Fault Lines Box Set

Chapter 1-2

“Nah, it’s not the music that makes me sour,” the bartender growled as he reached for the cash Rory dropped. “I can’t like his kind.”

Rory frowned and tilted his head. “Sorry?”

The bartender snorted and lifted his hand, effeminately dangling his fingers. “You know…his kind.”

Rory picked up his beer and took a long pull, trying to wash down the words threatening to bubble out of his throat. He set the bottle back down on the bar. He swallowed hard. He almost thought he’d controlled it, too, until the bartender grinned conspiratorially, as if the two of them were sharing a secret joke. Nope. He wasn’t going to be able to do it. “Well, I don’t think you need to worry too much, darling. I’m pretty sure he’s not interested in you.”

The bartender’s smile faded, and Rory nodded as the man spun and walked away. Under his breath, Rory added, “Dick.”

He turned his attention to his license, flipping it back to front as he reached for his wallet. Not a totally shitty picture, but then he usually took a half decent one. Thirty-three years old and, on a good day, he was still mistaken for mid-twenties. He kept his face clean shaven, like most of his body, and tried to keep himself in shape. Gabe would say that’s because Rory had way too much time on his hands, but Rory knew it was because he actually gave a damn about trying to keep his partner happy. Conceited, Gabe would say. Proud, Rory would say back. Self-important, Gabe would counter. Self-appreciative, Rory would snap.

Rory winced at their imagined disagreement. The fact that it would happen just like that said so much about their differences that it wasn’t even funny. No matter what Rory did, no matter how hard he tried, Gabe could always find a way to make it seem wrong—as though Rory had an ulterior motive for everything he ever did.

The green eyes on the plastic permit stared back at him, emotionless. Who are you, Rory Finch, he asked it silently. What are you? Not what everybody thinks, that’s for damn sure. Do you even know anymore? Do you remember?

He breathed out a heavy sigh and tossed the license on the bar.

“Whoa,” spoke a voice that was surprisingly close. “Am I invited to your pity party?”

Rory looked up and blinked into a set of eyes that were as blue as…well, the last time he’d seen something that blue had been when he was a child. His family had been vacationing out on the west coast. A storm had been brewing, and though the sky had been dark and angry, the sea below it had been the coolest, most exotic, sapphire blue Rory had ever seen. He’d been so moved by it that he’d written a long poem bestowing the sight when he got back home; he’d won a prize for it even. His very first writing commendation.

The young man from the jukebox pulled over a barstool and sat beside him. “I do love a good party. You like to party, Rory?”

Rory bristled at the familiarity, instantly on guard, and the kid laughed. He motioned to the man beside the door who was talking amicably with a new customer. The two at the door could have been twins, right down to their heavy rubber boots and flannel jackets. “Stan called you Rory earlier.”

“Oh, yeah. That’s me.” Rory drained his beer, using every bit of willpower he had not to let his gaze flick back to the pretty kid while said kid slumped over the bar. Instead, Rory motioned for the bartender to grab him another bottle.

The two of them waited in silence for the bartender to set down the beer, Rory’s jaw tightening when it was placed just a little harder than it needed to be. The kid smirked at the small spew of foam that bubbled up through the opening and slid down the bottle and a butterfly took flight in Rory’s belly. Blushing, for reasons he could not explain, Rory used his thumb to wipe the froth from the bottle and took a drink.

“Oh, Sid,” the young man chirped. “I’ll take one of those, too, please.”

When the kid began to fumble through his pockets, Rory thrust a twenty towards the glowering bartender. “Here. For both.”

Rory ignored the raised eyebrow and look of distaste Sid shot at him, and he also chose to ignore the fact that his change for the bill never came. He couldn’t help but think he should’ve picked a spot closer to the television set. It would have given him someplace to put his attention other than the mirror across the bar, because try as he might to keep his gaze elsewhere, it kept trailing back to the reflection of the young man whose own attention never stopped wandering. One minute the kid was watching the ever-changing colors radiating from the jukebox, the next he was grinning, obviously amused with the older couple at the end of the bar who were now arguing. Seconds later he was staring in bored resignation at the TV screen.

Pretty, Rory decided. Pretty like twink-in-a-porn-vid pretty, like Japanese manga pretty, like hopefully-not-so-young-as-to-get-ones-self-arrested-for-buying-him-alcohol pretty. The expression in the mirror had broken into a grin, a grin that widened when Rory realized he was staring and quickly looked away.

“So,” the kid said, drumming his fingertips on the bar. “You like football?”

Rory shrugged. “It’s all right, I guess.” He lifted his beer again and the kid followed his lead. They sat in awkward silence until Rory felt uncomfortable. “How about you?”

“Nah. I hate it.”

“Okay, I’ll bite then. Why are you watching if you hate it?”

The kid lowered his voice and leaned in. He wiggled his eyebrows. “I love the way the players asses look in their uniforms.”

Rory shook his head and looked away so quickly, he thought his neck would snap. Had that been flirting? Was the kid flirting? What had he started? What was he even doing buying a kid a beer in a bar, anyway? Or starting up a chit-chat? Being stupid, that’s what he was doing.

“You okay?”

No, Rory was not okay. He was a creepy pervert that had been checking out a young man in a bar who had to be what, half his age? Give or take a year or two? When he had a partner sitting back at home? He was going to hell and hell was not okay.

Rory said none of that. Instead, “Why? Should I not be okay?”

The boy shrugged and made a sound that could have been an I don’t know and stuck out his hand. “I’m Danny, by the way. Danny Weber. Thanks for the beer.”

He wasn’t going to reach for it, but he couldn’t very well leave the kid hanging there with his hand out. That would be rude. Besides, it was just a handshake. It wasn’t like they were trading spit. He reached out and shook Danny’s hand. “Nice to meet you. By the way, since I did in fact buy the beer, I should probably ask, are you even old enough to drink?”

Danny flourished at the bartender. “They served me, didn’t they?”

“Yeah, maybe they don’t know.”

“Dude.” Danny rolled his eyes. “Everybody knows everyone and everything in this town.” He reached into his pants pocket and slapped a worn wallet on the bar.

“Hunh. That was a much faster finding-of-the-wallet than it was five minutes ago.”

Danny flipped open the wallet and slid it towards him. “Of course. You’ve already paid for the beer.” He tapped the plastic window with the ID behind it. “See? Just as pretty in picture as real life.” He immediately picked up his wallet and peered at it. “Damn. Why am I not on t****k? I could make a fortune with thirst traps. So, what do you think of the place?”

Rory shook his head. “What? Which? The app, the bar, or Sunridge itself?”

Danny shrugged. “Whichever.”

Rory studied the young man’s face for a minute. “I’m not on it. The bar sucks. Sunridge isn’t much better.”

Danny’s grin deepened. “Dude, I hear you.”

For some reason, that seemed to inspire Danny into conversation. And not just casual what-do-you-think-of-this-weather talk, but full on chatter as though they were old friends recently reunited. Danny cheerfully filled Rory in on the sordid details of everyone in the bar: the couple at the bar, third marriage-recovery attempt after affairs on both sides; the cowboys at the pool table, caught poaching last year on the wild game reserve forty minutes out of town; Stan, the man who’d stopped Rory at the door, was on his second DUI charge and known to be a little heavy-handed; and Sid, who managed to keep the doors of the bar open throughout the pandemic using nothing more than sheer willpower and glass-polishing but ending up way too close to broke for comfort.

“Interesting bunch of people you got here,” Rory remarked and motioned for the bartender again. That second beer had gone down quite nicely, though Danny’s sat in front of him, mostly untouched. Danny seemed far more content to chat than drink.

Sid stepped up, shaking his head at Rory’s request. “We’re closing up, boys.”

Rory glanced at his watch. “You’re closing at ten?”

“Game’s done, so we are, too. Not enough business to keep the lights on tonight.”

Rory rolled his eyes at Danny. “My list of things to dislike about this town continues to grow.” He sighed and slid off the stool. “See you around, Danny. Thanks for the conversation.”

Rory tugged on his jacket, still damp from the rain, and dug for his keys. He watched in amusement as Danny stood and deftly slipped the almost-full beer inside his hoodie. Danny smirked at Rory and gave him a wink. “I’ll walk out with you.”

Out on the sidewalk, the rain had slowed but a cold wind had rolled in, putting a bite in the air that hadn’t been there before. Rory tucked up his collar and stared through the dampness at his waiting car. The car with the dent. The dent that had caused the argument. The argument with the boyfriend back home…and he clicked his tongue in annoyance. He really didn’t want to go home yet. The two beers had not brought a strong enough buzz to fall into a soundless sleep and ignore the blah, blah, blah that was waiting, and no way was it late enough for Gabe to be in bed yet.

Danny slapped Rory’s shoulder. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve swallowed a mouthful of cat piss.”

“What? No, that’s…no. Just a bad night.”

Danny’s expression brightened. “Hey! I’ve got an idea! Why don’t you come up to my place? I don’t have beer, but I’ve got some weed.”

Rory laughed. Good God, how long had it been since he’d smoked weed? Years. It had been years. “I don’t think so. Do I look like a teenager to you?”

“Uh, no offence, Rory, but no, you sure don’t. However, not only teenagers indulge, my friend. After all, as already noted, I am twenty-one and still choose to enjoy Nature’s herbal temperament manager.”

“Ooh,” Rory exaggerated, “right! Twenty-one! I almost forgot. You’re practically an old man!”

Danny narrowed his eyes. “Not as old as you, old man. Come on, it’ll be fun. You look like you could use some fun.”

Rory paused and took a hard look at the young man beside him. Goddamn, if it had been two years ago, it would have never crossed Rory’s mind not to go. He would have jumped at the chance. So much had changed, and not necessarily for the better.

“I heard what you said in the bar.”

The drop of Danny’s voice and the press of body as Danny moved closer, inspired all kinds of dirty thoughts in Rory’s mind. He had to clear his throat before he responded. “What exactly did you think you heard?”

“You know, what you said to Sid. About me not being interested in him.” He paused, seemingly gauging Rory closely. “I thought…maybe…you might be.”

“What? Interested in Sid?”

Danny laughed, dropping his seductive expression for a lighter, brighter one. “Yeah, sure. Totally. I know he puts me in the mood every damn time.” He paused, still smiling, then continued, “Come up. Whatever chased you outside on a night like this, whatever has you so pissy, it’s not missing you right now.”

No, Rory supposed Gabe was certainly not missing him at the moment, and Rory had to admit that he wasn’t exactly missing Gabe either. But that was just now. The light of tomorrow would change all that back. They would eventually get over the bickering. They had to. Nobody wanted to live a life in constant chaos. It was just stress. “I…well, I actually live with someone. Thank you for the offer, though.”

“So? I didn’t ask you to marry me. I asked you to come up and burn one with me.” Danny shrugged when Rory frowned at him. “I get it. You’re not interested. That’s cool. But that doesn’t mean you need to run off. Bar’s closed. Nothing else is open. Come up and relax.” Again, Danny paused. Again, he seemed to assess. “Or go home and deal with your thing. It’s your choice.”

Rory watched Danny move away, but he didn’t go far. The door to what Rory assumed was Danny’s apartment was less than six feet from the bar’s entrance. Rory looked at his car, then into the night sky. He cursed the thought that had him rooted to the sidewalk instead of walking away—the one that told him he’d probably be pretty damn comfortable sitting in Danny’s apartment instead of driving through the rain. It was that same thought that was telling him it was okay to go up because it’s not like he was planning on doing anything. He was a grown man, in control of his body and his emotions, and there was not a damn thing wrong with sitting in another man’s home and watching TV.

Yeah, right.

As if to add fuel to that fire, his stomach growled angrily. The beer had been too inviting, the conversation too amusing, and he’d forgotten all about ordering food.

Danny looked back and grinned. “I have frozen pizza.”

Rory sighed at the smirking man leaning against the door. “Fine, then. But only because you have pizza.”