed and sagged against the door frame. “You have a point. I’m making assumptions, and that’s not fair. God, you must hate me.”

I hadn’t expected such a concession, but I wasn’t ready to make nice quite yet. “I wasn’t going to say it, but yes, I do.”

“I’ve been Jeremy’s best friend since some of my so-called friends tried to beat him up in middle school. I’m a bit protective.”

“Ya think?” Was he really trying to help me understand where he was coming from, or was this some kind of manipulation?

“Silas is the only man Jeremy’s had a long-term relationship with.”

Oh fuck.

“The bastard worked for my firm. He’s suave, fashionable, and gorgeous.

He can be very attentive when he wants to be, and Jeremy enjoyed that for a while.

But Silas only bothers to cultivate others if he thinks he can use them.

He paid court to Jeremy, knew just what to say to lure him in, but he wasn’t in love.

He simply wanted a man he could take out and show off, and Jeremy is?—”

“Beautiful.”

David inclined his head. “He’s also loyal and hardworking, a good cook?—”

“Who wouldn’t want him?”

David cracked a smile. “Exactly.”

I had a nasty feeling I knew where this was going.

“He wanted someone convenient, someone who would be there at night, who could be counted on to be by his side when he attended a firm function, but securing Jeremy’s loyalty didn’t stop him from?—”

“Sleeping around.” I wanted to find this guy and make him pay.

“Not just sleeping around. That would be bad enough. I knew something was going on, and I told Jeremy to confront the bastard, but he was comfortable and determined to actually hold on to a relationship when he’d never been good at dating.”

I was growing impatient. “What happened?”

“Silas wanted a promotion. He applied for a position at another firm, but the senior attorneys there are very conservative. When he found a woman willing to be his new prize, he declared he wasn’t really gay.

He said being with Jeremy helped him see that it was a depraved lifestyle.

He walked out on Jeremy and got engaged. ”

“Fucking bastard.” I was going to take Silas apart. Piece by piece.

“That we agree on,” David said.

“Where is he?”

David smiled. “I sympathize with your desire to rip his head off, but Jeremy would kill both of us if I sent you after him.”

My rage had blinded me to everything else, but suddenly, David’s motive for telling me about Silas clicked. He was comparing me to that bastard Silas. “Do you really think I would fuck Jeremy over like that? Because if you do?—”

David held up a hand. “I didn’t say that.”

“You wanted to.”

He shook his head. “No.”

The word was emphatic, and it made me want to listen. If David used that tone in court, no wonder he was so successful.

“You’re right that I don’t really know you, but everything I do know, and the things Jeremy has told me say you’re nothing like Silas. What you are is scared.”

I bristled. “Be careful.” Don’t start a fight. Jeremy might not forgive me for knocking David out.

“You’re scared to be who you really are.”

How could I argue with that? Even if the words did make me want to hit something, preferably David. “I’m gay. I’m not going to decide I’m straight and leave him.”

David raised a brow. “Are you sure?”

“I’ve never been with a woman, and I never plan to be. I just…” Can’t disappoint the man who found me in that stinking, dark cave. The one who stopped the torture.

Don’t go there. Please don’t go there.

“I don’t have to justify myself to you.”

“True, but if you force Jeremy to keep up the secret-lovers routine you’re going to hurt him. Not in the same way Silas did —I don’t think you’d be deliberately cruel—but the result would still involve me picking up the pieces.”

I wasn’t sure what I would have said, but Sabrina called out to us, interrupting me. It was a relief not to have to find an answer.

“There you are,” she said when she saw us on the porch. “David, you’re not harassing Connor, are you? I told you I’d trust him with my life.”

"Yes, I know,” David said.

Sabrina glanced at me. I gave her a half smile, trying to tell her I was okay. She returned the nod and focused back on David. “You still want a ride home?”

“Sure. You ready?”

A ride home. Was that all it would be, or was Sabrina going to sleep with him?

“Sabrina.” I wanted to talk to her alone, but I’d likely set off more criticism from David.

“I should go help Jeremy in the kitchen,” David said, more perceptive than I thought he’d be.

“What are you doing?” I asked after David had gone back inside.

Sabrina frowned. “Taking David home. Why?”

I shook my head. “That’s a terrible idea.”

“Look, if my brother had his way, I wouldn’t even speak to men. I don’t listen to him, and I’m not going to listen to you. I like David.”

I sighed. “I don’t.”

“He’s protecting Jeremy like you’re trying to protect me.”

I hated that she was right, so I ignored it. “I promised your brother I’d look after you.”

“There’s a lot my brother doesn’t know, and that’s for the best in my case. For you two, the time has come for a serious conversation.”

I shook my head. “I can’t disappoint him.”

“You’re not a disappointment to anyone. If that asshole can’t see how lucky he is to have you for a friend, it’s his loss. For God’s sake, you saved his life. That should give you some leeway.”

Her words confused me. “You mean he saved me.”

Surprise showed in her eyes. “That’s not how he tells it.”

What had Mario been telling her? Mario wouldn’t have talked to her about the mission that had gone straight to hell, would he? “I was captured, and he rescued me.”

She frowned again. “He didn’t mention that part. He said he misjudged the assignment and that if it hadn’t been for you, he would’ve died. He said you saved him from an explosion.”

The scene flashed before my eyes. Mario setting the charge. We’d thought…

No, don’t go there.

I’d been the one to raise the warning, to get everyone clear. Yes, I’d made Mario leave when he was insisting on staying, arguing it was his duty, but I was just doing my job. There were no heroics involved.

Sabrina persisted. “You saved him, and if he rejects you because of who you love, then he’s a bigger bastard than I ever thought possible. I love him, but he’s stubborn and stupid about so many things. I can excuse most of them, but I would never forgive him for pushing you away.”

And that was one more reason to keep the fact I was gay to myself. “I don’t want to come between you.”

She stepped closer and took my hands in hers. “You’re not. Mario and I have always had problems. I should have told you when you came out, but…”

“Told me what?” Had she been keeping secrets from me? The thought unsettled me more than I liked. She’d been an anchor for me since I’d left the Marines.

“I like David, but I’m not going to sleep with him because I don’t sleep with men.”

“What?” Could this night get any crazier?

“Have you ever seen me go out with a man?”

I almost said that, of course I had, but when I really thought about it, I realized the answer was no.

Sabrina had gone out in mixed groups, and I’d just assumed.

She’d danced with men but never gone home with any of them.

I’d seen her cuddle with other women, but I’d just thought they were friends. Girls did that kind of thing.

“Ingrid wasn’t just a friend. We were dating.”

“And now you’re not, and that’s why she hasn’t been around, since she didn’t show up for Shakespeare.”

Sabrina nodded.

“Why didn’t you tell me? We’ve been friends for over a year. I lived with you.”

She sighed. “At first I didn’t tell you because you and my brother were so close, and I thought you might feel the same way he does about the gays.”

Frustrated, I shook my head. “Fuck, if I’d just told you at the beginning…”

“It’s not your fault. By the time you’d been here a few months, I knew you weren’t like my brother.

I started to wonder about you. You notice men in a way I wouldn’t expect a straight man to, but you also notice everything around you.

You’re always checking your environment just like Mario does, so I thought maybe that was just the Marine in you. ”

“Marines scan the area, but the straight ones don’t stare at guys’ asses.”

Sabrina grinned. “When I saw you with Jeremy, I felt certain you were gay too. I was going to tell you I liked women but then you told me about yourself, and I wanted your coming out to me to be about you.”

I guessed that made sense, but I was still a little hurt that she’d waited so long.

“I’m sorry. I should have told you before now, but tell Mario about yourself, please.”

“Does he know about you?”

“Yes, but he tries to pretend he doesn’t. He’s certain I just need to meet the right man.”

I rolled my eyes. “Of course he does, and you’re right. I should tell him.” That didn’t mean I would actually find the courage to.

“Go talk to Jeremy. I had to hold him back from charging out here to save you from David. He’ll want to know you’re okay.”

I raised a brow. “I hope he knows I can hold my own against a snarky attorney.”

“I have no doubt you could kill David sixteen different ways with your pinkie, but in here,” she tapped my chest, “your defenses are lacking.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything else. Sabrina was exposing me too thoroughly and the feeling unsettled me.

“You’ve been through hell. I know there’s a lot Mario hasn’t told me. Neither of you are ever likely to tell me the whole story, even if you could, but please don’t let those memories keep you from being with Jeremy. I still think you should call Larissa, my therapist friend.”

I started to protest, but Sabrina held up her hand. “I know you’ve had bad experiences with therapy, but remember, this is me making the recommendation. You trust me, right?”

“With my life.” I echoed her earlier words.

“Good.” She rose on tiptoes and kissed my cheek. “I’m going to take David home now.”

I stayed on the porch while she got David out of the way. As soon as the door closed, I heard Jeremy’s footsteps coming down the hall.

“I’m sorry about David,” Jeremy said as he stepped onto the porch.

I shook my head. “It’s okay.”

“What did he say to you?” Jeremy looked pained. He was probably certain I was destined to hate David now.

“Nothing all that awful. Nothing that wasn’t true.”

“I swear, I thought he would behave better than that.”

“He doesn’t want you hurt again. I get that.” And annoyingly, I really did. I’d gained respect for David. The man had even admitted he was wrong, and I knew how hard that could be.

Jeremy pressed his palms to his eyes. “Fuck, he told you about Silas, didn’t he? Great. My biggest humiliation and he spilled it all. I’m going to fucking kill him.”

I tugged on Jeremy’s hands, enclosing them in my own. “Don’t. David’s right, I can’t ask you to hide with me.”

Color drained from Jeremy’s face. “Are you breaking up with me?”

“No, I’m… I have to go slow, get used to the idea of being out, but I want to try, for you. Sabrina and I talked and she told me…” I wondered how much I should say. Sabrina hadn’t given me permission to tell Jeremy.

“That she’s a lesbian?”

“Yes. It hurt that she hid who she was from me. I don’t want to do that to anyone.” I took a deep breath. “Wait, how’d you know?”

“I guessed, and a comment she made confirmed it while we were in the kitchen.”

I stared at Jeremy, disbelieving. “But you’re the one who wanted to set her up with David.”

Jeremy smiled slyly. “I never said that. I said they’d get along well.”

“Bastard.”

“Me or David?”

I growled. “Both of you.”

Jeremy smiled more warmly this time. “I care about you a lot. And I can be as patient as you need me to be.”

Those words were exactly what I needed to hear.