Love In Slow Motion (Love Beyond Measure #2) - E.M. Lindsey Page 0,79

though. This isn’t an attempt to get a second date. You just looked like you could use something nice.”

Ilan stared at his shoes and let out a small sigh. “Sorry. I must seem like an arrogant jackass.”

“You always were,” Preston said with a soft grin. “It’s one of the things I liked about you.”

Ilan huffed and looked up. “It’s no wonder you’re single. You have the worst taste in men.”

“Would you say that to the man you were in love with?” he asked, and Ilan couldn’t hold back his laugh.

“Yes. Especially him, because he deserves way better than the mess I have to offer. But,” he said with a sigh, and Preston’s eyes went wide.

“Wait, so you two…? Your best friend’s dad?”

“I think so,” he said, his voice raising like it was a question. The barista saved him from another long, awkward pause, and he took his coffee to the cream and sugar bar to sweeten it. When he glanced back, he saw Preston was waiting, and he knew he wasn’t getting out of it that easily. They made their way out the side door, then Ilan chose a table in the sun which helped keep the sharp winter breeze at bay. “We had a date the other night. Only, I didn’t realize it was a date until I got there.”

Preston choked on his sip of tea. “How’s that?”

“Because I thought he was dating someone else. I thought I was going over for some apology dinner or something. Then the next thing I know, we’re sitting on the couch drinking wine, holding hands—and he’s telling me he’s had feelings for a while.” Ilan dragged a hand down his face and let out a soft groan. “I don’t know what to do.”

“I think,” Preston said slowly, like he was talking to a small child, “you’d start with, ‘I like you too.’ I mean, this a good thing, right? You told me there was no chance between you two.”

“There wasn’t,” he protested. “There shouldn’t be. It’s like some fucked up plotline. Doctor falls in love with best friend’s dad over the holidays. It’s a made for TV drama where the best friend dies in the end.” He snapped his jaw shut and panicked for a second about sending that out into the universe.

Preston leaned over and gave his hand a pat. “Your best friend is not going to die in the end, and life isn’t a movie, Ilan. This is why I’m glad you walked out on me.”

Ilan glared at him, but he couldn’t begrudge him the sentiment. He was a mess, and he was starting to think the only person that knew their way around it was Fredric. And that made him even more precious. “I have to take him on a date,” he said after taking a long swallow of his coffee.

Preston grinned at him over his mug. “The tragedy.”

“I have to…god. I have to let myself open up. I have to,” he stopped, because he didn’t want to say it. He had to feel things. Fredric was a natural romantic, and Ilan knew that the moment his guard was down, he’d be swept up and carried off, and there was absolutely no coming back from that. If Fredric decided—some months down the line—that Ilan was just too fundamentally flawed to love for the rest of his life, it would carve him hollow and leave him to rot. But now that he knew—now that he had just a taste—he couldn’t walk away.

“You spend most of your life in control,” Preston said into the silence that settled over them. “With work, with your personal life. I mean, you were always like that. We all kind of figured you were bullied as a kid.”

Ilan’s eyes narrowed. “Only until I grew six inches and learned to beat the fuck out of them on the playground.”

Preston threw his head back and laughed. “We all figured that one out too. But we all kind of knew it left scars.”

“It wasn’t…it wasn’t me,” Ilan confessed after a beat. He licked his lips and stared across the street because he always felt a little sore when it came to remembering what Julian went through. “My best friend is deaf and has a cleft palate. It was obvious—he had a huge scar from surgeries, and he wore hearing aids. Back in school they were those massive, tan colored things that weighed like four pounds each.”

Preston winced. “I remember.”

Ilan reached up under his glasses and absently scratched at the