Roommate Arrangement (Divorced Men's Club #1)(31)

“No. Nope. No sympathy here. I’m okay with you not feeling the same way, and I mean, can you blame me? You were part of my whole sexual awakening. You’re hot and kind, you always make time for people and make sure they’re comfortable when they’re really, really not …”

I’m trying to reassure him, but the more I talk, the more wary his eyes become.

“I’m so sorry,” he says. “I didn’t know. If I did, I never would have—”

I snort. “I don’t need your pity. I knew about my feelings, and I was more than happy for that to happen, knowing it might be the one and only time. I like being attracted to you. It’s better than me crushing on someone who’s an asshole to me.”

“I feel like an asshole.”

“You didn’t know. I didn’t tell you.”

“You should have.”

“Why? So you could make my choices for me?”

He lets out a heavy breath. “You’ve been good to me. I don’t want to hurt you, Beau, but I’m going through a divorce. This was—”

“If you say a mistake, you will hurt me.”

He gives me a sad smile. “No mistake—I knew what I was doing. I’m attracted to you, and I was interested in it happening again, but not now. Emotionally, I have nothing to offer you.”

“Did I say I wanted anything emotional from you? All I said was we should hook up again.”

“Can you honestly tell me if we keep hooking up that it won’t make things weird for you?”

Okay, honestly, I can’t tell him that. Things are already weird now that I know how perfect his cock is and have heard the sexy noises he makes during sex. “Yeah, it probably will.”

He exhales loudly. “Do you need me to move out?”

“What? No.” I turn to face him straight on so he knows I’m serious. “We’ll chalk tonight up to some hot fun that we both needed and move on. We were friends before, yeah? So there’s no reason getting each other off should have to change anything.” I’m praying he agrees with me. My feelings for him aren’t incapacitating. They’re just … a lot. So much that I don’t want him to move out. Even if it’s hard, even if it means jerking off nonstop, I want him to stay.

“It doesn’t?”

“Nope.”

He eyes me. “Can I say something that might be shitty of me?”

“Always.”

He catches his bottom lip before releasing it. “It feels good. To know someone thinks of me that way after everything my fucker ex did, which is shitty because I really like you, and I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“I promise I won’t get hurt.”

“You can’t promise that.”

“It’s fine.” I wave my hand, faking a confidence I so don’t feel. “Let me stroke your ego after how good you stroked me.”

He laughs. “Shit, don’t say that.”

“Why? You weren’t lying when you said you were good with your hands. That was maybe the best hand job I’ve ever had.”

He shoves me. “Beau.”

“And I sucked your dick good, didn’t I?”

“Fucking hell …” He grins as I nudge him. “You’re playful after you’ve blown your load.”

“You think this is different? You should see me after I’ve taken a pounding.”

We lock eyes, and Payne doesn’t try to hide the interest in his. He sighs and looks away, so I take that as my sign to get out of here. Now. Before my orgasm wears off and I begin overthinking everything.

Before I leave, I lean in, lips to his ear, and drop my voice. “It’ll only be weird if you let it.” Then I kiss his cheek and flee to my room.





To my surprise, Payne acts like last night is totally forgotten, and without the orgasm high to make everything fine, I’m grateful.

Because I’m low-key freaking out.

I didn’t mean to blurt feelings all over him, and I’m grateful I didn’t go so far as to tell him that I’m actually totally smitten with him and I’m scared it will never go away.

Because that would have been a fast way to lose myself a roommate.

We head over to Marty’s Saturday drinks together, and Payne seems like his usual happy self. Almost like last night didn’t happen.

And if I hadn’t felt the mortification bone-deep this morning, I might have thought it was a dream.

But nope.

Payne’s cum-covered T-shirt was still on the living room floor when I got up.

We’re half an hour late to arrive, so most people are there before us. It’s a combination of Marty and Lizzy’s work friends and a handful of people from school. They’re people I’ve met a few times before, but other than one or two guys from our graduating class, I’m not friendly with most of them.

“About time,” Marty says, walking over and holding out a beer to me. “I almost thought you weren’t going to show.”

“Late night,” I say without thinking, and the second the words are out, Payne’s eyes fly to mine. Well, I guess if I was unsure about it happening, that’s my confirmation. “Had lots of work to do.”

The tension leaves Payne’s body, and thankfully, the moment goes right over Marty’s head.