TWO

 

It wasn’t good news. Brad had known that even before he’d gone in for the meeting with the new accountant that he’d hired. After all the nastiness with Lester, the man who’d had Brad’s job before him and who was looking at some serious jail time for stealing from the band, Lara, the head of the record label, had wanted everything financial run through several people, just to be safe.

Which was fine with Brad. He had no special aptitude for numbers, and he could definitely understand why everyone was being so careful. Lester had betrayed a lot of people, and none of them were all that ready to trust again. So Brad had kept his distance from the band, had spoken to them only when he had to. It was better to let them get to know him a little, he thought.

Even so, in the month since Brad had taken over for Lester, he’d interacted at least a little bit with three of the members of the band. Ken, Jamie, and Lance had all been approachable enough, though cautious around him. But they didn’t hold themselves remote in the same way that the fourth member of the band did.

Aaron was the most beautiful of the four, at least in Brad’s opinion, and that was saying something. All four of them, after all, had been picked for their looks as much as for their talent. And, of course, they’d also been picked for their sexuality, because the Lost Boys was a boy band made up exclusively of queer members.

It didn’t matter, though. This was the biggest job that Brad had ever had, and it could be a huge boost to his career. Assuming that it didn’t completely ruin it, and as Brad listened to the accountant laying things out in painful detail, he realized that maybe the ruining part was much more likely than it was that this would make his career.

When it came down to it, the band was ruined. Financially, anyway. The sheer amount of money that Lester had siphoned off into his own accounts was insane, and there didn’t seem to be much chance of them getting any of that back. Not for the foreseeable future, since Lester would first need to be convicted of the crime, and he was still waiting for a trial.

They were drowning in the red, and there was money coming in, a lot of it. But all of the reserves were gone, to the point where the many expenses had run the accounts into overdraft.

So to say that Brad was in a bad mood when he left the office, that would be putting it mildly. He was pretty sure that he was developing a headache, and he didn’t think it was one that even the strongest dose of Aspirin could touch. No, he knew himself, and the only thing to do was to put a plan into motion. Once there was a plan, he could deal with pretty much anything.

It was a simple enough thing to call together all of the Lost Boys, something that he had yet to do on a formal level. But it was time. They would have to accept him sooner or later, because if things kept on going as they were, Brad wasn’t sure that there was ever going to be a way that the band could recover. The interest charges alone were astronomical.

The meeting was set, but then Brad found himself in a pretty awkward situation. His car was in the shop, so he was reliant on taxis at the moment, but the day was surprisingly busy, and he couldn’t see one anywhere. He walked for blocks, never seeing a single available cab, and he was quickly getting to the point where he was going to have to look seriously at the possibility that he could be late to his own meeting.

For most people, this wouldn’t be a big deal. Brad, personally, would rather be slammed right in the stomach with a solid two by four. So when he finally saw the cheerfully glowing light of a cab, which was, miraculously, already pulling to the curb, it seemed like salvation.

Only that’s where things got awkward because he probably should have noticed that there was someone else there, a reason that the cab had been pulling over. So fixated on his own mind, with numbers and plans running through his head, Brad was lost in himself, and he almost blindly reached for the door to slide into the cab.

But someone else was reaching, too. Someone else with slender, pale fingers, a man, the man who had called the cab in the first place. Damn it! How much money was he going to have to offer this guy to give him the cab? He didn’t have time to try to find another.

The guy was turning around, and even as preoccupied as he was, Brad couldn’t help but notice the smooth grace of the way he moved. And then his eyes widened because even in his day and age, it wasn’t that common to meet a man with hair dyed as brilliant a red as this man’s was, hair that fell with artless grace across a pale, smooth forehead.

He had only seen Aaron from a fair distance away, at least in person. He’d seen pictures, of course, but that wasn’t the same thing as being confronted with his utter, spellbinding beauty. With the height of his cheekbones, his delicately pointed chin, his full, pale pink lips. And nothing in the whole world could have prepared him for his eyes.

Rich and vivid even through the man’s annoyance, Aaron’s eyes were like nothing that Brad had ever seen before, or not in person, anyway. He’d heard about them, though. Hadn’t Elizabeth Taylor been said to have violet eyes? Eyes of so deep and brilliant a blue that in some lighting they almost looked purple?

That was Aaron. And, for a moment, Brad did something utterly out of character. He let himself just look, to get caught up in a moment, to touch Aaron’s fingers lightly and stare into those impossible, remarkable eyes.

It seemed a strange sort of miracle that Aaron could be looking at him back, but he was. More than that, the annoyance seemed to melt out of Aaron’s face, turning into a sort of wonder, Brad could almost swear to it. It was like Aaron was feeling what Brad was, as they really, truly looked at each other for the first time.

“I guess we should probably share it,” Brad forced his voice to be brisk, all about business, which came fairly easily to him, which was a good thing right now, because it was the only thing keeping him together. “The cab.”

“Why would I share a cab with you?”

Aaron’s voice was every bit as gorgeous as the rest of him, a low, soft, deep thrumming purr, one that sent tingles of delight through everyone who heard it. Or so Brad had to imagine, considering the man’s popularity. He had to smirk a little bit when he realized that Aaron didn’t even recognize him, though. That was obvious, from the confusion on the other man’s face, like he was trying to figure out where he’d seen Brad before.

Maybe Brad had overdone it just a tiny bit on giving the boys their space.

And yet, despite that, Aaron still hadn’t moved his hand away from Brad’s. Though Brad supposed, it was possible that the guy just wanted to keep his claim on the cab which they both wanted.

“Because we’re both going to the same place,” Brad explained patiently, though a slight smirk tugged at the corners of his lips. “Don’t you even recognize your boss?”

The cabbie honked the horn suddenly, a blaring blast that even broke through the tension which was building, thicker and thicker, between them by the second. As a show of good faith, Brad released his grip on the car and instead offered his hand. “Brad. Your manager. If you were thinking that you’ve seen me around before, that’s why.”

Understanding dawned on that lovely face, and Aaron slowly released his own death grip on the car handle. Instead, he took Brad’s hand, palm to palm in a handshake. Funny, though, it didn’t feel like a handshake. Brad had shaken many hands before, but he had never noticed before just how intimate the grasp could be.

Palm to palm, Aaron’s fingers gripped Brad’s, and not gently, either. Aaron had a good, firm grasp, not a wimpy handshake, which was something that Brad utterly despised. But it was clearly meant to be just a brief touch, and even that was a bit of a surprise because Brad had heard that Aaron was pretty much the most remote, removed person in the world.

Brad didn’t know about that, but he did know that there was a feeling, somewhat like touching a live wire, only the electricity was coming from Aaron. Without meaning to, not really, Brad took a single step forward, and Aaron didn’t pull back.

God, he was heading right for a sexual harassment lawsuit if he wasn’t careful. With a brief rumble, Brad cleared his throat and then finally released Aaron.

It had been a long time since anyone had gotten to him like Aaron was doing, and Aaron was so completely off limits that it wasn’t even funny. He’d only just met the man, though, so surely it wouldn’t be that difficult for Brad just to forget this, to not engage with it.

To just be this man’s boss.

It was just polite to open the door for the other man, to rest his hand on the small of Aaron’s back to usher him into the vehicle. Or so he told himself as he swung in after him so that the relieved cabbie could pull out into the street and join the throngs of cars, all swarming down the street toward the main road.

Silence fell between them, and Brad congratulated himself without words for not saying anything more. Not touching Aaron. Not flirting with him, trying to see where this went. It wasn’t like Brad was even interested in that sort of thing. He had his career to build. But even if he was, well, he already knew that Aaron was not someone that he could even try with.

So he was pretty proud of himself, at least until the cab swerved to avoid a pedestrian who flung themselves into the street, utterly reckless and seemingly uncaring of their own safety. The pedestrian quickly darted between the lanes and lanes of cars and was gone from sight, but the movement of the taxi sent Brad crashing into the side, while Aaron pressed tightly up against his side.

That same jolt filled him, the same hopeless, helpless desire. He had the urge suddenly to put his arms around Aaron, to help him steady himself, but Aaron was already, thankfully, pulling away from him.

No, really. That was a good thing. So then why was Brad so glad when the taxi lurched again? When he found Aaron pressed up close against himself once more? Neither of them had even done up their seat belts, he realized. The cab had started to knock them around before they’d even had a chance.

It was hard for him to be too heartbroken about it when he was still fighting with the urge to pull Aaron to him, to steady him and keep him right up against his own body. This was ridiculous. He had more control than this.

So what was it about this man that he’d only just met that made him question that control?