Page 32 of The Boss (Straight Men #2)

The show must go on .

That’s what I kept telling myself as I buttoned my cuffs, my hands steadier than they should have been.

Freddie Mercury had recorded that song while he was dying. Weak, exhausted, knowing his body was failing him, but still, he faced the microphone and sang like nothing in the world could break him. His voice soared—stronger than ever, defiant, transcendent. He delivered perfection on the first take, and the rest was history. ‘Inside my heart is breaking, my makeup may be flaking, but my smile still stays on.’ That was the kind of strength I needed now.

I stared at my reflection in the mirror. My tuxedo hung crisp and precise on my frame, a costume tailored for a role I was supposed to play. The rehearsal was about to start, this ridiculous performance where we’d practice standing in the right place, walking at the right time, pretending this was something natural and inevitable. A choreographed prelude to a day that would bind me to Chantelle forever.

My stomach clenched.

Chantelle wanted it to be perfect—flawless, seamless, a pristine execution of a future she had designed down to the last detail. Every step, every word, every gesture accounted for. And I would follow through because that was expected of me. Because that’s what I thought I wanted.

‘I’ll face it with a grin, I’m never giving in, on with the show.’

I exhaled slowly, tugging at my bowtie. The sacristy was dim, tucked away from the grandeur of the main hall, its small stained-glass window casting muted colors over the dark wooden cabinets lining the walls. The air was thick with incense and aged linen, tinged with the faint chill of stone walls that had absorbed centuries of whispered prayers. A single arched doorway led back into the cathedral, where the others were already gathered, waiting.

Beyond that door, Grace Church stretched in solemn elegance—Gothic arches soaring toward the heavens, chandeliers suspended like frozen constellations beneath the high, vaulted ceiling. Stained glass fractured the fading light into kaleidoscopic patterns across the marble floor and polished pews. It was a place meant for devotion, for belief. But belief in what? That love was sacred? That vows were unbreakable? That standing at the altar meant something beyond a carefully arranged recital?

Before I could spiral deeper into cynicism, someone knocked on the door, and when I turned around, Chris was there, stepping inside the small chamber.

“Hey, are you ready?” he said, closing the door behind him. “They sent me to look for you. Duty of the best man, I suppose.”

My hands curled into fists. He was so fucking beautiful. Dressed sharp in his navy blue suit, his blond hair tousled just enough, his lips slightly parted like he was about to say something else—but didn’t. His eyes flickered over me, a fleeting softness before he schooled his expression into a mask of indifference.

I had tried to keep my distance from him, just like he’d asked. He wanted space, and I’d told myself I could give it to him. But the truth was, I couldn’t. I had slipped—small things, stolen moments, a perfectly timed encounter in the hallways when I knew he’d be there, a visit to his department I hadn’t meant to make. Because when I talked to him, it was the only time I felt like myself. Like I wasn’t suffocating under the weight of everything I was supposed to be.

“So, this is it,” I said, taking a step closer to him.

“Yeah.”

“I…” For a moment I got lost in his eyes. “I never meant to hurt you.”

He shrugged, casting his gaze down. “But you said it yourself. It was always going to end like this. You, marrying her. Me, being left behind. I knew it from the start.”

I took another step closer. “Then how can you still put up with me?”

Chris parted his lips as if to speak, then pressed them shut, like he was holding the truth back. He looked like he wanted to step back, to put more distance between us, but with his back against the door, there was nowhere to go.

When he didn’t respond, I stepped in, closing what little space remained between us, my body almost brushing his. “Tell me,” I pressed, my voice dropping to a whisper. “Why do you keep going along with this?”

His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “Because I’m a fucking idiot, that’s why.”

“No,” I murmured. “That’s not it.” I brought my hand to his face, my thumb tracing the edge of his jaw. His blue eyes fluttered shut, his breath catching. When he opened them again, something in them had changed.

“What do you want me to tell you? That I still—that I still have feelings for you?”

I swallowed hard. “Sometimes our thoughts and our feelings take us where we can no longer go,” I said quietly. “Feelings are not captive.”

Chris let out a small, bitter laugh, but there was no humor in it. “Maybe it would be better if they were.”

I shook my head. “No, it wouldn’t.”

His gaze lifted to mine, searching. “Then tell me how to stop wanting you.”

I didn’t answer. Because there was no answer.

I moved before I could stop myself, pressing my body against his, grabbing him, crashing my mouth against his.

Chris whimpered, hands pushing against my chest, but I didn’t let him go. My fingers tangled in his hair, my other arm locking around his waist to pull him flush against me. He made a small sound—half protest, half surrender—and it was all the invitation I needed. My tongue slid past his lips, claiming, desperate, my kiss rough, searing, everything I had been holding back crashing to the surface in one violent, unstoppable wave.

He gasped against my mouth, his resistance faltering. “Zac—”

But I wasn’t listening. My hands roamed over him, greedy, starved. I grabbed his belt, yanked him closer, my fingers skimming down the back of his thighs. And then—

A sharp rip.

Chris tensed, jerking back. “Did you just—”

I didn’t need to look. I could feel a jagged tear across the ass of his pants and briefs, exposing bare skin underneath. I’d torn both in a single swipe.

For a beat, neither of us spoke. Then Chris groaned. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Just like that day in my office, when we first met. When his pants gave up the fight, and I burst out laughing at his predicament. But this time I wasn’t laughing. My hands locked onto the sliver of exposed flesh, my breath coming fast, ragged. Back then, at our first meeting, I didn’t know what I wanted. But now? Now there was no doubt. “I’ll buy you a new one. Ten more. Anything you want.”

Chris started to pull away, but I caught him, spinning him toward the sacristy credens and bending him over. He braced his hands against the polished wood, looking over his shoulder, eyes blown wide. “Zac, what the fuck are you—”

“I need this,” I rasped, my fingers splaying over his lower back, trailing down. “I need you .”

His breath escaped in a shaky exhale, his resolve crumbling as I dropped to my knees behind him. My hands gripped his hips, pushing his torn pants further apart, exposing him completely. I’d never eaten ass before—never wanted to, not with anyone else. But for him, I would. For him, I had to.

I spread his round cheeks, the soft golden fuzz dusting the creamy skin, my mouth descending right into his cleft. The first swipe of my tongue across his hole had him jerking, a strangled moan tearing from his throat.

I didn’t stop. I licked him open, slow and filthy, my hands locking him in place as my tongue worked deeper. Chris cursed, his thighs trembling, his body bowing forward over the cabinet, his ass pushing out into my face. His fingers curled over the wood, grasping for something—anything—to hold on to.

I groaned against him, my cock aching, straining against my zipper. We weren’t prepared for sex, but it had to happen anyway. I’d die if it didn’t. So I slicked him up, pressing my tongue into his tightness again and again, knowing there was no lube, nothing but this—my mouth, my spit, the heat of my breath against his shaking flesh.

Chris choked out my name, his voice cracking. “Zac—fuck, fuck —”

I dragged my tongue one last time over his entrance before standing, gripping his waist, pressing the length of my body against his back.

“Someone might come,” Chris panted, his forehead dropping against the table.

“I don’t give a fuck.” I swallowed hard. “I need to be inside you now .” My hands moved back, my fingers trembling as I unzipped my fly. I took my cock and balls out without even unbuckling my belt, spitting on it and rubbing the saliva over the hard, throbbing length. And then I was pushing inside him, bare and unrestrained, my cockhead sinking into that impossible heat.

He let out a ragged sound, his fingers clenching. “Oh God—”

I held him steady, easing in, inch by inch, my jaw clenched so hard it hurt. He was so tight, so hot, his body clinging to me, taking me deeper until I was fully seated inside him. A shudder wracked through me. I didn’t move right away. Just felt him. Surrounding me, holding me, his .

Chris bent his head, his breath hitching. His voice came out barely above a whisper. “I hate this… I hate that you can make me feel like this.”

Like this . He didn’t need to explain. I knew what he meant. The way the world narrowed when we were in the same room. The way logic ceased to matter. The way we existed in this strange, fragile space between defiance and inevitability.

I pressed my forehead against the back of his neck, my hands gripping his hips. “I can’t give you up,” I admitted, my voice wrecked, broken. “I don’t know how.”

Chris blew out a shaky breath. And then he pushed back against me, rocking his hips, wordlessly telling me it’s okay .

That was all I needed. I pulled back and thrust into him, hard, deep, my hands sliding up his chest, gripping him like I could keep him. Like if I fucked him deep enough, claimed him completely, he wouldn’t slip away.

He moaned, his body trembling, his hands fisting the tablecloth. “Love isn’t supposed to feel like this.”

“Like what?” I asked, rocking into him faster and faster.

“Like it’s killing me. But I’m willing to die anyway.”

There it was. The truth, laid bare. No confessions. No grand declarations. Just this—the quiet devastation of knowing we were way past the point of no return.

A sharp ache bloomed in my chest. I swallowed it down, tilting his chin up so he had to look at me. “Then why does it feel like coming alive?”

I bent over him, pressing my mouth to his neck, biting down, marking him. My thrusts turned frantic, desperate, my hips slamming into him, my breath ragged in his ear.

He was mine. Mine.

And yet, deep down, I knew—I was the one who was his.

And when I came, shuddering inside him, burying myself as deep as I could go, flooding his insides with my cum, I felt it—something breaking apart in me, something irreversible. As I slumped over him, my breath still mingling with his, I knew I’d already lost.

Because this wasn’t just fucking. This was surrender.