Page 37 of Someone Like You

PHIL

H e couldn’t imagine a more Scottish love confession.

Maybe if Ian had been wearing that beautiful kilt…

He was shivering and covered in goosebumps head to toe, but he couldn’t have cared less.

He stood in Ian’s entryway, waiting to be told what to do because his brain wasn’t functioning at the moment.

Ian hung his jacket, toed off his boots, then took a good look at Phil, who was so drenched he was dripping all over the floor.

“I’ve got a tumble drier, if you want.”

“Uh?”

“You look like a drowned rat.”

Drowned rat might have been a compliment. Phil felt more like a corpse fished out of a lake after a few days. The wet fabric clinging to his skin was numbing his libs, cold as ice.

“How long did you sit there?”

“I don’t know, half an hour?” Phil checked his watch. “Uh. More like an hour.”

Ian shot him a what the fuck look .

“I was out for a run and just… found myself at your doorstep.” A violent shiver coursed down his spine.

Ian narrowed his eyes at him. “Clothes off before you catch pneumonia.”

“If you wanted me naked, you just had to ask,” Phil grumbled while struggling with the hoodie’s zipper. A part of him wanted to ask Ian to turn around, but he was all too aware of how childish it would have sounded. “It’s not much of a spectacle, anyway.”

He avoided mirrors when he wasn’t clothed.

He knew he didn’t look bad , but anyone who had seen his physique before depression had ruined his discipline would’ve had to admit he’d let himself go.

He still had his muscles, but they’d lost all definition.

His abs, once taut, had gone soft. The only reason his muffin top was barely noticeable was that his appetite had plummeted, even more so after starting the medication.

Had it not been for Abby, he’d have starved himself to death.

Ian came forward, gently prying his hands away, and started to work on the jammed zipper. “What’s your idea of a spectacle?”

You , Phil thought, getting a meaningful eyeful of Ian’s figure. When his gaze lifted back up, it met a scolding frown.

The zipper went down. Ian helped him peel off the drenched hoodie, then the t-shirt underneath, dropping them both to the ground, then reached past him, grabbing a black hoodie from the rack by the door that he draped over Phil’s bare shoulders.

It smelled like detergent and that familiar musky scent that translated to Ian to Phil’s senses.

“Ask me what’s a spectacle to me.”

Phil swallowed. He wanted to cry. Again . But this time it was for a completely different reason. He also may or may not be dying to kiss Ian.

“What’s a spectacle to you?”

Ian’s hands rubbed over Phil’s arms, the friction producing a wonderful warmth.

“The strength of a man who’s fighting battles that would crush me in a matter of days.

” He pulled the hoodie snug around Phil’s trembling frame.

“And that shit-eating glint in his eyes when he outsmarts me. That one drives me insane.” Intent blue irises trailed down Phil’s torso, then up again.

“It’s really obnoxious of you to be as attractive as you look. ”

Phil was hot now. He was still shivering and still felt shards of ice puncturing him all over, but his face and his chest were on fire.

He really wanted to kiss Ian.

“Abby said something like that once. Back when we were dating.”

“Speaking of Abigail… I just had a life-changing conversation with her.”

Phil’s eyebrows rose. He didn’t know which part of that single sentence was more disconcerting. Ian and Abby had just had a life-changing conversation? To talk about what?

Actually, he knew what .

Him.

But to say what?

“Just as in… recently?”

“As in just now . Not goin’ to lie, for a moment there I thought she was out for blood. That woman knows how to intimidate a guy.”

“She does ,” Phil had to agree. He was proud of his pint-sized cherry bomb.

Ian gave the edges of the hoodie a perfunctory tug. “She accused me of breakin’ your heart.”

The heart in question, which had been very much broken until mere minutes ago, missed a few beats. Phil would have never put it like that, but…

“Yeah, well…” He ducked his head with a sniff. “You did .”

Ian splayed a hand on Phil’s naked chest. Beneath it, Phil’s heart throbbed in anticipation. He wanted more of that touch. More of that warmth. He wanted to tear Ian’s clothes apart and soak up the beautiful heat of his body wrapped up in his arms.

“My goal was to preserve your relationship,” Ian stressed, his hand gliding up until it curled around the nape of Phil’s neck. If it was a reproach, it didn’t sound very reproachful. More like enamoured.

Kiss me , Phil whimpered inside. Please, just fucking kiss me .

“But you and your pearl-clutchin’ morals had to go and spoil it all.”

“My most sincere apologies for having a conscience.” Phil shoved the feverish yearning under a mask of phoney indignation. “At least If I lose Abby it’ll be because of the truth rather than a lie.”

Ian scoffed out a muffled chortle, his expression mellowing. “That’s not what’s happenin’.”

“What’s happening then?” Phil’s tetchy tone only seemed to amuse Ian further, bringing out those dreamy dimples Phil was so hopelessly weak for. Ian’s thumb stroked the underside of his jawline, back and forth, so tenderly Phil’s knees instantly turned to mush.

“If you want,” he muttered, “you’ve got a free pass for a foot in both camps.”

Phil’s mouth fell open, but no sound came out. He replied what he’d heard in his head a few times to make sure he’d processed it correctly.

No mockery.

No sarcasm.

Only anticipation.

A foot in both camps.

Abby and Ian.

It was more than he could have dared to hope for.

It was everything .

He licked his lips, overcome with emotion. “Abby said that?”

“Yeah,” Ian all but laughed. “Pretty matter-of-factly, too. She also said…” His forehead creased. “I think the exact phrasin’ was: ‘There’s nothing I can do about grapefruit, but I can let him have you.’ Whatever that means.”

“I’ll explain later.” Phil frantically fisted Ian’s t-shirt to yank him down to his eye-level. “Can we fucking kiss now?”

A slow, devilish smirk formed across Ian’s lips. There was an emotional glint in the blue of his eyes.

“No objection. ”

“Great.”

Phil grabbed Ian by the neck and very ungently pulled him into a kiss so frantic and messy it felt like a matter of life or death, all pants and teeth, and lips relentlessly chasing lips despite the burn of the beard and the oxygen running out fast.

It was a funny feeling — the reverse height difference he wasn’t used to, expanse of solid muscles filling his arms, unafraid of his strength, and the loving, passionate touch of Ian’s lips upon his own, hungry and eager but carefully responsive to his most subtle cues, indulging every title of his head, every brief hesitation, every experimental shift.

Kissing a guy so much bigger and stronger than him made him feel so small and fragile…

Kissing a guy .

Phil laughed into the kiss.

Ian pulled back. “What?” His arms stayed around Phil, hands splayed on the bare skin of his back. The hoodie had fallen to the ground and no one was interested in picking it up.

“Nothing. Just… Ah.” Phil dipped his head with another laugh, more than just a little breathless. “I’m like twenty years late with this sexual awakening shit.”

“Didn’t realise there were deadlines for that.

” Phil could feel the pressure of every single one of Ian’s fingertips into the small of his back, hot and unflinching.

His lips burned from the friction with Ian’s beard, but he could still feel the delicate swipe of Ian’s tongue, too, and that burned in a whole different way.

Phil’s arms relaxed, draping over Ian’s shoulders as he took in the breath-taking sight of the man who’d been living rent-free in his head all this time.

“At my age you just kinda assume that that ship has sailed, you know? You’ve seen the best of both worlds, stuck to one side all your life…

” His gaze dropped to Ian’s mouth and he had to bite the inside of his cheek to suppress a smug grin.

“Turns out the best of the other world was actually waiting for me in Scotland. ”

Ian kissed him, a light, lingering brush that made up for all the previous violence, and whispered upon his lips: “Thank you for dragging your arse all the way to me.”

The tenderness of it awakened two contrasting feelings within Phil: the need to cry and the yearning.

He latched onto the latter, not wanting to ruin the moment, but while he struggled to keep his eyes from welling up, something else happened — something that made him glance up at Ian apologetically, only to find him smiling.

“Happy to see me, Handsome?”

With a boldness that came out of nowhere, Phil pressed up closer to Ian. The flimsy running shorts did absolutely nothing to conceal his hard-on. His tongue swept at a corner of his parted lips as his eyes roamed across Ian’s body.

“I’m not seeing nearly enough of you.”

A greedy light ignited in Ian’s dilated pupils. Strong hands grabbed Phil’s hips. “Maybe a shower’ll help.”

There was a promise lurking behind the casualness of the proposal, a sweet one that made Phil’s mouth go dry with anticipation, but at the same time a visceral nervousness gripped his guts. He didn’t know what to expect from that promise — didn’t know what Ian expected of him.

“I’ve never—”

Ian shushed him with a gentle tug that brought Phil’s erection flush against his thigh. “Just let me take care of this . If you say stop, I’ll stop.”

The mere mental picture of that forced Phil to bite down on a pathetic moan.

“And if I say more ?” he asked breathlessly.