Bad Boyfriend (9 page)

“Really? Where?”

“You know the space between the forsythia and the shed?”

How in the hell did Eli know what Quinn’s backyard looked like? Pretty much all Quinn had done after getting Eli in the house was fuck him. Quinn pictured that cupcake of an ass in his kitchen this morning. Right. Eli had been up early, and the kitchen window looked out into the backyard.

“No,” Claire said with a regretful smile in her voice. “Quinn’s never had us out to his new house. But maybe now that you’re in the picture, we can fix that. Give me your email address, and I’ll send you an article about bulbs.”

“That would be great, Claire. Thank you.”

Their two waiters had started bringing out salads, so Quinn urged Eli toward a seat with something like relief. With years of experience at the Laurent table, Quinn knew Claire, Paula and Alyssa were quite capable of maintaining conversation without anyone else’s input. Eli’s little performance would be upstaged.

Because the luck of the Irish held true for this Maloney, he and Eli ended up across the table from Peter and the empty seat Quinn knew Chrissy and the baby would be occupying.

Alyssa hadn’t made it into the seat next to Peter before she was shrilling, “Oh my God. Finally. You wore it. It looks great on you.”

Quinn glanced down. He’d taken off the sport coat. Purple argyle diamonds. God help him.

“You bought him that sweater? We have totally got to go shopping.” Eli’s voice had taken on a singsong affectation that was nothing Quinn had heard from him before but all too familiar to anyone who’d seen a stereotypical gay man on television. In a minute, Eli would start snapping his fingers. “Quinn’s closet comes in two colors: gray and grayish.”

“Count me in for shopping,” Paula put in.

“Me too.” Chrissy slid into her seat, handing off a complicated piece of baby equipment and the baby to Peter.

He dragged an empty table over and put the carrier on it. Standing behind his wife, he shot Quinn a disgusted look.

“Quinn hates shopping,” Alyssa said as if that was akin to hating puppies.

“I know, right?” Eli added in that same tone. “Sometimes even I’m not sure he’s gay.”

Peter’s chair made a grinding scrape as he dragged it out and took his seat. Unable to meet Peter’s gaze, Quinn looked to Dennis for help. Dennis, who’d had his back since the Academy, only stared like Quinn had lost his mind. All Quinn could hope for was that Roger’s selective deafness had kicked in.

“The sweater looks very handsome on you, dear,” Claire said gently.

“We’ll work on it,” Eli fake whispered to Alyssa.

Quinn put his hand on Eli’s thigh as a warning.

There was no salvation coming from the talkative women. Claire failed to offer her usual call to action about the latest health threat she’d discovered about online. Alyssa fought off a giggling fit, biting her lips, cheeks rounding like a chipmunks. Paula was occupied with a whining Faith who was flinging unwanted items from her salad onto the tablecloth.

Crunching on a crouton, Quinn pushed harder on Eli’s thigh, praying it would keep him from leaping into the conversational void.

With a smirk that deserved a punch to the jaw, Dennis said, “So how did you guys meet?”

“Why don’t you tell him the story, baby?” Eli turned to face Quinn with a half-lidded expression that Quinn guessed was supposed to be romantic, but made Quinn think of the way Eli’s dark-rimmed eyes had looked when he came.

Quinn jerked his chin in Faith’s direction. It wasn’t a complete cover. Their meeting wasn’t exactly fit for a nine-year-old’s ears.

“Ah.” Alyssa winked. “We’ll talk later.” She gestured between herself and Eli.

“You betcha.” Eli returned her wink.

Wishing his hand was leaving dents on the brat’s ass instead of resting on his thigh, Quinn tried a pinch right above the inseam. He wasn’t sure he’d made an impression through the denim until Eli flinched.

A phone buzzed, and Peter pushed away from the table enough to check his display before tucking the phone back into his case.

“I didn’t know you were on call.” Chrissy turned toward her husband.

Peter’s hand paused in the act of bringing a huge leaf of lettuce to his mouth. “I’m not. Force of habit.”

A fireman could always be called in, Quinn knew well enough, but he hoped to God Peter wasn’t up to his old tricks with a brand-new baby who’d be the one suffering this time.

“What do you do?” Eli asked.

“City fireman,” Peter muttered. “I’ll bet you’re in school.”

Eli shook his head. “I work for a newspaper.”

“Paperboy?”

“God, Peter. Anyone would think you were jealous,” Chrissy said with a light laugh.

In the deafening silence that followed, Quinn missed his stab at a cherry tomato. It rolled off the plate, ricocheted off the basket of rolls and left a trail of dressing as it spun down to the far end of the table where Roger caught and ate it.

“Actually, I’m a photographer.” Eli’s voice was cheerful.

Claire seized the topic at last. “That’s wonderful. You know, now that Gabriel’s here, I want to get a new family portrait done.”

Eli rested his fork and knife on the edge of the salad plate. “I don’t have a studio or anything. We do mostly digital work.”

“That’s exactly what I want. The family has a webpage now, so it would be perfect.”

Claire’s web update on the rest of the Laurents and her own family took them through the salad course and what felt like an eternity from the plates being cleared to the waiters bringing out roast beef and vegetables, family style.

“You’re not a vegetarian, are you, Eli?” Paula asked.

“Nope.” Eli helped himself to two thin red-centered slices before passing the plate to Alyssa. “My friend Nate is, though. He eats so much healthy stuff it makes me sick.”

Faith asked for clarification on vegetarianism, declared a newfound affiliation and reached for another roll. Her mother dumped a pile of broccoli and carrots on her plate and put the roll back.

“Where’s your little boy?” Eli asked.

“With my folks. I thought we might enjoy a meal without him reenacting the Battle of Verdun around our legs.” Paula tilted her head to look down the table. “Thanks for that, Dad,” she called to Roger.

“Roger’s a military history expert.” Quinn relaxed as the conversation no longer felt like a minefield. “He volunteers down at the Torsk and the Taney.”

“In the ship museum at the piers,” Alyssa clarified.

“Cool.” Eli added some carrots to his plate. “Maybe I could get the paper to do a feature. I’ll talk to Nate.”

“Your vegetarian friend is your boss?” Alyssa asked. The word vegetarian made Faith glare at her mother and poke at the mountain of vegetables she’d been given.

“Among other things.” Eli winked at her. “But that was in the past.” He patted Quinn’s arm, and Quinn began counting down the seconds to the next explosion.

He didn’t have to wait long. Eli wasn’t giving up the stage now.

“Quinn is so lucky to have you all. Do you remember the thing last year with Kellan Brooks? He was on
Get a Job
with Kimmie Stafford?”

“The one whose dad is head of Brooks Blast? The energy drinks?” If it was pop culture, Alyssa knew it. “Right. He came out. It was all over the internet. I showed you that, Mom.”

It wasn’t all over Quinn’s part of the internet, because he had no idea what they were talking about.

“His dad cut him off after he came out. He walked away from all that money to be with Nate.” There was nothing affected about Eli’s voice now. Strong and warm with awe, it sounded like hero worship. “I know for a fact Kellan turned down half a million, just to be honest about who he is.”

The sound of silverware on the restaurant plates echoed in the aftermath of that conversational bomb. Quinn didn’t know whether everyone not looking at Peter was any better than if they’d all stared. Eli had neatly set that up and detonated it from a safe distance. It might have been aimed at Peter, but the shrapnel raining down on Quinn cut deep.

Maybe Eli had a broader target in mind. Quinn knew he deserved it. He hadn’t been honest with Eli. And the thought of meeting Chrissy’s kind gaze made his head ache.

Gabe came to his father’s rescue with a brief whimper and then a gut-deep wail. Peter was up before Chrissy could blink. “I’ll get him.”

“So. What are your plans for the holidays?” Claire said.

Eli stretched his arm along the back of Quinn’s chair. “Quinn’s talking about taking me to Hawaii.”

Quinn choked on his ice water. He should have gotten a beer. “That’s—”

“You mean you wouldn’t be here for Christmas?” Claire was horrified.

“Well, it’s still up in the air,” Eli said.

Quinn turned a steady, threatening glare on him. It worked on surly fifteen-year-olds. But Eli was made of sterner stuff. He grinned back and continued. “We’re not sure. Everything’s so unsettled with civil unions and marriages.”

Under a stream of excitement from Alyssa and Paula, Quinn heard Dennis choke out, “Marriage?”

Quinn began to weigh the advantages of murder over suicide.

Somehow Quinn managed to endure through dessert without having to decide on either option. He gulped a little coffee, took two bites of the overly sweet cake and looked with longing at the pastries that had been a source of further contention as Faith decided she was a sugartarian instead. Eli had sucked down a napoleon and an éclair while Quinn stuck to black coffee, cursing his thirty-five-year-old metabolism and trying not to think of how obscene the chocolate and cream looked on Eli’s wide mouth.

As Quinn pinned his two fifties to the christening gown displayed on the gift table, the women clustered around Gabe who was apparently doing something precious. Dennis and Peter had followed their father into the bar, and Eli was about to disappear into the men’s room. Quinn caught up to him in the narrow hall.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

“What do you think? I swear your ex-father-in-law is trying to get me drunk. That’s the third Canadian whiskey he’s bought me.”

“Don’t say—”

“Whiskey?” Eli blinked slowly. “Or father-in-law? If you’re going to follow me in, give me a minute because I really gotta pee.”

Quinn was a patient man. He taught teenagers, for Christ’s sake. But leaning his head back against the Budweiser sign on the dark paneling didn’t do anything to control his need to shake Eli and demand to know what the fuck made it so funny to screw with Quinn’s life. Knowing he wanted to follow the tirade by shoving his dick so far up Eli’s ass he’d taste him for a month didn’t help either.

When he went into the bathroom, Eli met his gaze in the mirror where he was washing his hands. Eli licked his lips, and Quinn caught sight of himself. His cheeks were flushed, eyes hard and focused, the sweater clinging to his chest. One thing he didn’t look was old. He folded his arms across his chest.

“Exactly what are you doing? And don’t say washing your hands or just sitting on a pillow will feel like burning coals by the time I’m done blistering your ass.”

Eli blinked again, smiled and ran a cool finger along the V-neck of Quinn’s sweater. “Mmm. Hot. But I prefer to save that kind of stuff for bed, Daddy.”

Quinn did not shiver, even if the jolt to his body could qualify as one. The chemistry between them had nothing to do with Eli acting that way in front of the family.

He grabbed Eli’s hand and squeezed, forcing it down to his side. “Listen, you little shit, you do not get to waltz in here and—”

“I didn’t waltz in. You invited me.” Eli wrenched his hand free and jabbed his finger into Quinn’s chest. “And don’t think you didn’t invite me to do exactly what I did.”

Anger beat hot and strong in Quinn’s temples, tightened his spine, forced his hands into fists. He took a step back.

Eli followed, crowding Quinn against the sink. “You wanted Peter to think you’d moved on. You wanted everyone to remember the big gay elephant in the room that none of you could talk about because of Peter. I did all that.”

The anger wasn’t for Eli now. It was for himself because there was no arguing with that. Punching himself wouldn’t help, though, so he unclenched his fists.

“Now.” Eli crowded into him in an entirely different way, spine and hips moving fluidly. “You knew what would happen when you followed me in here and it wasn’t just you bitching.” He hooked a finger in Quinn’s belt. “Jesus. You looking at me like that is getting me hard. C’mon.” He yanked Quinn by the belt into the stall and reached around him to lock the door.

Eli wrapped an arm around Quinn’s neck, dragging him down, other hand unlatching his belt, his fly.

“We can’t.” But Quinn’s words were an ineffective moan against Eli’s lips. Had he known this was going to happen when he came in here?

“We can and we are. So hurry up.”

Eli licked and sucked on Quinn’s lower lip, forearm sliding over Quinn’s dick as Eli got his own pants open.

“What if someone—?”

Eli leaned back against the stall barrier, one leg sliding up to wrap around Quinn’s thigh.