No Such Thing (The Belonging Series) Read online

  Well, maybe one regret.

  Bobby Nelson. They hadn’t been serious, because Alessandro didn’t do serious. They weren’t even boyfriends, just occasional fuck buddies who hit Wilmington’s few gay bars together. But Bobby fucked like a machine, and he didn’t mind switching when Alessandro was in the mood to top. If he’d been back in the city, Alessandro would have called Bobby for a celebratory “I got a new job!” fuck session.

  Thinking about Bobby and that perfectly thick cock slamming into his ass turned Alessandro on, but no way on earth was he going to jerk off with Eunice in the house. That was just too damn weird now that he was an adult. He considered opening his laptop and playing a game, but he’d be too tempted by the stash of porn hidden in a folder he’d titled The Mating Life of Sea Creatures just to amuse himself.

  Exercise was a better idea.

  Despite the fact that some gray clouds were thickening overhead, Alessandro shouted to Eunice that he was taking a walk and he hit the pavement at a brisk pace. He’d stumbled into a new job while walking around town this morning. Maybe this afternoon he’d stumble into something equally as interesting.

  Chapter Three

  Perch Creek Park was just on the edge of town, on a lot of land that edged into the woods on the north side of the valley. Perch Creek ran straight down the center, dividing it into sports fields and an open recreational area for families and school trips. Jaime rode his bike past the baseball diamond and soccer field/running track and over the wooden bridge to the rec side of the park.

  Two large wood pavilions stood on the south, each flanked by barbecue pits. To the north was a slightly wooded area with a small playground for kids, some picnic tables and benches and a municipal bathroom building. With school still in session, and it being a Tuesday afternoon, few people were wandering around, and he preferred it that way.

  He rode over to a wooden bench situated beneath an oak tree, which offered just the right amount of shade. He ignored the fact that some clouds had formed as he settled down to read. He had three books on the industrial revolution, including a thesis he’d gotten on loan from another town’s collection. He was taking online classes to get a degree in history, and he hoped to go on to earn his master’s, as well, so he could eventually teach at university level.

  Professor Winters had been his goal for years, and he finally had the time and energy to go for it. The only thing he didn’t have was money, which was why he was doing it slowly, online, with as many scholarships and loans as he could scrounge.

  He’d been reading for less than half an hour when the first thick raindrops splattered against the page. He glanced up and another hit him directly in the eye. The air was thick with the scent of rain. He shoved his books into his bag, slung it over his shoulder, then hopped on his bike. He pedaled hard for the nearest pavilion twenty yards away. Another figure was running for it, too, and Jaime got there first, just as the bottom let out in a rush.

  The other man wasn’t so lucky. He was drenched by the time he skidded to a stop under the safety of the pavilion. The open sides wouldn’t do much if the wind started blowing, but the deluge seemed to be coming straight down. Jaime popped up the kickstand on his bike before turning to get a look at his companion.

  Alessandro blinked at him from ten feet away. Water ran down his cheeks from his soaked hair. His white T-shirt stuck to his skin, outlining muscles and abs in all the right places. They stared at each other for a moment. He hadn’t expected to see Jaime there.

  Jaime blinked first. “Hey.”

  “Hey.” Alessandro wiped his palms down his face and swept away some of the excess water. “Guess I should have grabbed an umbrella, huh?”

  “That may have been prudent.”

  “Prudent?”

  “Practical.”

  Alessandro frowned. “I know what it means.”

  “Oh, sorry. What are you doing here?”

  “I was bored at home, so I decided to talk a walk.”

  “To the other side of town?”

  “It’s a small town.”

  “It’s not that small.”

  “Small enough.” Alessandro tugged off his T-shirt in one smooth motion that startled Jaime into backing up a step. While Alessandro wrung water out of the shirt, Jaime appreciated the view—smooth chest, the hint of a developing four-pack, and the start of a happy trail just below his belly button. He clamped his mouth shut, afraid he’d start drooling at any moment.

  Instead of putting the wet shirt back on, Alessandro prolonged his torture by spreading it out on a table to dry. The rain showed no sign of letting up, which Jaime both blessed and cursed.

  “Where’d you live before here?” Jaime asked.

  “Wilmington. It’s not a city by some standards, but it makes towns like Perch Creek look like a Smurf village.”

  “True. I’m sorry about your—” He’d almost said “your father” but he wasn’t sure if Alessandro thought about his foster parents like that. “About Mr. Deforio’s passing. He’d come into Baker’s Dozen sometimes on Saturdays for muffins and coffee. He was a nice guy.”

  “Thank you.” A shadow of grief flittered across Alessandro’s face. “It’s hard when someone is suddenly gone. You keep thinking of all the things you never said and should have.”

  Jaime nodded, genuinely sympathetic. He’d had a chance to say goodbye to his mom before she passed, and he’d been sick enough once that he and Shannon had had that conversation, too. “I bet he’d be proud of you for coming back to help out Mrs. Deforio.”

  The corner of his mouth quirked. “Yeah. Yeah, he would.”

  “It can’t be easy, just leaving your life behind.”

  “I didn’t have a lot to leave behind, except a bad job and an apartment full of Ikea furniture. Honestly, I barely miss it.”

  Jaime’s nerves jumped with the audacity of the question he couldn’t believe he was asking. “No girlfriend mourning your departure?”

  Alessandro paused, one black eyebrow arching quizzically. “No, no ex mourning my departure.”

  The change of noun wasn’t lost on Jaime. “I guess that makes things easier.”

  “Maybe. But I can’t imagine the dating pool around here has expanded much since high school.”

  “I wouldn’t know.” He could have bitten his tongue off. That comment made him seem like some sort of loser who couldn’t get a date—unless Alessandro knew about his illness and why he’d have been off the market for so many years.

  “So who’s the lucky one?”

  Jaime blinked. “The lucky what?”

  “You said you don’t know the dating pool, so I assume that means you’re with someone.” Alessandro shook his head, seeming suddenly embarrassed. “Or you can tell me it’s none of my damned business.”

  Why on earth would Alessandro assume he was with someone? “I’m not—” What? He didn’t want to admit how pathetic he was. “I study a lot, for my degree, so I don’t really date much.”

  At all. Ever. Loser.

  “You can’t live your life with your nose in a book, Jaime.”

  “Says who?”

  Alessandro shrugged one shoulder. “Me, I guess. But I was never much for studying. I barely passed high school and never had the grades for college.”

  “Not everyone needs college. Shannon never went and she’s doing really well for herself.”

  “She’s got a great little shop.”

  “Our mom taught her how to bake. It was a dream for both of them to have a bakery one day.”

  “Cool.” Alessandro hopped up onto one of the tables and braced his feet on the bench beneath. He rested his elbows on his knees and studied the rain falling in an endless curtain around them. “How long do you think it’ll do this?”

  “Hard to tell.” He considered pulling out his phone and checking the forecast, but he preferred to not know. It took the spontaneity out of the day. “So where were you really going when you saw the help-needed sign?”

  Alessan
dro laughed. “The steakhouse down the street, on the off-chance they needed help in the kitchen. But I’m glad I stopped at Baker’s Dozen.”

  “Me, too.” Jaime coughed. “I mean, Shannon was really stressing this morning, so I’m glad she got someone fast.”

  “How fast I am remains to be seen.”

  He rolled his eyes. “That she got someone quickly.”

  “Well, I’m a quick study, and I like a challenge.”

  Those final four words made Jaime’s skin prickle, as much for their overt innuendo as the tone Alessandro used when saying them—like a caress of fingers over silk. He had to be imagining the whole thing. He didn’t dare hope Alessandro was actually gay, or interested in him. Neither one of them said anything for a while. Jaime was completely stumped. He wasn’t a blunt person by nature, but every single thought circled back to asking Alessandro the bluntest, most personal question possible. He just couldn’t get the words past his lips.

  “So Eunice suggested I find out where people my age hang out and go make new friends,” Alessandro said. “You’re my age. You want to take me out?”

  Jaime’s brain tripped and his cheeks heated. “Take you out?”

  Alessandro nodded. His coffee-brown eyes searched Jaime’s face. Jaime tried to hold his gaze, tried really hard, but his dropped down to Alessandro’s mouth. Smooth, thin lips that Alessandro licked at that exact moment. Jaime swallowed hard, then looked away.

  “It’s okay. Never mind,” Alessandro said lightly, no hint of annoyance or embarrassment in his tone. “But maybe we can hang out sometime.”

  “Maybe.”

  The rain hadn’t stopped, but it had lightened considerably. Alessandro collected his shirt, then set off in the drizzle. Jaime watched him go, feeling like a complete fool for ruining the perfect chance to get to know Alessandro better.

  * * *

  Alessandro worked to keep his gait steady and casual as he walked away from the pavilion, all the while silently cursing himself for screwing that up. He’d been too aggressive, maybe. Jaime was giving him all the right signals. Maybe Jaime wasn’t out, or he hadn’t accepted that part of himself. The drama of helping someone step out of the closet wasn’t appealing, but he was attracted to Jaime. He didn’t want to date him or anything, but he wouldn’t mind finding out if those red lips were as kissable as they looked.

  Running into him at the park had been a stroke of luck until Alessandro had shoved his entire foot into his mouth with the “take me out” thing. Too much, too soon.

  The rain stopped by the time he returned home. Wet jeans were crazy uncomfortable, and his thighs were chafing. Eunice didn’t say a word about his drowned-rat state. At dinner that night, the four of them sat down to Rice-A-Roni and cubed steaks, with cake for dessert. He listened to Tony and Molly regale him with stories from school.

  Tony Mancuso was ten-going-on-fifty, placed with the Deforios two years ago after his father beat his mother to death with a frying pan. He still had occasional outbursts of anger, Eunice said, but was mostly a quiet kid. On the flip side, Molly Tanner was seven, talked without pausing for breath and was incredibly easy to startle. Eunice warned him that she’d been sexually abused by her stepfather when she was five, and this was her third placement in two years. She’d been responsive to Sully, but tended to avoid men from teens to middle-aged, so she should have shunned Alessandro.

  Instead, on the day they met, Molly had shaken his hand. She hadn’t smiled, but that had been enough for Alessandro. His heart went out to both of the kids and for the horrors they lived with every single day. Tony’s father was in prison for life, but Molly’s stepfather was out there free, the bastard, after serving less than a year. The injustice of that made Alessandro sick.

  After they cleaned their plates, Eunice brought out the chocolate-iced layer cake. “To celebrate Alè’s new job,” she said.

  “Where at?” Tony asked.

  “Baker’s Dozen.”

  “Cool. Will you bring us stuff?”

  “Maybe if you get an A on your Math test on Friday.”

  Tony pulled a face.

  “What’s Baker’s Dozen?” Molly asked, her large eyes fixed on the cake.

  “It’s a bakery that also serves food,” Alessandro said. “I go in early in the morning, but I’ll be home every day when you guys come home from school.”

  “Shannon Winters owns it,” Eunice said. “You remember her, Molly? She brought all those yummy treats to the Easter bake sale at church?”

  Molly’s face scrunched up as she thought it over. “The lady with all the metal in her ears?”

  Alessandro chuckled. “That’s her.”

  “Joe Parsons says her brother’s queer,” Tony piped up.

  “Tony!” Eunice said sharply.

  Alessandro stiffened. “Who’s Joe Parsons?”

  “This kid at church. He’s in the older kids’ youth group, but I heard him talking to his friends last week. They said Jaime Winters is queer.”

  “What’s queer?” Molly asked.

  Before either of the adults at the table could field that one, Tony said, “It means he likes boys instead of girls.”

  Molly still looked puzzled. “So?”

  “This is not an appropriate dinnertime conversation,” Eunice said. “Tony, please do not repeat idle gossip.”

  “What’s idle gossip?” Molly asked.

  Eunice sighed and sliced the cake.

  * * *

  As he tried to fall asleep that night, Alessandro’s thoughts were full of Tony’s words, replaying over and over in his head.

  “They said Jaime Winters is queer.”

  It could just be, as Eunice said, idle gossip. Idiots trying to explain why Jaime was shy or antisocial. It could also be true, which gave Alessandro a small flare of hope. Even if Jaime was only ever his friend, he’d take it. Take it, enjoy it and then let it go when Jaime left him for something better.

  As long as he hadn’t completely blown it today.

  Chapter Four

  Friday evening, after spending the afternoon reading at the park, Jaime came home right before dinnertime and was pounced on by his big sister.

  “What’s up with you?” she asked before he could put his bag down on the living room couch.

  “What do you mean?”

  She’d come in from the kitchen, putting her on the other side of the couch, and it made a great barrier. “You stop by almost every day at closing time looking for scraps, and you haven’t been since Tuesday. I repeat. What is up with you?”

  “I’m cutting out carbs.”

  “You’re too skinny as it is.”

  “I found a better place.”

  “For free food? Try again.”

  He sucked at lying to his sister. He also didn’t want to come out and say he was avoiding Baker’s Dozen because he’d embarrassed himself in front of Alessandro and couldn’t bear facing him.

  “You feeling okay?” she asked.

  “God, yes. It’s not that.” She worried too much about his health. Though he’d never had a bad reaction to the antirejection drugs he was on for life, every sniffle and cough was a potential disaster scenario to Shannon.

  She came closer and put her hands on the back of the couch. “Then what is it, Bug?”

  “You were right.”

  “Okay, I don’t hear that very often, but you still need to remind me—”

  “About Alessandro.”

  Suspicion cut across her face. “What about him?”

  “He’s cute and I like him but I made a fool of myself in front of him, so yes, I’m avoiding your place while he’s there.”

  “Oh.”

  “Oh?”

  “Yeah, oh. By the way, he asked about you today.”

  Jaime’s heart nearly jumped into his throat. “He did?”

  “Asked if you were doing okay, since he hasn’t seen you around. And I’d bet a month’s profits he looks for you when that door opens.”

  “Why?”<
br />
  “Oh my God, I love you but sometimes you are so dense. Look, he’s interested. You’re interested. And no one ever got what they wanted by being too afraid to ask for it.”

  Jaime considered denying it, but there was no point. Shannon wasn’t wrong. He’d had an incredibly erotic dream about Alessandro last night—the kind where he woke up with come in his briefs, sweating all over. The guy popped into his thoughts at random times during the day. Most people would call that interested.

  He’d been healthy for two years. Someone else had died to give him a second chance at life, and Alessandro was right. He couldn’t live his life with his nose in a book.

  He wanted to start living.

  “I don’t have his phone number,” he said without thinking.

  Shannon grinned. “I have the number for Eunice’s house. It’s in the church directory.”

  Even after Shannon shoved the directory at him, it took Jaime several minutes to work up the nerve to type the numbers into his cell phone. And it took another full minute to actually hit the button to dial. He stole away to the far corner of the living room, heart hammering, pulse racing.

  The phone rang three times. “Deforio residence,” a tiny, girlish voice said.

  “Hi, is Alessandro home?”

  “Yes.”

  When she didn’t say anything else, he added, “May I speak with him?”

  “Okay. Hold please.”

  The phone clunked, and then feet pounded away. Moments later, the phone banged against something. Someone muttered a curse. “This is Alè.”

  “It’s Jaime. Um, Winters.”

  “Hey.”

  “So, um, do you still want me to take you out and show you around town?”

  A brief pause followed. “Tonight?”

  “If you aren’t already busy.” Total dork. It was Friday night. Of course Alessandro was—