Page 20 of No Rhyme or Riesling

John muttered a curse under his breath and turned away. Beau was right, of course. Still, the man was a daddy himself. Beau should have known to decideforAdam. Should have known not to make the offer in the first place.

He continued down the bar and stopped between the stools where Adam and his friend sat.

“John!” Adam exclaimed with a grin, throwing up his arms. The wine sloshed around inside his glass, but there wasn't much left, so it didn't spill over the sides. “I get to sing at Morgan and Everett's wedding! Did you hear? I'll have to call Trevor and see if the band can come to town, but–”

“What are you drinking?” John interrupted him.

“Huh? Oh!” Adam giggled and thrust out the wine glass. “I have no idea, but Beau picked it out for me and it'sreallygood.”

John took the glass, his frown deepening as the scent of it hit him. He swirled the wine around, tipped the glass towards his nose, then took a sip.

A pang shot through every nerve in his body as the wine rushed over his tongue. His heartbeat picked up and his skin tingled all over.

And not a pleasurable kind of tingle. More like hair standing on end in the face of inexplicable danger.

“This is my riesling,” he realized aloud.

John stared at the glass. It should have thrilled him. Wine from his favorite part of the vineyard justhappenedto be the one that Beau chose for Adam? The part of the vineyard John closely associated with his boy? It was such a perfect coincidence.

Yet the revelation slammed into him like a harbinger of doom.

“Myyyyyyriesling,” Adam sang, sending him and his friend into a fresh fit of giggles. Then Adam gasped, his eyes going wide for a moment before he grinned and belted out a line from Elton John's “Your Song,” just the way Ewan McGregor began the medley inMoulin Rouge.

Adam and his friend shared a look, then stumbled over one another in their hurry to get back to the piano. The opening notes of the song filled the room, and even though Adam swayed drunkenly where he stood, having to throw out a hand to brace himself on the piano, his voice was still nothing short of pure magic as he started to sing.

Christ. John stood mesmerized. His worry momentarily fled as the entire world narrowed down to the exquisite sounds his boy made. And when Adam looked right at him—singing about the wonder of having someone special in his world—John felt his heart clench at the raw emotion in Adam's tone.

But the moment shattered a second later when Adam gasped, thrust out an arm to point at John, and shouted, “John! Come sing with me!”

John felt his cheeks warm as people turned to look at him.

Shit. He'd had more than enough of being the center of attention all week. But at least that had been for his job. That, he could do. But performing in front of an audience? Wildly different story. None of the people there even knew John had a musical hobby. It simply wasn't something he shared with anyone.

But now everyone was looking at him with surprise and anticipation. Like they actually expected him to walk over there and join in.

“John!” Adam whined.

The heat on John's cheeks grew worse as he looked at Adam and subtly shook his head.

Adam slammed down his wine glass on a table, but the glass slipped off the edge and broke. The boy didn't even notice as he stomped past the mess, his mood snapping from joyful and carefree into cranky and sullen in the space of a heartbeat. “Why won't you sing with me?” Adam demanded, speaking far too loudly. “You never sing with me anymore!”

“Adam,” John bit off. He risked a glance at the people around him and found almost everyone staring at them. Even Adam's friend was stealing glances, all the while seamlessly repeating the same few bars on the piano, clearly waiting for Adam to come back and pick up the lyrics where he'd left off.

“You used to sing with me all the time,” Adam continued, stopping right in front of John and scowling up at him. He poked John in the chest with his index finger, the motion knocking him off-balance.

John grabbed him with his free hand, steadying him. “I think it's time for us to go.”

“What? No!” Adam snapped, the sound amplified in the otherwise silent room. His friend had stopped playing, and now every single person there was standing quietly, watching the commotion. “We just got here,” Adam went on. “And I haven't seen Sky in ages and I want to sing and I want you to sing with me!”

“No,” John managed to bite off when all he wanted to do was walk out of the room and never face any of these people again.Christ. He hated to imagine what they must all be thinking of him.

Somewhere in the room, in the brief silence that followed, one of the boys whimpered, “Daddy.”

“Stop saying that fucking word!” Adam screamed, squeezing his eyes shut and covering his ears. “Fuck! I need a drink.” He whirled around, aiming for the bar.

John carefully set down his glass and grabbed Adam instead. He got the boy's wrists in one hand and used the other to hold Adam by the back of the neck, pushing him towards the nearest exit. “You've had enough,” John bit off as he opened the door to the back patio before taking a firm hold of Adam again. He had no idea if they could get around to the parking lot from there, but he wasn't about to parade Adam through the entire crowd to get to the front door instead. It was bad enough that he could feel everyone watching them for the few seconds it took to force Adam outside.

Christ. His entire body burned with humiliation. It wasn't as bad as the night Adam's dad accused him of assault, but it was close.

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