Page 57 of Winter Ends
He chuckled. “Jesus. That was so damn cheesy. But yeah, I get it.” Daniel reached out and grabbed my hands, our fingers tangled together, and we sat and looked at each other for a while. It should have been weird, but it wasn’t. I liked this. Itdidfeel right. Like everything was coming together, and we were right where we were supposed to be at the correct time and place.
“Babe?”
Daniel huffed again. “You really want me to put a label on it?”
I nodded. “It has to be you. I want your permission to call it what I want to call it.”
And like two idiots, we sat there and became boyfriends. Exclusive. And it took a lot of beating around the bush because, go figure, at twenty-five and twenty-two, we couldn’t just come out and say the fucking words. When had any of this been easy?
Chapter 37
Daniel
“He’s alive.”
I jumped as Chase’s hands landed on my shoulders. It was our first day back at work since the fateful trip to the cabin, and everything felt... different. Literally everything remained the same, but now I had someone I was attached to, and I no longer wanted to kill Shawn. How long would it take before anyone noticed?
“Yeah, I’m alive,” I joked, leaning against the bar top and looking over my best friend.
Chase grinned. “I haven’t heard from you since we left the cabin. You either died or spent the entire time being dicked down.”
My eyes widened as I flew across the space to cover his mouth. “Would you keep it down?”
He laughed.
Dear fucking lord, it wasn’t funny. Sure, Chase knew about my history with Art, and now he sort of knew the details with Shawn, but I didn’t need everyone else knowing that I was fucking the owner’s son. That just screamed favoritism and aftermy talk with Shawn, he had it bad enough. I couldn’t imagine what people would think of me.
“Sorry, man. You just seem all relaxed and shit. I haven’t seen you that chill in a long ass time.”
In the two days we’d been back, there’d been a ton of orgasms. And sure, that probably made me a little more relaxed than normal.
“Staff meeting in five minutes?”
My eyes widened to comical levels as Mr. Stevens entered the bar. Oh, dear lord. Was I going to be able to keep my shit together around him now? If what Shawn had said was true, it wasn’t like his dad would freak out about him having a boyfriend, but when your boyfriend’s dad was your boss? God, that felt like crossing so many lines.
“You okay?”
I snapped my attention back to Chase. “Fine?” I squeaked. Nope, I didn’t sound confident at all. This was a fucking mess. Did I need to act like Shawn and I hated each other still? We hadn’t talked about that. Sure, we’d discussed being official, but work? This was a different arena.
Chase grabbed my shoulders, massaging them gently. Why was it suddenly so hard to chill out?
The room filled with other employees and when Shawn came in, my breath caught. God. All I wanted to do was stand next to him, grab his hand, and let everyone fucking see that things had changed in the week we’d had off. Would it be too much?
I didn’t have to think about it for long, because it was like the asshole read my mind. Before I knew what was happening, he was next to me, an arm around my waist as he leaned in and placed a kiss against my lips. The chatter in the room instantly stopped, all eyes on us. My face heated at the attention. That was one way to announce shit to everyone. Part of me wanted to be angry that we hadn’t discussed how we were going to do this, butI also loved that he wasn’t afraid to say that I was now his. He really hadn’t been joking about that.
A loud throat clearing had us jumping back from each other and there was Mr. Stevens, standing there with his arms crossed. “This is a restaurant, not a hook-up joint. I’d appreciate it if you treated it appropriately.”
My face flamed even more when Shawn grabbed my hand instead, leaning against the counter next to me, waiting for his dad to speak.
“Welcome back, everyone. It seems there’s been a small... change in dynamic since we all last saw each other. I hope that’s a change for the better and doesn’t mean I’m going to lose more staff.” Mr. Stevens glared at his son, and Shawn rolled his eyes. My heart stuttered when he let go of my hand to cross his arms over his chest to mirror his father’s pose.
As Mr. Stevens continued to brief us on what was expected in the new year, the tension in the room became palpable. We had some small menu changes in the dining room and he had a new cocktail idea for the bar. He planned to train us on it later, and when the meeting broke off, he flagged Shawn to follow him to his office. Worry settled into my gut, slithering and making me feel sick. As much as he assured me that his dad was more of a friend than a parent, I didn’t want him to be in trouble for our relationship.
I was stacking glasses when one of the other bartenders slid next to me.
“What the hell happened there?”
It was probably the most blushing I’d ever done. I wasn’t one to be embarrassed, but this was all brand new. This wasn’t the same as when I’d been hiding my relationship with Art and Tilly at all. I was allowed to be open and talk to people about it.
