Page 25 of Finley

“That,” Daniel interrupted, pointing as he took a step forward. “That’s the problem right there. I have no idea what’s true. Back then and now. God, Brantley. Seven years. It’s been seven fucking years since I’ve seen or heard from you, and the second I got your note,everythingI’d ever convinced myself was bullshit came crashing back in.” Daniel’s jaw bunched where he’d clamped it shut, and he clenched his fists.

“It wasn’t all in your head,” Brantley said. “It was real. It did happen.”

“Yet in one selfish move, you made the decision that it would’ve been better if it hadn’t.” When Daniel’s eyes met Brantley’s, the defeat and rejection this confident man had been hiding became evident.

An uncomfortable silence settled around them as they stood there, closer than they’d been in years, yet more detached than ever before. This emotional distance was so much worse than the physical—thatcould at least have been overcome.

Brantley knew, right then, that if they were ever going to move beyond this stalemate they were in, something needed to give.

“Finn?”

When Daniel shook his head and looked away, he tried again.

“Finn? Is that really what you think?”

“I don’t know what to think,” Daniel snapped.

Then Brantley did something he hadn’t done since the first time they’d been in this house. He took Daniel’s chin between his fingers and looked him directly in the eye.

“What do you want? Right here and right now—what do you want? Do you want to take me to bed and fuck me until you can forget me? Then let’s go. I figure by Monday morning you should be good, right?”

Daniel’s eyes glittered at him, but Brantley kept his pinned to the man who was shaking with emotion.

“If only it were that easy.”

“It’s not?”

Daniel wrapped his fingers around Brantley’s wrist. Then he pulled it away from his face and tugged him in close. “You know it’s not. Even when you pushed me out that door and out of your life, I stood outside, waiting for you to open it again. I wassosure that you would…”

Brantley remembered. He’d sat inside with his back to the door and listened to Daniel try to reason with him for hours until there’d been nothing to listen to anymore, and when Daniel had left, he’d given in and let his heart crack open and the tears fall free.

“This is so fucked,” Daniel told him. “Iknewcoming back here would be a mistake. But I couldn’t help myself. I had to see you again.” Realizing what he’d just said, Daniel schooled his features and went to turn away.

But Brantley wasn’t having any of that. He reached for Daniel’s face, took it between his hands, and asked, “How long?”

Daniel’s eyes were direct as they found his. “What?”

Brantley gave in to the urge to smooth his thumbs over Daniel’s jaw, and then he asked again, “Howlongare you here for?”

Daniel raised a hand to one of Brantley’s wrists, and surprised him by gently encircling it. “Two days…two weeks… However long it takes. I had some time owed to me.”

Brantley slipped his hand into Daniel’s and thought he caught a flicker of pain enter his eyes. He’d put that there, and he vowed that he’d do whatever it would take, even if it meant letting Daniel go, to remove it.

“Okay, then. So let’s take this one day at a time. I asked you to come home, and you said yourself the one place you truly call home is through those doors over there.”

When Daniel looked beyond his shoulder and his fingers tightened, Brantley could sense the war waging between the man Daniel was now and the one he’d been the day he’d left.

“Stay here,” Brantley suggested. “Even if it’s with you in my room and me in the spare. I asked you home because I want you here. The reasons you came are your own. We need to talk about this, Finn. I need to know how I can make it better. Please…don’t leave it like this.”

DANIEL DIDN’TWANThis heart to hurt the way it did as he stared into Brantley’s eyes, but that’s exactly what was happening.

Every time he made a move, every time he got close, Brantley would look at him in a way that brought all of his long-suppressed emotions back to the surface. It was frustrating as fuck.

He studied the achingly familiar face only inches from his own. The stubble lining his jaw also had those new touches of silver in it, but beyond that, Brantley Hayes looked the same. Just as sexy as he had the first time Daniel had seen him. Sophisticated sex. That was how he’d always thought of his professor. Until he took his clothes off—then he could barely think at all.

“I’ll take the spare,” Daniel said. Brantley’s lips curved, and Daniel heard himself ask, “How is it possible that you’re even better looking now than you were back then?”

“Me?” Brantley chuckled. “You had me changing my clothes for close to an hour before I came to see you tonight just so you might consider giving me a sideways glance.”