Wes smiled, that lopsided, shy grin, when Justin ambled across the lawn to join him. He’d thought Wes was throwing a baguette to the ducks, but no, he was throwing seed and nuts. There was a feed dispenser behind him, up on the trail that ran through the quad.
“If you feed ’em bread, it hurts the ducklings’ development,” Wes said. His voice rumbled through Justin, vibrating his bones. “Too many empty calories, not enough nutrients, gives them angel wing. They can’t fly.” He tossed another small handful of feed, scattering the ducklings across the pond.
“I never knew that.”
Wes squinted at the water. “I know a thing or two about animals.”
“What are you doing this weekend?”
Wes shrugged, looking down. His hat shielded his face, hiding his expression from Justin. “Exploring the city. It’s Paris. There’s a million things to see. I’ll try and scratch a few off the list.” He looked up, this time squinting at Justin as he tossed the last of his seed to the ducklings. “You going with the group to the coast?”
The French Riviera, sun-drenched beaches, golden sunshine. Perfect, tanned bodies lying on the sand. More gay clubs than he could count. Nightlife more famous than Vegas. His French lover might be down there, just waiting for his Texan summer fling. “No,” Justin said, shaking his head. He shoved his hands in his jeans pockets. “I was going to explore the city, too. Want company?”
He was being all kinds of stupid, sacrificing his plans to tag along with Wes, a straight cowboy from Texas. Straight cowboys were a dime a dozen back home, and football players? Every guy had a jersey in his closet, dreams of his glory days running on a loop in his mind. Wes wasn’t special. Justin knew the kind of guy Wes was. So what was he doing? He’d come half a world away to fall for the same guy he saw every day at home? What Texan came to Paris and fell for a cowboy? There was something Freudian in that. There had to be.
He berated himself in the bathroom mirror at the university, shaking his head at his foolishness.
But they walked home together again, a different route this time, wandering past the Palais Garnier, the home of the Paris Opera and, more importantly in Justin’s mind, the Paris Opera Ballet. He veered away from Wes, drawn to the playbills, the posters of this production and that. Swan Lake. Romeo and Juliet. La Bayadère. The opera house rose over him, its gothic opulence somehow a perfect contrast to the delicate illusion of ballet.
Wes hovered behind him, eyeing the posters of dancers, delicate ballerinas en pointe and danseurs hoisting them sky high, leaping across the stage in full extension, arms and legs thrown wide, muscles taut, heads tilted back. Pure focus. Pure ecstasy. “You like ballet?”
Usually, there was more of a sardonic edge to that question, turning it into an accusation, an indictment. Usually, Justin’s hackles rose. But not today. “I do,” he breathed, trailing his fingers down the advertisement for Swan Lake. The production was going for the next month. Maybe he could find a way to see it. “It’s beauty and power wrapped together. It may look delicate, but it's not. At all. I love the absolute rawness of ballet.”
Wes blinked. His eyes scanned the posters again. Raw was not a word used to describe ballet very often, but it was true. Raw power, iron control. Ballerinas were cheetahs, so much capacity and potential and skill constrained into each fine movement. “Never thought of it that way,” Wes rumbled. “But yeah. Look at him.” He jerked his chin to the danseur in the midst of his leap. “That’s a lot of power right there. I know football players that would be jealous of that jump.”
Justin beamed. His heart fluttered. “Exactly. The athleticism, it’s…” He sighed.
“Do you dance?” Wes eyed him, his gaze running down Justin’s body, lingering at his hips and thighs. “You have the strength.”
He turned away. Paced down the row of posters, letting the dancers’ faces swim in front of him. “Not seriously. I love ballet, but I’m not any good at it. Not enough to really chase it. I’m a better modern dancer. I was on the drill team in high school.” He’d joined his junior year, after he’d finally burst the bubble of his parent’s fantasies. He wasn’t going to play baseball anymore. He was one of four guys on the drill team, and they were all very, very gay. He’d lost his virginity to one in the back of the bus on the way to an out-of-town football game.
Wes was quiet. “Our drill team was the color guard,” he finally said. “They did both. Color guard girls were usually the ones the cheerleading captain didn’t pick at tryouts.”
“It was pretty serious in Dallas. More than a few girls went to try out for the Cowboys cheerleaders and made it after being on the drill team.”
“You must have been good, then, to be on the team.” Wes bumped his shoulder. When did he get so close? “And you do know a little bit about football if you were on the drill team. You were at the games for your school.”
Justin laughed. “I spent most of my time in the stands gossiping, but yeah, I guess I know a bit.” He knew which of the running backs had the best butt, and which quarterback had gotten drunk over spring break and let a guy give him a blow job.
Halfway back to their hotel, Justin ducked into a restaurant and came out with a bottle of wine. Wes tried to protest, tried to dig out some euros from his pocket, but Justin waved him off. There was something swimming in his veins, some kind of electricity that he needed to bleed off. Thoughts he shouldn’t be thinking. Hopes he shouldn’t be pinning to the sky. Getting drunk was a tried-and-true way to erase his mind.
They tipped wine into the same coffee mugs they drank from each morning, sitting cross-legged in front of their window and watching the Paris night come to life. The Eiffel Tower lit up across the city, twinkling like a thousand fireflies had come together for a brilliant show. He sighed, sipping his merlot, and slumped against the windowsill. Paris in summertime, and his heart was pitter-pattering. His eyes slid sideways, to Wes, the cowboy football player he could have met any other day in Texas, on campus, even, but who he’d met here. In the city of love.
He was so screwed. This was going to come crashing down, like it always did. This was going to end in pain, and regret, and wishing he’d never, ever tried. Don’t do it, his mind whispered. You can’t be friends with him.
And another part of him whispered back, I’m not sure what I want with this man is friendship. Not anymore.
Chapter Three
Wes splashed water on his face, washing away the remnants of shaving cream. Droplets ran down his neck and the valley between his pecs. He felt the cool touch like fingers on his skin, skittering all the way to his waist. Like Justin’s fingers, stroking—
He squeezed the edge of the porcelain sink, hard enough his arms trembled. He tipped his head forward, closing his eyes as water dripped from his nose, his chin. All his life he’d fought this. He’d choked this want, this desire, ever since the day he declared to his father he was going to marry the ranch foreman or one of the cowboys down from Montana. He’d been young enough to get away with it, get called hilarious instead of a freak. He’d been laughed at.