Page 20 of Sapphire Sunset

The text was followed by a gif of a cartoon Supermanstanding atop a cartoon building, chest out, his cartoon cape blowing behindhim in the wind.

So Connor had left the hotel. And probably because he knewlingering and waiting for Logan might seem suspicious and get Logan in trouble.

Logan raised his finger to type out a response. He wasn’tsure what. Something sweet, something warm. But when his hand froze as if amillion eyes were watching him, he stood there for a while.

Finally, he lowered his arm and pocketed the phone. All theromantic things he’d wanted to text Connor were knocking around inside of himlike pool balls searching for pockets. He left Sapphire Cove feeling likenobody’s hero.

When Connor got home, the condo was quiet,and Naser’s bedroom was empty. There was no sign he’d returned home afterConnor had poured him into an Uber with Jose and Ken. And that could only meanone thing. He’d ended up in another three-way with Jose and Ken.

And more power to him, even if he would return homeeventually, completely freaked by the fact that he’d been their third yetagain. As if the mere fact that two boyfriends had chosen to mutually have sexwith Naser at the exact same time still meant someone had cheated on someone,and Naser would eventually figure out who had been wronged if he kept talkingabout it for hours on end while Connor grunted and ate ice cream.

Still, Connor could have used the distraction of Naser’smisplaced guilt and kept hoping he’d hear the key in the front door.

No such luck so far.

Eventually, he nodded off, sitting up in bed.

When he woke up the next morning with sunlight peekingaround the edges of his drapes, he’d keeled over to one side like a personwho’d been shot in the skull. The crick in his neck would take a day to get ridof, at least. But despite the aching muscles, before he’d even managed to situp all the way, he started reaching into the folds of the comforter for thehard lump of his phone.

He found it, turned the screen to him, and saw he had onenew message fromLogan—your hero.

He kicked the covers off, swung his legs to the floor, andran one hand through his hair as if text messages had eyes that instantlyconnected them to the person who’d sent them.

A few swipes and then there was Logan’s text message staringback at him.

It was a thumbs-up emoji.

For a while, Connor didn’t move.

There were, in Connor’s educated opinion, very specific usesfor all of the emoji in existence, including the thumbs-up. It was meant toindicate you’d received an important piece of information, usually a specificrequest. That was about it. It was a more colorful, illustrated version ofCOPYTHATorGOTCHA. It was an emoji cousin to the letterK,a reduced form ofOKused by those who felt themselves too busy orperhaps too subtly angry to reply with both letters of said two-letter word.The thumbs-up was most certainly not, however, an appropriate response to aspecific question about one’s well-being. It said,I’d rather you didn’task meorNone of your business.

Or, worse, you thought the question was an attempt to findout how the other person was feeling about the scorching hot make-out sessionyou’d had the night before, and you were trying to communicate you felt nothingbut remorse over it. Maybe because you’d had your ass dragged by the boss overit.

But if someone had seen them, if Rodney had reprimandedLogan, would he really have sent a thumbs-up in response indicating things wereokay?

Pulse racing, Connor went to type a response.

Something clever and witty and teasing. Something thatpretended like all the worst-case scenarios running through his head wereoutside the realm of possibility, so why not make a sheepish joke about them?

LOL. ROFLMAO.Teddy bears and hearts and maybe sixhundred snakes to indicate the length of Logan’s epic bulge.

But his fingers froze, and he found himself staring at thephone with a sick feeling in his stomach.

The phone felt like it weighed twenty pounds all of asudden.

And only when he was in the shower, standing under the warm,dousing spray did he realize he’d put it down on the nightstand, undressed, andwalked into the bathroom in a numb daze.

Logan’s workout was a wash. All he could seewas Connor’s text and his own douchey response, so he’d quit halfway throughand headed home. But not before pulling over and punching the steering wheel infrustration.

He could hear an episode ofStorage Warsplaying ashe approached the trailer. No one was yelling except for the people ontelevision, so his dad and Sally were probably dozing on the sofa. Good.

Just then his phone rang. It was Donnie.

“’Sup?” Logan answered.

“Oh, shit. What’s wrong?”

“What do you mean?” Logan asked.

---