Page 39 of Sean's Sunshine

Billy smiled at him, and it wasn’t the beers, and it wasn’t his imagination—blushed. “You’ve got a nice mouth, cop,” he said. “Says good things.”

Sean sobered, remembering his conversation with Andres. “You were only supposed to be here a week,” he said unhappily. “But you’ve stayed for six. And I like you here.”

Billy’s eyes grew large and almost limpid. “But…?”

“No ‘buts.’ Just… you didn’t have to stay. You’re so busy. School. Two jobs. And I’m three. Why did you stay?”

He watched Billy swallow like there was too much to say. “Maybe I like hanging out in the park with dogs and old guys. You ever think of that?”

Sean smiled like he was supposed to but then sobered. “I’m not always a walk in the park,” he said softly. “Lots of days are sixteen hours, and I’m surly and pissed off.” He paused. “Or, you know.”

Billy stared at him, and Sean could see when it hit him. His eyes widened, and that limpid Bambi look returned full force. Hadn’t Sean thought his eyes were flat and cynical? He’d liked that—those eyes knew what was in the world and didn’t take any crap. This look here? It was vulnerable and sad. No sadness, he thought wretchedly. Billy was competent and terse—and damned funny, Sean could admit it. But not sad.

Until now.

“Hurt,” Billy whispered. “Or dead.”

Ouch. The hard word. “Can’t promise it won’t happen,” Sean told him. “I mean, I’ll probably live longer thanRivers, but there’s no promises.”

Billy grimaced. “Rivers takes stupid chances. Always the fuckin’ hero. But you are too. I’ve seen it. Always the fuckin’ hero.”

“I’m… evolving,” Sean said with dignity, remembering the days when he’d have been the first person to crap on Billy, on his other job, on his feelings. “I didn’t used to be.”

Billy shook his head. “Naw. You changed. It’s hard. Change is hard.” He paused in the act of wiping out the chip bowl and rubbed his chest. “Like now. My chest.” He took a wobbly breath. “Myheart.It’s changing.” He swallowed and put the bowl—a decorative glass one that Sean used for company—in the cupboard. “Change is hard.”

“Is it too hard to stay here?” Sean asked, his own chest aching.Heart. It’s your heart that hurts.

He was relieved and terrified when Billy paused and rubbed his chest and thought. Terrified because what if he said yes? It had obviously just hit him, what Sean did for a living. That this might not be the last time Sean was hurt doing his job. What if Andres was right andthiswas the thing that broke them, their tenuousevolvingrelationship.

And relieved because it meant he was thinking about it—really thinking about it. Sean had learned that this man had surprising integrity. Thinking about it meant it mattered to him.

“It’s hard,” Billy said, wiping down the counter and not meeting his eyes. “But it’ll be harder not to stay.” He turned and gave Sean a surprising flash of smile, although he kept his eyes averted as he continued the light cleanup of the kitchen. “And not only because they won’t let me pay rent at the flophouse.”

Sean smiled a little too. “That leaves, what? Curtis, Cotton, Randy, Vinnie—”

Billy shrugged. “Cotton doesn’t pay rent, but Curtis says it hasn’t gone up.” He looked around as though afraid somebody might be listening in on what was already an intimate moment. “Between you and me, I think John or Lance or someone makes up the difference there. None of us can ever remember renewing a lease, and it’s got to go somewhere, right?”

Sean nodded. He’d met Billy’s boss, the porn mogul. He was a manic redheaded goober who happened to enjoy watching porn—and filming it, although Sean understood John was letting other people do more of that these days. He was also, Sean had learned, surprisingly philanthropic. The kids—and many of them were eighteen or nineteen—had health and dental and options for life after porn, even if they only filmed a few scenes. The kids who came to him for work weren’t exploitable to John, and they weren’t disposable.

Given that Sean hadwatchedporn when the desire hit him, it made him feel better about the whole thing.

“So they’re making rent okay?” Sean asked, making sure.

Billy gave a half smile. “They are. I… I mean, it’s the flophouse. The population changes, people get out of porn, more people get in. It’s never supposed to be forever.”

Here could be forever.

“Then stay here,” Sean asked rashly. “I… I mean, I have a spare room….” He swallowed and then figured he could claim the beer made him honest. “Although you don’t have to stay there… all the time.”

Billy leaned back against the counter, arms crossed in front of his ever-impressive chest. “Let me get this straight,” he said mildly. “You want me to give up my bed in the flophouse—and it took me a year to get my own steady bed—in a place where I’ve got sex on tap with guys who will seriously not even remember we got busy the night before on the promise of a guy I ain’t even slept with yet?”

“We could sleep together,” Sean said hurriedly and then gulped air. Dammit. “I mean… we couldsleeptogether.” He tried a smile, but it felt more like a plea. “I… I would like to sleep next to you. Kiss you again.” He bit his lower lip. “Touch you. If you’d let me.”

“I’d like that too,” Billy whispered. “But what if it doesn’t work out?”

“I have a spare room,” Sean said in desperation. “I mean… worst case here, we make okay roommates.”

“What about rent?”