Secret (Elemental) Read online

  Nick blinked, surprised, then realized he knew her from school. Cute, with almond-shaped eyes, carefully highlighted hair, and clothes just tight enough to get a second glance from most guys. Courtney or Carrie or something.

  Nick felt himself sliding into the familiar, doing what was expected. He had to, or people might talk. He returned her flirtatious smile and gave her their typical twin line. “Does it matter?”

  She gave him a mock pout and probably thought she looked sexy. It did absolutely nothing for him. “What’s going in your cup?” she said.

  He met her eyes and gave it right back. “Surprise me.”

  “Something hot and sweet coming right up.”

  “Make the same for me, sugar,” said Adam.

  While she smiled and grabbed a second cup, Adam leaned close enough to whisper to Nick. “I can play this game, too.”

  He was teasing, but Nick felt the undercurrent of . . . something else. Admonishment? Sadness? Disappointment? All three? Before he could puzzle it out, Adam drew back and pulled out his wallet.

  “I’ve got it,” said Nick.

  “No way. You’re doing me a favor. I got it.”

  “A favor?”

  “Giving me a ride home.”

  Oh.

  Nick felt like he was stumbling through his evening, and every step was wrong. When Courtney-Carrie-Whatever handed them their cups, he could barely get it together to thank her.

  She’d written her number on the cardboard sleeve. Along with her name—Courtnie—with a big heart over the I.

  “Ready to go?” said Adam.

  “Yeah. I—” Nick hesitated, not even sure what he was going to say. “Yeah. I’m ready.”

  Their breaths fogged when they stepped outside. After the warmth and bustle of the Starbucks, the sudden silence closed in around Nick.

  “I’m not chasing you off,” said Adam. “I just knew we couldn’t talk in there.”

  “Okay.” Nick thought he should apologize, but he couldn’t quite nail down why. The truck rumbled to life, and he reached out to twirl the dials to get the heat going again. Cinnamon and vanilla wafted from the paper cups to filter through the cab, warm scents that pulled some of the tension from his shoulders.

  “So what’s it feel like?” said Adam.

  “What’s what feel like?”

  “The back wall of that closet you’ve buried yourself inside.”

  His voice wasn’t unkind, but Nick heard an echo of what he’d felt inside the coffee shop. Not quite judgment. But almost.

  Nick wrapped his hands around his cup and inhaled the steam. “It sucks.” He paused. “Sorry—in there—”

  “It’s all right. You don’t have to apologize.” A hesitation. “Your family still doesn’t know?”

  Nick shook his head.

  “But you came to the studio.”

  “Yeah.”

  Adam took a drink of his coffee and stared out the windshield, a musing smile on his face. “When I saw you walk in with Quinn, I almost forgot what I was teaching.”

  “I didn’t think you noticed.”

  As soon as he said the words, Nick wished he could kick himself. He sounded sulky, for god’s sake. Sulky.

  Adam didn’t let it go, either. His smile widened. “Don’t you worry. I noticed.”

  Nick busied himself with backing out of the parking space, grateful for the darkness, because he was sure heat sat on his cheeks again. But then he got to the edge of the lot and sat there, wondering where to go.

  If Adam invited him back to his apartment, he had no idea what he’d say. An invitation equaled an opportunity to say no. A choice. Making one decision led to more complicated ones. Worse, he felt Adam watching him, probably deliberating over the same thing.

  But Adam didn’t offer an invitation. “My place,” he said firmly. “Drive.”

  CHAPTER 4

  Adam’s place looked exactly like Nick remembered. A simple one-bedroom walkout in the basement of an apartment building. No television, but three packed bookcases and an impressive stereo took up the main wall. Nothing else was noteworthy: a small kitchen with a two-seater table tucked in the corner, a tiny bathroom, and a bedroom dwarfed by the queen bed crammed in there. But the living room was huge and open, especially with the wide sliding door leading to the outside.

  Nick had gone to friends’ houses before. Parents would either be home, or there’d be plenty of evidence they existed. Parental involvement was a reality. Even his own house had Gabriel’s sports equipment stacked in a corner of the garage, or Michael’s bills and papers always left on the kitchen counter, or Chris’s laundry flung at the bottom of the basement stairs. Always a reminder that no matter what, being alone was practically impossible.

  Here, this space was very much Adam’s.

  And they were very much alone.

  “How long are you planning to hang in the doorway?” said Adam. He shrugged out of a fleece pullover and tossed it through the bedroom door. It left him in a loose T-shirt, cords of muscle trailing down his arms. The air carried his scent to Nick, oranges and cloves.

  The truth was that he liked watching Adam move, all rhythmic and lyrical as if the music never stopped.

  He could hardly say that. He leaned back against the front door and took a sip of coffee. He meant it to look casual. It probably looked like he was eager to escape. His heart was already working double time. He lived his life doing what others expected of him. Being here with Adam had no place in that. And worse, he had no idea what Adam expected.

  Except maybe an answer to his question. Nick shrugged a little, feeling the hardness of the door at his back. “I was wondering what you had in mind.”

  Then he mentally kicked himself again. He shouldn’t have said that, either.

  Adam didn’t tease him this time. He stopped in front of Nick. “You’re safe here,” he said quietly. “Okay?”

  Nick nodded and looked away. His jaw felt tight.

  “Seriously. You don’t have to watch your words or your thoughts or whatever has you so wound up.” Adam put his hands on Nick’s shoulders, not letting go even when Nick stiffened. “I only brought you here so we could talk. You just looked like you needed a breather. You can leave any time you want.”

  A breather. Nick needed a whole oxygen tank. He swallowed and made himself meet Adam’s eyes. “I don’t want to leave.”

  “I don’t want you to leave.” Adam took Nick’s free hand and tugged. “Come on.”

  Nick hadn’t held hands with another guy since it was mandated on field trips in kindergarten. It should have felt foreign, uncomfortable. He should have been pulling away.

  But it didn’t feel foreign. Adam’s grip felt warm and secure. He could have led Nick straight off a cliff and Nick would have followed. At the bedroom door, Nick’s heart staggered and scrambled to maintain a rhythm, but Adam led him past that, to the couch.

  Not like it mattered. They were alone.

  Comforting and terrifying at the same time.

  Adam sat close, curling into the cushions to face Nick. Their fingers were still loosely twined, and Nick knew Adam was giving him space to pull away. He didn’t.

  Nick waited, testing the air. He’d always been able to sense changes in air patterns, from a door opening, from someone coming close. But lately he’d also been able to sense emotion indirectly, from the rate and quality of someone’s breathing.

  The air always talked to him, and now, it echoed Adam’s promise. You’re safe here.

  He looked at their fingers latticed together. Adam’s thumb brushed against his own, very slowly, very gently, a tentative touch as if he knew that too much would send Nick reeling.

  But firm enough that Nick knew he could grab on and cling for dear life.

  “I never kissed a guy before you,” Nick said, flat out, no preamble. “My brothers have no idea.” He winced, remembering Quinn’s comments during the landscaping job. “They probably think I’m a total player. Even my twin brother—�
��

  “Gabriel, right?”

  “Yeah.” Nick glanced up, surprised that Adam had remembered. “He says I’m the good twin, and that’s why I get more girls.”

  “That would make him the evil twin?”

  Nick frowned. “If you ask Quinn, she’d say yes. But he’s not. He has a good heart. He’s very loyal. We got picked on when we were younger, and he always took a beating so I could get away. He’s the kind of guy to punch first and ask questions later. Quinn hates him, and I wish I could fix it. But he can be sharp—cruel. He speaks without thinking, and it gets him into trouble.”

  “You’re close?”

  “Yeah.” Nick hesitated. “I think we’re growing apart this year. A little.”

  “And he has no clue you’re into guys?”

  Despite the fact that he was sitting here holding hands with Adam, the instinct to reject the notion was so strong that Nick almost denied it. He had to clear his throat. “No. No idea.”

  “Do you think he’d hurt you if he knew?”

  Nick blinked in surprise. “What, you mean physically?”

  “Yeah, I mean physically.”

  Nick had never worried about his brothers beating the shit out of him over something like this. Anger, isolation—those he expected. Not violence.

  His eyes zoomed in on the scar pulling at the edge of Adam’s lip. Years ago, someone had slammed Adam’s face into a locker at school, causing enough damage that he’d needed plastic surgery to put his face back together.

  But Nick couldn’t imagine Gabriel hurting him. Not with his fists, anyway. Disappointment and rejection were another story.

  Nick shook his head. “I don’t think he would. But he might not take it well. Gabriel is very . . .”

  Adam waited.

  Nick ran a hand through his hair, feeling it stand up in tufts. How could he explain Gabriel? “He plays on four varsity teams at school. I think he knows most of the cheerleaders intimately, if you catch my drift. He’s got a girlfriend now, but if anyone’s a player, it’s him. He’s brave—I mean, he’s trying to get into firefighter school. Just very . . . I don’t know.”

  “Alpha?”

  “Yes. Perfect word.”

  “You admire him.”

  Nick shrugged.

  Adam smiled. “You do. I can hear it in your voice.” He paused. “How old are you?”

  “Seventeen. How old are you?”

  “Nineteen.”

  Two years. It felt like twenty. Nick didn’t know how to explain that it wasn’t just his brothers, that school would take on an entirely different feel if he had to walk down the halls with all his classmates knowing the truth. Adam could be himself, and he had a safe place to go if the world started to crumble around him.

  Nick wasn’t sure he had anything. He didn’t think his brothers would throw him out of the house, but he didn’t want to live there feeling their resentment, their unease. Their judgment.

  And he couldn’t stop going to high school. Education was his only way out of this town.

  But he still couldn’t bring himself to tear open those college letters hidden in his desk. What if they didn’t want him, either?

  “Do your parents know about you?” Nick asked.

  “Yes.” Adam smiled. “I was obsessed with dance from day one. I used to make up routines to show tunes in my living room. I asked my parents for hot pink legwarmers for my ninth birthday. I’m a walking cliché. I think they knew before I did.”

  “And they were all right?”

  “They were all right until I got hurt. They wanted to send me back to school, but they wanted me to pretend to be straight—like anyone would believe that, right? I mean, I get it, they were worried. I spent two weeks in the hospital. They’d seen what those idiots had written all over my Facebook page. But I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t pretend, and I didn’t think it’d do any good. So I got my GED, I got a job, and I moved out.” He paused. “We’re all right. They help me with rent sometimes, since I’m going to school part-time.”

  But Nick heard it in Adam’s voice. His parents had asked him to pretend, and that had created a gap that time wasn’t fixing.

  Nick spent so much of his life pretending not to be an Elemental, risking persecution for something he couldn’t control. What if he came out and his brothers told him to keep pretending? This felt like a double whammy.

  Nick looked into the warm depths of Adam’s eyes. “You spent two weeks in the hospital?”

  “I might have played the patient a little more than necessary. I had a hot male nurse.”

  Nick smiled and found himself reaching to trace the line on Adam’s face, before realizing what he was doing. He started to pull away.

  Adam caught his wrist. “You can touch me.”

  But Nick didn’t move. His pulse was choking him. This was so different from the first night they’d come here. Then, he’d been so confused and desperate that he hadn’t even admitted his feelings to Adam until he leapt out of his chair and kissed him.

  Now there were too many thoughts in the way. Too many fears. No Quinn to break them up if things went too far. He felt like he was falling, scrambling to find purchase, and the only rope he had was fraying strand by strand.

  “What do you want?” said Adam, his voice a bit lower, the sound curling through Nick’s thoughts. “Something like this?” He traced a finger over Nick’s lip, slow and deliberate.

  Every nerve ending in Nick’s body responded to that touch. His breath shuddered before he could stop it.

  Adam smiled. He shifted closer, putting his palm against the side of Nick’s face, sliding fingers through his hair. He leaned in to breathe along Nick’s jaw. “Or something like this?”

  If Nick turned his head, their lips would meet. Adam’s weight pressed into his side, warm and solid and masculine. Just from those simple touches, Nick’s body was responding more forcefully than it ever had with any girl. Heck, once Quinn had climbed in his lap and unbuttoned his pants, and his body hadn’t stood at attention the way it did for Adam’s palm on his cheek.

  His brain might have been a hot mess, but his body was definitely not confused.

  Adam moved closer still, pressing his lips to the hollow below Nick’s jaw, sliding his hand out of Nick’s hair and down his neck. His movements were strong, confident, nothing like the feather-soft touches of a girl. Adam’s hand slid lower, squeezing Nick’s chest through the T-shirt.

  Nick swore and grabbed his face, bringing their lips together because he couldn’t take it. Adam kissed him back with equal force. Nothing hesitant, tongues and heat and strength. Nick’s hands found Adam’s neck, his shoulders, the muscled planes of his chest. Tugging at his shirt yielded the smooth skin of Adam’s waist, the curve of his rib cage.

  Adam grabbed the waistband of Nick’s jeans and jerked him closer. Nick’s breath caught. His brain stopped working. He wanted to throw Adam down on the couch.

  So he did just that.

  But when he followed him down, Adam put a hand against his chest. “Easy,” he said between breaths.

  “The hell with easy.” Nick knocked his hand away and kissed him again, pinning his wrist against the cushion.

  Adam smiled and yielded, kissing him back before putting his free hand against Nick’s shoulder.

  Nick grabbed his hand and pinned that one, too. But then he realized Adam had tried to stop him twice. He broke the kiss. Their breathing turned loud in the space between them.

  The tiniest bit of tension hung around Adam’s eyes, but his voice was teasing. “The hell with easy, huh?”

  Nick blushed fiercely. He actually felt the heat crawl up his neck.

  Adam laughed, but quickly sobered. He flexed his wrists. “You’re strong.”

  “Sorry.” Nick let him go. But he didn’t draw back.

  “I wasn’t complaining.”

  Nick wasn’t sure how to read this, and it wasn’t like he had a ton of experience to draw from. “You stopped me.”

/>   “I stopped us.” Adam paused and put his hand against Nick’s face, almost a caress. Nick closed his eyes and inhaled.

  Then Adam’s voice lost the softness. “Let me up.”

  What could he do? Nick shifted back, sitting on the edge of the couch. This felt like a prelude to rejection.

  You’re safe here.

  No. He wasn’t. He didn’t feel safe anywhere. Emotion clawed at his throat. He’d let a wall down, and now he was furiously trying to put the bricks back together.

  Were they going too fast? Had he done that, or had Adam? The hell with easy.

  For a breathless instant, it had been amazing to let go of thought, to let instinct rule his motions. But now he was paying for it, and he couldn’t analyze everything fast enough.

  “Look.” Adam drew a hand down his face. “I don’t want you—”

  “Forget it.” Nick shoved off the couch. The path to the door seemed a mile long.

  “Hey.” Adam came after him. “Hey.”

  Nick’s hand closed on the doorknob. Adam grabbed his arm. He was stronger than Nick was ready for, and he spun him around.

  Most girls couldn’t do that, either.

  “What?” Nick demanded. The air had dropped ten degrees.

  “Well, you’re definitely gay. A straight guy wouldn’t be such a drama queen.”

  Nick set his jaw. “Let me go.”

  “Can I finish what I was going to say?”

  Nick stared back at him. For all his gentle grace, Adam had a core of strength. Nick had seen it once before, and he was seeing it now.

  “Fine,” he said. “You don’t want me . . . ?”

  “I don’t want you to rush into something you’re not ready for.” Oh.

  Adam’s hand loosened on his bicep, but he didn’t let go. “I’ve dated guys before who don’t want to be out. It’s a personal decision, and I get it, but . . .”

  Nick swallowed. “But what?”

  Adam looked at him, hard. “But if you wake up hating yourself, I don’t want you taking it out on me.”

  Nick studied him, allowing some of the earlier moments to click into place. Adam asking if Gabriel would hurt Nick. The tension in his eyes when he said, “You’re strong.”