Fuck the script.
At least Dane had accomplished that goal today.
Press conference, botched.
Parents, pitchfork angry.
Backbone, found, sort of.
First Olympics, almost jeopardized.
Only to be saved by the guy who’d made the past ten days a living hell.
The guy he still desired.
The guy whose sexy grin ensured Dane would follow him anywhere.
Including to the outside of a darkened Goodwill store. Dane guessed he was about to veer even further off the script. “It’s closed,” he said.
Alex slid his sunglasses back on and adjusted his cap, tucking under the ends of his dark curls. “That’s what I was counting on.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Make sure that hoodie’s up good.” He skulked down the side alley between buildings, and Dane, after zipping up the stifling hoodie and yanking it down over his forehead, shadowing his face, followed cautiously.
They cleared the back corner, and Alex pumped his fist. “Score!” He dashed over to the mound of bags by the rear exit door.
“What’re you doing?”
“They’re not supposed to, but people leave donation bags after hours.” Kneeling, he rifled through a grocery bag brimming over with clothes, tossing items aside at Dane’s feet. “This is how we got the best stuff as kids.”
The remembered fondness in Alex’s voice chilled Dane’s blood. Had those five outfits he’d worn at camp been donation finds like this? The “best stuff” in Alex’s wardrobe? Dane had realized quickly that summer—by Alex’s single beat-up duffle, his lack of electronics, and the way he’d counted every penny—that Alex came from a different world than him. Dane had been too focused on living in the moment, too caught up in the attraction like no other, that he hadn’t scratched beneath the surface. Hadn’t wanted to because then it would have been real. And reality was the last thing he’d wanted that summer.
Things had just gotten very real.
Mo had been right. Life had been more unfair to Alex, and Dane had been the one whining. Like a privileged ass. Alex hadn’t made his life a living hell—Dane had done that just fine on his own. And he’d made Alex’s life hell too, if he were being honest. He hung his head, a more sincere apology than the one earlier on his lips.
Alex cut it off with a slap to his shin. “Don’t just stand there.”
“Is this legal?”
“Probably not, but we always left behind what we could, be it our clothes or money. We didn’t steal anything. We just wanted first dibs.”
Dane hid his self-reproach behind a cough and knelt, digging out his wallet and withdrawing a fifty. “This cover it?”
“More than.” Alex smiled wide, and Dane’s fingers itched to touch its corners, to trace and part those full curved lips. That smile made his stomach flip now as much as it had when he’d spotted it across the pool the first day of camp.
That smile was his ruin and his salvation.
An elbow jostled him out of his daze. “Dig in,” Alex said.
Dane patted the sides of a black trash bag—felt like clothes—and pulled it toward him, untying the orange plastic strings. “What am I looking for?”
“The last thing anyone would expect you to wear.”
“To where?”
“A club.”
Dane froze. “We’re going dancing?”
Alex’s eyes cut to his, mischief kicked up a notch, along with one corner of his mouth in a devastating smirk. “I know you can.”
“Barely.”
“Don’t worry, I’ll lead.”
Countless nights they’d danced together in the dark, in the narrow space between their dorm room beds. Bodies close, lips brushing, hearts beating as one. “But we never went out?”
“You never told your parents ‘no’ before today either.” Alex held his gaze, challenging him to take that next step. Would he risk being seen, risk the pointy end of his parents’ pitchforks, for a chance to have Alex’s body close again? A chance to maybe touch, to maybe taste those lips again . . .
Fuck yeah.
He ripped open the first bag to Alex’s deep, throaty laughter. Another gift on this strange day. After pawing through a layer of baby clothes, he unearthed a pair of dark jeans and a navy button-down. “How’s this?” he said, holding it up for Alex’s inspection.
“Ay dios, you’re hopeless.” Alex swatted the clothes out of his hand and shoved a different bundle at him. “More like this.”
Dane unfurled the fabric—a stretchy black top that might as well have been mesh for how see-through it was and jeans that looked like they’d had a run-in with an angry lawn mower. “I’m not wearing this.”
“I know. I am.”
Dane muffled a strangled gasp, imagining Alex in that top. Before his body ran away with his mind, a gray cowboy hat landed in his lap.
“You’re wearing that for sure. It’ll cover up the red.”
Dane trailed his fingers along the wide felt brim. When in Rome, or rather Texas . . . He searched deeper in his bag, finding another button-down. This one chambray, with Western-style stitching and scuffed pearl snap buttons.
“Now you’ve got it,” Alex said, grinning. “This’ll go with.” He tossed him a white ribbed tank top and retied his bag. “Grab the dark jeans and we’re set.”
Bags repositioned, Dane slipped the fifty into the donation box while Alex tapped at his phone. “We gonna change at the club?” he asked.
“Nope, at the next stop.”
Which turned out to be a Walgreens down the street. Dane spotted the Restrooms sign in the back-right corner and made it two steps that direction before Alex bumped his hip with a plastic shopping basket. “Supplies first.”
In the hair aisle, Alex grabbed a bottle of styling gel, then one row over, a foundation compact and tube of eyeliner. Dane balked. “I’m not wearing makeup.”
“One, you’re already wearing makeup from the presser, because I know you’re sunburned. Two, do you want a night out where no one bothers you?” Dane couldn’t argue either, and Alex dropped the items into the basket. “That’s what I thought.” He disappeared around the row-end, then returned with a bottle of Febreze. “Here,” he said, handing Dane the freshener and clothes. “Go to the bathroom, spray down the clothes, and get changed. I need to grab a few other things and pay.”
Dane brandished the bottle of Febreze. “Don’t you need to pay for this?”
“I’ll tell the cashier. Go.” Alex hustled away, and Dane, afraid of what “a few other things” might include, opted for ignorant bliss a while longer.
In the restroom, he tossed his cowboy hat on the purse hanger in the one toilet stall and hung the clothes over the metal stall sides, going to town on them with the spray, thinking the entire time that this night out plan was increasingly insane. The prospect of dancing with Alex again sent heat purling through his belly, but doubts and anxiety worked on his nerves and weakened his legs. How was he supposed to handle any of this?
“It’s just a dance club.” He yanked his outfit down, held each piece under the dryer a few seconds, and continued to coach himself as he changed. “Find a girl who isn’t too drunk, dance a safe distance apart, keep your hat on and head down.” He could do that . . . If he ignored Alex dancing.
Not likely.
The memories he’d brushed aside earlier came roaring back.
Music had coursed through Alex’s then-rangy body, his long legs, narrow hips, and firm ass moving perfectly in time with whatever tune they’d played or whatever song Dane had hummed in his ear. Smooth and seductive, dancing as natural as swimming for Alex.
Not for Dane. White boy head-bob, that was about all he could manage on his own. Years of cotillion classes were wasted on him. He’d been awkward, offbeat, and murderous on his partner’s toes. Until Alex moved behind him, pressed his front to Dane’s back, and splayed his fingers across his hip bones. Leading. Something Dane had been expected to do when dancing with girls. With Alex, though, Dane hadn’t had to worry about that. All he’d had to do was lean back and give his body over to the hard one behind him. Following. Something he’d been as eager to do horizontally.
His first taste of freedom.
His last.
It’d take an act of God, or a very firm grip on the nearest piece of furniture, to keep Dane from reaching for that freedom again tonight. From reaching for Alex. He’d already gone too far today. Maybe he should buy some rope and tie himself in place. “Because that wouldn’t look weird or anything,” he muttered.
“What wouldn’t look weird?”
The door whooshed closed at the end of Alex’s question, and the flip of the lock ramped up Dane’s nerves. “Nothing,” he said, fumbling the buttons of the shirt.
“How’s it going in there?”
Dane opened the stall door, eyes downcast as he tried to straighten out his shirt. “There are a lot of snaps.”
Alex inhaled sharply, and before Dane could wrap his head around that sound, around the blush streaking those high cheekbones, Alex had already moved on. To standing right in front of him. “You’re supposed to leave the shirt open.”
Dane lifted his hands, and Alex batted them away. He grabbed the uneven shirttails and ripped the buttons apart, the staccato snaps mirroring Dane’s stuttering heartbeat. Alex’s grip on the chambray lingered, as did his presence in Dane’s space, and with each heaving breath, each whiff of cologne tinged with chlorine, a pore-deep scent no swimmer could shake, Dane’s paper-thin resolve shredded.
He started to reach for what—who—he wanted, then Alex stepped away, rotating and digging into the plastic shopping bag in the sink. He returned with a pair of scissors and a razor, shoving them into Dane’s hand. “Cut off the sleeves, then shave. There’s gel in the bag.”
Dane rubbed his other hand over his jaw. Hipster cut notwithstanding, he kind of liked his scruff. His parents never tolerated it at home.
“Coach is gonna make you lose it before Madrid,” Alex said, as if reading his thoughts. “And it’s a fucking beacon.”
No denying that. Between his beard or his smile, Dane couldn’t say which would attract more attention in his current state.
“My outfit?” Alex said.
“In the stall.”
“Thanks.” Alex brushed past, shoulders grazing, and Dane fought back an excited shiver, stopping his curling fist just before the razor sliced his palm. Moving to the sink, he shrugged out of the shirt and took the scissors to the sleeves. “What did Bas say on the phone?”
“Just checking in. He suggested we stay out a while longer to let the dust settle.” Alex’s dress pants appeared over the door. “He couldn’t talk long. He was too busy inking the pup.”
“Jacob?” Dane tossed his newly sleeveless shirt over the hand dryer, dug the shaving gel out of the bag, then sat the bag on top of the shirt so he could run water in the sink. “Is that the best thing right now, with training and all?”
“The hangover will be a bigger problem.”
He scrubbed down his face and lathered on the foaming gel. “He got the pup drunk?”
“Jacob’s a student athlete at UT with a fake ID. I’m sure it’s not his first run-in with tequila.” Alex’s dress shirt flopped over the pants as Dane swiped one cheek clean.
“What’s going on with those two?”
“What do you mean?”
“Mentor-mentee or something else?”
“I don’t know which way the pup swings.”
A final swipe of the other cheek. “But we both know Bas will fuck anything that moves.”
The door swung open behind him. “Do we?”
Dane’s gaze shot to Alex’s reflection in the mirror, and he dropped the razor. He was sure it clattered against the sink, but he couldn’t hear it for the blood whooshing in his ears. Blood that beelined south as his gaze made a similar journey down Alex’s body. The mesh top showed off his broad chest better than Dane had imagined, and those ratty jeans fit just shy of decent. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen Alex shirtless and in jammers daily, but that was Alex the swimmer.
Unreachable. A safe distance away.
This was Alex the man. Standing five feet behind him.
Looking like everything Dane had ever wanted.
His gaze swept back up and met Alex’s in the mirror. He held the heated stare until it burned, then cast his eyes aside with a muttered “Fuck.”
“Finish up so I can put on the final touches,” Alex said, voice low.
Dane wiped down his face and the sink, as he wrangled his body and hormones in line. Talk about something else, someone else. What had they been saying right before Alex stepped out of that stall looking like sin? Oh, right . . .
“Before, I didn’t mean . . . Bas and I haven’t—”
“I know. He’d have told me.” Alex tossed the compact at him. “Doctor the pale bottom half of your face.”
Dane glanced in the mirror over his shoulder. Sure enough, postshave, his jaw was a lighter shade than the rest of his pinked face. He dotted and patted, unhappily reminded of his mother, until Alex took his mind off it with more talk of Bas and Jacob.
“He’ll tell me about the pup too. If something develops there. At best, it’ll be a summer fling. Bas doesn’t do commitment, not since the last Olympics.”
But did Alex do commitment? Dane couldn’t give him that, no matter how much he wanted to. He hadn’t been lying at the press conference when he’d said he was terrible boyfriend material. His life was twenty-four-seven swimming and posing, with a freelance coding gig snuck in for his sanity’s sake. He didn’t have room for anything—anyone—else. And why the hell was he thinking about a future he couldn’t have? He could have tonight, though. Where only he and Alex existed, dancing in a crowd, in disguise and unknown. He could take a night off and get lost, pretending he and Alex were sixteen again. As close to real as he could get. He could make pretending work for, not against, them.
Alex skirted around Dane, leaning closer to the mirror to doctor his eyes and run styling gel into his hair. Dane, careful not to touch, tossed the razor in the bag, gathered their clothes, and shoved them in there too. He grabbed his overshirt and shrugged back into it, leaving it unbuttoned this time.
“All right, your turn,” Alex said.
Dane turned back around and lost his breath, again. The charcoal around Alex’s wide, expressive eyes made the dark brown irises pop, all the warm earthy shades swirling together, utterly captivating. Dane couldn’t have torn his gaze away if a gold medal depended on it.
Those eyes got closer, Alex in his space, as he ran gelled hands through Dane’s hair, slicking it back. Only those captivating eyes kept Dane’s from rolling back in pleasure. He clenched his jaw, fighting a moan, and when he spoke, it came out rough and gravelly. “I thought I had the hat for this.”
“In case you lose it,” Alex said, his own voice a timbre or two lower. “The gel makes it look darker, less noticeable.”
“You’re good at this disguise thing.”
“More like good at the club thing.” He stepped back, observing his work, and Dane inhaled through his clenched teeth, hoping it wasn’t too audible. “When Bas and I were at SC, we went out a lot. I miss it.”
“Didn’t get a lot of practice with that in Chapel Hill.”
Dane reared back at the threat of eyeliner, only stopping when Alex’s thumb and index finger captured his chin. Alex flicked his finger against the sensitive spot beneath Dane’s chin, an erogenous zone neither of them was likely to forget, and Dane froze. “Not fair.”
Alex shrugged. “Close your eyes,” he smirked, and Dane caved. “You didn’t stray far. Charlotte to Chapel Hill. It’s what, two hours?”
“You met my parents, right?”
Pressure on his chin was all the answer Dane needed. “Look up,” Alex clipped.
“They’re both alumni, Dad’s family for generations. There was no getting out of that one, being a double legacy and all.”
“You didn’t have to go back to Charlotte, to SwimMAC, afterward. Mo’s at Nation’s Capital. DC, LA, I’m sure any club would be happy to have you.”
Alex’s hand dropped from his face, and Dane felt the loss acutely. He reached for the trailing hand and wrapped his own around Alex’s forearm, keeping him close. “Not everyone’s as brave as you, Alejandro.”
It would have been so easy to pull Alex forward, against his body, against his lips. But as unfair as life had been to Alex already, he deserved someone better than Dane. He deserved a future Dane couldn’t give him. All he could give Alex were the next few weeks, his efforts in the pool and at being a real teammate, including blowing off a little steam tonight.
As teammates.
That was all.