Chapter Sixteen
The sound of hammering woke Brent from his nap. A quick glance at his alarm clock told him he’d overslept anyway, so he rolled out of bed, grabbed his jeans from the floor, and put them on as he left his bedroom to figure out what the hell was going on.
He traced the source of the sound to the front porch, where Riley was…
Well, tearing it up.
“Dude, what the hell?” Brent asked. “That’s my porch.”
Riley was prone to doing weird things, but not usually mindlessly destructive things.
“I’m aware,” Riley said without looking up, a long nail hanging out of the corner of his mouth. “I’m fixing it.”
He nodded to a stack of brand-new boards in the corner.
“Oh. Uh. Why?”
“Because it needs to be fixed,” Riley said, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.
Shame made Brent’s stomach sink. He knew that. He knew the porch needed work, and he knew there were other things he had to do around the house, but he’d never had the time.
Or the skills.
“You don’t have to do that,” Brent said, not wanting Riley to go to any more trouble on his behalf. Riley had done so much for him already.
Riley stood, bracing his back as he stretched, and took the nail out of his mouth. “I want to. And when I’m done here, I’m thinking we need to do something about the crack in the kitchen wall and the busted light fitting at the top of the stairs.”
“And you’re suddenly a carpenter?” Brent asked, raising an eyebrow. “And a plasterer and an electrician?”
Riley shrugged. “I’ve worked a lot of odd jobs. I haven’t told you the gritty details of every single one. But it’s okay if you don’t trust me to do this.”
“I do trust you to do it,” Brent said automatically. He’d trust Riley with his life, he definitely trusted him with his porch.
“Then let me?” Riley asked, giving Brent his best puppy eyes. “I want to help. I should have helped a long time ago.”
“You know you don’t have to do stuff for me, right?” Brent said. “You’ve already done so much.”
“Maybe I like doing stuff for you?” Riley smiled a tiny, warm smile. “What are friends for?”
“I never do anything like this for you,” Brent said. “You’re always doing stuff for me.”
Riley wet his lips. “Remember a while ago you helped me make some investment decisions? Long and short term stuff, so I’d have the best chance at keeping up my cashflow without having to live paycheck to paycheck?”
Brent nodded. He remembered sitting down with Riley and being surprised at how sensible some of the decisions he made were. He’d told him so at the time.
“Well, one of them paid off recently. I mean, really paid off. I have more money than I know what to do with, and I will need your help reinvesting some of it. But I don’t have to worry anymore, and I won’t have to worry for a very long time. And that’s thanks to you. So don’t you tell me you never do anything for me.”
“But that was just…”
“You using your specific skills to make your friend’s life easier?” Riley raised an eyebrow.
Brent sighed. When Riley put it like that…
“Fine. I’m not totally useless as a friend. I get it.”
“You’re not even slightly useless,” Riley said. “You have no idea how wonderful you are.”
Brent blushed all the way to the tips of his ears.
He wanted to kiss Riley, but he wasn’t sure he was allowed to anymore.
Riley wouldn’t want to be tied down like that, and Brent didn’t want Riley to resent him. He needed to be content with what he’d gotten.
But he wasn’t. Brent knew now what being with Riley could be like, and he wanted it so badly his stomach was knotting up at the thought of not having it.
With a surge of something—confidence, or need, or maybe stupidity—Brent leaned in, brushing his lips against Riley’s cheek.
It wasn’t the slow, comforting kiss he wanted, but maybe it’d be enough to let Riley know that he was still interested. That he wanted more of what they’d had.
It wasn’t even about the sex—not that Brent was going to refuse it—so much as it was about the closeness. About wanting physical affection, and wanting it from Riley.
They’d been so innocently affectionate when they were kids, and this week had felt like a natural extension of that. Like it was the way things were supposed to be.
Brent was glad now that he hadn’t married Rose after all. Being with her had never felt so good, so easy as being with Riley did. It would have been a mistake.
He wasn’t sure he could tell Riley that yet. Riley was still treating him like he was fragile.
“I’ll make lunch,” Brent said, suddenly feeling the need to get away. He didn’t want to face the aftermath of kissing Riley.
He just wanted to kiss him and have that be okay.
“Okay,” Riley said slowly, blinking at Brent. He was clearly surprised, but he didn’t seem upset.
“Are sandwiches okay? I need to go grocery shopping, but I think I can throw something together.”
Why was he still talking?
Probably because as scared as he was of how Riley would react once he recovered from the shock, he didn’t actually want to be away from Riley.
He wasn’t ready to feel like that, but that was how he felt.
“Sandwiches sound great,” Riley said, still staring at Brent. “Thank you.”
“No problem,” Brent responded, turning away, his cheeks burning.
He had no idea whether that reaction was good or bad, and the suspense was killing him.
Making lunch seemed like a much safer option than hanging around.