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  “Look,” Cobalt said, getting up and moving to crouch in front of him, ostensibly to soothe the now quivering dog, but also to better see Preston’s face. The man was staring straight ahead, refusing to even look in Cobalt’s direction.

  “Please look at me.”

  Preston’s jaw popped again. His eyes moved just enough to lower and look into Cobalt’s.

  “I agreed to his fucked-up terms just by not calling him on them. I got me into this mess. And you and I agreed: I’m the one who has to fix it. That’s what all the phone calls were about. I called the company to find out if he got back okay. They thought I was calling to give them my answer.”

  “What answer?” Preston’s gaze lost some of the chill.

  “Cal’s proposal that I go back with him… he made it sound like it was all about him. His idea. Like he wanted me there with him, but I know him. I know that isn’t what he wants. He likes long distance. The company sent him to ask me to go back.”

  “Why?”

  “To be honest?” He let out a sigh, hugged Chance, and kissed the top of his hairy head, then resettled on the bench, a touch closer to Preston than he had been before. “After all this time? I’m not 100 percent sure. At first I thought maybe someone had the asinine thought that if I was there with him, he would settle down.”

  “Wouldn’t make him less of an asshole,” Preston griped.

  That made Cobalt smile. “So you’re human after all.”

  “Excuse me?” Finally Preston relaxed his rigid pose enough to turn his head. Even the dog seemed to relax as he moved.

  “It wouldn’t make him less of an asshole. You’re right about that. But that isn’t why they want me. And if it was, I hope you know I would certainly tell them where they could shove that nonsense.” He met Preston’s gaze and tried very hard to keep the butterflies from waking fire-breathing dragonlings in his gut to burn through his calm. “They want me to dance.”

  “They… what?” Preston blinked at him.

  “Dance,” Cobalt enunciated, like that would actually explain anything.

  “But you don’t…. You should….” Preston shifted to face him, pushing at his thigh with one knee. “You quit.”

  Cobalt nodded.

  Preston’s intensity pinned him, made him a butterfly himself, at the mercy of that penetrating gaze.

  “And now I’m unquitting,” he whispered.

  Preston continued to stare, his expression so bland it was impossible to know what was going on behind it.

  “You have to say something,” Cobalt said after an uncomfortable silence.

  “I will.” Preston rose and took the dog’s leash in hand. “I have to walk.”

  Chapter 16

  WELL. SO that had been a dick move, Preston realized, even as he hurried away down the path, crushed gravel shushing underfoot. Cobalt had just opened up his soul, and Preston had left him splayed and vulnerable. And taken his dog to boot.

  “Fuck!”

  A tiny, wrinkled man with a tinier dog stopped and leaned away from him as he passed, startled looks on both their faces. Preston smiled—or grimaced, more likely—at them. They scurried past and he was alone again.

  “Why New York?” he asked Chance. “Why that ballet?”

  Chance licked his fingers and trotted on next to him turning his doggy attention from his own anxieties to soothe Preston’s.

  “He should dance. He needs to dance. The modern company he’s starting is a good idea, but ballet again?”

  Chance huffed.

  “And why Cal?”

  Nothing from the dog there.

  “Yeah, buddy. You and me both. You and me both. And what about you?”

  A slight tug on the leash made him look down, and he realized the dog was now loping to keep up with his agitated pace. He slowed and glanced around. The two of them were alone near the far edge of the park. He could look clear across the grassy, puddle-ridden expanse to the bench where Cobalt still sat, lanky legs held at the most proper angle, tight together, like he was trying to keep himself small against the damp spring chill.

  He looked thin, sitting there. Not small, because he was too broad shouldered for that. But brittle. Breakable. Alone.

  “Come on.” Preston gave the leash a tug, and Chance fell in beside him, taking Preston’s fast lope at an easy canter of his own. Crossing the park was a wet business. Spring had left the softening earth soggy, and with every step, his heavy boots sank deep into the turf. But it was faster than going back around the way he had come.

  He slowed before he reached the bench, approaching from directly behind Cobalt. The dog tugged forward, showing the first inclination all day that he could stand to be more than half a foot from one of them. He chafed at Preston holding back.

  “Are you done fuming?” Cobalt asked without turning around.

  Preston grunted. He hadn’t thought Cobalt knew he was there.

  “Maybe.” He stopped but let go of the leash.

  Chance trotted over to plop down directly on Cobalt’s feet and rest his head on his forepaws.

  “At least you brought my dog back. He’s soaked.”

  “What are you going to do with him in New York?”

  “Nothing. He’s staying here. With you.”

  Preston pursed his lips so hard the scar at the corner of his mouth twinged.

  “While you house-sit. You can”—Cobalt waved a hand over his shoulder in a very fluttery way—“fix things.”

  “Like floor tiles?”

  “And windows.”

  “But not you.”

  Cobalt’s throat worked for a moment. “Not me,” he agreed quietly.

  For a few minutes—agonizing, long, fraught minutes—they remained where they were, Preston standing six feet behind Cobalt’s bench. Neither of them said a word.

  The ball was firmly not just in Preston’s court but in his hands.

  “I said I would back you up.”

  Cobalt nodded. “I appreciate you backing my decision.” He sounded so flat.

  I want to stand by your side.

  And why the hell would he not just say that? What was stopping him? Fear of rejection from a man he’d been gaga over for… fuck. For his entire adult life?

  “Well, hell.” He sloshed through the last puddle and plopped onto the bench next to Cobalt.

  “Preston, I wish you would understand. New York is going to be hell. Calvin is going to be the devil incarnate when he figures out I’m not there because of him. Learning to dance again is going to—”

  “Shush.”

  Cobalt’s eyes got wide, and he stared at Preston.

  “I have a lot to say, and I need you to listen to it all before you say anything back.”

  “Should I take notes?”

  Preston turned to capture his face and keep his attention. “Maybe you should, wiseass. Because there are going to be parts of this you had damn well better remember when you are almost a thousand kilometers away. If you need to write them down in red lipstick and eyeliner, then do that. Just make sure it’s the waterproof kind.”

  “What do you even know about waterproof makeup?” Cobalt asked in a breathy, sweet voice.

  Preston kissed him quiet, gratified to feel Cobalt give under the pressure of lips and the hand on his jaw. When he had let out a soft, heated breath and the tension in his body eased, Preston backed off.

  “You listening?”

  Cobalt nodded.

  “Calvin? He’s gone.”

  Cobalt blinked, then nodded. “Yes.”

  “I mean gone gone. Anything he left in your house, you bring back to him on this trip, and he never comes near you again.”

  “You can make that call?”

  “I just did.”

  Cobalt’s smile was angelic and calm. “Okay.”

  “That’s it?”

  “He’s very bad for me.”

  Preston snorted. “You think?”

  “It’s like… kids, you know? When a couple has kids
in common and letting go is harder than it should be? The virus became a thing that tied us together, and I lost perspective. I thought… I don’t even know what I thought.”

  Placing a finger over Cobalt’s lips to quiet him, Preston waited.

  “S-forry.” Cobalt spoke from behind the muffle. “Shutting up,” he whispered as Preston removed his finger.

  “First of all, that’s so wrong I don’t even have words. But I’m not you, I’m not pos, and I don’t have to understand. I said I would back you.” He smiled. “Stand by you. At your side, like a proper boyfriend. That’s what I will do. If I can’t be in New York with you—which is what I want, but I get that you need to do this alone—then I’ll be here. I’ll look after your dog and your house and your life while you go do what you have to do, and when you come home, it won’t be to a hovel just this side of hell. It’ll be a little bit of peace and calm and whatever else you need it to be.” He dropped his hand from cupping Cobalt’s face and placed it serenely in his lap, determined not to let his pounding heart dictate the tone of this conversation.

  Right now Cobalt needed him to be in control and calm. He needed grounding and reassurance, and that was fine. Preston was a star at calm and controlled.

  Cobalt swallowed hard, making his prominent Adam’s apple bob. “Az really wants me to take you with me. For you to drive me around and look out for me.”

  “I’m sure he does.”

  “But you don’t want to come.”

  Moving slowly, like he might with a skittish animal, Preston lifted his hand and cupped it around the back of Cobalt’s neck. He pulled Cobalt in for a deep, hungry kiss, letting every bit of the possessive, protective, demanding feelings in his heart flood the touch. When he moved away again, they were both breathing hard.

  “When you stopped dancing, you stopped living, Coby. You holed up in that hovel and eked out survival, but the best, brightest parts of you shut down. I thought you were going to curl in around yourself until you vanished.”

  “That why you brought me Chance?”

  Preston shrugged. Chance had been a collaborative effort between Azure and himself, and they had hoped the dog would give Cobalt something to worry about outside his own troubles. It seemed to have worked to some degree. He had opened up a bit after that, and eventually began to sneak out of himself and back into the world. But it had been slow progress, a step into the light, and then three into darkness with every one of Calvin’s visits.

  “I can’t help you dance. And I can’t follow you around New York protecting you from all the things dancing does to you. Not all of it is bad, and you’re the only one who can choose to accept the good parts over the bad.”

  “Cal being the bad.”

  “Cal. And the media, and the stress. I can make you a home, though, and be there whenever you need it.”

  “And you’ll just wait? Right now they want me to understudy Cal. I don’t know why, exactly, though I have my suspicions. I don’t even know if it will last once they see me dance now. I’m not what I was.”

  Preston had a momentary urge to stop that kind of talk, but then, when had he ever been a proponent of backing off the truth? Exactly never. And Cobalt was a force of nature, both on and off the stage, but what had once been an unstoppable, icy whirlwind was now something more like a ferocious but less refined tropical storm. Preston would take him either way, but the ballet world might not.

  “And you have to remember,” Cobalt was still talking, “if they end up wanting me to tour with them, I could be gone months at a time. For years. It could be a long time before we—well. Whatever we do, it could be a long time before we do it.”

  Preston chuckled. “What do you think I’ve been doing since you left to dance the first time, Cobalt?”

  “Sorry?”

  “I’ve been waiting, Coby. Most of the time, I tried to pretend I wasn’t. I tried to fake my way through a few meaningless affairs and convenient acquaintances who liked the kind of control I crave, but all I was really doing was waiting for you to see me.”

  “And now I don’t know where else to look.”

  “I would love to say you don’t have to look anyplace else.” Preston leaned away, needing space and perspective, but he kept tight hold of Cobalt’s hand. “But perhaps the mirror is the best place to start.”

  “I already know what I’ll see there,” Cobalt muttered.

  The tone of his trite comment bit into Preston’s heart. “I don’t think you do, actually.” He caressed Cobalt’s cheek, sad that his dancer was staring down at the dog now, and no longer into his eyes. “And that’s exactly why you need to do this on your own.”

  Cobalt curled a lip, and Preston recognized his attempt to fit his icy mask over the vulnerability. It was, apparently, one thing to talk about what he might do about improving his life and himself. Quite another to get anywhere near how he felt about himself.

  “Don’t you dare,” Preston said softly, flicking the pad of one finger over that curling lip. “No hiding behind your princely cool.”

  “I can do what I want. You just said I’m going to have to do it myself anyway. So you don’t get a say in how.”

  “I do.” Preston pulled him back around, trying to get him to look up again. “I get to make rules that you have to follow, because that’s how we work.”

  “Says who?” Cobalt lifted his chin. His eyes flashed and he jutted his jaw.

  His defiance brought a grin to Preston’s lips. It was life that, less than a year ago, he had almost despaired of seeing in Cobalt’s eyes again. “Says both of us. If you didn’t want me to challenge you, you wouldn’t rise to it when I do.”

  Cobalt scowled but didn’t argue.

  “I’m going to want things from you, Coby. I’m going to push you to do things you’re not sure you want to do, or that scare you. I’m not a bully. I’m not pushing to see you fall over, like Cal does. I’m pushing because I love you, and I want you to love me back, but you can’t do that if you don’t have faith in yourself. If you don’t believe you deserve to be loved. No. Don’t.”

  Cobalt had begun tearing up.

  Preston leaned in and kissed each eyelid in turn. Of course, that only forced the tears down Cobalt’s cheeks, and Preston felt like an idiot for making him cry.

  “You deserve to be loved, Coby. And you deserve to dance, and you have to know that. You deserve to love yourself, and that has to be the first thing.”

  Cobalt sniffed and nodded, though his lashes fluttered and Preston could feel him shaking. “I want you to come with me. I want that so bad.”

  “And you know I can’t.”

  “I’m not who I was when the entire dance world loved me. I was tough and cold and nothing touched me. I could survive then.” He shook his head. “I am so not that guy now.”

  “Good, because I’m not going to lie. That guy was a bit of a jerk.”

  Cobalt laughed and sniffed.

  “But I get why you had to be him back then. You were alone. You aren’t now.”

  “That should make me less scared, shouldn’t it?”

  “And it will, once you learn to trust it. But you have to learn to trust yourself first. Then me. It’ll take time, and no one can do it for you.”

  “Stop being right and just hold on to me.”

  Easy enough. Preston folded him tight against his chest. He wanted to go with Cobalt, to shelter him and keep the vultures—and Cal—far away from him. Selfishly, though, he also wanted a lover who was whole and confident enough not to need that from him.

  “It’s going to be okay,” he assured Cobalt. “You’ll see.”

  “Where’s your crystal ball?”

  Preston kissed his hair and pulled the scent of him deep inside. “Don’t need one. I know you can do this.”

  Cobalt sighed. “I want to go home.”

  “As you wish.” Another kiss to his hair, and then Cobalt moved out of his arms, gathered the dog’s leash, then rose without another word.

&nbs
p; Chapter 17

  SWEAT DRIBBLED down the side of Cobalt’s face as he plunked the last box on top of the pile on the porch. He glanced overhead one more time, wanting to be sure the entire pile was underneath the eaves and out of the weather.

  “Don’t worry so much,” Preston assured him. “I made sure the pile was in a good place. I’m asshole enough not to care if his stuff gets ruined. But practical enough to know everyone is better off if he gets all of it back intact.”

  “So burning it is out of the question, then,” Cobalt muttered, swiping at the trickle of wet on his cheek.

  “If only because giving him an opening to freak out over a pile of crap he doesn’t even care about isn’t worth the small amount of satisfaction.” Preston took Cobalt’s hand and tugged. “Trust me, the payoff will be ten times as good when you see his face as you dump it all off at his place and then leave.”

  Cobalt nodded and sank against the pillowy comfort of Preston’s body. It was nice to have so solid a man to lean on. He liked that his own angles and too-sharp points had this mountain of cuddling man to swaddle them. Cal wasn’t a cuddler, and his hard-muscled body had never been a good fit for Cobalt’s long planes and protrusions. Snaking an arm around Preston’s waist, Cobalt rested his head on Preston’s shoulder. “You’re going to be there for that dumping-off part,” he ordered.

  Preston squeezed him. “As your driver, yes. And on that day, you can order me around all you want.” He pushed Cobalt away from his body and lifted his chin so Cobalt had to look him in the eye. “Az found you a perfectly nice place, so once we dump this lot, I’ll take you there.”

  “Because you still want to make sure it’s suitable.”

  “Heat in the rads, triple glazing on the windows, locks on the doors.” He kissed Cobalt, and his taste was at once sweet and steely. Cobalt opened his mouth to let Preston’s tongue explore. Who even cared what they had been talking about? His breath leaked away, and he would happily have gone on kissing into eternity.