Page 49 of Mr. Naughty List

Taking a man out there seemed risky. Especially when it was a man he was just fucking and not in love with. They were country folk, after all. Loving, but traditional for the most part. Casual hookups were not part of their ideal for love of any kind, much less homosexual love.

The Keurig kicked off again.

Aaron took the mug from RJ’s hands, taking a deep sniff of the cinnamon bun scent, suddenly unsure if he needed the extra jitteriness of caffeine. “So, what? You’d drop me off at the farm and then pick me up on the way back?”

“I could. Or you could come to the studio with me. It won’t take long for me and Chip to figure out what we want to do, or if he’s even up for working with me right now given that I’m about three songs short of a four-song demo.”

“I’ve never been inside a recording studio.”

“It’s small, but good quality. You should come. Chip will like you.”

Aaron gulped. “I don’t know. I’m not really…out.”

RJ tilted his head. “Because you’re a teacher.”

“That. And a few other things.” His mother’s reaction at the dance the night before, for example.

“Okay. That’s fine. I’ll just say you’re my friend. No big.” RJ shrugged. He glanced up, his hazel eyes raking over Aaron. “I mean, we are friends, right?” He lifted his chin and said more definitively, “We’re not just fucking anymore.”

“Aren’t we? Just fucking?” Aaron’s heart started to pound, and he put the coffee cup aside on the counter. He definitely didn’t need the extra stimulant right now.

RJ shook his head, slipping into that relaxed certainty he used while they were screwing. “No, babe. We passed ‘just fucking’ when you started texting me about your day, and then when you slept wrapped around me like a boa constrictor last night. We’re definitely in the friends-with-benefits category now, leaning toward outright holiday lovers.” RJ grinned, taking in Aaron’s body, top to bottom again.

“Oh, shit.”

RJ laughed. “Sorry. But it’s true.” When he caught the expression on Aaron’s face, he reassured him, “But don’t worry. We’re not boyfriends. We’re definitely not that.”

“Holiday lovers?” Aaron kind of liked the sound of that. The men in the documentaries he’d watched about queer culture of the nineteen seventies and eighties all called each other that: lover. It was so much better, he’d always thought, than boyfriend or partner. He’d always wanted to be someone’s lover. It sounded sexy, romantic, and fleeting.

Fleeting.

Well, okay. He could get behind fleeting.

“Lovers,” he agreed. “We’re lovers.”

RJ grinned. “Cool. So we’ll go out to Straw Plains together, then? No sense in taking two cars. I mean, really, think of the environment.”

Aaron smothered a grin. “You don’t have to convince me. I’m in.”

RJ swooped over and wrapped his arms around Aaron, his coffee sloshing on Aaron’s bare arm, still hot but not scalding. “Great. I just need to grab my guitar from my mom’s, and we can get on our way.”

“Your mom’s?” Aaron blinked. Never mind whether RJ was ready to meet his family, was he ready to meet RJ’s?

“Breathe. She’s just my mom. And we’re just friends, remember?”

“Lovers,” Aaron insisted, tasting the word.

“Right.” RJ grinned a little soppily. Aaron’s inner alarms went off at that, but he silenced them, reveling in the way RJ looked at him like he was precious. “But I get the impression you’re not ready to tell people about that part?”

“Oh, no. Right.”

“My mom will guess, but she won’t say anything. I’ll just dash in and get the guitar and then we’ll go.”

“Can I wait in the SUV?”

“Probably not.”

“Are you sure?”