Page 14 of Promised Secret (Promises, Promises #3)

Chapter Eleven

DAN

It was a sunny, beautiful day to volunteer at the summer fair. Carol had arrived before me, despite me getting there a good hour and a half before my shift.

I definitely wasn’t trying to avoid being alone with Clay at our home. I had absolutely no problem being in the living room where I’d made him come. Absolutely no problem at all. Everything was just fine and dandy in the world of Dan Yao.

Who the hell was I kidding?

Nothing was fine, and the only dandy thing about this was the new spank-bank material I now had featuring Clay’s face filled with pleasure.

It was absolute torture because it also meant I spent every waking moment hard and replaying the scene in my head. It kept me up. I hadn’t masturbated this much since the first time I saw Clay naked in the locker rooms in middle school.

My dick was exhausted. I was exhausted.

“Morning—oh deary, why do you look like a zombie freshly woken from a grave?” Carol exclaimed, hand to her heart.

“That’s oddly specific,” I replied and rubbed a hand over my face. I felt like a zombie, but instead of munching on brains, my only mission was to masturbate until there was no more cum left inside of me.

I bet Clay’s meat stick would taste amazing in my mouth.

“Where’s Clay?”

I jumped at the question, scared I’d actually said that thought out loud. Carol and the rest of the town didn’t need to know that I was fantasizing about my stepbrother’s cock.

“Sorry?” I squeaked as she eyed me suspiciously.

“Clay? I figured you two would arrive together for your shifts since, you know, you live together?” she asked with a curious brow raised.

I tugged at the collar of my shirt, already feeling the stuffy summer heat despite it being early morning.

“Figured I’d come early to see if anyone needs help,” I lied.

Carol looked skeptical of my answer but didn’t question it. She resumed setting up the hugging booth area. I went to help her.

I had totally escaped the house. I wasn’t actively trying to avoid Clay, but I didn’t know how to face him, especially in our own home.

Which was why I’d been hanging out at our friends’ house late into the night these past couple of days.

Sam and Ryker offered for me to stay with them, but Ryker looked like he was ready to interrogate me all night if I had, and I just didn’t know how to explain any of this to them.

Plus, I would probably die from staying overnight with their cat.

Gray was adorable, but I was allergic, and he loved finding unsuspecting chests to stomp on.

Jones looked like he wanted to say something to me the entire time I was at their cabin, and I couldn’t help wondering if Clay and I had been caught when we kissed in Jones’ hot tub. Thankfully, with Ryan and little Karla there, Jones couldn’t speak as freely.

Clay had kept quiet about my new avoidant tactics so far, but I knew he wouldn’t stay silent for long. It was always like this. Whenever I tried to pull away, he would chase me down and capture me with his determination.

Which was why I needed to get out of the house and away from him for just a while longer and try to build up some sort of resolve. Or at least until I figured out what I was going to say to him.

“I’ll tell him I was abducted by aliens and only returned today. The person jerking him off the other night wasn’t me, it was the aliens,” I muttered to myself. Maybe it was my sleep-deprived brain, but I thought it was a feasible idea.

“Aliens?” A voice that sounded suspiciously like Clay’s sounded in my ear, but that couldn’t be. He wasn’t expected to be here for another hour.

I peeked over my shoulder, jumping when I found Clay right behind me.

Despite the early hour, he didn’t look like he’d just rolled out of bed. He’d shaved since I’d last seen him, which made him look more youthful. I missed the stubble that scratched my chin during our kisses.

The white sleeveless shirt he was wearing should be illegal for how showstopping it made his arms. Arms that were perfect for hugging.

Fuck.

Everyone was gonna want to hug him today, and I was just gonna have to deal with it. I knew it was for charity, but I wished I could drag Clay into a dark corner and hide him away to keep all for myself.

“Uh, how long have you been standing behind me?” I asked, wiping my palms against my jeans.

Clay never made me feel nervous, but my thoughts about him did. They sometimes scared me.

“Long enough to hear you muttering about aliens. Did you go down another conspiracy theory rabbit hole?” he asked with mirth in his eyes.

“No,” I lied.

I had been following news of a recent UFO sighting that people thought was actually government-planted drones used to transport weapons of mass destruction.

But my alien research was beside the point.

I would much rather he thought I was obsessed with more lore than what I’d actually been muttering to myself.

His lip curled up softly, clearly not believing me. “You can share it with me if you want. I’ll listen,” he said.

It felt like every time I tried to create a protective moat around myself, Clay was already building the bridge before I could fill the trench with water. He always knew how to get to me.

“I know you will,” I replied softly. He always listened to me ramble on about my interests.

It started with my obsession with police officers and their pledge to be our protectors.

Then there were the dry medical facts I practically lived and breathed through my years of medical school, and now it was my fascination with conspiracy theories.

He never minded chatting with me about birds being living dinosaurs or how Anne Hathaway and her husband were the reincarnation of William Shakespeare and his wife.

Clay didn’t believe in any of them, but he still discussed them seriously because they interested me.

Ever since I was young, I’d gone through life knowing what my path was, knowing that I had to focus on that path to succeed and make my lao-ba proud.

Taking over the family clinic was what had been expected of me.

It was a huge burden that I’d mostly come to terms with.

Clay never forced any of his expectations on me. On the contrary, actually, as he became a safe landing, allowing me to just be. My promiscuous side and my need for his comforting kisses, my silly side, and the hours I could go on about the current theory I was obsessed with, he accepted them all.

He never judged me, and always came to me in the steady way he did everything. He nurtured the parts of myself that I pushed aside to focus on what was expected of me.

“There you are, Clay. I was wondering why you didn’t come with Dan,” Carol said, breaking the moment we’d been having. She’d just returned from chatting with the fair organizer about the rain that was forecasted for later in the day.

She informed us everything was still going on as scheduled.

We finished setting up the area under the large tent, decorating it with paper crafts that the kids from the elementary school made during class.

A large blackboard was stationed at the entrance listing the price of each hug, and there was a table in the back where volunteers would handle the payments and donations.

The vast majority of the tent was for the volunteer huggers to schmooze with people to attract donors.

I couldn’t help but think we were selling our bodies, but hey, at least it was for a good cause!

Frederick arrived just before our official start time.

“Hey,” he said when he saw us.

He was wearing a tight black shirt that somehow made him look even bigger than usual. The kids were already obsessed with his giant form, and I now caught more than one passerby shooting appreciative glances his way as they passed our tent.

“I already know who’s going to rake in the most donations,” I muttered.

“Is there a prize for top hugger?” he asked with a chuckle.

“Bragging rights?” I offered, which earned me a snort.

We didn’t have a chance to talk more since the first wave of people had already joined us. As I expected, all the kids were starry-eyed when they saw Frederick. They all wanted hugs from him, which meant donations from their parents.

Clay was popular with the kids, too. Many of them seemed to recognize him as the police officer who patrolled the town.

Meanwhile, my customers were mostly the parents of the children.

I had an occasional kid requesting a shy hug from me, but for the most part, they preferred Clay and Frederick.

I couldn’t blame them, since I, too, wouldn’t want to be hugged by someone who poked them with needles.

Kids loved showing me their strong side.

They didn’t look towards me for comfort.

As for Frederick…I guess his giant teddy-bear size had made them all forget the fact that he was also poking them with needles at my clinic.

Clay laughed off to the side of me. I’d worried about how Clay would react to all the physical touch today. He was never the hugging type. The only people he really hugged were his mom and me. He only hugged our friends on the rare occasion, and it was always on his terms.

So, I was relieved to see that Clay actually looked like he was enjoying himself. He listened intently to a kid who was excitedly saying he was going to be a police officer when he grew up, too, and wear the cool uniform just like Clay did.

Clay encouraged the kid with an intensity that said he fully believed the kid’s endeavors. He looked like a patient and caring father who believed in the success of their kid.

The women lingering around them didn’t hide their feverish eyes as they watched the interaction. They were looking at Clay like they wanted to have his kids. They didn’t hide the fact that they were obviously checking him out.

The dread of him getting with one of those women in the future crept up my spine like a horror movie.

Clay had only ever told me about women he found attractive, so it made sense he would end up with one. He’d find a woman to date, get married, have kids, and leave me as the depressed-as-fuck uncle.

It wasn’t like it’d be hard for Clay to find someone, either. More women had gathered around him.

Thank fuck he wasn’t wearing his police uniform. In his official blues, his hair tousled from wearing his hat, and the top buttons on his shirt undone to give us a tease of his hard and hairy chest, he was irresistible.

God, I wanted to have his children. He could pump me full of his seed, and I’d have all the fucking children he wanted.

In the middle of figuring out how male pregnancies could work scientifically, someone poked my shoulder to get my attention.

“Hey, man!”

Hard arms wrapped around me, then another pair quickly followed.

“These are gonna cost you,” I told Jones and Ryker with a laugh and hugged them back.

Jones pulled out his wallet and slapped some cash on the table. “I’ll order a round of hugs for all of us,” he said and gestured to our group of friends.

Karla squealed and ran into my arms, laughing as if she was doing something mischievous. Ryan shook his head and chuckled as he watched his daughter. He waited for his turn for a hug.

Sam was the last to hug me. He had to go on his tiptoes to wrap his arms around me, which only made me realize how small the man was compared to the rest of us.

He returned to Ryker’s side and tucked himself under his fiancé’s arm, like it was his protective blanket.

The look they shared was filled with nothing but love.

I’d been skeptical when Ryker first told us he was pretending to be engaged to Sam to land an apartment, but maybe my friend knew exactly what he was doing. He’d wound up finding himself an amazing partner and getting himself engaged for real.

Jones wasn’t too far from getting hitched, either. He found a home with Ryan and Karla, and I’d never seen him happier.

I had a sneaking suspicion that Clay was the next one of us to get matched up. It obviously wasn’t going to be me, considering the one person I wanted was the one I could never have.

I glanced at the man in question again. A line of women had formed to hug him.

I couldn’t control the intense jealousy of Clay being physical with someone he was actually attracted to.

He probably liked their softness, which was a stark contrast to my body. I was muscular and hard like Clay was. That was something I couldn’t change.

It was only after another three more women hugged Clay that I finally noticed how stiff his actions were. I was so focused on stewing the sourness that settled in my stomach that it took me this long to realize how uncomfortable Clay looked.

I instantly headed toward him. Right then, it didn’t matter how I was feeling. All that mattered was making sure Clay was okay.