against someone who was downright adversarial wasn’t nearly as stressful as being up against someone I liked and respected because I didn’t give a shit what we thought of each other when it was over.
Butting heads with the man I loved? The man I leaned on more than I probably had any right to? That was terrifying. Because the thing I stood to lose was him. Him, and the life we had together, and… God, everything. Just getting into an unusually heated argument with him was enough to send me into an anxiety tailspin, but this? Holy fuck. How did I cope with this? And what did I do about it?
“Aaron.” Tom’s voice was firm, but not sharp. Kind of like the tone I used when a client was getting ahead of themselves and freaking out about losing their license or going to prison. The come back to earth so we can talk about this rationally voice.
I met his gaze.
He folded his hands on his desk. “Do you think this is something you can come back from?”
My throat tightened. “I don’t know. I feel like we crossed too many lines, and…” I rubbed my eyes and sighed heavily, then dropped my hand to the armrest. “We agreed at the start that this was just kink. We weren’t going to get emotionally invested in Kelly. And…I did.”
“Did he?”
I blinked. “What?”
“Did Will get emotionally invested in Kelly?”
Shaking my head, I exhaled. “No. When I told him I was, that’s when he got pissed off.”
Tom looked skeptical.
“What?”
He leaned over one armrest and watched me, head tilted. “Okay, he flew off the handle about you being more into Kelly than you’d agreed to be, but from everything you’ve told me since you guys met him? Especially the amount of time those two have spent together? Bonding over art? Will helping Kelly with his house?” He squinted. “Are you sure he’s not more invested in Kelly than he’s letting on? Or than he even realizes?”
“I, um…” I swallowed. “I don’t know. He had casual fuck buddies before me, though. Like, friends with benefits who really were just friends, but they fooled around because they felt like it. So it’s not like he’s incapable of being physically intimate with someone and still being just friends.”
“Yeah, sure, he’s capable of it,” Tom said. “But do you really think that’s what’s happening here?”
After twenty years together, I should’ve been able to answer that one way or the other. I knew Will. I understood him. If he’d gotten in too deep with Kelly, I’d know it. Right?
But I didn’t. I honestly couldn’t answer Tom with a definitive yes or no, because holy shit, Will and I were so far off the same page right now that I just didn’t know.
Shaking my head, I whispered, “I have no idea.”
Tom grimaced as if he understood just how painful that was for me to admit. In a gentle voice, he said, “It sounds like you two need to have a conversation, then. Ideally sooner than later.”
I nodded. “Yeah. I know.”
He watched me, eyebrows slowly climbing. We’d been friends and colleagues too long for me not to recognize the unspoken, “Well? Why aren’t you talking to him?”
“Today’s one of the days we have lunch at Bold Brew.” I gritted my teeth against the threat of tears. “I’m kind of afraid to go.”
“Why?” he asked gently. “Will’s not the type to make a big scene over something or start a fight in public.”
“No, no, he’s not.” I exhaled. “I’m just worried he won’t show up.”
“Oh. Have you tried calling him? Texting him?”
I dropped my gaze.
“Aaron,” he said softly. “It isn’t like one of you went out and cheated on the other. It makes perfectly logical, rational sense for emotions to sneak into what you guys are doing with Kelly. Will is a logical, rational person. I’m sure after you’ve both slept on it and cooled off, you’ll be able to talk about it and work it out.”
“I know.” Yeah, rationally I did know that. But nothing about this felt rational. Nothing about it felt right or normal or predictable. I’d broken the biggest rule we’d put into place for this arrangement with Kelly, and after last night, how could I know for sure that wasn’t a red line for Will? He’d had a lot of reservations about doing this at all, and this very thing had been his biggest concern. What the fuck did I expect? That he’d magically warmed up to the idea