All In (Firsts and Forever 2)

“How long have your parents had that thing?”

“About twelve years.” I swung a particularly heavy bag into the truck bed.

Dante stopped what he was doing and looked at me. “Your parents got that thing when you were a kid? And then they kept it, even after it started terrorizing their son?”

“Really? That surprises you? My parents threw out their only child and all of his stuff, just because I had the audacity to be honest with them and tell them I was gay.” I swung another bag into the truck. “My mother loves that dog. No way was she getting rid of him.”

“That’s epically fucked up,” Dante muttered.

“Welcome to my world.”

When we were both seated in the cab of my pickup, Dante turned to me and said, “I don’t know about you, but I’m starving. Want to grab something to go and take it back to your apartment? That way we can eat right after we haul all your stuff inside.”

“Good idea. Where should we go?”

“We’re only a few blocks from Flannigan’s. We could swing by there and pick up some of my grandmother’s pasta with marinara.”

“Nolan’s,” I corrected. “And what do you mean, your grandmother’s pasta?”

“I put a dish on the menu when I owned that place, before Dmitri cheated at cards and won it from me,” Dante told me as I started the truck and rolled down the alley. His door swung open, and he cursed and slammed it shut a couple times.

“I’d forgotten that the bar was yours for a while. How long did you own it?”

“Just six months. It was a pain in the ass. The profit margin was too small for the number of hours it took to run the place properly. That’s why I let Dmitri win it from me. I was glad to get rid of it.”

I pulled up in the back alley behind Nolan’s and parked illegally, and he took my hand as we went in the employee entrance. Dante greeted the cooks by name, and placed a to go order through the pass-through window. He still acted like he owned the place.

And then he swung me around and pinned me to the wall, and kissed me gently. He laced his fingers with mine and pulled my hands up and pinned them to the wall too, one on either side of my head.

“This is a lot of PDA,” I murmured, feeling the color rise in my cheeks.

“You’re already out at work. Everyone knows you’re Jamie’s ex,” Dante said. “And besides, this isn’t ‘public’ per se. It’s not like I’m sexually molesting you out in the dining room.” He kissed me again, more deeply this time.

I noticed movement out of the corner of my eye and turned my head to look at Dmitri, who’d just come out of the office. He assessed the situation quickly with raised eyebrows, then smiled and said, “Hi guys. Don’t tell me, let me guess. You’re here for the spaghetti, aren’t you, Dante?”

“Hi Dmitri,” he said with a friendly grin. “Of course I am. And if you ever take it off the menu, I’m going to kick your ass.” Embarrassingly enough, Dante kept me pinned to the wall during this little exchange, my hands still up beside my head.

“Good luck with that,” Dmitri told him, but he said it affectionately. The two were old friends. He turned and went back through the door.

Not five seconds later, Jamie poked his head out of the office and stared at me. Apparently Dmitri had ‘told on me’ and Jamie had come to see this for himself. Dante was busy kissing my neck, so I knit my brows at my ex over the top of Dante’s head and tried to will Jamie to go away.

Jamie mouthed the word, “Really?” He thought Dante was seriously bad news, so this wasn’t sitting well with him.

I rolled my eyes at him and said nothing. After a moment, Jamie frowned and ducked back into his office.

Cole was up next, coming to the pass-through to pick up an order. “Hey, you’re back,” he said to me. “Hi, Mr. Dombruso.”

“Hi Cole,” Dante replied, before kissing and nibbling my earlobe. As if this all wasn’t embarrassing enough, my cock leapt to attention at the thing he was doing to my ear. Who knew those two body parts were hardwired together?

“You’re still here,” I said to Cole lightly, even as my face burned with a ferocious blush.

“Yeah. Well, you know, after earning a whopping fourteen dollars during the lunch shift, I gladly agreed to stay and work a second shift when Ruby called in sick.” Cole leaned forward and tilted his head a couple inches to observe what Dante was doing to my ear. Then he looked at me and grinned. If embarrassment was lethal, someone would be making my funeral arrangements right about now. His food came up, and Cole grabbed a couple plates and headed back to the dining room with a cheerful, “Have fun, you two.”