A series of failed relationships with women has left Detective Nathan Wolf still single at thirty-four—because he’s too scared to admit to his longtime crush on his best friend James.
Read on for an excerpt of Getting It Right,
the next installment in the Restoration series
by A.M. Arthur.
Getting It Right
by A.M. Arthur
Chapter One
Never said I’d let you fuck me...Get off...Let go!
Ezra’s words chased themselves around James Taggert’s mind as he stalked down the sidewalk, away from Pot O Gold, desperate to stuff his hands into his too-tight jeans pockets to keep them from trembling. Never in his life had he acted like such a selfish asshole and allowed a situation to get that out of control. He stopped a few blocks from the bar he’d abandoned and leaned against the cool bricks of a closed Mexican grocery store. He needed to apologize to Ezra, but he was too embarrassed and too drunk to make it as genuine as Ezra deserved.
His phone was at his ear, the other end buzzing.
“Jay?” Nathan Wolf’s voice was a balm to his frazzled nerves. “What’s wrong? It’s after midnight.”
“Price is getting out.”
“Shit, when did you find out? Where are you?”
Having a best friend who knew all of his sordid backstory made times like this so much easier. “This afternoon. I’m outside the Pot. I’m fucked-up, Nate, and I did something. Something bad.”
“Stay put. I can be there in under ten.”
The phone call ended, but the calm of talking to Nathan was taking some of the edge off his panic. He tapped a cigarette out of the crumpled pack in his back pocket. Thumbed the lighter. He took a long drag, letting the smoke fill his lungs to choking before releasing it hard through his nose. The stinging helped sober him up a bit more. He stared at the smoldering end of one of his worst habits.
I really need to quit. Again.
He’d quit five times in the past ten years, but kicking a habit he’d picked up at fourteen was hard. And not even a serious consideration when the cigarette in his hand was the only thing keeping him from pacing like a lunatic while he waited for Nathan. He shouldn’t have come out tonight at all, not after the news he’d gotten, but what else was he supposed to do when he found out Stephen Price had made parole? Sit home and stew until the anger made him crazy? He’d dressed up, splashed on his best cologne and come down to his favorite watering hole for peach mojitos and cock. Irish pub by day and popular gay bar by night, Pot O Gold was his preferred destination for both.
He had walked in, ordered his first drink from Riley, one of his favorite bartenders, and then perused the pickings. A lot of familiar faces. A lot of guys he’d already fucked. He didn’t have a rule about fucking someone only once, but too many repeat performances and some guys got a little clingy. He wanted sex, not a relationship.
Ezra Kelley had caught his attention immediately. He’d seen Ezra around the Pot on and off for the past year or so, sometimes alone and sometimes with other people. Bar chatter said Ezra was a good fuck. James had taken in the tall, lean body, the spiky blond hair and silver stud in his eyebrow. Even the purple sleeveless top that matched the strange purple contact lenses had turned him on. Perhaps because Ezra was the exact physical opposite of what James really wanted and could never have.
He had claimed Ezra quickly. Dancing with him, drinks in hands, practically fucking with their clothes on. James downed more mojitos than he usually allowed himself, because the rum brought numbness. Numbness from the pain of today’s news, the pain of old loss and the violence churning inside him, aimed directly at Stephen Fucking Price and everything he’d taken from James’s family.
Alcohol, adrenaline and Ezra’s wood had made James temporarily lose his mind. They’d walked into the bathroom stall together. That had definitely been mutual. And Ezra hadn’t minded that blow job one bit until James had put Ezra against the wall and pulled the guy’s pants down to fuck him. He’d been too damned drunk to see the surprise in Ezra’s eyes, or hear the real fear in his voice. And then James had been an asshole, trying to argue with him about what they were going to do. Accidentally scaring Ezra into barfing up all of his night’s drinks.
And like a fucking coward, James had fled. Fled down the sidewalk to this spot to wallow in his shame and try to keep the acid in his stomach from erupting.
He dragged on the cigarette, watching the tip flare orange. The whole world still listed a bit to one side. He’d moved all of his morning appointments to the afternoon, clearing his schedule until noon, but drinking himself into a hangover on a weekday was idiotic.
Then again, how often did he find out that the bastard who molested his sister when she was thirteen was being paroled? None of his psychology textbooks had given him an answer for how to react to that kind of news, so he’d done exactly what he always advised his patients not to do—mask the pain. His mask of choice was alcohol and sex.
Except he’d overdone it on the alcohol, and he’d hurt Ezra in the process.
I am a douche bag.
* * *
He smoked his way through two more cigarettes before Nathan’s beat-up Ram pickup pulled alongside the curb. For a city cop, he was still adorably country. Nathan leaned across the console to shove open the passenger side door, and James gratefully slid inside. The simple, familiar presence of Nathan nearby made James’s nerves unfurl a little bit more. Nathan was the one thing in James’s life that had always made sense. Had always been easy.
Weariness settled into his bones, turning his drunken daze into extreme fatigue. He wanted to pass out and soon.
Nathan shoved a bottle of water at him, then eased the truck back into the street. He cracked both of the front windows, probably because James reeked of smoke. Nathan had never been shy about telling him how gross his habit was. Nathan was also smart enough not to engage in conversation until they were shuffling up the short sidewalk to Nathan’s half of a two-story duplex. Nathan slung an arm around James’s waist, and the heat of the other man’s body so close felt amazing. Real. Not like the fake closeness of dancing with strangers in a crowded bar.
He finally got a good look at his friend as Nathan crossed the narrow living room to the kitchen in the rear. Flannel pajama pants and a spring coat. James had woken him up.
Yeah, I’m a douche bag.
“You hungry?” Nathan shouted from the kitchen.
“No.” In the familiar, somewhat cluttered warmth of Nathan’s home, he had a safe place to wallow in the shame still burning in his gut.
Nathan’s place was the definition of a straight bachelor’s pad—which worked since Nathan was a straight bachelor. Dark leather furniture right out of a magazine’s page, decorated exactly the same because he couldn’t be bothered. A monster, sixty-inch flat screen mounted on the wall over an entertainment console boasted two gaming systems, alongside a Blu-ray player and hundreds of movies. Only a handful of photos hung on the wall, mostly of his rather large extended family that lived in southern Delaware.