Home and Away (29 page)

It felt like gentling a wild animal, if self-loathing professional hockey players could be counted as such. Which, actually, they probably could.

When Callum’s arm curled around Rupert’s waist, he pulled back and pressed their foreheads together.

“I’m sorry,” Callum said, his voice rough.

“For what?” he asked, though he thought he knew.

“For being a chicken. For not telling the truth when it was important.”

Rupert sighed. “Callum, you’re too hard on yourself. It would have been foolhardy at best, disastrous at worse, for you to come out to John Shaw, of all fucking people.”

“But I lied in front of Christian. He was trying to come out to that asshole, and I didn’t back him up. I should have backed him up.” Callum’s voice cracked, and Rupert squeezed him tighter, trying to press warmth and comfort and love into Callum.

“You were there, Callum. You stood up for him. Made sure he was safe. You would have carried him out of there before you let his father hurt him further. You were everything he needed you to be today.”

“Except out.”

“Except, possibly, out. But given that the kiss you snuck out there didn’t raise any eyebrows, I’m guessing you spoke to him afterwards.”

“Yeah, I told him once we got home.”

“That was very brave of you, Callum.”

Callum’s huff was pure frustration. “I don’t know why you would say that. I’m not brave. Christian is brave.
You’re
brave.”

Rupert wanted to crawl into his bed and pull the covers over his head. “I am not.”

Callum forced him back with his hands banded around Rupert’s arms. “You were Christian’s knight in shining armor today.”

Rupert frowned, staring at Callum’s shoulder. “I was scared witless,” he admitted.

“So?”

“So, I’m afraid
all the time
,” Rupert said, his hands flailing at his sides. “Callum, the entire team, the
team I manage
, can see that I’m afraid of them. Today I almost jumped off the porch and ran back to the car. To you. Because I knew you’d keep me safe, too.”

“I would have,” Callum agreed.

“So! You see my point.”

“No, actually, I don’t. Because you
didn’t
run back to the car. And you
did
take a job that clearly freaks you out. Courage isn’t about not being afraid. It’s about being scared witless and doing it anyway.”

Rupert frowned. “Shakespeare?”

“Nelson Mandela, actually. And do not try to distract me, because my point is valid. More than that, it’s
important,
and you need to get it through your thick head. Look, I was dumb enough to confuse how nervous you get around some people with a lack of courage. But I was wrong. Everyone who thinks that is fucking
wrong
.”

Rupert swallowed past the thick lump in his throat. “Do you know why I didn’t make it to the Olympics?”

“What?” he asked, clearly confused. “What are you talking about?”

“Do you know why I didn’t make it? Why I didn’t compete?”

“Uh, yeah. I sort of Googled you,” Callum admitted. “You got hit by a car outside your training facility.”

“No,” Rupert said softly, hardly able to believe he was going to talk about this.

“What?”

“I mean, yes, I was struck by a car. I ran right in front of the poor woman who hit me—didn’t even see her until she was on top of me. I was too terrified, so fucking afraid and focused on trying to escape that stupid rink that I couldn’t think. Couldn’t
see
.”

Callum’s grip on his arms tightened. “Why? Why were you running?”

Rupert swallowed again, tried to clear his scratch from his voice. “There was a hockey team. In the locker room that day…”

“No,” Callum whispered.

“No,” Rupert agreed. “They didn’t do anything. Not really. But the ones before, the kids at school who locked me in closets and stole my gear. Who cornered me in the shower until I promised myself I’d always wait until I got home to wash up. The ones who tried on my performance clothes and tore them while they pranced around the locker room like great, hairy, talentless drag queens, mocking me and everything I loved. Each one of them alone was nothing, but together,
as a team
, they were powerful. Infinitely more clever and effective in their torture as a group than as individuals. So they taught me to never be alone in a locker room. To shower at home. To keep my distance. And to be afraid. So that when that other team, the one that laughed and threw me dark looks and stood as a unit to stare me down…I ran. Straight into a car, as it turned out.”

He was afraid to look up, to see what was on Callum’s face, so he wasn’t expecting the kiss. Rupert kissed back, briefly, because it was a relief. Because it made him feel better, and if he let it go on long enough, it would help him forget. But he didn’t understand what Callum was getting out of it. Why he would do it at all.

Rupert ended the kiss with a gasp. “What are you doing?”

“Kissing you?”

“Yes, well, I noticed that bit. But I don’t know why.”

“Because you are brave. And you’re beautiful. And I wanted to kiss it and make it better.” His lips twitched and he shrugged. “Or something like that.”

Rupert’s heart clenched, and the words were there, right on the tip of his tongue, begging to come out.

He was saved by a loud knock on the door.

“Callum! I need those potatoes!”

Callum spent the rest of the evening trying to wrap his head around what Rupert had told him. But there was dinner to prepare, and a bedroom to set up, and a four year old to put to bed, and a twelve year old to settle into his new room before his first night in his new home.

Callum was exhausted. It had been a long day, and it hadn’t helped at all that Rupert had only become more subdued as the day had gone on.

It was sweet relief to crawl into bed once they’d sent everyone home. Reese had left immediately after dinner, as had Jack and Grady, but Mike and Alexei had lingered. They’d seemed inordinately concerned that everyone was settled in and ready to sleep in their new bedrooms. Callum was grateful, if confused. It was one thing, as landlords and the designers of the space, to be interested in how well it was all coming together, but that didn’t really translate to Alexei telling Oliver that he would be so proud of him if he spent the entire night in his room again.

They’d watched television for a while after Oliver was asleep, Christian trying hard to stay awake but fading fast. After a particularly huge yawn, he’d confessed he hadn’t been able to sleep well at the shelter the night before. Callum could only imagine what had been going on in the poor kid’s head. He’d thrown his arm around Christian and, within minutes, he’d been asleep against Callum’s shoulder, Rupert smiling over at them in a way that made Callum feel a little tight through the chest.

At last, though, Christian had gone to his room and Mike and Alexei had left. The apartment was quiet and Callum was quick to change into his pajama pants. He was almost used to wearing them at this point. That Oliver was likely to come see them at any point in the night was a compelling reason to adjust, obviously, but now he thought he might keep wearing them in Denver, even if there was no hope of late night visitors who made them a requirement. He thought they might be a comfort he could hold onto.

The moment Rupert climbed in the other side of the bed, Callum mustered the last of his energy and rolled over Rupert, pinning him to the bed.

“Hello,” Rupert drawled, almost managing to smile.

Callum wasn’t necessarily looking to start anything, but he wanted to be closer to Rupert. To break through whatever was quietly running through that gigantic brain.

He started with a kiss, not stopping until Rupert began to respond.

“Better?”

Rupert shrugged. Callum kissed him again, tracing his tongue along the seam of Rupert’s lips until he let Callum in. Callum indulged in several long, slow sweeps of his tongue before pulling away. Rupert squirmed a little beneath him, aligning their hips and bringing his knees up to cage Callum.

Callum refused to be distracted. “You understand,” he began, holding Rupert’s stare, “now, all these years later, that what you did wasn’t cowardly, right? That it was the perfectly natural instinct to protect yourself.”

“I ran into a
car,
Callum. I ruined my chance to go to the Olympics. You went—you know what I missed. You can imagine what losing that was like for me.”

“You were bullied. Mercilessly. For years. I cannot be the first person to tell you that wasn’t your fault.”

Rupert’s frown was downright petulant. “Reese and I have this argument on an almost weekly basis, actually.”

“Well, there you go!” Callum declared.

“But he doesn’t know…he doesn’t know I ran. He, and everyone else, assumed those boys chased me.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Callum, I never looked back. Or forward, sadly. I just panicked.” He paused, his face pale and his eyes pleading with Callum to understand. “I was such a monumental idiot I ruined my career, my
knee,
possibly for no better reason than I was an utter coward.”

“You’re
not
a coward.”

Rupert sighed with utter exasperation. “You are very stubborn. I have no idea why I like you at all.”

“Easy there, duchess,” Callum murmured, smirking.

Rupert rolled his eyes and opened his mouth, no doubt to demand Callum stop calling him that, when a loud thump issued from Mike and Alexei’s apartment through one of the bedroom walls.

Callum took advantage of the distraction to kiss Rupert again. This time it only took seconds to gain Rupert’s complete cooperation. Callum hummed when Rupert’s hands skimmed over Callum’s ribs and in, pressing against his lower back while his hips rolled up.

Callum trailed kisses over Rupert’s cheek. His neck, and behind his ear. He was busy worrying the soft lobe between his teeth when they heard another, louder thump, followed by a faint cry.

Callum lifted his head. “What was that?”

Rupert pulled him back down. “I’m sure it’s nothing.”

This kiss was deeper, and there was no mistaking the intent. Callum planted his knees on the mattress and thrust his growing erection against Rupert’s.

Thump. Thump.

“Do you think they’re okay over there?” he asked as nibbled his way under Rupert’s jaw and toward his ear. He was intent on the texture of Rupert’s nighttime stubble against his tongue. He hardly heard the next muffled cry.

Rupert cocked his head to listen. “Do you recall what room is on the other side of that wall?”

Callum had to think about it, mapping Mike and Alexei’s apartment in his mind even as he mapped the shell of Rupert’s ear with his mouth. “The master bedroom, I think.”

No sooner had the words come from his lips, and those lips has sealed around Rupert’s ear lobe, than a long, desperate wail could be heard faintly.

Callum sat up on his knees between Rupert’s wide-spread thighs. “I think that was Mike,” he said, genuinely concerned now.

Thump. Thump.
Another cry, this one sharper, followed by a lower sound.

Rupert clapped a hand over his mouth and actually
giggled
.

Callum looked down at Rupert curiously. “Do you think he’s okay?”

Rupert grinned, silent while another long cry reached them. “Oh, yes,” Rupert said in a deep voice, his cheeks pink, “I think Mike is, in fact, very happy right now.”

The next cry was the loudest yet, accompanied by the entire wall giving a hard shudder.

Callum finally caught up. His cheeks burned. “Oh.
Oh.
Ha! I guess we know why they were so bent out of shape about Oliver sleeping in his own room, huh?”

Rupert laughed, loud and bright. Callum grinned down at him. Both their eyes widened when something that could only be Mike bellowing, possibly in Russian, came through the wall.

“Wow, that’s…” Callum wasn’t sure what words to use.

“Kind of hot?” Rupert suggested.

Callum swallowed. He traced his eyes down Rupert’s long, lean torso to linger where Rupert’s erection tented his pajama pants. That was so hot Callum’s brain fried, taking his filter with it, and the truth just fell out of his mouth.

“I want you to fuck me.” Callum could feel a hot blush making its way over his face and down his neck. Even his chest felt warm.

“Okay,” Rupert said at last, his voice hoarse.

“I mean,” Callum said, suddenly realizing he’d made all kind of assumptions, “only if you want to.”

Rupert’s scorching look went completely blank. He arched one brow. “Oh, gee, let me think.”

Callum laughed, though he was having a hard time looking too long at Rupert’s face. He couldn’t honestly believe he’d just blurted that out.

“Are
you
sure?” Rupert asked.

Callum nodded, staring somewhere in the vicinity of Rupert’s sternum. “Yeah, I really…I really want that. I’ve never done it. I mean, you know, where I was the one, umm…on the receiving end?”

And he really didn’t want to think about the times he was on the giving end either. Because this…wasn’t that. At all. The differences were so vast, so startling, that Callum could hardly bear to think about what he’d done. How wrong it felt now.

“Callum,” Rupert said, pushing up on his elbows and ducking his head so that Callum had no choice but to look at him. “Are you okay?”

Callum swallowed. “Yeah,” he said, trying to sound less like a dithering idiot and more like a man who knew what he wanted. “Why?”

“Because you went rather alarmingly pale in the space of a few seconds.”

Callum huffed out a breath that almost sounded like a laugh, only it wasn’t. “Yeah, I was just thinking about stuff. From before.”

“The men you’ve had sex with, you mean?” Rupert asked.

Callum winced at how direct Rupert was, how
simple
Rupert made it seem. “Yeah, I guess.”

Rupert studied him, obviously picking his words carefully. “I know you are no longer interested in pursuing company that way, but you seem more upset than just the memory would seem to warrant.”

Or maybe he was appropriately upset and Rupert just didn’t know the truth.

Earlier, Rupert had trusted him with something he’d kept from almost everyone. Callum trusted Rupert as much. Rupert wouldn’t judge, but Callum still ached at the thought of saying anything. He’d worked hard at packing it away for a lot of years.

“It wasn’t good,” he blurted.

“The sex?”

“Yes. No.” Callum sighed. “The sex was usually fine? But it was…er…fast. And mostly, kind of alone. If that makes sense? The men, they would be prepared. And we didn’t really talk. Or kiss,” he added, though Rupert was aware of that already. “I think maybe…I worry that I didn’t do what they wanted. That I might have assumed stuff and then…”

“Callum, we’ve talked about this. These men were consenting adults there for their own reasons, maybe even the same reasons you were. You didn’t force them, did you?”

“No!”

“And if they asked you to stop, did you?”

Callum swallowed heavily, swaying where he knelt on the bed. He planted a hand in the mattress to steady himself. “I…yes. I think so?” He looked at Rupert and said aloud what had haunted him. “I don’t know.”

Rupert sat up slowly, his knees pressing into Callum’s sides, his hands curling around his elbow and his jaw. Callum thought Rupert should to be moving away, not closer.

“What do you mean?” Rupert asked calmly.

Callum shook his head. “I mean, I would have stopped if I’d heard him say no. If I’d known he didn’t want me to…to keep going,” he said, his voice growing hoarser. He blinked hard against the sting in his eyes.

“Are we talking about a particular he, here?”

“Yes. I don’t know his name,” Callum confessed in a whisper.

“Why do you think he wanted to stop if you didn’t hear him say so?”

“It was loud. In the club. They had…they had speakers, in the bathroom?” Callum shook his head again, trying to clear the song from where it had been stuck on repeat for four years. “We were in a stall. And his back was to me.” He felt the first tear roll down his cheek and watched it land on Rupert’s shoulder. “I tried to ummm…reach around. Help him out? But he shoved my hand away. Kept moving. I thought he was trying to get me to hurry up. But then I…I was done, you know? And he shoved me away, like, way too fast, and he wouldn’t look at me. He, um, he had been saying
something
the whole time, kind of chanting it, and I’d just thought it was him making noise, you know? Into it, I guess. But then he turned, and he still wouldn’t look at me, and he was saying,
fuck you
. Over and over.
Fuck you fuck you fuck you
.”

Callum swallowed and gave up any pretense at composure. His face was streaked with tears, and he couldn’t hold in a wet sob. He’d been here before, and it never helped.

Rupert held him, pulling himself closer until he was practically in Callum’s lap. Callum pressed his forehead into Rupert’s strong shoulder as he waited, aching and raw, for Rupert to tell him he’d made a terrible mistake. That he should find a way to make amends. He could tell Rupert about the hours he’d put in on Michaela’s family foundation, how he’d made huge anonymous donations to LGBT centers that needed help, that he’d attended as many events as possible with Michaela, just in case that meant one more person, one more fan of his might show up and donate. And he could tell him how it may have made a difference to the bottom line, to a lot of kids, but it had never once eased the ache of knowing he might have hurt that man.

“You’re very stupid, you know,” Rupert said quietly.

He was. So stupid. He never should have gone to those clubs. He buried his face into Rupert’s warm neck and took a deep, shuddering breath.

“Is this why you’ve been living like a monk for four years?”

Callum nodded.

“Did you go back to that club and look for that man?”

Callum’s hands curled into fists against Rupert’s back.
How did he know that?
He nodded again more hesitantly.

“Was he there?”

“Yes,” he said, his voice little more than a scratch in his throat.

“And what did he say?”

“He saw me and turned away. Left before I could get to him.”

“Was it the next night?”

Callum couldn’t understand why Rupert was asking these questions. “No, it was months later. The next time the team was in town.”

Rupert sighed and put a gentle hand on Callum’s cheek, forcing him to lift his head. “Callum, did he shove you away while you were having sex?”

“No?” He didn’t think so.

Rupert arched a brow, so Callum really thought about it.

“No. Definitely not.”

“Were you holding him down? Restricting his movements? Covering his mouth or being rough?”

“No! I mean, we were standing. My hands were on his hips, and maybe the wall for balance. I mean, it was maybe rough, I like it rough,” he said, his words rushed, his face flaming hot. “But I thought he liked it too. I would never…I wouldn’t…”

“I know. And so should you.”

“But he was cursing me, Rupert. He looked miserable.”

“He probably was.”

It was like a punch to the chest. Callum tried to look away, but Rupert’s hand on his cheek wouldn’t let him.

“Callum, other than you being bloody gorgeous, I don’t know why that man let you fuck him in the men’s room. I don’t. And neither do you. But he had his reasons and he
did
consent
.
That’s what matters here. Yes, it would have been nice to know he was such a mess before you agreed, and I imagine you would have said no if you’d known—”