Page 85 of Resisting You

Renato laughed, watery and quiet, and he nodded. “Can you take me? I don’t want to drive.”

“Yes. Come home with me,” Frey said. He picked up Renato’s hand and kissed his knuckles. “We can have a movie night with Rex. Then…” He let silence fill the gap. He didn’t know what was going to come next, but it didn’t matter so long as Renato was there.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Renato was still reeling when they all sat down to dinner, but he took pride in the fact that he was keeping it together. Of course, Rex was a great incentive not to fall apart because the last thing he wanted to do was traumatize a child, but he was still unsure that this was all real.

He was in love with Frey. He’d been fully intending on telling Frey that he was falling for him and wanted to make things official. He’d gotten up after Frey drifted off to work through how he was going to explain it.

Then he’d seen the book. It was sitting open on the coffee table, and he would have ignored it, except he saw his name. And he was only a man, and his curiosity had him glancing over the first page. If it was Frey’s journal, he would have left it.

But it wasn’t.

It was page after page of quotes. Page after page of hard written proof that Renato was a callous, heartless bastard. And as much as he wanted to claim he hadn’t been that bad, it was impossible because he remembered every single thing Frey had written down.

The pranks had hurt his feelings, but what destroyed him was knowing the kind of person he’d become. How could he ask Frey to love him knowing the way Frey thought of him? Knowing that Frey kept all those cruel things in a book to read over and over.

Because it was obvious that nothing had changed.

Frey hadn’t marked anything down in several weeks, but the fact that it was open meant he was still reading it.

It had broken Renato’s heart to leave when he heard Frey begging for him to stay, but he couldn’t. He wasn’t sure he was ready to give Frey up, but he needed to know he could become a better man.

He’d gone to the cemetery, parking down the street and hopping the fence. He sat by Grady’s headstone and waited for something—a sign, a ghost, a whisper in the trees. But he was met with silence because his husband was gone. He was dead. No one was watching over him.

Renato was entirely and completely alone.

He cried over his loss for the first time in a long, long time, but it was almost cleansing in a way. He wasn’t holding on anymore. The next day had been a blur, and he wasn’t even sure how he’d gotten to the cinema, only that after buying popcorn and soda, he couldn’t bring himself to go in. The voice was Grady’s, but it wasn’t him.

And it wasn’t what Renato wanted or needed. He wanted Frey. He didn’t feel well enough to drive, so he sat on the hood, and he wasn’t quite sure he was ready to believe that Frey was actually there when he pulled up.

Kissing him felt real. Crying against his shirt felt real. So did the bouquets of flowers in his arms, which he put in water the second they got back to Frey’s. But he felt like he was walking through a fog.

He felt a small tug on his shirt, and he looked over to see Rex standing a few feet away in green pajamas covered in LEGO-looking men. He was smiling, toothy and big like he hadn’t a care in the world.

‘Sit?’ Renato offered. ‘Where’s your dad?’

‘Shower,’ Rex told him. He hopped up on the edge of the sofa cushion and kicked his feet. They made a soft, rapid thudthudthud against the frame. ‘Are you sad?’

Renato’s eyes widened. ‘Do I look sad?’

Rex nodded sagely. ‘Do you need a hug?’

Unable to help his smile, Renato nodded, and it was only seconds before Rex was scrambling into his lap and holding him tight. It felt odd…different, almost alien. But only because Renato had the wild thought that he could be part of this.

Every day.

For the rest of their lives.

Rex pulled back and sat cross-legged, looking at Renato for a long time. ‘My dad,’ he signed slowly, ‘is afraid I’ll bother people if I talk to them about weddings.’

Renato shrugged. ‘Some people are afraid of weddings.’

Rex nodded. ‘Do you know Deaf people?’

He was going to get whiplash from the way this child changed subjects, but he did his best to keep up. ‘When I was young, I went to doctor school.’ He hoped Rex understood the signs for that. ‘To learn.’

Rex made a Y with his hand and tapped it in the air. Peh-peh.

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