“You smell so —” Ruxs paused.
Green didn’t interrupt, he waited, wanted him to finish. He watched his partner shake his head as if jarring his thoughts and step away from him.
Ruxs cleared his throat. He moved to the other side of the kitchen and began to put his wallet and badge in his pants. “We better get going. We have to put in our hours at the shooting range today and go back to talk to JJ.”
Green watched Ruxs with bewilderment. Damn, this behavior was getting confusing. He wasn’t new to lust. His partner was looking at him like he’d never seen him before… never smelled him before. Does he know I’m bisexual? Their sexuality had never really been an issue or topic of conversation. They’d always dated women, but neither of them having time to get into anything too serious. Their jobs had hectic schedules and quite frankly were too dangerous for most people to stomach. It would be just another typical day in the office if they were running and dodging bullets in a crack neighborhood. But they loved that about each other. He loved how fucking crazy his partner was. Wait, this is Ruxs. Uber macho, I love to fuck girls, Ruxs. I’m being ridiculous. I need to get fuckin’ laid myself. I’m imagining shit now.
“You going to get JJ out of here soon?” Green asked, putting on his own hardware and grabbing his keys before meeting Ruxs at the front door.
Ruxs just nodded his head, yes. “We need to go by his job before the range. I have to let him know how this is going to work.”
“Cool. Should be an easy day for us.” Green led them out the door to his truck, waving at the building owner on his way.
They were back to waiting on JJ to make his route to the back of the strip mall he did security for. Ruxs’d been pretty quiet on the ride there, only answering Green’s questions here and there. He was trying to work up his nerve to say what he needed to say to his partner. He didn’t know if he should just ask him out, but that would be stupid, they were always out together. Green wouldn’t think anything was different about that.
“You’re awfully quiet. Thought you felt better today,” Green mumbled, still staring at his phone screen while they sat in the truck.
“I’m fine.” Ruxs’ voice was gruff. “Just a little tired, I guess.”
“You still want to go play catch with Curtis? I can take you home after we finish the shooting range, so you can rest.” Green turned to look at him. Ruxs was sure he looked crazy right now because his mouth was hanging open. Green never mentioned taking him home or wanted him to go home. Ruxs hated his place. It was shitty, and dark, and nothing to do there. He didn’t even have cable. He’d shaken his head, trying to think of the right question to ask Green when he dropped his bomb.
“I got a date tonight.” Green smiled broadly, waving his phone in his hand.
Is that what he’d been doing the last fifty minutes while they’d been sitting there? Texting and setting up a date with some chick? Ruxs felt like his chest was on fire. He was angry. Here he was thinking that Green had to be picking up on his changes in behavior towards him. The longing looks, the extra touches. He thought Green was okay with the direction they were going. His partner wasn’t dumb by any means, so Ruxs could only assume that Green had hurriedly set up a date to let him know that he wasn’t interested in what Ruxs was selling. He didn’t want him. Ruxs brought his hand up to the back of his neck to squeeze and quickly changed it to adjusting his collar because Green knew he did that when he was upset.
“You got a date,” Ruxs said incredulously, trying to sound normal. “Just now.”
“Yeah. Well, this girl had given me her number a while ago. She’s a forensics analyst in Buckhead. Ran into her on the Charleston bust… you remember. Dark hair, kind of tall, brown eyes. She talked to us for a while.”
Ruxs was shaking his head no, but hell yes he remembered. Goddammit. That was like six months ago. He’d got her number? What the fuck? He also remembered how attractive she was. Shit.
“Well anyway.” Green put his phone in the center console, continuing his attack on Ruxs’ mental state. “I messaged her about a half-hour ago. She said she remembered me and would love to go out tonight. I figured since you are obviously getting back out there, maybe I should too.”
“What?” Ruxs yelled. “I’m not out there!”
“Dude, you just had a date… remember?” Green narrowed his eyes at him.