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“I’m not.”
Delightfully relaxed, he leans back on his palms and nods thoughtfully.
“I think it’s pretty obvious I’m gay. I wasn’t exactly subtle when I talked about my ex.”
I shrug. “I never assume anything.”
“I do,” he says and smiles in a self-deprecating way that’s endearing as all hell. “I should know better.”
“I’ll give you a pass considering I’ve never told anyone except the men I’ve hooked up with.”
“So you’re in the closet? Wes—”
“Yeah,” I interrupt with a chuckle. “He knows. He’s always worked for me, never for Jim, who is the only person I didn’t want to find out, so I never hid it from him.”
“So you’re . . . bi?”
I tilt my head from side to side because it’s not a simple yes or no answer.
“I’ve never liked labels,” I admit. “Everyone I’ve ever met has labeled me. Trust fund baby, jock, fratboy, idiot, deadbeat . . . I figure that if people want to label me without even knowing me, there’s no point in me labeling myself. I’m attracted to whoever I’m attracted to, and in spite of Jim, I’ve never been ashamed or shy about approaching those people.
“Sure, I’ve had to hide sometimes, because Jim would probably have burned down everything our family built rather than leave it to a queer son. If he’d ever found out, he would’ve, at the very least, sent me to a conversion camp. He didn’t have a religious bone in his body, but he used all the tools available to exercise his bigotry. Hell, he’d have planned a sting operation to get me locked up, but my sisters made sure I knew from the moment I realized I didn’t only like girls that I needed to be careful.
“They made sure Wes knew to protect me if it ever got out, because they wanted me to get the inheritance, wanted me—a man they raised to be good and kind and loyal—to grow the family legacy and make it something we can all be proud of.”
“That sounds kind of—”
“Manipulative?” I interrupt with a soft chuckle and shrug again. “They can be really good at it when they want to be, but that implies lying, and they’ve never lied to me, not once. Not even when they could’ve potentially gained a place in Jim’s will for it.”
Sunny breathes out harshly.
It’s a hard fact to swallow, the way my family works, and I don’t actually want to overwhelm him, so I try to quickly close out the subject.
“I still got around plenty in school, in college. My teammates all might’ve hated me, but the rest of the students loved me. Not for any good reason, but still.” I shrug carelessly. “I never lacked for opportunities since I was the star hockey player—at least every year that Lex wasn’t on the team—and rich on top of that. I’m hot enough, I suppose, and I gained a reputation for always making sure fucking was fun for everyone involved.”
Sunny smirks.
“That’s good to know, even if it’s a low bar.”
I shrug again.
“It’s the world we live in, and I made sure I enjoyed every second too. On top of all that, I actually had game.”
I wiggle my eyebrows to make him laugh again. I like his laugh.
“I used to have game too,” he murmurs. “College was fun.” He lets out a quick laugh. “My siblings say I got all my whore out in four years.”
“Did you now?” I ask, going for flirty, and damn if he doesn’t blush. Fuck he’s pretty.
“Maybe, maybe not.” He shrugs and puts on an air of nonchalance. “We’ll find out, I guess.”
“Only if I’m lucky.”
I wink and his blush deepens.
I make it home early the next day solely for the purpose of getting another twenty uninterrupted minutes with Sunny.
This morning his face was completely emotionless when he came into the kitchen. He let me know over breakfast that Hannah would be picking him up and that her and Barry’s baby shower is this weekend.
