Pulling Away

hapter 1 Noah Riggins wondered if he ought to just walk into Charlie Banks’ house or knock. He’d been standing outside the closed door for a good three to four minutes thinking about it. He’d known Charlie practically all their lives. They’d grown up in the same neighborhood, gone to the same schools. They hadn’t been best friends or anything. They were the kind of friends you did stuff with when your normal friends weren’t available. In truth, Charlie had been popular when they were kids. Good looking and athletic, he’d been a pitcher on the high school baseball team. Noah hadn’t been unpopular, but they’d definitely had a different set of friends. Now, as adults, they both owned the houses they’d grown up in. Noah’s mother and stepfather had sold him the house when they retired to Arizona. Whatever their relationship growing up had been, it had changed recently. In the five years since high school they’d both come out as gay. It had shocked the hell out of Noah when Charlie came out. He didn’t guess it had surprised anyone about himself, though. Anyway, Noah’s relationship with Charlie had changed last weekend when they’d had, what was to Noah at any rate, mind-blowing s*x. It had been fantastic. He couldn’t even remember who’d made the first move. He’d been at Charlie’s house, in the kitchen, and before he knew it, they were going at each other. And they’d had s*x two times since then. Of course, they hadn’t really talked about it, but to Noah, Charlie was sort of his boyfriend now. Wasn’t he? So should he knock or just walk in? Noah sighed, pushed his eyeglasses back into place, and knocked on the solid oak door. “Yeah, come in,” Charlie’s muffled voice called from within. Noah turned the knob and entered the front hall of Charlie’s house. The house was fairly dark. Charlie didn’t turn on many lights. He could see Charlie sitting at the desk in the corner of the front room. He found a switch nearby and flicked it, illuminating the living room. Charlie glanced at him briefly, before turning his attention back to the computer screen. “Hey, thanks, I’ve been meaning to turn that on.” Noah clicked on a lamp nearby. “I know you like living like a mole, but I like light.” “Hmm.” Noah sat down on the couch next to the desk. “What are you doing?” “Playing an online game.” Charlie’s dark curly hair looked tangled, as though he’d been running his fingers through it while he played. His perfect, sensuous lips were turned down in a frown. Noah guessed maybe he wasn’t doing so well in the game. He watched the man in silence for a while, just enjoying looking at him. Charlie had movie-star looks. Besides the dark curly hair, he had chocolate brown eyes framed by long, thick lashes, high sculpted cheekbones, and a long, never-broken nose. Really, if you wanted to be technical, Charlie was pretty. Beautiful, actually. If he didn’t have a killer muscular body to go with it, he probably would have looked like a girl. Charlie had it made, too. His parents had been well off before their accident. Their will had left him a substantial amount of money. He didn’t even have to work. He did some freelance accounting crap on the side. Because, yeah, besides being too beautiful for words, Charlie was smart, too. Noah, on the other hand, was an average guy with an average brain who had to work hard at everything he did to succeed. He even had an average office job. Charlie had all the luck. Unless you counted having both your parents die in a drunken driving accident, of course. Noah squirmed with discomfort. Life wasn’t perfect for anyone. “Why are you frowning?” Noah asked after a while. “You losing?” “No. I was looking for someone.” Noah leaned forward. “Oh yeah? Who?” “A gamer I sometimes play with,” Charlie said. “We’ve been instant messaging each other lately. He’s gay, too. But I don’t think he’s on right now.” “What’s his name?” “Sly Cat is the name he uses.” Noah watched the screen for a second. “Well, since he’s not on, why don’t you close out of that and we’ll order a pizza and watch a movie or something.” Charlie just ignored him. Noah got up and took the yellow delivery notice out of the pocket of his jeans. “My package was delivered here while I was at work?” “Uh, yeah,” Charlie said, glancing behind him. He pointed at a small brown box on a dining room chair. “Over there.” Noah picked it up. Inside was a butt plug he’d ordered. He wondered if he ought to mention that to Charlie. Would that take his attention away from the damn computer? “You know what’s in this box?” “Nope.” Noah grinned. “A s*x toy.” Charlie just nodded and reached for a can of soda he had next to the computer. Noah blew out a breath. “Did you hear what I said?” “Sure, you bought a s*x toy.” Charlie finally turned to look at him. “Look, Noah, I don’t want to be rude or anything, but I’m kind of tired tonight. I just want to veg in front of the computer, okay?” Noah swallowed disappointment. All right, so Charlie had dismissed him two nights in a row. No big deal. “No problem,” he somehow managed to say. Charlie smiled. “Thanks. Call me tomorrow.” The pathetic thing was, Noah probably would. He sort of waved, but doubted Charlie even saw it because he’d gone back to the damn online game. Noah was really starting to hate that thing. It was only just after six, but being December it was already dark outside. Not that Noah was afraid of the neighborhood or anything. Having lived in this particular Los Angeles suburb for so many years, he knew it was safe. But it was also unusually chilly, so he ran to the house across the street and two doors down from Charlie’s. He threw the butt plug package on the couch, no longer interested. What he was, though, was hungry. He headed for his freezer in the hopes some frozen dinner might actually look appealing.