Something sharp was digging into his hip, and if he were ten years younger, he wouldn't care.

Kurt caught Evan by the waist and lifted the omega off his feet, unwilling to break the hottest kiss he'd had in ages for something like personal comfort. Instantly, strong legs twined around his waist.

That was good. That was better than good. Stumbling a few steps further into the dark apartment, he narrowly avoided the couch he'd caught a glimpse of earlier.

Paper crumpled under his feet, barely heard over the pounding in his ears as he pulled back just enough to grab a breath. Evan was hot, his lithe body burning where their naked chests pressed together.

The blond bartender wasn’t Kurt’s usual type. From a distance, he looked almost fragile, barely coming up to Kurt’s shoulder.

Now that he had his hands on that tight body, though, Kurt could feel the wiry muscles corded under soft skin. It was like holding a bolt of lightning, energy thrumming between them so strongly that his hair stood on end.

Their shirts were discarded somewhere over by the tiny kitchen table. Evan smelled like whiskey, but he tasted like fine wine, sweet and tart — until he bit Kurt's lip hard enough for everything to fade into iron.

"Bedroom," Evan growled against his lips, the slender fingers in his hair yanking hard enough to make stars burst across Kurt's closed eyelids.

"Yup," he agreed into Evan's mouth, stumbling another step. Paper ripped, but he couldn't bring himself to be disappointed. He'd sign another copy of whatever it was in the morning.

He stumbled and almost fell when Evan bucked against him, the firm ridge behind his zipper rubbing roughly against Kurt's cock through the thin fabric of his slacks. This was much better than listening to his sisters argue about dress colors.

Kurt groaned as blunt fingernails scraped across his chest. Right. Not thinking about his sisters. "Do that again."

The little omega obliged, pinching Kurt’s nipple until he had to bite back a whimper. If he'd known what a wildcat the little bartender was, he'd have made a pass at him ages ago. Breaking the kiss with a wet noise that made his hips hitch, Kurt caught a brief glimpse of the bedroom just ahead before warm lips latched onto his throat.

"Fuck." He could feel the little shit smiling against his skin as he stumbled the last few steps and dropped them both on the bed. It creaked alarmingly.

"You should come with a warning label," he said, as Evan's breath washed over the damp skin on his neck. Every hair on his body stood on end.

"Would it have done any good?" Evan asked, squirming up the bed in a way that made Kurt clench his teeth.

"Not a damned bit," he ground out, rolling his hips against the mattress. It wasn't as satisfying as having that sweet body underneath him, but he desperately needed something to take the edge off.

Propped against the headboard as he dug around in the single nightstand, Evan grinned. "Didn't think so. You seem like the kind to take it as a challenge."

"It's like you know me," Kurt said, leaning up enough to peel off his slacks. His silk boxers followed, leaving his cock free to the cool air. A shiver raised goosebumps on his skin, but he was far from cold.

Evan licked his lips, his eyes locked on Kurt's erection. Smirking, Kurt gave it a few strokes, and Evan growled, "Tell me you're not allergic to latex."

"Nope," he said. "No allergies, unless you're planning on doing something that requires a lot more negotiation than we've had so far."

That usually threw people off, and Evan was no exception, pausing thoughtfully with one hand in the drawer. "Raw ginger. The powdered stuff is fine," Kurt said. "Don't ask how I found that one out, please."

Speechless for a moment, Evan snickered and tossed a condom at him. "I'm going to get that story out of you someday," he said as he shucked off his own jeans. He was commando beneath the sturdy denim.

"Sure," Kurt said, tucking the condom off to the side. "Whatever you want. Tomorrow."

Evan spread his legs, and Kurt almost choked on his own tongue. The omega might have been small, but he was perfectly proportioned, from his cock to the corded muscles of his calves. Kurt's mouth watered.

"Mind if I..." He didn't bother finishing, leaning in and swiping his tongue across the head of that perfect cock. Reveling in the gasp that earned him, he did it again. Salt burst across his tongue and made his mouth water.

Something bounced off his shoulder, and he grinned as he dug a little tube of lube out of the rumpled sheets. Slicking up his fingers, he went back to what he'd been doing, savoring the feeling of a hard cock pressing against the roof of his mouth.

Evan's body was tight, but he yielded almost immediately, kicking Kurt in the hip at the chill of the lube.

"Sorry," Kurt said, pulling back enough to blow a stream of air over the dick dancing in his face. "Cold?" Evan glared down at him, kicking him again as Kurt drove a single finger in deep.

Tracing the vein along the underside of Evan's cock with his tongue, Kurt worked a second finger in. The smell of sex was rising around them, rich and musky, making him suck in deep savoring breaths. It reminded Kurt that it had been entirely too long since he'd done this.

Evan bucked back on his fingers, groaning, so he added a third one. It seemed too tight, the stranglehold making his fingertips tingle, but Evan didn't even slow down.

Scrambling for the condom, Kurt leaned up on his knees to catch Evan's mouth. The kiss was a little too much teeth, but it was worth it for the way the moans shivered against Kurt's tongue, sensitizing his whole mouth. The condom was one of the lubricated kind, determined to slip out of his hand, and he grimaced, giving up the kiss to pull back and slide it on.

Evan gasped when he pulled his fingers free, and the additional lube just made the situation so much worse.

"You ready for this?" Kurt asked, trying not to feel awkward as the condom slid around like a bar of soap.

Nimble fingers snatched the condom away and slid it on him in a smooth roll that had him groaning. "Are you?" Evan grinned at him, hooking his ankles around Kurt's shoulders and dragging him closer.

Kurt didn't dignify that with a response, lining up with one hand and pressing against that tight, hot hole. Evan's face melted into a pleasured grimace, his eyes rolling back in his head.

Any satisfaction that Kurt might have felt was quickly overwhelmed by the heavenly silk that surrounded him. He groaned, letting his head hang loosely so that he could watch his cock spread that tight body wide.

With the guy being so small, he was prepared to take it easy, but Evan was having none of it. As soon as Kurt started to slow, those pointed heels dug into the small of his back and yanked them together.

"Jesus," he cursed against the fluff of blond hair that stuck to the sweat beading on his lip. "Pushy, much?"

"If we're having a conversation at this point," Evan panted, his teeth scraping over Kurt's collarbone, "then we're doing it wrong."

The laugh that welled up was strangled in his throat as that delicious body clamped down on him, and his hips jerked. There was no more talking after that, the air filled with gasps and moans and, on one notable occasion, a shout. As much as he tried to replicate that one, Kurt couldn't pull enough brain cells together to figure out what had made Evan arch like that.

His thighs burned from keeping up with Evan's demands for harder and faster. The only thing keeping the tension curling up his spine at bay was the raw determination to win this sensual race. Evan was glorious below him, his pale skin flushed red, his lips swollen and wet, sweat dripping down his temples. The golden hair there was honey-dark with sweat.

Hitching Evan higher, Kurt rolled his hips, looking for that perfect angle. It took way too many tries, and he was barely clinging to his control when Evan finally clamped down on him. A whine started up, just a vibration at first, in the lean chest pressed against him, and grew steadily louder as Kurt pounded that spot over and over, his rhythm breaking apart as he held on with gritted teeth.

Evan's eyes were almost black, staring into the distance as he chased his own pleasure. Bracing himself on one shaky arm, Kurt curled his hand around Evan's angry red cock. Two strokes later, and he almost sobbed in relief as Evan's whole body tensed around him.

It was heaven and hell, the exquisite pleasure of being squeezed so hard that he could feel every heartbeat winding tighter and tighter until he felt like he was going to shatter. In slow motion, he watched the muscles on Evan's chest and arms cord, standing out like they were carved out of marble.

The first pulse of white splattered against Evan's chest, and he lost the battle. Dropping his head to Evan's shoulder, Kurt thrust hard once, twice, and then his own orgasm shook him like an earthquake. The whole world condensed to nothing but the feel of that body around and under him, the smell of sex, and the salt of sweat against his lips.

"Shit."

No matter what his frat brothers thought, Kurt wasn't in the habit of waking up in random strangers’ beds, so the unfamiliar voice next to him dragged him out of sleep immediately. The bed definitely wasn't his, either; a spot on his hip had gone numb where the springs were starting to push through.

The air still smelled of sex and whiskey.

The bar. Evan. Right.

"Get up." A sharp finger poked him in the shoulder. "It's after eleven, and I have to go open up the bar."

By the time Kurt opened his eyes, Evan was across the room trying to separate their pants. His slacks hit him in the face before he could say a word.

"Up. I need a shower, and you have to go." Ducking into the living room, Evan returned with his shirt and the paperwork they'd gone over last night. "Here. Your copy. It'll be too busy tonight, but you can start Tuesday."

Letting himself be dragged to his feet, Kurt obligingly pulled on his slacks. An amused smile hovered on his lips. It would have been hypocritical of him to be offended, since he'd been on the other side of this dance more than once. He'd never had it happen to him, though, and that was almost delightfully novel.

"You're an interesting guy, you know that?" he told Evan as he pulled on his shirt. "Have you seen my shoes?"

"They're by the door." Evan rushed around the room gathering his own clothing, unselfconscious of his nudity. His phone chimed from somewhere near the foot of the bed, and he cursed. "Hurry up. I have a delivery due at noon, and the driver is always on time."

"You can shower. I'll let myself out," Kurt said, amused. He would have been reluctant to leave someone alone in his house, too, but his house was a multi-million dollar mansion. This was a grubby....

Not that there was anything wrong with Evan's apartment. Even if he wasn't working with Evan, he liked the bar. The last thing he needed was to be banned for insulting the owner.

Evan looked him over skeptically. "Don't leave the door open for too long. Princess is a ninja, and if she gets out, it'll take hours to find her."

"Who?" Kurt almost got whiplash at the sudden change of subject.

"My cat," Evan said, as if it was obvious.

Kurt blinked, his eyes scanning the apartment again. Venice's husband had had a cat when they were dating. The thing had been so old that he'd expected it to fall apart at any moment. Even so, the apartment had been littered with catnip mice, and every surface had been coated in cat hair.

"Okay..." Kurt ran his hand across the dresser. No dust, and no cat hair. "Right. Don't let Princess out,” he said skeptically.

He stood in the doorway with the door open for a full five minutes until the water shut off in the bathroom. Not so much as a whisker twitched. Why was it always the crazy ones?

"You should punch him." Pyotr grinned at the drunk suspended above the ground in one massive fist. The guy looked about ready to piss himself, staring in mute terror as the knots of scar tissue on Pyotr's face twisted it into a nightmarish parody. The parking lot of Gregerson’s bar was almost empty, and the streets were silent in the early hours of Wednesday morning.

Glancing at his phone, Kurt hummed thoughtfully. "How about not? I already used my hazing-ritual-gone-wrong excuse in court. I doubt Judge Thomas will accept it again."

That had been a wild weekend. He bit his cheek to hide a smile.

"Not hazing," Pyotr grunted, propping the drunk up against the wall with a grimace. "You haven't been given the speech yet, so you could get away with it." He spat a particularly insulting Russian curse at the pavement.

Kurt raised an eyebrow at the Russian as Pyotr dusted his hands and headed back inside. "Got something against that drunk in particular?"

"He is trouble," Pyotr said. "I accidentally broke his jaw one time, and now I am not allowed to punch people unless they try to punch me first."

"You know, I know a couple parole agents. I could talk to somebody for you." Kurt pulled his phone out and checked on his latest alert again. There were three stocks that he was keeping an eye on, and they were performing exactly as he expected. By six, he was going to be up another two percent.

The bar was as dark and quiet as the street as they locked the door behind them. Evan had turned the lights down while they were gone, the soft glow of the security lights softening the worn edges of the room. Evan himself was nowhere to be seen, but the lights were on in the storeroom, so they headed that way.

Pyotr snorted. "I am not on parole. I have a spotless fucking record, thank you very much."

He sounded more amused than insulted, clapping Kurt on the shoulder hard enough to rock him to the side. "Despite what my mother seems to think, I do not get in trouble with the cops every weekend."

"No offense intended, man. I just know a couple Russians, and it would take the long arm of the law to put any kind of restrictions on them," Kurt said, shrugging apologetically. "Your wife must be a tough woman."

"Not married," Pyotr said, ducking his head. In the shadows, the scars almost disappeared from his face. He wasn't a handsome man, even without them, but the strong line of his jaw was striking. "No woman would have me. You will learn that Evan is surprisingly strict about things like breaking bones and furniture."

Kurt laughed. Pyotr didn't.

"I'll keep that in mind," Kurt said, pulling his phone back out as he followed the Russian to the storeroom. It had been surprisingly nice to keep his phone put away most of the night, but now he felt like a junkie in need of his fix.

"Hand me that,” Evan said from the storeroom.

"Which that? There are fifty thousand things on that shelf," Pyotr muttered, barely a foot in the door. He shuffled over obligingly, leaving the doorway free for Kurt to prop his shoulder against.

It took a minute for him to pry his eyes away from his phone — Tokyo had closed half an hour ago, and his summary reports were coming in — but when he did, he stared. "Holy shit."

The storeroom, apparently doubling as Evan's office, was a nightmare. On the left side of the room, bottles and kegs and other supplies were stored with military precision on row after row of shelves. On the right, all of that went out the window.

There was probably a desk somewhere behind Evan in the chaos, and he could just make out the outline of two overstuffed filing cabinets on the far wall, groaning under the weight of the paperwork spilling everywhere. That same paperwork was stacked almost to the ceiling in places, the piles barely maintaining their upright state. A few had obviously failed, splaying across the floor almost to the door. Leaning down, he picked up an invoice with a large shoe print across the middle. It was dated two years ago.

"You need serious, professional help," he said.

"Told you so," Pyotr muttered from where he was shuffling around battered ledgers stuffed with more loose papers. "This one?"

"No, the red one. And shut up." Evan had his hands on his hips, kneeling on a rickety office chair that was missing one arm.

"They're all red."

“I ... I need to sit down." Kurt smoothed the invoice out and set it on the pile closest to the door. His hands itched with the need to sort and digitize all that paper. It was like the semester he'd had to share a room with Teddy, and the architect had almost killed him for messing with the “organization” of his drafting table.

Evan sniffed, his nose in the air. "You can go," he said, waving dismissively. They'd barely interacted all evening, the omega looking genuinely surprised when Kurt had shown up to his new job.

He was trying not to take it personally. He’d had enough one-night-stands to know how uncomfortable it could be when the other guy wanted more. It was a shame, though. He would have enjoyed doing that again.

"Take the next couple of days as your weekend, and you can come back on Friday afternoon to help Pyotr get ready for the weekend." Evan waved him off without taking his attention off the papers trying to slide out of his hands.

Kurt backed out of the room, his eyes sticking to the stacks of paper. Nope. He wasn't getting involved in that. He'd be there for weeks, and he had trades to make.

Maybe he'd call Marcus and see if there was anyone in the area whom his frat brother had a grudge against.

Nine o'clock was an unreasonable hour of the morning to expect him to be up and functional.

Kurt glared at the shiny, state-of-the-art espresso machine in the corner of his kitchen, counting the seconds until it quit burbling and gave him his damned drink. It wasn't that he'd forgotten that his sisters were holding a wedding planning session today; it was just that he hadn't expected them to do it at his house.

More fool him. His entire family had arrived fifteen minutes ago like a flock of brightly colored birds. Loud ones.

"I like this one."

"No."

"But it's pretty."

"It clashes with the napkins."

"So pick different napkins."

Kurt groaned and leaned his head against the warm steel of the machine, inhaling the pure coffee fumes direct from the source. He couldn't do this today.

"I'm going to my office," he muttered to no one in particular as the coffee machine gasped and spat out his drink. "Don't bother me."

"Do you like this tablecloth or this tablecloth better?" Marizza asked as he shuffled past her. They were both blinding, eye-searing, headache-inducing pink. His whole state-of-the-art kitchen was covered in piles of pink.

Fabric, paper, ribbon. Was that glitter? He grunted and gripped his coffee mug harder.

"He agrees with me," she said as he escaped into the hallway.

A wave of loud protests rose up in response, and he shut the door on all of it with an unhealthy amount of satisfaction. The blessed silence of his office surrounded him, the hum of his computer soothing his battered nerves.

He loved his family. He did.

"You look rough." Curled up in the big armchair that he left by the window for her, his youngest sister, Lucia, smiled at him sympathetically from behind the curtain of her hair. Her voice was soft and whiskey-rough, despite the fact that she rarely had anything stronger than lemonade.

For her, he made an effort to be sociable, downing half his coffee in one breath. "I should be used to it by now. This is what? The sixth wedding?"

"The brain blocks traumatic memories to protect us," she said, smirking as she unfolded from her seat. "And it's the eighth wedding. Four sisters, four cousins." Her hands were refreshingly cold as she cupped his temples and massaged, his headache melting away like it had never been.

Slumping against the door, he rested his head against hers. "After this one, it's over. You and I will be sensible about our weddings."

She snorted. "You're never sensible, and I'm never getting married, so there's that." Pulling him toward his desk, she pressed him into his chair and began squeezing the tension out of his shoulders.

With his back to her, she was so focused on the knots that were inevitable in his profession that she let her hair slip to the side a little. She would have been a supermodel, his little sister, if it weren't for the raised birthmark that crawled up one side of her body from her shoulder blades to her hairline. It was brown and pink, red and white in turns, a patchwork story of various surgeries and removal attempts. Her shoulder still hitched up on one side where the skin was too tight.

"I'm sensible," he protested. She ignored him, digging her thumbs into a spot next to his spine until he hissed. "I'm more sensible than the crazy women currently occupying my living room," he corrected.

"Not hard," she said. "It's worse this time. Marizza's only doing it because Venice and Elodie did. She doesn't actually care about any of the colors or dresses, but if Venice does something, you know Marizza has to do it twice as big."

"That doesn't actually make her seem less crazy," Kurt pointed out.

Lucia leaned over his shoulder and slanted him a glance out of the corner of her eye. "Was I supposed to be trying to?" The scarring pulled her eyelid to one side, making her look constantly amused.

Conceding the point, he shrugged. Outside the office, something crashed to the ground. "It's probably a lost cause, anyway," he said, leaning over until he could rest his head on the padded wrist rest from his keyboard.

She giggled, the sound airy and bright. "Completely, but..."

"We love our family," he said with her, the phrase warm and well-worn, like an old t-shirt. "God, I need more sleep."

"I told you that you needed a couch in here," she said without sympathy.

He stuck his tongue out at her. "I have it on good authority that I would never leave my office if I could sleep in here."

"No," she said, pinching his ear. "Instead, you just keep your phone surgically attached to one hand."

"Don't be mean to me," he muttered, his eyes fluttering. Despite the jet-fuel levels of caffeine, he was running on empty.

"You'll get a crick in your neck if you fall asleep there." Her voice echoed from a long way off, and he wondered if she'd gone back to the window.

"Just resting my eyes," he said, shifting to a more comfortable position. Her sigh was the last thing he remembered for a while.

He would have liked to say that waking up slumped over his desk was an unusual occurrence, but he tried not to lie to himself too often. His back definitely recognized the angle particular to this situation and was not happy about it.

"Shit." His back popped, and he groaned.

"I tried to warn you," Lucia said.

Turning to glare at her, he winced when his neck twinged. She was still curled up by the window, a book open on her knees and a cup of tea steaming on the windowsill. The light was no longer slanting in, the manicured lawn outside highlighted by late-afternoon sun.

"What time is it?" he asked, fumbling for his phone.

"Two," she said. "I would have woken you at three."

He smiled without looking away from the numbers scrolling across the screen. "I knew there was a reason you were my favorite sister."

"Don't let anyone else hear you say that," she said. "I don't want to have to deal with the whining."

The market was doing exactly what he expected, so he wouldn't have any trades in the US market for a few days. Tokyo was another story, but it wouldn't open for a few hours. Lifting one eyebrow, he turned to smile at her. "If you think they don't already know, you're fooling yourself."

She rolled her eyes. "There's a difference between knowing and having your nose rubbed in it," she said, taking a sip of her tea. "Besides, Catherine thinks she's your favorite."

"Catherine doesn't care if she's my favorite."

"Which is exactly why she thinks she is. You pretend like you like independent types." Turning the page of her book, she didn't even look up as he sputtered.

"I pretend to like them?" He knew it was a bad idea to ask, but he couldn't help himself. People thought Lucia was all sweetness and light, but that was only because she was quiet around strangers. Years of being dismissed and pitied had given her a sharp insight and a tendency to towards blunt honesty. Even her sense of humor could be painful.

She raised one eyebrow, a smirk twisting her thin lips. "Let's face it, brother dear. If you didn't love the crazy, you'd have moved to California as soon as you graduated. Instead, you came right back home and bought a house within walking distance."

"I love my family," he protested. "There's a difference between accepting their crazy and going looking for someone else's."

Taking another sip of her tea, she didn't dignify that with a reply.

Kurt got to his feet, looking down his nose at her with as much wounded dignity as he could muster. "I don't have to take this in my own home," he said.

She giggled. "That's why you're hiding in your office."

"I'm not hiding." He wiped a line of dried drool off his chin. "In fact, I'm going to go to my kitchen and make myself lunch."

She waved him off. "You do that. Mama's currently working on the seating chart."

He wasn't proud of the way his steps hesitated as he approached the door, and from the soft snort behind him, she hadn't missed it either. "I'm not afraid of my mother."

The doorknob was cold against his hand, the hinges too well-oiled to creak ominously as the door swung open. Braced for screaming and hair-pulling, he was surprised to find the house quiet. It did nothing to calm his nerves.

The living room could have been used as a set piece for a natural disaster flick. Deserted, the room was covered in debris, books of fabric samples and scraps of magazine sprinkling the furniture. One of the chairs was overturned, and the lamp that had been on the end table was now on the floor, light glittering on the broken glass.

It was the sixth lamp he'd had in that spot since he bought the house.

The light was on in the kitchen, and he almost turned around and went upstairs. Now that he'd mentioned food, however, his stomach was demanding that he put something in it. Taking a moment to brace himself, he said a small prayer and slipped inside.

"There you are, baby," his mother said, slouched at an angle on one of the bar stools. She waved him over to press a loose kiss to his cheek.

She was alone, the kitchen surprisingly intact and lacking arguing sisters. "Where'd everybody go?"

"To pick up more samples," she said, the words slurring together. "None of the tablecloths match the napkins Marizza wants." She gestured to a scrap of fabric draped across the back of the chair opposite. It was a slightly less violent pink than any other choice he'd seen so far. Not quite pastel, but at least it didn't give him a headache on sight.

"Pretty," he said.

"Isn't it?" She sighed, a slow smile turning up the corners of her impeccably tinted lips, deep mauve today to match her nail polish. Glancing down at the papers spread in front of her, she sighed again, sliding down a little on her stool. "Can I sit your Aunt Tia Imelda next to you at the reception?" she asked plaintively.

Kurt bit back a groan. "Of course, Mama." Of course, his aunt would fly in for Marizza's wedding.

It wasn't that she was a terrible person, unlike Uncle Harrison, who liked to go into racist rants after two glasses of wine. She was just dour, uptight, nosy, and judgmental. Out loud. With her hearing aids turned off.

"Thank you, baby. You're such a good boy." She scribbled something down on the chart in front of her, the swirls and loops not following any of the lines or boxes. Catherine would be able to translate it, somehow, but she was the only one. "Now, I've got you and your date seated at the second table. Marizza wants to have her friends at the head table instead of family. Remember what happened at Elodie's wedding?"

His heartbeat stuttered, then sped up with an uncomfortable lurch. "Vividly," he said, trying to distract her. She swatted him halfheartedly. "I can't say that this will keep everyone under control, but I'm willing to try."

"Good," Mama said. "Now, as far as dates go—“

He groaned. "Mama..."

"Don't Mama me," she said, her eyebrows coming down a fraction. "You need a date. There are dozens of nice girls who would love to go to Marizza's wedding as your date."

"I don't need a date," he said, the familiar argument wearing on his nerves. His stomach grumbled again, and he tried to walk away, but she hooked her arm around his, trapping him in place. His skin prickled with cold sweat.

"You need a date," she insisted. "You're almost forty, sweetheart. You don't want to be alone forever, do you?"

"I'm thirty-eight," he snapped, trying to pull his arm free. She was surprisingly strong for as many pills as she must have taken already, and she clung like a barnacle. Her slender hands made him think of Evan, and wasn’t that just inappropriate? He’d have to do a few extra Hail Marys at church this week.

"Mama, I don't want to take some girl I barely know to a wedding. It sends the wrong signals."

"So get to know someone," she said. "I send you these beautiful women, and you barely give them a chance. It's months until the wedding. You should go out with Mrs. Sante's daughter. Who knows, you might like her if you give yourself the opportunity."

It was the same conversation they had before every wedding, and he'd gotten out of every one dateless, if not unscathed. He didn’t want to get to know some nice girl. He didn’t want to get to know anyone his mother pointed his way, really.

His mother’s taste was questionable, tending toward traditional. He didn’t like traditional. He liked men like Evan.

He tried to imagine Evan’s reaction if his mother called him a “nice boy,” and it broke the tension squeezing his chest. Coming up with excuses and reasoning his way through the maze of guilt and pleading was exhausting, but it was better than the disappointment and recriminations that were his other option. He loved his family.

Valeria Sante had an internship in New York in October. He could take her on a few dates, and then fake being upset at the fact that she was leaving. It was worth it to make his mother happy.

"I think my boyfriend would probably object to me dating other people."

He didn't even realize he'd spoken until his mother recoiled like she'd been shot. Frozen in shock, he kept his head turned away from her. His breathing was very loud in the sudden silence, but not loud enough to hide the rattle of her pill bottle.

On instinct, he started walking. By the time he hit the front door, he was running, the Miami heat swamping him as he hit the driveway. His car burnt rubber as he took off, but he barely heard it over his heart pounding in his ears.