door closed behind me. In the hallway, I ran the palm of my hand over my forehead and tried to swallow the regret rising in my chest.
The next morning, I was exhausted and distracted as I shaped batard after batard, pressing the dough hard into the bench with the heel of my hand. I’d hardly slept the previous night, tossing and turning restlessly as I’d recalled the kiss over and over in my mind.
Communication was the most important aspect of any relationship. I knew that. And it was even more so when you started introducing any sort of power play into it. So why had I let communication lapse so badly when Heath had kissed me? Just because Heath had taken the initiative to kiss me didn’t mean I’d had any right to pin him like that, touch him like that.
I’d scared him. Ignored his boundaries. I’d acted in exactly all the ways I shouldn’t have, if I wanted him to trust me.
I’d let myself get swept away. Something about Heath made me feel like a teenager again, caught up in desire that was so overwhelming it made my head spin. And I couldn’t let that happen if I wanted to take care of Heath. I needed to be fully present, but attentive—so I could put his needs first.
God, I was doing it again. It was just a kiss, but I was already spinning out fantasies when what I really needed to be doing was getting a grip. Just because he’d kissed me, and reacted the way he did, didn’t mean he was a sub. And even if he was, after Eddy I didn’t know if I should get involved with another sub at all, not with everything going on in the club.
“Careful, son, or you’re gonna knock all the air out of that dough,” Dad said warmly as he stepped into the open kitchen.
I glanced down at the loaf I was shaping and cringed. He was right—I’d overworked it, and now it likely wasn’t going to rise in the oven.
Dad leaned his hip against the bench and crossed his arms over his chest. “What’s going on?” he asked, his brown eyes narrowed in concern.
I sighed and took my hands off the ruined loaf.
Dad hardly looked older than me, in a worn old t-shirt and his faded club leather. He was shorter than me, but just as broad. People who didn’t know us often mistook us for brothers instead of father and son. But the worry on his face now was nothing but paternal.
“From the look on your face, I’d guess it’s boy trouble,” Dad said.
I sighed again, heavier this time. I could never hide anything from him. He’d been open about his own bisexuality ever since I was a kid, so I’d never had to worry about explaining my own preferences. Dad was always accepting, and he’d helped me through my last rough breakup with good humor and grace.
“It’s one of the guys in Hell’s Ankhor,” I admitted.
“Oh?” Dad raised his eyebrows.
“I’ve got a chaperone when on the premises,” I said. “Their most recently patched-in member.”
“The Kid,” Dad said with a nod. “I remember seeing him at the clubhouse that day. Definitely your type.”
I cringed. Embarrassing that Dad knew my type, but I’d been going for Heath’s type for as long as I could remember. “I know. We had kind of a rocky start, but I thought things were improving. We were getting along a little better. I was even beginning to think he might’ve been, uh, interested in me. The same way.”
“Okay,” Dad said. “And?”
“And I fucked it up,” I admitted. For as close as Dad and I were, I wasn’t about to tell him exactly how I fucked it up. “The Kid’s a little anxious. And he was scared of me at first, I think. Or at least intimidated by me. So I spent all our time together trying to warm him up to me, and show him there wasn’t anything to be afraid of.”
“Right,” Dad said tentatively.
“But yesterday…” I rapped my knuckles on the bench and shook my head, frustrated with myself even at the memory. “I undid all that work. Made it worse. He probably trusts me even less than he did at first.”
“You hurt him?” Dad asked bluntly.
“God. No.” I’d scared him, that much was clear, but I hadn’t hurt him. I’d never do that. “I just—I didn’t communicate the way I should’ve.”
Dad nodded, like that was the answer he’d expected. “You’re worried about