Total pages in book: 65
Estimated words: 63481 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63481 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 317(@200wpm)___ 254(@250wpm)___ 212(@300wpm)
He told himself he wasn’t disappointed when Will’s footsteps receded. He really wasn’t. Just because he sometimes jerked off thinking about his bodyguard didn’t mean that he had, like, feelings for him. Kinky fantasies were one thing. Reality was completely another. He used to jerk off thinking about Henry Cavill; didn’t mean he thought he had any chance with the real man. The same logic applied here; so it didn’t mean anything. What he needed to do was to stop freaking out about harmless fantasies and finally arrange his second date with Scott—the man he was actually interested in. The man he was practically in love with. Scott could be his happiness.
Will could never be something other than a fantasy.
Chapter 15
Contrary to Will’s belief, Scott Palmer wasn’t an idiot.
He’d always had good instincts.
He sensed that something was off as soon as they got on the yacht, and as the evening progressed, the sense of disquiet kept getting stronger.
Like, Scott was hot. It wasn’t just his ego; it was an objective fact. He knew he was hot, and other people knew it too. It was very rare that people’s gazes weren’t drawn to him whenever he entered the room. When he and Gadiel had first met, Gadiel had been no different from other people, his appreciative gaze difficult to miss.
But now...
Gadiel didn’t give his body more than a passing glance. Since they had gotten on the yacht, Gadiel hadn’t tried to touch him in any way. Sure, they weren’t exactly alone; the yacht had a crew. But they stayed out of the way. It wouldn’t have been impossible for them to get some time alone—had Will not been there too.
Yeah, about that.
Scott had picked up on the tension between his cousin and Gadiel straight away. Gadiel seemed angry with Will, pointedly not looking at him all evening—except he kept shooting Will quick looks whenever Will wasn’t looking his way. Which wasn’t often, because Will’s eyes had been practically boring a hole in Gadiel’s face since the beginning of the date. That in itself was strange enough. Scott had seen Will at work before: he was great at making himself as unobtrusive as it was possible for a six-foot-tall man to be, his gaze rarely resting directly on his clients in order to make them feel more at ease. This fixed, intense stare definitely wasn’t Will’s usual behavior at work.
“Okay, am I missing something?” Scott finally said over dinner, sick of the tension he didn’t understand. He didn’t like conflict. He’d never liked being around angry people. “Did Will do something, Gady?”
In his peripheral vision, Scott could see Will scoff at the nickname, but he ignored it, keeping an expectant gaze on Gadiel. He was the one more likely to talk.
Gadiel pursed his lips. “I just found out that he was a liar.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Will said. “I’m the one who told you the truth! It makes no sense that you refuse to talk to me but are totally fine talking to him.”
“That’s different,” Gadiel said, without looking at Will.
“I still don’t see a fucking difference,” Will bit out.
Scott blinked, stunned. His cousin rarely swore, much less at work.
“Wait,” he said. “Is this about...?”
Will glowered at him. “Yes. It’s about your bright idea to not tell him that we’re related. I told him the truth, and now he’s pissed. But not at you. Me.”
Well.
While it was a relief to know that Gadiel wasn’t angry with him for their little deception, it was perplexing that he was angry with Will.
“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here,” Gadiel hissed, scowling at Will before flushing and averting his gaze. “Go away.”
“You’re the one who wanted me here,” Will said tersely.
“That was before I found out that you were a lying asshole with an agenda!”
“That’s rich coming from a—”
“Um, guys?”
“Stay out of it,” Will bit off, barely glancing at Scott before going back to boring a hole in Gadiel’s face with his eyes. “You are being ridiculous, and you know it.”
“I know no such thing.”
“You’ve barely looked at me for three days,” Will said.
Gadiel glared at him. “And that matters to you why exactly? You’ve been just pretending to be my bodyguard so that your cousin could get laid.”
A muscle jumped in Will’s jaw. He pushed his plate away and got to his feet. “I’ll be on the lower deck if you decide to finally stop acting like a big baby.” And he stalked away.
“Screw you!”
As Will disappeared out of sight, Gadiel’s scowl transformed into something dejected and unhappy. He stabbed his fork into a piece of salad on his plate.
Scott cleared his throat. “Well, that was uncomfortable,” he said, trying not to show that he was more than a little peeved. Frankly, he wasn’t used to not being the center of attention. He and Gadiel had barely talked tonight, with Gadiel distracted and uncharacteristically moody. The whole thing was irritating as hell, considering the fact that Will’s entire purpose here was to help him get together with Gadiel instead of distracting and frustrating him—or whatever the hell this tension between them was.