Borrowing Trouble(5)

“Hey, Landon, what’re you up to this Saturday?” Jay wasn’t sure what exactly made him want to invite Landon to hang out with him, especially since the man seemed not to want to fraternize, but damn if he wanted to spend his first kid free weekend in a while alone. And yeah, Landon was younger and probably had little interest in hanging out with someone almost ten years older than him, but Jay couldn’t stop himself.

Landon raised an eyebrow and shrugged. “Nothin’, I don’t suspect. Was gonna go down to Jackson, but my friends backed out and I don’t wanna go by myself.”

Jay wondered what Landon did in Jackson. The city was bigger than their little town and probably offered better entertainment than anything a twenty-eight year old could get into here, but Landon never recounted tales of his times, even though he drove three hours just to go out. The other guys drove a little over an hour to go out and always came in on Mondays with tales of their weekends in the little honky tonk they frequented, so you’d think Landon would have tales to share of, what would have to be, more interesting bars. Or maybe Jay was being presumptuous in assuming Landon drove down to go to bars.

“I was thinking about catching the Ole Miss game at Woody’s over in Winona,” Jay offered. Landon’s blue eyes blinked owlishly. He seemed to make that face a lot. Jay never could read the expression and it always made him feel like maybe he’d done something wrong. “It’s no big deal. The kids are out of town at their mom’s come Friday, so I thought I’d get out of the house.”

Landon was silent for another moment before nodding, his expression giving away nothing. Finally, he shrugged one shoulder and an easy smile tugged up one side of his face, and Jay felt a funny feeling he couldn’t put a finger on. “Sure. Better than getting drunk by myself.”

Well, wasn’t that heart-warming. “Glad you can be bothered.”

“Oh, that’s not what I meant.” Landon held his hands up, neck flushing in the adorable way it did when he was flustered or embarrassed. Adorable? Jay was pretty sure that thought made him blink in a similarly owlish fashion. What the hell?

“Sorry,” Landon apologized. “I’d like that. Haven’t been to Woody’s in a good minute.”

“Uh, yeah.” Jay looked down at his desk and shuffled papers, trying to cover his reaction to thinking another man was adorable. When Jay looked back up, he noticed Landon was looking like maybe Jay’d lost his mind.

“You okay?” Landon asked warily.

“Yeah. Sorry.” Jay cleared his throat and fussed at himself to get it together. “State game starts at 7:15.”

Landon gave a nod. “A’ight. See ya then.”

Jay watched Landon leave, then caught Ms. Lynne’s speculative gaze. He didn’t like the narrowed eyes as they studied him. The last five minutes had been possibly the weirdest of his life.

“Real nice of you to invite Landon. He don’t get out much,” Ms. Lynne said with a feigned nonchalance.

Jay shrugged. “Seems to get out plenty to me.”

“I s’pose,” was all she had to offer. He didn’t have anything to say to that either.





Chapter 3


To say Landon was surprised by Jay’s invitation to Woody’s would have been an understatement. He was afraid he’d come off as an * over the last few weeks since he’d tried hard to stay away from the man. He’d done his damnedest to reign in his body’s reaction to Jay Hill, but damn if the man wasn’t like a flame to Landon’s moth.

There wasn’t much about Jay Landon didn’t like. Physically, Jay was amazing, but as a man, Jay was even better. He worked hard, had Landon’s father’s respect, was a wonderful father, to hear most people tell it. But the man was straight. He had kids. He also had an ex-wife that he was still close with, who people thought he would get back together with.

Landon almost said no when Jay invited him out, but the man had seemed to genuinely want a friend to hang out with, though Landon couldn’t figure out why Jay had thought of him. What could it hurt, though? Aside from his two best friends he only got to see sparingly, Landon didn’t exactly have a burgeoning social life. His social life lacked even more when he stuck around his hometown for a while. What would one football game hurt?

He could put aside his lusty bullshit and ease two people’s need for friendship by being a f*cking adult and going for a beer and football. That seemed much more fulfilling than another weekend of bitchy twinks at the gay bar he frequented in Jackson anyways. He was too damned old and lived a totally different life than the other twenty-somethings he met there.

Landon noticed Jay immediately after walking into Woody’s. Woody’s was an institution locally. A country grill and bar where you ate catfish and threw peanut hulls on the floor seemed to sum up the local color quite well.

“What’s up?” Landon asked as he plopped down in the booth with Jay.

Jay smiled his kind smile and Landon was glad he’d decided to take the man up on his offer. He really was a nice guy. He couldn’t imagine how shitty it must be to be surrounded by all the guys who didn’t exactly want to party with the boss man, no matter how well they knew him. Landon welcomed that social divide, while Jay was probably suffering because of it since he seemed to spend all his time working or with his kids.