Page 26 of Summer Kitchen: M/M contemporary small-town romance

Dev met Casey’s eyes over Nash’s head as he peeled Nash’s arms away and sidestepped him, only to get tackled by Owen.

“Dude!” Owen pounded him on the back as though Dev were part of his drum kit. He stepped back and grinned up at Dev. “How’s life as a lumberjack?”

“I’m not a lumberjack, you nut.” Dev returned Owen’s grin but limited himself to a couple of bro backslaps. Owen had always reminded him of one of the more enthusiastic puppies at Ty’s shelter, and despite being on the downhill side of his thirties and built like a fireplug, he still did. “Good to see you. Welcome to Home.”

Owen buffeted his shoulder. “It’s been too long, dude. Way too long. Why’n’cha ever come to one of our shows? Joe sent you tickets every time we played on this coast.”

Dev didn’t reveal by so much of a flicker of an eyelash that Joe had done nothing of the sort, probably on Nash’s orders. “Mmmphmmm.”

“And dude…” He leaned closer, lowering his voice to what he probably imagined was a stage whisper, but after decades behind his drums, between amp towers, was more of a stage bellow. “LA is awesome. You gotta come.”

“Thanks, man. Appreciate the offer.” Dev turned to Eli, whose personal style as well as his stage presence had always rivaled Equinox Mountain—unmovable and remote, yet somehow magnetic. He held out his hand. “Eli.”

Eli didn’t shake—he was probably in touch-avoidance mode today—but he inclined his head and murmured, “Dev,” before turning back to the lilac bush.

Studiously ignoring Nash seething next to him, Dev faced the unknown man in the driveway. “Hi. I’m Dev, and you must be—”

“That’s Harry,” Nash said, and then sidled closer and hissed, “your replacement. Your total replacement, know what I mean? But that’s why we’re here, right?”

Dev’s smile cranked closer to a grimace when he caught Casey’s startled blink. He dialed his expression into something more welcoming—he hoped—and stepped away from Nash. “Nice to meet you, Harry.”

“It’s Haru, actually,” Casey said. “Haru Inada.” He smiled at Harry—who, apparently, wasn’t Harry at all, but trust Nash to ignore other people’s preferences. “Have I got that right?”

Haru nodded, but his smile was tight. “You do.” He held out a hand to Dev. “It’s an honor to meet you at last, although I feel like I know you already.” When Nash snorted, pink tinged Haru’s high cheekbones. “From your music. Your songs. Your style.”

“Which you still haven’t managed to master,” Nash said. He invaded Dev’s space again and placed a hand on his lower back, just above the curve of his ass. “Now, why don’t we cut the bullshit? Take me to my real room.” He leered. “The one I’m sharing with you.”

Haru’s smile vanished and his expression turned almost painfully blank.

Fuck, did Nash just do that?

If Nash’s not-so-subtle insinuations were accurate, Haru was his new boyfriend as well as POV’s lead guitarist, and Nash had just thrown him under the bus in front of his bandmates, his manager, the fucking driver, and a couple of—to Haru—perfect strangers.

Same old Nash.

“Dude,” Owen muttered.

Dev edged away from Nash again, took Casey’s hand and gazed down into his eyes. “I was about to tell you. I moved all your stuff over to the cottage.” He kissed Casey’s forehead, earning a delighted hoot from Owen and a snarl from Nash. “Is that okay? You’re there every night, anyway.”

Casey’s smile was a little shaky. “That’s fine.”

“We’ll put Nash in your old room. Eli can have the green bedroom, Owen—”

“Oh! Oh! Casey said you put me in the nursery, right?” Owen turned to Haru. “You should share with me. It’s a huge room. Three beds. And the haunted attic is right overhead.”

Dev lifted his eyebrows. “Don’t let Owen snow you,” he said to Haru. “Harrison House is not haunted.”

“It so is,” Owen said to Haru out of the corner of his mouth.

“We’d arranged for each of you to have your own room,” Casey said, “but if you’d rather share—”

“Come on, dude.” Owen nudged Haru in the ribs. “We’ve shared worse rooms on tour.”

Haru glanced at Nash, whose frowning attention was still on Dev. “I—”

“How about this?” Casey said. “I’ll take you all up and show you what we’ve got arranged for you. Since you’ll be the only ones staying here, you’re free to mix and match accommodations however you like.” He spread his palms. “None of the rooms have an en suite, so other than window placement and furniture arrangement, they’re equally comfortable.” Casey bent to pick up a suitcase.

“Leave that, Casey,” Dev said. “Time enough for everyone”—he emphasized the word—“to cart up their luggage after they know where they’ll be sleeping.”

“All right. This way.” Casey trotted up the porch steps, with Eli trailing morosely at his heels, Haru following after a last glance at Nash, and Owen bounding ahead to open the door for all of them.

Nash watched them go, but didn’t move. Typical. That was Nash. No rules applied to him that didn’t align with his own agenda. “So,” Nash drawled, “that’s my replacement? You couldn’t do better? Jesus, Dev, do you know how insulting that is?”

Dev planted his feet wide and crossed his arms. “If we’re talking insults, how about the way you treated Haru just now?”

Nash scoffed. “Oh, please. He got what he wanted. A year of my dick and a chance to play onstage with POV. He’s got no complaints.”

“How do you know?”

Nash’s brow puckered. “What do you mean?”

“How do you know he’s got no complaints? You don’t even call him by his proper name.”

Nash scrunched his face like he was staring into a follow spot. “What are you talking about? You expect me to call him babe?” He infused the word with a barrel of mockery. “If you think that kind of shit will convince your boy toy that he’s anything but temporary, you’re delusional.”

Heat beat behind Dev’s eyes and his fingers curled into fists. “For one thing, what I call Casey is none of your business. For another, I’d expect you to call the band’s lead guitarist, and, not incidentally, your own boyfriend, by his actual name. How do you introduce him on stage?”

Nash looked honestly confused. “I don’t. He’s just part of the band.”

Dev raised his eyebrows so far his forehead cramped. “You’re shitting me. Even when we played at the worst dive bar in Modesto, we introduced everyone by name.”

Nash waved Dev’s words away. “That was your idea. After you left, I didn’t see the point. People are coming to our concerts to see us, so they know who we are. We don’t need introductions.”

“Unbelievable,” Dev muttered.

Nash’s expression changed, turning almost flirty. “Forget about Harry.”

“Haru,” Dev said, not moving.

“Whatever.” Nash sauntered toward him. “Now that we’re together again, he’s irrelevant anyway.” He reached for Dev, but Dev blocked him.

“We are not together. Where the fuck did you get that idea?”

“Oh come on.” Nash edged forward again, causing Dev to back up until his heels hit the steps and he lost his balance.

Nash grabbed his arms to steady him, but didn’t stop there. He yanked Dev against his chest and ground their hips together. “Yeah, that’s more like it.”

“Fuck’s sake, Nash, get off me.” Dev freed himself and sidestepped, pivoting so he had the whole of Harrison House’s front yard at his back, the better to stage a hasty escape. “We’ve been over for a long time.”

Nash shook his head, his expression almost pitying. “Dev, Dev, Dev. As soon as I heard about this so-called festival of yours, I got the message, loud and clear.”

“Since I didn’t tell you about the festival—on purpose, I might add—I’m not sure what message you think I was sending.”

“That you wanted it all back—the band, your life, me.” He spread his arms. “Well, here I am.”

Dev huffed. “So you think that instead of, I don’t know, just talking to you, I’d stage an event involving dozens of food vendors and musicians, not to mention the participation of my entire town and the cooperation of businesses as far away as Boston and Burlington, just to get back with you?”

Nash grinned. “As a grand gesture, it’s impressive.” He cast a dismissive glance at Harrison House. “Although it would have been better if you’d held the thing at someplace less downscale.”

Temper fraying, Dev counted slow breaths through his nose. One. Two. Fuck it. “Here’s the thing. I didn’t invite you to this festival.”

“I know.” Nash winked. “Very sly. But then you always were.”

“Are you delusional? I always told you exactly what I thought.”

“Please. What you spewed in our last convo was a fucking joke, and you know it. Come back here? Leave music behind? Leave me behind?”

Dev gritted his teeth. “I came back because my brother and grandfather were killed, something you treated as though they’d done it just to inconvenience you.”

“It fucking well was an inconvenience,” Nash shot back. “We had Joe on the line, wanting to represent us. Three different labels vying to sign us based on our demo. And then you bolted.”

“You make it sound like I left with no word. I told you what I needed, but you ignored me.”

“What you needed? What about what the band needed? What I needed? You never once thought about that, did you?”

Dev rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I thought that as my boyfriend, you’d at least try to comfort me. Help me weather the loss.” Although by that time, Dev had pretty much realized that Nash wouldn’t offer anything more than lip service.

“I was very sympathetic!”

“You said, Oh, that’s too bad. And then asked if we were out of coffee.”

“I thought coffee would make you feel better! You’re always cranky before your second cup.”

“It was eleven o’clock at night!”

“So?”

“I don’t fucking—” Dev carded both hands through his hair. “You know what?” He dropped his arms. “Never mind. The point is that this festival has precisely nothing to do with you. It barely has anything to do with me. It’s about Home. Its businesses. Its people. Since you’re on the music roster, that makes you part of the festival, but it doesn’t make you part of my life. Not anymore. That door is closed for good.”

For an instant, uncertainty flickered across Nash’s face and his brows pinched together. But then his expression cleared and he chuckled. “Nah. If you were really done with me, you’d have pulled all the rights to your songs. But you didn’t. You let us play them live.”

“I didn’t want to penalize the band. I told you that before I left. Multiple times.”

Casey’s tart words came back to him then: Telling somebody something doesn’t do much good if they don’t listen.

He studied Nash, eyes narrowed. Maybe Dev needed to frame this in terms Nash would understand, that would hit him in the one spot he never ignored.

His wallet.

“You know,” Dev drawled, “now that you mention it, maybe it’s time to renegotiate. Your manager has been emailing me for months about releasing the recording rights.”

Nash’s smile was triumphant. “I knew it. I told the guys I’d have this sewn up by—”

“You and I are done, but if the band wants to record my music, fine.” He grinned. “As long as I get the royalties.”

Dev left Nash gaping at him and strode across the lawn, but before he rounded the corner of the house, he turned. “And by the way, for your information? Casey is worth a hundred of you.”