Page 56 of Find Me Again

"Fans were shocked to hear your statement about being gay. What would you say to them?"

"No comments for now."

He tried to sidestep her, only to notice a man with a camera to his left.

Fucking hell.

"And what about the mysterious man you were photographed with?" She shoved a photo she was hiding behind the envelope at him. "Any comment on who he is?"

Neil couldn't help himself—he glanced at the photo, his heartbeat already picking up.

Someone had caught the two of them talking at the airport, Neil smiling and leaning close.

Ryan's face wasn't visible, at least, but Neil's stomach still rolled at the thought of people showing up at Ryan's house—or worse, at his work.

"Who is he?" the reporter pressed.

"A bodyguard," he blurted out, regretting it as soon as the words left his mouth.

While that was what Ryan did for a living, it shouldn't bethe first thing Neil said about him to the press.

Once he was ready to talk to them about Ryan.

Which he still wasn't.

"He's your bodyguard?" The reporter raised her eyebrows. "So you're afraid something will happen to you now? Were there any threats against you?"

And for a split second, Neil was tempted, exactly like he'd been tempted on Boxing Day, on his way to tape the interview. It would be so easy to use the excuse now, to bluff his way through it and leave anything else for later.

The second passed, though, and he imagined Ryan watching it later on, which was bad enough. Then a realization hit him.

His instincts might still be in the closet, buthe wasn't.

The cat was out of the bag, Ryan was ready to do this thing with him, so what did Neil have to lose?

He straightened his stance and met the reporter's gaze head on.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Ryan arrived home exhausted, his flight getting delayed by over six hours in the end, but at least he was finally back. For all that he enjoyed staying at his brother's place, nothing topped his own bed and his own space.

Well, Neil would be a most-welcomed addition, but still. Home was home.

When Ryan got up from the well-deserved nap around noon, he busied himself with getting his place into shape after a long absence, which was supposed to provide a distraction from wondering about what Neil was doing, what he was thinking, and—most importantly—what he might decide about their future.

And yet, the distraction wasn't really working, because Ryan kept coming back to their conversation at the airport. It had looked like they were on the same page at first, but then Ryan had said he was in and Neil sort of… froze there for a moment. He'd snapped out of it quickly, and they'd ended on a good note, but now that they were apart, Ryan couldn't help but wonder what it meant.

It wasn't until his phone rang on the kitchen counter and he saw Neil's ID that Ryan felt his shoulders drop a fraction.

"Hey, there." He lowered the heat under the stir-fry he was preparing for dinner. "Missing me already?"

It was a joke, but also wasn't, and he rolled his eyes at himself.

What was he, fourteen?

"Of course." Neil's smile was evident in his voice. "How could I not? It's been, what, fifteen hours?"

"Something like that."

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