***

Levi was frustrated by his own thoughts, hating that in quiet moments they ran away with him and took him to places he didn't want to be. Like sitting on the wall outside the club, having a smoke.

Tam had all but quit the habit for Casen, acting sly and saying that he didn't have the time or inclination to carry on when every minute of his day was filled with his husband. Right now, Levi needed it to distract him from the chaos in his head. He couldn't help but wonder if that was why Tam used to smoke, but didn't anymore. Was it really because of Casen or was it because he was no longer mentally conflicted or emotionally upset enough to need a smoke to calm his nerves? He figured it all came back to Casen one way or another.

“There you are,” a female voice sang, to his right.

Levi rolled his eyes and ignored the girl. She was tall, blonde and buxom, which had never been his type. She also wore the most ridiculous six inch heels and a skirt that might, possibly, had been better suited as an eye-patch. It wasn't covering anything; he could see her bright pink underwear even as she walked towards him.

Shaking his head, he took another drag on his cigarette and wondered why he was still there. Mack was inside, flirting with every girl who came over to paw him. In Levi's mind, they weren't even anything he could complain about. He had no hold over Mack; they weren't boyfriends or lovers or even just seeing how it went. He was the pathetic one making something out of nothing and he couldn't take it.

As soon as the flirting started, he left Mack to make his choice of which girl he was going to shag tonight and headed outside for a smoke. He was on his third cigarette already. Just the thought of Mack kissing one of those girls made Levi feel queasy. He couldn't bring himself to let his mind accept the full risk; that Mack might be in there right now, fucking some girl in the bathrooms or the back alley.

“Honey, what's wrong?” the girl cooed as she sat beside him. She was clearly drunk, because she mostly fell onto the short wall and tottered for a second. Once she found her balance, she put on a sweet smile and her hand on his knee. “Carmel can make it feel better,” she sang, as if she was trying to entice him into something he already wanted.

He didn't want it. He didn't want her. “Shove off.” He sighed and threw her hand off him.

“Come on, sweetie. I'll play doctor and cure you by morning.” She giggled, as if that was a tempting offer. She smelled like a brewery and she was so drunk that she could barely walk. He didn't doubt that any guy who took her up on that offer was going to have his raging hard on ignored while Carmel lay passed out, within an hour of getting her home.

“No thanks,” Levi tried for turning her down gently, offering a smile to soften the blow.

Carmel gave him a sad smile and patted his thigh as she struggled to cross her legs. “Seriously, cutie, I have a psychology degree. What's wrong?” she asked, amidst a hiccup or two. Then she leaned in close, as if she was going to kiss him. He was ready to back away if she tried, but she just smiled softer and whispered, “Are you having trouble getting the little soldier to stand to attention?”

He almost laughed, not sure if it was because of her question or because she was beginning to seem like a nice girl.

Before he could get a word out, they were interrupted.

“Hey!” Mack's voice shouted over, with more than a hint of anger.

Levi heard footsteps and realised Mack was running. Then he yanked Carmel's hand off his thigh and glared at Levi, as if he was the one who'd been playing games and flirting with every female in a five yard radius.

“Keep your hands to yourself,” he ordered, looking like he actually meant it.

“Sorry, Carmel…he's my over-protective wing man,” Levi apologised, using the term that Mack had used just a few days ago.

“Wing man!” Mack raged, grabbing him by the shirt and drawing him in close. “Wing man, my ass,” he bit out, the anger written all over his face.

Before Levi could argue and start the fight that had been brewing in his mind all week, Mack kissed him. Not just any old kiss, but the kind that said he'd been dying to do it for weeks, that he never wanted to stop and that he'd been dragged to the end of his rope.

Levi kissed back, glad to have some kind of affection from him. The hot, desperate kiss slowed and Mack stepped closer. He cupped his face in both hands and gently eased his tongue into Levi's mouth, until he was desperate for more. But it never came; Mack kept them at that lingering, drawn out pace for what felt like forever. When he finally broke away, Levi was too dizzy from their kiss to think clearly.

“Wing man,” Mack scoffed and walked away.

“Wait!” he shouted after him. He got the word out and his arm lifted to grab onto him, but Mack was already too far away. He had to blink a few times before he could see clearly and found Mack already halfway back to the club.

“You know, I could have been out of here hours ago, with any one of those girls,” Mack called back, sounding aggrieved. “I could have had a threesome with two of them, who were talking about dipping parts of me in chocolate and licking it off.”

Levi could understand why he was mad; offers like that didn't come around often. Mack was every inch a man and he was stunning to boot. But he couldn't stop himself from asking, “Why aren't you?”

“You stupid fucking–” He stopped and groaned in frustration. Finally, he turned and marched over to Levi, poking a finger into his shoulder. “You! That's why. Because I thought you wanted something with me. I thought that if I just gave you enough time, you'd get your head out of your ass and stop being the shy weirdo you were acting around me and you'd tell me what you wanted. That you wanted me!” he shouted at him. “Instead, you curled up in your protective shell and hid away like a fucking hermit. Like maybe all you want is to drool over me from afar, because my fucking kisses are – because I'm – not good enough for you,” Mack went on, furiously, only looking all the more beautiful to Levi the madder he became. “Well, you know what? They're good enough for anyone else,” he argued, reaching out to grab the first person who walked past.

Levi watched the tall, blonde haired guy begin to react to having his shirt grabbed. But then he saw Mack and let himself be drawn in.

When Mack pulled his head down to kiss him, he went more than willingly; he had his mouth open before they met. It only took a moment of burning jealousy for Levi to react. He saw their lips touch and he lost it. Levi grabbed the guy by the back of his shirt and dragged him away from Mack.

The two girls the guy had been with reacted in vastly different ways; one of them laughed while the other slapped the guy they were with. She reached out to slap Mack as well and he stood there, willing to take it.

Levi caught her wrist at the same time the other guy did.

“I swear, Clea, I have no clue what happened,” he muttered, though his eyes shot to Mack and said the exact opposite. He was attracted to Mack and hadn't been willing to fight him.

“Piss off, before I smash your face in,” Levi snapped. He'd tipped over the edge and the guy was lucky to get away untouched. Well, at least by him.

The guy nodded and walked away, dragging what seemed to be his girlfriend and her friend with him.

Levi caught him looking back and heard his girlfriend warning him he wasn't getting sex tonight, but he didn't care. He did care that Mack had just grabbed some random loser off the street and snogged them in front of him.

“The same goes for you,” he told Mack.

Levi was fed up. He couldn't handle this anymore; everything was simpler when they were just friends. He should have kept his feelings better hidden, so that Mack could never find out. He should have had his head screwed on straight and focused more on Tam than himself.

He had dropped his cigarette the moment Mack kissed him, so he left it in the puddle it had landed in and headed back to campus. He didn't want to see Mack right now or possibly ever again, so he was going back to his room and he was going to find some way to make this bearable.

Mack was Casen's twin; he couldn't just tell his best friend and Tam's husband that he never wanted to see Mack again. Unless Mack chose to stay away by choice, he was stuck. Worse still, stuck with his best friend thinking that he and Mack were best friends. He wasn't sure life could get much worse, right now.