The manager’s face went carefully blank, while the other stranger wasn’t quite as successful at hiding his shock. He’d likely recognized Andrew as the widower whose wife’s funeral had been a few days ago. Just great. Fucking fantastic.
Suppressing the cowardly urge to run back into the room and slam the door shut—it was a little too late for that—Andrew found himself frozen, unsure what to do, hysteria and embarrassment warring inside his chest. What should he do? How soon would the rumors spread?
His eyes locked with Logan’s inscrutable dark eyes.
After a moment, Logan walked back to him, shrugging out of his suit jacket. He draped it over Andrew’s shoulders, the jacket big enough to cover Andrew’s thighs too. “Sorry, I should have left you a change of clothes,” Logan said, his voice loud enough to reach the other men’s ears. “The coffee completely ruined yours, I’m afraid.”
Andrew blinked at him stupidly before realizing what Logan was attempting to do. He was giving him a somewhat plausible explanation for his state of undress. He was giving him a way out.
The rush of gratitude that washed over him was nearly overwhelming.
Andrew nodded numbly, feeling relieved, grateful, and—
But as soon as Logan stepped back, the panic was back. His hand shot out and grabbed Logan’s wrist—he barely stopped himself from grabbing his hand. Don’t go.
Logan looked back at him, something like surprise flashing across his face. His dark eyes were a little softer now.
“I’m not leaving,” he said, his voice quieter. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. I promise.”
Andrew felt as though his face was burning. Was he really that transparent? That pathetic?
Giving a clipped nod, Andrew released his wrist and stepped back into the room.
He closed the door and leaned against it.
When had he become such a needy wreck? It hadn’t been this bad even on the island—at least he didn’t think it had been. Granted, in the past few months on the island, he had spent practically every minute with Logan, so there hadn’t really been an opportunity to miss him and be clingy. The one time he’d woken up and found Logan gone—he remembered Logan holding him tightly and rubbing his back as Andrew clung to him like an octopus—it had freaked him out at the time, but it hadn’t happened again, with Logan always warning him before he went away.
Andrew ran a hand over his warm face, shaking his head in bewilderment. Maybe he really needed a therapist. Maybe he should ask Logan to take him to a therapist—
Fucking hell. He really needed help.
Sighing, Andrew shrugged off Logan’s jacket and headed to the ensuite.
A hot shower made him feel a little more like a human being. He was just finishing getting dressed when the door opened and Logan entered the room.
They stared at each other, Andrew’s hands going still on the button of his shirt.
Logan was the one to break the silence. “You don’t have to worry about my employees. They won’t talk.”
“I’m not worried,” Andrew said.
The look Logan shot him was skeptical, but he didn’t argue.
They stared at each other some more.
It was strange. They’d spent an entire day in bed, not an inch between them, having sex pretty much nonstop like animals in mating season, and yet as soon as the haze of want was gone, there was this wary tension between them that refused to go away. They were two very different men who knew each other inside and out. They were somehow too intimate and too apart at the same time. It was a paradox. And it drove Andrew crazy. This need inside him, this need for Logan’s closeness, was the scariest thing he’d ever felt, but at the same time it felt like the most natural thing in the world to need him. It really fucking messed with his head.
“I need to see a therapist,” Andrew said.
Logan’s dark brows furrowed. “Now?”
“Yes,” Andrew said firmly. He hesitated. “Will you go with me?”
He hoped he sounded neutral instead of pleading, but judging by the softening of Logan’s expression, he had failed.
Logan nodded and reached for his jacket.
***
Dr. Gillian Black was a middle-aged woman with a pleasant, friendly demeanor.
She invited Andrew and Logan to sit down on the comfy couch in her equally comfy office. She listened without interrupting as Andrew stumbled his way through the explanation of their problem.
Logan was silent at his side, his knee almost brushing Andrew’s. Almost. Andrew shouldn’t have been so fixated on the inch that separated their knees. It shouldn’t have distracted him so much, but it did, and he kept losing his train of thought, because the need to have Logan a little closer was eating at him.
Finally, Andrew finished talking, and silence fell over the room.
“Well, the issue is rather obvious,” Dr. Gillian said at last, watching them with her sharp gray eyes. “You went through a very difficult experience together. You were isolated from the world for nearly a year. Codependency is to be expected in such circumstances.”