We Have Till Dawn

I hoped he wanted me to. The more sex, the better. It would save me from accidentally filling the silence with chitchat.

As soon as Gideon joined me and closed the door, the driver pulled away from the curb. The light in the car faded, and I was struck by a sense of awkwardness that I didn’t like. I wasn’t used to it. I wouldn’t say I was the most confident guy out there, but I didn’t take myself too seriously, and I was pretty easygoing.

Fuck, it was my job to make Gideon comfortable here.

I cleared my throat. “How was your day?”

That was innocent enough, and he could get away with a simple “Good.”

“Long. Way too long.” He drummed his fingers restlessly against his knee and peered out the window, making it abundantly clear that he felt the awkwardness too. “Lunch was inedible, and dinner wasn’t much better.”

I bit my tongue, literally. I wanted to ask him shit. I wanted to offer a shoulder if he needed one.

“Are you hungry?” I wondered.

He shook his head quickly and faced me. “Before you ask a second question, it’s customary for me to ask how your day was. So. How was your day?”

I smiled, because I couldn’t not. I thought he carried himself well and fit into our “normal” society most of the time, but whenever his peculiarities made themselves known, my sappy heart melted a little.

“It was good.” I reached over the middle seat and grabbed his hand, threading our fingers together. “I did this and that, went here and there, and my lunch was awesome. So was my dinner.”

I’d taken Nonna to Sahadi’s for some shopping after a short day at work, and then I’d had dinner at her place while she had gossiped about people in the neighborhood.

Gideon stared at our hands and brushed his thumb over my knuckles. “You’re comfortable with me.”

That wasn’t what I’d expected to hear. I cocked my head at him and wondered where his mind was at. Which…well, based on our brief history together, he was rarely mellow or in balance. I’d experienced him with anxiety and discomfort; I’d been with him when he was hard as a rock and thinking only of sex, and, recently, I’d seen him grin and chuckle, often when we were balls deep in cuddling and fighting off the cobwebs of sleep. But other than those precious moments, he alternated between horny and on edge, so it was close to impossible to guess his thoughts.

“I’m testing the waters,” I corrected carefully. “I poke to see if now’s a good time to push a limit or break a rule.”

He frowned at me. “Why do you want to push my limits? That’s not nice.”

Heh. Yeah, well… No, he was right. It wasn’t nice of me. “I’m curious about you,” I admitted. “I like our chemistry and…” Fuck. What was I doing? Soon as I heard myself uttering those words, I knew I’d crossed a line. My own damn line. I was getting invested. “I’m sorry.” I rubbed a hand over my mouth and glanced out the window. We were heading south along the west side. We’d just passed Chelsea Park. “I’ll be on my best behavior from now on, I promise.” I squeezed his hand but couldn’t look his way yet.

It was rattling.

At the same time, there was an honest indifference within me that went, “So fucking what?”

So fucking what if I was genuinely interested in him? It happened.

“Change of plans,” Gideon said abruptly. “Please take us to the corner of East 64th and Park.”

My eyebrows flew up, and I turned toward him. What would we do on the Upper East Side? Considering our original direction, I had been leaning more toward the adult store option. The Village was full of ’em. But up by Central Park…? The only thing that belonged there was Gideon himself. He could probably afford a condo there.

“To answer your second question, I am, in fact, hungry,” he told me tightly. And quietly. He was uncomfortable and restless again. His knee bounced, and his grip on my hand bordered on painful.

I played along for now. “What are you in the mood for?”

“French fries,” he stated frankly. “I haven’t had any yet this week.”

It was Tuesday.

It was best to roll with the punches, because if he was in the mood for fries and had to go halfway across Manhattan to get some, he had very specific needs.

“I have a minor obsession,” he muttered, facing the window. I stifled my amusement as best as I could. “Now you share something insignificant about yourself.”

A flurry of excitement flew through me, and it made me shake my head to myself. This wasn’t good, any of it. It was a two-month thing, and we only had five weeks left. A little less than that, even. But fuck it, right?