Where We Left Off - Romeo Alexander Page 0,6

and diligently passed around for everyone to savor.

“How is he?” Nathaniel asked politely.

Blair grinned, looking between him and the painting. “Prolific.”

Nathaniel blinked, understanding. “He, Theo…”

“Is Omega, yes. I thought you knew.”

“No, I’ve enjoyed his work for years. But I’ve also been...out of the loop, being on the other side of the country.”

“And no doubt your family was not passing on any gossip about my poor black sheep cousin.”

Nathaniel gripped the cuff link of his shirt, fiddling with it. “No, I can’t say I heard much about anyone.”

Blair chuckled. “Well, you’re bound to hear about it eventually. It’s quite the scandal. Turned himself into a proper artist, living off his own means. And then he got it in his head that he was going to fall in love with a man two decades older than him.”

Nathaniel realized he was still fiddling with the cuff link. His father had always chided him for it, citing it as an obvious show of nerves to anyone who might be looking for a weakness. Annoyance at himself, both for doing it and for allowing his father’s voice to echo through his head, flashed through him.

He continued to smile benignly. “Sounds...colorful.”

Blair waved a hand. “Oh, they’ll paint it as sordid as possible, I’m sure. Fact is, he’s a good artist, and he’s in a relationship with a man who loves him and treats him right. They’re happy, successful, and secure. I’m happy for him, even if I’m technically not supposed to have anything to do with him.”

“But you do,” Nathaniel pointed out.

Blair grinned wickedly. “My father and uncle set me up to deal with the family’s finances, and I’m extremely good at what I do. Get rid of me, and they’ll have to bring in an outsider, and they can’t have that.”

“No, I suppose they couldn’t,” Nathaniel said, amazed at her gall and impressed by her wiliness.

And if he were honest, despite having only met Theo a few times in the past, Nathaniel felt a strong surge of jealousy. The man should have, by all logic, been cast out, forgotten, and left to rot, as anyone who dared to stand out and disobey the rules of their families would have.

Instead, he’d found success and happiness. It flew in the face of everything Nathaniel had ever been taught about their way of life. And to twist the knife a little more, Theo had apparently found happiness with another man and still had someone in his family who supported him and was genuinely happy for him.

“Well,” Nathaniel started, clearing his throat. “I’m glad things worked out for him.”

Blair eyed him. “You mean that, don’t you?”

Nathaniel turned to look at her, curious. “Of course I do. Why else would I have said it?”

Blair snorted gently, turning her attention back to the painting. “Because in our world, people say a lot of things for a lot of different reasons, and it’s usually to get something or simply appear polite. Tell any number of people in my family that my cousin is living as a painter, all but married to another man, and they’ll tell you how nice that must be, but you can see them recoil. It’s in the eyes. Always in the eyes.”

That left him unsure what to say next. Though he’d never really been close to Blair, he had run into her at family functions and other social settings more than once before he’d been thrown across the country by his father. She had always been very good at somehow both toeing the line and yet pushing across it without going too far. It always left other people unsure what to say next, especially because she practically welcomed people to step over the line.

“I can be happy that someone else has found happiness,” Nathaniel told her.

Blair turned to look up at him. “Have you?”

Nathaniel stared, thinking that was a prime example of just how strange a conversation partner she could be. No one really wanted to know how someone else was doing, unless it was for amusement’s sake.

“Mm, no,” she concluded, turning away.

“Uh,” Nathaniel grunted, taken aback. “That was...swift.”

She waved a hand in front of her face. “It’s in the eyes.”

“Always is?” he asked with a small smile.

“Exactly.”

“And mine don’t show happiness.”

“No, they don’t. They’re...well, no, they’re not happy.”

“Perhaps you missed your calling as a therapist, Blair.”

That earned him a small laugh from her. “I think not. Can you even imagine?”

“I imagine it takes a certain type of person,” he agreed.

“Someone who is most decidedly not me,” Blair