Page 25 of Limitless

“What are your plans for the rest of the day?” he asked, once the lush trees of Luxembourg were in his sight. There was green paint on Leonidas’s thigh that matched the chestnut leaves. Andy tried to forget about it.

“I don’t know.” Leonidas shrugged. “What are we doing?”

“We?” he sputtered.

Leonidas arched one thick, black brow. “Unless you are ready to say goodbye.”

“No!” he answered quickly, his cheeks heating. “I mean, no, I’m not, unless you want to.”

“Not quite.” Leonidas’s lip quirked into a small smile. “Besides, you’ll have to come back later to see what you made last night.”

Andy’s heart skipped a beat, thinking about last night, and he swallowed, blinking up at Leonidas and feeling so noticeably off his game. It didn’t make sense how he could feel so in control sometimes around this man and not others. It was like his equilibrium had been shattered, and down was up, and Paris was home.

“Let’s get something to eat,” he suggested.

Leonidas nodded in agreement and led them down a side street to a small shop on the corner. Andy insisted on paying, since a few euro for wine and cheese wouldn’t make a dent in his bank account, then together they walked back to the Luxembourg Garden.

One of the lawns was crowded with people enjoying their own picnics and Leonidas pulled Andy to the grass and dropped their bags down, then gracefully folded himself into a cross-legged position. Andy joined him, opening the bottle of wine with a twist.

“Shit,” he mumbled, frowning.

“Hmn?”

“We don’t have glasses.”

“We don’t need them,” Leonidas said, taking the bottle away from him and downing a swift drink like he had in the studio the night before.

“Do you think it’s going to rain again?”

Leonidas had busied himself with pulling their lunch out of the paper bag from the shop. He squinted and looked up at the sky, then leveled a penetrating gaze at Andy.

“No.”

“Shame.” Andy picked off a corner of the cheese they’d bought and put it into his mouth.

Leonidas chuckled and stretched out his legs, crossing them at the ankle. “So, tell me about you, Andy…Andrew. I don’t even know your last name.”

“Are we going to play the get to know you game?”

“Would you rather not? Do you prefer to jack men off in alleys and forget about them?”

The other man almost sounded hurt, almost sounded like what had happened at the pantheon yesterday hadn’t been such a spur of the moment thing, even though it hadn’t been planned. Andy tried to ignore the way his chest wanted it to mean something when his brain knew it never could.

“I’ve never jacked off a man in an alley,” he answered.

“I’ve never been jacked off in an alley, so I suppose that makes us even.”

“Motel,” Andy said with a sigh. “Andy Motel.”

“No one calls you Andrew?” Leonidas broke off the end of a baguette and chewed it while he waited for Andy to answer.

“My father.”

“You sound like you and he don’t get along,” Leonidas observed. He held out a grape to Andy, who popped it into his mouth.

“We get along fine now that he’s dead.”

Andy snatched another grape and chewed it slowly so he wouldn’t need to elaborate. It would have been an understatement to say that he and his father clashed…but that hadn’t been their whole life. Back when Andy was younger, they’d gotten along. When Andy had been on the debate team, and when he’d worn the Brooks Brothers suits his dad had bought for him, and when he’d never questioned the plan for his life.