“I did it because you got in my face and made me see how irresistible you are, regardless of your gender. And Logan?”
“Yeah?”
“I still think that, but now, there’s so much more to it. I really like you.”
The laugh that met Tate’s ears was devoid of humor and full of mockery. “Really? Ninety percent of the time you’re furious with me.”
“Yeah, I know. You drive me crazy because I like you,” Tate stressed. “A lot.”
“A lot, huh?”
Closing his eyes, Tate imagined—finally—the smirk he could hear in Logan’s voice.
“A whole lot.”
“Like how much?”
Tate started laughing. “What are you? Twelve?”
“No. I’m drunk or really close.”
“So, now is when I should ask you all the hard questions?” Tate queried only half-serious.
“Do you have hard questions?”
“Yeah, I guess I do.”
“Sure then. Fire away,” Logan replied flippantly.
Tate heard the underlying tone, and he recognized it for what it was—caution. “Okay. What really happened with Cole today?” Tate hadn’t realized he wanted to share that burden until it came out of his mouth.
Logan sighed. “You heard everything that happened.”
“Yeah,” Tate agreed, “but I only understand half of it.”
Tate wondered if this was the moment when he would see that this all meant more to him than—
“Well, you know he’s my brother, right?”
Tate let out a sigh of relief. Logan wasn’t going to shut him out. “Yeah.”
“We didn’t know that until I turned eighteen, and our father’s trust was made known to me.”
Logan stopped talking, and Tate waited.
“And I already told you that his father had an affair…well, obviously, he didn’t choose my mother and I...”
Tate couldn’t even begin to imagine how that would affect a teenager. Not only growing up without a father, but then also learning that he had a whole other family? A family that included a brother he had never known about.
“The asshole died when Cole was five, so at least I never had to meet him…” Logan revealed, and his voice trailed off, leaving Tate to wonder if he really meant it.
“Anyway, you didn’t ask all of this.”
“No. Don’t do that,” Tate finally spoke.
“Don’t do, what?”
“Don’t change the subject or assume that I don’t want to know about you. Talk to me. Tell me.” Tate held his breath and waited, hoping that Logan would open up and trust him.
“Okay. You want the details? Let’s see…my mother never married. She told me that she had fallen in love once and that the pain she’d felt from loving someone she shouldn’t far outweighed any joy, so there was no point.”
When Logan paused, Tate had to ask, “Someone she shouldn’t?”
“Yes. Sounds familiar, huh?”
“As in me? I’m hardly married, you know that.”
“But you’re straight.”
Tate swallowed and remained quiet, not really knowing what to say.
“I promised myself, I’d never have regrets, like the one she had.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means that I didn’t care one way or another what you said. I was willing to try anything just to taste you once.”
Tate knew that to be the truth, but decided to ask anyway. “And how did that work out?”
“I haven’t regretted it yet,” Logan answered right away. “But that’s a different conversation. You want to know why Cole was upset. Hmm, well, I tracked Cole down the minute I got to college. He was just starting his second year, and he hated me as soon as I told him my name.”
“Well, that’s bullshit.”
“Is it? All he knew was that his father, a man he’d idolized, had left a college trust fund to another kid—his other kid. I would have hated me, too.”
Tate sat up on the couch and shook his head. “But it wasn’t your fault.”
“That didn’t matter. I represented everything bad that his father had done.”
“But you work together, so obviously, you get along now,” Tate queried.
“Oh yeah, I was a total pain in his ass the first month of college. Everywhere he went, I showed up.”
“Imagine that.”
Logan’s voice took on that same serious edge he’d had earlier. “When something is important, I don’t give up.”
Tate was about to pursue that, but then Logan started again. “Then, I found out where he was living off-campus, and I made myself at home on his doorstep until he talked to me.”