Heat Stroke (Beach Kingdom 2)

Marcus tapped his fingers on his thigh. So he had a man crush. Didn’t males get those on each other all the time? There were entire football stadiums of dudes wearing their heroes’ jerseys, chanting their names and mooning over them on flat-screen televisions. And Marcus occasionally jerked off while thinking of Jamie’s mouth. Or the way his dark hair sometimes fell over his forehead. Or the way his triceps winked when he slid a drink across the bar.

Same thing.

Sweat broke out across Marcus’s forehead and it had nothing to do with the sun beating down on him from the cloudless blue sky above. This infatuation with Jamie…it wasn’t the same thing as a man crush, was it? He might have gotten away with bullshitting himself at the beginning of the summer, but the more time he spent with Jamie, the more he kind of needed to be around him. Marcus couldn’t explain it. If a day passed without him seeing Jamie, it wasn’t complete.

“Jesus,” he muttered, rubbing the back of his neck. “Snap out of it, Diesel.”

Thing was, Marcus had told himself to cut it out before. He’d ordered himself to start picking up girls and bringing them home again, but over the last few years, he’d just lost his enthusiasm for the dating game. Getting a chick’s number used to be his sole mission in life and now he couldn’t even spare an appreciative glance at the lifeguard in the next chair. And she was seriously hot. If Marcus’s brother was there, he would be ridiculing him to no end for taking this long to run game on a girl.

Marcus caught her smiling over at him and gave a weak wave.

Why did waving suddenly feel unfaithful?

Okay. Pull it together, man.

Even if he was into dudes, which he was not…Jamie Prince was way out of his league. Not only did Jamie look like he could be on billboards modeling Armani underwear, he read books thicker than Marcus’s johnson—and that was saying something. During the rest of the year, Jamie was an economics teacher. Yeah, the middle Prince brother was way overqualified to be working on the beach, and word among the other lifeguards was he only did it to make sure his hothead, ex-con younger brother stayed out of trouble. Although Rory had calmed way down since he’d gotten into a relationship. Way down.

Did that mean Jamie wouldn’t lifeguard next summer?

Marcus swallowed a fistful of panic.

It didn’t matter. First of all, totally not gay. Second of all, Jamie obviously didn’t even want to be friends with him, let alone…other stuff that Marcus definitely didn’t want to do.

So it was fine. It was fine.

Jamie’s voice crackled over the walkie-talkie and Marcus’s spine straightened. The public channel. He could hear it echoing from the chair closest to his, too. “Andrew, this old hippie literally just rolled a suitcase of sparklers onto the beach and appears to be selling them. Should I congratulate him on his giant nuts or bring the man down on his head?”

Marcus laughed into a fist. Man, Jamie was funny. And smart as shit. He looked especially brainy when he wore his glasses, but when he was lifeguarding, he wore contact lenses. Which was nice, because nothing was blocking his eyes from view—

“I’ll call it in,” Andrew crackled back. “Keep him in your sights for now.”

“Roger that.”

Before Marcus knew what he was doing, he switched to a private line and radioed Jamie. “Hey Jamie.”

A sigh came back. “Hey Diesel.”

The loneliness he’d been bogged down in went away. Just like that. “You must miss me, right? The distance is killing you.”

“Yes, Marcus. ‘Morning without you is dwindled dawn.’”

“Is that from one of your brainy books?”

“It’s Dickinson.”

“Christ, Jamie. Always with dick on the brain.”

A long pause. “Why do I let you get away with that shit?”

Marcus frowned. “What shit?”

Another static-laced sigh. “Never mind. What do you want?”

“Let’s make a bet.”

“No.”

“Afraid you’ll lose?”

“Ha.”

Marcus should have said never mind and closed the channel of communication. Every time he was around Jamie, shit got more and more confusing. For instance, right now, his cock was hard as a fucking rock inside his red swim trunks and he refused to admit his boner had everything to do with the gruff, sarcastic voice coming through his radio. If he was hard for a dude…he didn’t know himself anymore. His father and brother sure as hell wouldn’t know him. They might not even want to know him. Not to mention his friends at the gym who worked out every day specifically so they could get laid easier. With girls. Girls seemed to be the main topic of discussion everywhere he went. At home with his family. At the gym. On the internet.

Men who liked men were never in the mix. It simply wasn’t discussed as an option among the people he knew. Ever. If he ever broached the subject, his friends would probably be weird about it. No, they definitely would. Everyone in his world followed the same pattern—work, lift, party, eat, sleep—he would be like a giant glop of ink on a white canvas.