Page 16

chapter sixteen

“Jesus, Joseph, and Mary,” Miles growls, his fake mustache clinging to his upper lip for dear life. “I can’t believe you brought me to a dang gay bar.” The corner of his fake mustache slips, and I reach up, pressing it back to his skin, letting the adhesive bond again. During the ride to Manhole, the closest gay bar to Tallulah, Texas, I had to reglue it to his upper lip twice. The ridiculous blond wig I picked out for him makes him look like something out of a low-budget soap opera, but that’s fine. The more ridiculous he looks, the less likely he is to be noticed, and that’s the entire point. I planned this knowing Miles wouldn’t be super comfortable in a gay bar, worrying someone might notice him, so the costumes were a must. Luckily, Party Planet is open year-round and has the best wigs this side of Dallas. Okay, maybe that’s not true, but who cares? This is my internal monologue, and if I want to embellish for emphasis, I will. Fucking sue me.

As for me, I’m wearing a red wig and glasses, bearing a striking resemblance to famed 90’s talk show host, Sally Jesse Raphael. Did I need to disguise myself too? No. But I’m gay, and the gays love a good wig.

When Miles took Mallory’s hand at church, leaving me alone in my heartbreak, I thought it might end me. Then I realized that was just stupid. Because this is Miles, and Miles loves me. He’s just scared. He’s fucking terrified of giving up everything, and I get that. After so many years of hearing people telling him gays were devilish degenerates, he probably has a warped view of what gay life is really like. Tonight, I plan to give him a front-row viewing.

The bar is packed, and twinks, twunks, bears, and daddies line the dancefloor, all watching as local drag legend Sukki Cox prances around on the stage ahead, miming to an old Cher song. Miles and I are front and center, right below her. Miles nuzzles closer to me. He’s shaking, and that makes me bummed, because I want him to enjoy himself. Every gay man should have the chance to experience a drag show without worrying about their eternal soul being damned in the process. At least, that’s what I assume his issue is. Unfortunately, that assumption proves wrong when he leans in and whispers, “They shouldn’t be performing sexually suggestive choreography in front of impressionable minds.”

I turn and glare at him. “We’re going to have to work on that internalized homophobia.” I inconspicuously motion around the room with my finger. “Do you see any children here?” Miles nods and points at a short man who’s knocking back a Red Bull across the bar. The guy is wearing a onesie and has a coloring book and two crayons in his hand. “For God’s sake, he’s not a child, he’s a little.”

Miles stares at me, dumbfounded. “He’s a little what?”

“No, I just mean he’s into age play. He’s a sweet guy. You’d like him.”

“Age play? What does that even mean? You know I don’t know all this gay lingo.”

I snort a laugh. “Who the hell are you telling? It took me half a fucking hour to teach you the difference between bisexuality and pansexuality, and if I’m being completely honest, I’m still not sure you’re one-hundred percent clear.”

“I’m trying, Dare. I’ve been in the church all my life, so I never got the chance to learn all this stuff like you did at college.” He stares down at the glass of soda he ordered from the bar, watered down from melted ice cubes, and I’m pretty sure there’s a pubic hair on the rim. “I’m scared.” The hand not holding his pube-spiced Coke slips into mine, our fingers weaving together, and he gives me a squeeze. There are cracks in his heart. I know, because it’s written all over his face. So, I place my hand on his cheek, and I touch our foreheads together.

“When I got to your window and saw the bars—”

“I’m sorry,” he interrupts. “I’m so sorry. Everything’s happening so fast and I feel like I can’t catch my breath. I just needed some space.”

“Away from me?”

He breathes slowly, pulling his forehead away and studying my face. “I thought I did.”

“And now?”

He swallows, and after an uncomfortable moment of silence, he says, “I’m still not sure.”

The pain must be clear on my face because he quickly shakes his head. “I just need a little time to breathe, and to figure out what comes next. If I do this, I lose everything. I’ll lose my home. I’ll lose the church, Dare.” His jaw trembles. “I don’t know who I am without the church.” A tear falls down his cheek. “Who am I outside of God’s light?”

“You’re the man I love,” I answer.

“Could you two shut the actual fuck up,” a voice booms over the speaker system. When I look up, the impatient drag queen is glaring down at us from the stage like we’ve just rectally impaled her mother with a walking stick. “I’m trying to put on a goddamn show!”

“Gosh, I wish she wouldn’t talk like that,” Miles says, except . . . it isn’t Miles. Miles is right in front of me and the voice came from behind.

Looking over my shoulder I see an elderly man—perhaps thirty-eight years of age—with a bald spot. He’s staring up at the ceiling like a rogue lightning bolt might strike down through the ceiling. It’s a look I know all too well.

As the queen saunters off, I turn to the man and eye him up and down. He’s wearing a pair of jeans that have clearly been starched to high hell, because the crease is stiff and unfaltering. Jesus. Who irons creases into their jeans anymore? It’s like we’ve entered the stone ages of 1999. God help me if Miles ever heard me call 1999 the stone ages, because he was probably a teenager back then. The point remains, this man’s jeans are far from fashionable. He’s also wearing a red-and-blue striped Polo with a white undershirt beneath. On his neck, he’s got a string of . . . dear God, are those puka shells?

The guy opens his mouth to speak, but before he gets the chance, another elderly man approaches from behind, looking like he wants to deck me in the face.

“Just where the fuck do you get off, Gray Collins?” The man screams. “I leave you for forty-fucking-seconds to grab a drink, and you’re already trying to replace me?” The man flips me off using his ring finger. “He’s married, you son of a bitch. Did he tell you that? Did he tell you we have a baby at home? Did he?”

The man—Gray Collins, I presume—closes his eyes and sighs. “She’s a dachshund, Kent.”

“She’s a good girl, unlike her father. Did you let him see your cock, Grayson? Did you let him touch your bald spot?” Tears flood the older man’s eyes. He’s cute, I guess. He’s got curly brown hair that’s shaved short on the sides, but he doesn’t hold a candle to my Miles. “Are you leaving me for a younger, hotter piece of ass?”

The other man’s eyes bulge. “I would never! You know you’re my world, Half-pint.”

“Yeah? Well, you’ve got a funny fucking way of showing it,” the other man says. “I came home for you, dammit. I came home to save my ex-gay ex-boyfriend from a ridiculous lavender marriage, and this is how he repays me?”

Ex-gay ex-boyfriend? Lavender marriage? It’s like he’s telling Miles’ life story, and that makes me nervous, because I can’t help but wonder if this is what Miles and I will be like when we’re in our forties? Sobbing dramatically during a drag number? Well, Miles will be in his sixties, but still. I look over at Miles, but he’s staring down at the soda in his hand.

The curly headed man points a finger at Miles. “Don’t look at him again. I’ll scratch your eyes out.”

“I wasn’t!” Miles insists.

Kent’s eyes narrow. “And just why the fuck not? Are you saying he’s too old for you? Is it because of his bald spot? His crow’s feet? Well, I’ll tell you something, if it’s because of his tummy, I’ll slap you in the face. That’s not his fault. I force feed him empty carbs so I don’t feel like an absolute sloth when I inhale half the kitchen in one night. His metabolism just isn’t as fast as mine. You can’t blame him for that.”

“I would never,” Miles swears. I share a look with the other man, and he seems just as resigned to the foolishness as I do.

“Well, good.” Nodding, he shoves out his hand, shaking Miles’, then grabbing mine as he adds and adds, “Glad we got that cleared up. I’m Kent Fox.”

I’m not sure why he felt the need to give us his last name, but fuck it, when in Rome. I shake his hand and add, “Darren Matthews. And this is my—” I look at Miles, needing to know how he wants me to introduce him.

“His boyfriend, I guess. Marco Bigsby.”

I furrow my brow. What the hell kind of a name is that? The other two are buying it hook, line, and sinker, so I just roll with it, nodding my head.

Wait.

His boyfriend?

Fucking swoon, much?

Suddenly, the lights go on, and when I look to the stage, the drag queen has her hand on the light switch near the end of the stage. She lifts her microphone to her mouth and barks, “Out! I’ve warned you once, I won’t warn you again.”

“It’s his first drag show,” I plead. “I’m sorry, we’ll be quiet.”

She squints her eyes at me, then at Miles. Suddenly, those squinted eyes bulge. “Oh my God. I know you.” She’s not looking at me. She’s looking at Miles. Kneeling in front of him on stage, her cock fully visible through the slit in her dress—which, by the way, nice—she snatches off his wig and shouts, “Aha!” like she’s part of the goddamn Scooby gang. Next comes the mustache, and she rips it off with all her might. Jarringly, she launches up and rushes off stage, returning a moment later holding a phone. As she walks toward us, she’s scrolling, searching for something. When she finds it, her jaw clenches. Holding her phone out for the crowd, a video plays.

My heart pounds in my chest when I see an image of Miles standing in the aisle at church. It’s a video from earlier. Someone recorded Miles’ and Austin’s confrontation. As the scene plays out, the camera pans to me, and the look on my face is one of absolute despair. The person behind the phone aims it once more at Miles, catching the moment he took Mallory’s hand. The final shot showcases me and the tear dripping down my cheek, then the camera whirls, showing a visibly irate Agent Meadows. Well, his visibly angry eyes and brows, at least. He knows better than to show his whole face, what with the whole I-co-own-a-hitman-agency thing.

Why the hell would Meadows record this? I didn’t even notice him at church.

“How did you get that?” I ask, but my voice can’t be much louder than a whisper.

The queen touches her phone screen, then holds it out toward us again. It’s been shared to social media. Fuck. When I see the view count I have to do a double take. There’s over a million views. I know Meadows offered to make us go viral with our conversion therapy videos, but I turned him down. And why would he even upload this? It’s just some sad little twink crying in the corner while a man of God takes his wife’s hand. There’s nothing untoward about it, aside from the accusations of homophobia spewing from Austin’s mouth. I mean, it’s hardly news that an evangelical pastor is low-key homophobic.

Then it happens. The image flips. Security footage. Miles’ bedroom. Why the fuck is there a hidden camera in Miles’ bedroom?

“No,” Miles whispers, backing. “Please, no.” When I turn to him, he’s white as a ghost. His eyes are burning into mine, pleading, begging for a miracle, but I’m not a miracle-maker. I’m just a twenty-something twink with boundary issues and borderline-problematic methods of wooing the man I love. “What do we do?”

I don’t have an answer for him.

The video plays in the background, and in it, I’m in Miles’ lap, kissing him gently. Thankfully, it ends soon after and doesn’t show anything too damning, but the kiss is proof enough.

Our lives are about to change, and I can’t stop it from happening.

Turning, Miles rushes out of the bar, and I follow close behind. When he makes it to the truck, he doesn’t offer to help me in. While he cranks it, I climb up, panting by the time I’m seated. There is absolutely no reason a truck should be this high to the goddamn sky. Miles has his head pressed against the steering wheel, and his eyes are shut tight.

We’re quiet, the only sounds around us being that of Miles’ exhaust, and his soft whimpers. I’ve got a hand on his back as a gentle reassurance that he’s not in this alone.

“God dammit,” he cries, and it’s a deep, wounded, feral sound, scaring the hell out of me. “I’ve given you everything!”

I deserve this. Whatever he has to say, I’ve more than earned it. That doesn’t make it any easier to sit through. I’ve never heard Miles swear, and I’ve damn-sure never heard him say “God damn.” Those words are the ultimate sin for an evangelical. Even more than taking another man’s cock up your ass. The fact he’s taken the Lord’s name in vain, and knowing I’m the reason he’s done so, feels like a punch to the gut. I open my mouth to apologize, but tension hang heavy in the air and I can’t make my mouth work. I know he’s pissed off at me. He deserves to be pissed off at me, because I’ve ruined his life. I’ve taken everything he cares about and tossed it in the trash. Miles rears his arm back and slams his fist into the steering wheel, his truck’s horn piercing the night around us.

Then, silence.

“Darren,” he whimpers, and then, “Darren, please.”

I slide closer, trying to keep my composure, because the broken sound of his voice is too much for me to handle. “I’m right here, baby. I’ve got you.”

“I’ve given Him everything.” His voice is soft, hardly more than a whisper, and he sniffles, calm and slow. “I’ve given Him my entire life. I’ve torn myself in two to be worthy of His love, and it’s still not enough. He’s taking everything. He’s taking it all.”

I have no words to soothe my wayward pastor, so I give him the only thing I can. Something special. Something true. “Baby, look at me.” When he sits up, the indention of the steering wheel is still pressed into his forehead. I cup his cheeks, keeping the touch gentle. “Let Him.”

“What?”

“Let Him,” I repeat, inching closer. “Let Him take everything, and He’ll still have nothing, because we are everything . I don’t give a damn if you have a big, fancy house or if you’re leading a congregation. Those aren’t the reasons I love you. They’re not why I want to be with you.”

His brows droop in defeat, and he closes his eyes, shaking his head. “I don’t know who I am without Him.”

“Mine,” I swear. “You’re mine, and if something as simple as loving another man is enough for Him to cast you out of his kingdom, I’ll make room for you in mine.”

“I’m sorry,” he whispers.

“You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”

“I do. I’ve always tried to protect you. When you were . . .” He takes a breath and pulls his hand away. “When you were little, and my father started preaching his hate speech, there was this little fire in my chest. I’d heard him preach about us a million times by then. I was used to it. But the fire only started when you moved here. It was like it was talking to me. Telling me you shouldn’t have to hear it, because . . . because you’d hear it enough one day.” He takes my hand, and the grip is almost relentless. “I think I knew. I think I knew you were just like me, right from the start. I lied to myself and said it was just your way. You were delicate by nature.” Sniffling, he shakes his head. “You were a bouncing, sparkling little light, and I tried to turn that light out.”

“Miles, I wasn’t ever going to actually turn straight. I was only going along with it to spend time with you.”

“I didn’t know that, though. I thought I was leading you back to the straight and narrow. I’m a monster.”

I squeeze his hand. “Did you though?”

He jerks his head to look at me. “What do you mean?”

“Miles, baby, you doodled stick figures and watched me jack off. Did you seriously think that was going to turn me straight?”

His eyes narrow. “Are you insinuating I did all this to watch you masturbate?”

“No. I think you just missed your best friend and you wanted to spend time with him, same as me.” I lean the side of my face against his headrest and smile. “You have no idea how much I missed you when I was at college. It was agony. You made me promise to be brave before I left, but I was so fucking scared, Miles. I wanted to call you as soon as I got there and beg you to come pick me up, but I knew you would be disappointed in me. So, I stayed, and I tried to carve a life for myself, but you’d already carved out my heart. That’s what it felt like. Like part of me was still back here with you. I could barely sleep. It was hard to make it through most days. You were my best friend, and then you were just gone, and I was in this big new place with people who thought all kinds of crazy things. Things that made sense. Things your father preached against all our lives. I wanted you with me. I wanted you to see the real world for yourself.”

“I was jealous,” he whispers, looking down at my hand. “I hated myself for it, but I was so jealous you got out. My dad wasn’t ever going to let me leave, but your father practically shoved you out the door.” He sniffles. “He made me marry Mal, and all I could think was my little Dare-bear was going to get to live the life I never could. I resented you.” The last part is said with so much shame, it sends me to action. I lean forward, unable to be away from him. Needing him to know it’s okay.

“I would have resented you too. If you got out and I was stuck here.” I kiss him. Light as a feather, it’s my gentle promise, “Miles, I want you to listen to me. This life you’re living—this is not a hill you have to die on. There is so much more out there waiting. Let me show it to you. I have enough money from my time at the agency. Come with me. You and Mal.” The last part surprises me, because dear God, when did I become a Mallory Brooks fanboy? God help me, I stan.

Miles blinks at me. At first, I think he’s going to turn my offer down. Instead, with a quivering lip, he asks, “Can I tell you something?”

“You can tell me anything.”

“It’s something I’ve never told anyone. Not even Mal.” He’s breathing a little faster now, and when his hands start shaking, I wrap an arm around his shoulder.

“You’re okay. Whatever it is, you’re okay. I’m here.”

He places his hand over my heart like he needs to hold onto it to get through whatever this is. “My dad, he . . . he made me do something I didn’t want to do.” He quickly sucks his bottom lip between his teeth, and the look he’s shooting me is horrifying. It’s like years and years of anguish, pouring out like a bursting dam. “Before I married Mal, he paid a woman from church to turn me straight. He paid her to sleep with me. I didn’t want it. I didn’t want her hands all over, touching and grabbing like she owned me. I begged her to stop. I begged and begged, but she just kept going, telling me it was God’s plan. That she was doing His work.”

“Oh, Miles,” I whisper.

“She raped me.” Once the words are out, he opens his eyes, and dabs at his cheeks again. “I’ve never said that word out loud.” He turns to me, and there’s so much hurt and ache all over his face. Decades of anguish slathered across it like makeup. “I felt so dirty. When I told Dad I was struggling, he just told me to man up. He kept saying over and over it was God’s will.” He sighs, and it’s such a devastating sound. I’m realizing I don’t know everything about my Miles. I thought I did. I thought my constant snooping and the late nights we spent together cuddled in bed gave me an inside look at a version of Miles no one else has had the chance to see. But there’s so much more beneath the surface. Life experiences he’s never shared with anyone, and I want him to share them with me. The good and bad. “We didn’t talk a whole lot after that. I started sneaking my mother’s pills to numb the pain. I just couldn’t make it stop. The memories. Her hands. Dare, they were everywhere.”

“Baby,” I soothe. “I’m sorry.”

He gives me an appreciative smile even though I haven’t done anything other than apologize. “I got really messed up on her pills and confronted Dad once. I asked him why it was okay for me to have premarital sex with a woman, but if I so much as looked at another guy, my soul would be damned to Hell. He didn’t have an answer for that.”

“Zealots never do. They cherry-pick sins and put them in their own little top-ten lists, arranging them however they see fit. Never mind the fact that no sin is greater than the next. We’ve got a lot of obese congregants who are quick to run their mouths about abortion or gay rights, but you don’t see any of them calling out gluttons. Brother Bishop cheated on his wife last year. I didn’t hear anyone tell him he was going to Hell.” I lean closer, my eyes locked on his. “Your father was a bastard, Miles. I’m so sorry you had to go through that. You deserved to have someone in your corner.”

“I did,” he says, the slightest hint of a smile touching his lips. “I had you.” He tilts even closer, and our lips touch. There’s an unspoken rush of emotion consuming us both, and the longer the kiss goes on, the bigger those feelings feel. He whimpers into my mouth, just the smallest admission of vulnerability, but I latch onto it, deepening the kiss, because I know it’s what he needs. Miles is the strongest man I’ve ever known, but even the strongest steel can be melted down into something else. That’s what they tried to do to him. To turn him into this cookie-cutter evangelist with his lovely wife and a not-so happy life.

“What happened after?” I ask, breaking the kiss. “After you asked why one sin was worse than the other?”

He sniffles. “He didn’t have an answer, and it made him angry. He socked me in the jaw and told me to take my queer ass upstairs. We never talked about it after that. It feels like I can’t breathe sometimes. I thought it would hurt less one day, but sometimes it’s like I’m right back on that bed begging God to make it stop.”

“Do you want me to have her killed?” The question isn’t a joke, because this isn’t a joking matter. Someone touched Miles. They touched him, and he said no. They kept going when he begged them to stop. “I swear to God, I’ll do it myself. Just say the word.”

His arms tighten around me. “She’s already dead. Cancer.”

I dig my nails into his back. “I hope it fucking hurt.”

He nods. “I had to see her at every church function. Five nights a week, she was there, smiling at me like she’d just rescued me from Hell herself. I didn’t want to see that smile. I didn’t want to see her, Dare, but I didn’t have a choice.”

“Wait. Was I here when this happened? Was I already going to church?”

“Yeah.” He stares down at his hand, not elaborating. I try to jog a memory I’m not sure exists. If I was here, I would have known something, wouldn’t I? We were inseparable. And if Miles was raped, he wouldn’t walk around with his usual happy-go-lucky smile he usually plastered on his face. The same one he tends to hide behind now.

“Wait. Was it the summer you got really depressed because they rejected your application for cabin leader at church camp?”

“Yeah. I didn’t get rejected. I didn’t even apply. I just made it up so you wouldn’t think anything was off. I didn’t want you to know about it.” His voice cracks. “I was so ashamed. But you were there, though. You were always there to make me smile. I swear, it’s like the second we met, you latched yourself onto my hip. You got me through it. You’re the reason I hung on when I wanted to . . .” He pulls away and looks out the window. “You’re the reason I’m still here. The only reason. I loved you before, but that love is different now. It’s changed.” He sighs. “Or maybe I’ve changed.”

I don’t know how to respond. How could anyone ever respond to an admission like that? I saved him. Our friendship kept him going. I kept him going. So, when the words refuse to come, I do the only thing I can. I touch the side of his face and guide him back to me, giving him another kiss.

As our lips brush against each other, there’s a knock on the window, and when I break the kiss and look to my right, one of the men from the bar is knocking on the window. It’s the more reserved of the pair. Gray, he called himself.

Miles takes a deep breath, then rolls down the window from the panel on his door. “Gray, was it?” he calls out.

“That’s me.”

“Where’s your husband?” I ask, because sassy though he may have been, he was kind of great.

Gray darts his eyes toward a white pickup truck. His husband, Kent, has the tailgate down, and is lying in the truck bed, his legs dangling over the side, staring up at the stars. “He had a little too much to drink tonight.” The way Gray smiles at him makes my heart feel warm and fuzzy. There’s so much devotion in his eyes. Endless appreciation, like he believes the stars Kent is staring at are all shining just for him. Hell, maybe they are. “We were childhood best friends. We grew up in church together.” His smile widens as he studies him. “I told him I loved him, and I lost him an hour later. He lost everything, and I lost twenty years of my life because I was too scared to run away with him.”

“And then he came back?” Miles asks.

“And then he came back,” Gray agrees. “And I thank God for it every day. I see you. Even before they showed that video, I saw you, because I was you once. I tried to hide my sparkle and shine from the world for twenty years. I made myself smaller so I wouldn’t be seen. Spent years denying myself, telling me I needed to stay the course. To walk the straight and narrow. All the while knowing, the only thing about you that changed was my tolerance for heartache. It’s a deep ache, isn’t it, Pastor?” There’s no anger in his tone. No judgment. Just sympathy. Miles stares at Gray like he’s dazed. “It gets away from you, the lie. You cling to it for so long, you almost start to believe it yourself. Then something—sometimes someone—comes from out of nowhere and shoves the truth back in your face.”

Miles looks at me, his jaw shaking as he nods. “Yeah.”

“Good. Let it. Let it remind you, because this life you’re living ain’t a life, Pastor. It’s Hell, and even the worst of us don’t deserve it. You can be happy. Do you want to be happy?”

“I’m . . .” Mile says, his voice breaking. “I’m scared.”

Gray reaches across the truck and squeezes Miles’ hand, but the man clearly hasn’t thought the action through, because to do so, he’s had to climb onto the truck’s side bar and wedge his entire torso through the window. He doesn’t let the awkwardness stop him, just hovers in front of me like Superman, squeezing my boyfriend’s hand.

“I know. I know you are, buddy. It’s big and horrible and scary right now, but I swear to God, it gets so much better. There’s life waiting for you at the end of the rainbow, Pastor, and it’s a life worth living. I got my happy ending. I know you can get yours too. And even if you don’t find some love story to end all love stories, that’s okay. It’s better to live a perfectly average life than an endless lie.” Wheezing, he lifts an arm and places his hand on Miles’ forehead and closes his eyes. His lips move, lost in prayer, but no words come out. Miles watches it all unfold, tears forming in his eyes as his hand trembles against the wheel. Gray opens his eyes and gives Miles a wide smile. “Amen. I’ll pray for you every night, Pastor. I’ll pray for your happiness.” Retreating, he draws a deep breath once he’s no longer doing his silly Superman pose.

“Thank you,” Miles says, wiping his eyes. “Thank you for that.”

Gray nods before looking at me. “Don’t follow in our footsteps, kid. I wasted two decades I’ll never get back. We may have forever in Heaven, but we’ve only got one life. Don’t you dare waste yours.” With a final nod, he turns and walks toward his truck.

When he’s gone, Miles grabs my hand and squeezes tightly. I look over to see him staring straight ahead, out into the packed parking lot. “Tell me we can do this. Tell me it can be me and you, and it can still be okay.”

“I will make it my life’s mission to see that you’re happy. If you want this—if you decide to come out—I will make you the happiest man in the world. I swear to God, it’s all going to work out in the end.”

“How? If I come out—”

“Whatever happens,” I say, squeezing his hand. “I’m right by your side. If they take your home, I’ll buy you a new one.”

His eyebrows knit together. “Buy a house? On your salary? In this economy, Dare?”

“In President Flump’s economy,” I remind him, and he nods in agreement. Look at that. A good dicking and he’s already leaning left. A win though it may be, it’s not the matter at hand.

He shakes his head. “Be serious, baby. I won’t be able to provide for you. I’ve already been struggling to provide for Mal. We’re both going to lose our homes. We’ll be destitute.”

I swallow slowly, a little nervous about my next admission. “You don’t need to worry about money. Even if I lose my job, we’re set for a while.”

His brows knit together in the center of his forehead. “What?”

“My job pays well,” I admit. “Well, it did. I think I might be fired. Or maybe Meadows is just mad at you? I’m not sure. Either way, I’ve got a nest egg saved from my time with the agency.”

“You’ve only worked there six months.”

I clear my throat and look away. “I make good money. Damn good money. Enough for us to live off for a couple of years.”

“A couple of years?”

I peek up at him and smile. “I got hired making fifteen an hour, but then Meadows’ pet choked on a hot dog, and I saved his life. Meadows loves his pet very much, and he’s a very appreciative man.”

“If he were appreciative, he wouldn’t have outed the man you love. He had a camera in my room . . .” His eyes bulge. “Good God, Almighty. He saw everything. Everything! He saw us doing—doing . . .”

“I know. And I’m livid too. Believe me, he’ll be hearing from me once we get home. But for right now, just know that if you do this, I have you. And I guess I’ve got Mal too.” A smile I hadn’t planned quirks. “We’ll be like a little dysfunctional family. A family who actually cares about each other.” I bring his hand to my lips and kiss it. “We’ve never had that before. We finally can.”

He takes a few shaky breaths, looking like he’s weighing the options in his head. Eventually, after leaving me in near-endless suspense, he nods. “Yeah. Okay, Dare.”