Riptide (Sand Dollar Shoal Book 2) Page 5

  Drake peeked into the basket and saw marshmallows, a box of graham crackers and Ghirardelli chocolate squares. Beneath the marshmallow bag was a Jiffy Pop and a couple of cans of cream soda. “I haven’t had cream soda since I was a kid.”

  “I had never tried it at all until I went home with Noble for a long weekend when we were at school. His Dad always had the fridge stocked with stuff for all of us rowdy boys.”

  Drake watched closely as Presley spoke about his high school years. It seemed odd to him that Presley would have gone home on school breaks with Noble rather than going home to his own family. Maybe his host hadn’t had the best childhood either? “I’d love to go to the beach with you. For all the time I lived in California, I’ve never done that.”

  “Great!” Presley grabbed the picnic basket and blanket off the table and headed for the door when he stopped short. “Oh, one more thing.” He opened the cookie jar and pulled something out which he offered to Drake. “This is the spare key to the cottage. I meant to leave it out for you earlier, but I got busy with getting things together.”

  “Thanks, this mean a lot.” It meant the world to him to have the key to the cottage, not that he was going to tell Presley that. Having the key meant that he lived here now. He was finally home.

  Presley nodded like he was going to say something else, but moved toward the front door instead.

  Drake grabbed his key ring from the front table and added the shiny silver key to it.

  “Are the other guys coming down to the beach with us?” If Drake had his way, it would just be him and Presley alone on the beach, but with as close as Presley was to his friends, it was a pretty good bet the other guys would be along to join them.

  “Not tonight.” Presley smiled up at Drake. “Landon’s on fire with writing this new book and Noble never does anything with Landon.”

  Drake snorted, but in his heart, it was the sweetest damn thing he’d ever heard in his life. “What about Griff and Gregor?”

  “They’re going out for the night. There’s a gay bar across town called Bait. I’m sure they won’t be back until after last call, if they come back at all.” Presley burst out laughing.

  Drake frowned. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had sex for the fun and intimacy of it rather than for a living.

  “What? You don’t like gay bars?” Presley’s voice was curious.

  “No, no. It’s not that at all. I was just thinking about something you said earlier.”

  Presley nodded before setting the picnic basket on the sand. “Why don’t you go grab some kindling and spilt logs and I’ll get the blanket spread out.

  “Sure.” He wasn’t ducking the question, but instead wanted to get settled in on the beach first so he could give Presley’s thought his full attention. It was one of the things he liked best about his new roommate.

  Ten minutes later, they had a nice fire going and Presley was shaking the Jiffy Pop over the flames. Drake was sitting next to him on the blanket, ready to take over shaking duties if Presley’s arm got tired.

  Now that the sun had gone down, it was a cool evening. Drake would bet temperatures were in the mid sixties or so. The combination of the fire and sitting so close to Presley kept him warm.

  “So, what was it I said that got you thinking?” Presley asked quietly, switching the popcorn to his right hand.

  “It was what you said about going home with Noble for long weekends and school vacations. How come you didn’t go home?”

  Presley looked up at Drake, but stayed silent for a moment. “Home never really felt like home once I’d spent time with the Killingtons. My family is from Memphis and it would have been too far to fly back there for three day weekends. Plus they were so busy running Hound Dog Hooch, they wouldn’t have had time to spend with me. It was the same for Gregor, going back to South Carolina was too far and Griff hated being with his father, even back then, so Noble took us home and his father, Nick, took us in.”

  “So Nick was kind of like a surrogate father for all of you?” Drake had a feeling he would like Noble’s father. Any man who would welcome his son’s friends into his house like that had to be an amazing man.

  Presley jumped with a squeak when the first kernels started popping.

  Drake kept silent while they waited for the package to finish popping. The aluminum covering inflated with the popping kernels, reminding him of a pregnant belly.

  When the corn was done popping, Presley set it down in the sand to cool. “Yeah, he was like a Dad to me. My father was always so serious, with every word out of his mouth having something to do with the distillery. He had these dreams of becoming a bigger name than Jack Daniels or Jim Beam and was convinced I was going to be the one to see the business rise to those heights.”

  “But that wasn’t your dream?” Drake wasn’t sure what to think of this. With the exception of his foster mother, Cindy, no one had ever asked him about his own dreams.

  Presley shook his head, leaning forward to pinch open the popcorn. He offered the treat to Drake, who took a handful. “I never wanted anything to do with running the distillery, but it had been ingrained in me. My parents sent me to Andover because it was the best high school education money could buy. It was the same with Harvard. I didn’t want to major in business.” Shrugging, he took a handful of popcorn.

  Drake knocked his shoulder against Presley’s and tried hard to ignore the tingles of electricity surging through his body at the contact. “What did you want to major in?”

  Presley snorted. “I wanted to be a marine biologist.”

  Laughing along with him, Drake grabbed another handful of popcorn. “What? You mean like Jacques Cousteau?”

  “Yeah, I always loved whales and starfish and stuff like that.”

  “Starfish? I don’t think I’ve ever seen one.”

  “Did you ever go to the beach when you were a kid?”

  Drake shook his head and let out a sigh. He didn’t really want to talk about his childhood or anything to do with his past, but since Presley had shared a bit about himself he felt like he should do the same.

  While Drake had been pondering what to say to Presley, the other man had been rummaging through the picnic basket taking out all of the s’mores supplies. When he was done, he handed Drake a metal rod with a marshmallow on the tip.

  He had no idea what to do with his marshmallow, but thankfully Presley did. Drake spent a few seconds watching him turn the marshmallow slowly over the flames and copied his movements. “I was born in New York City to a single mother. She had a drug problem, but managed to stay clean while she was pregnant with me. I bounced in and out of the system until I was about ten years old when she surrendered her parental rights and I was made a permanent ward of the state. I lived with three different families from then until I was eighteen.”

  “Drake, I’m so…” Presley paused, “I’m so glad your mother stayed off drugs while she was pregnant with you.”

  Drake was pretty sure that wasn’t what Presley had started to say. It was an awful lot to dump on someone you hadn’t even known for one full day yet. “My last foster mom, Cindy, was the one who used to make pancakes for all of us. She let us watch a lot of Discovery Channel. I always loved Shark Week the best.”

  “Me too!” Presley’s eyes lit up. “Maybe this summer we could go see sharks together.”

  “Where? At an aquarium?”

  Presley pulled his marshmallow back from the flames and grabbed two graham crackers. He set a piece of Ghirardelli on the bottom cracker before using the top cracker to help pull the marshmallow off the rod and make a sandwich. “They do have sharks at the New England Aquarium in Boston, but I was thinking we could go to Chatham. It’s another town on the Cape about twenty minutes or so from here. Now that seal hunting is illegal, we get great white sharks here in the summer. They come to New England to munch on the tasty seals.”

  Drake couldn’t help staring at Presley’s hands as they moved to make the sweet treat. He ha
d to because he had no idea what to do with the other ingredients in the basket. If he were honest with himself, it wasn’t just that. He loved the way Presley moved. His hands seemed to flow from one thing to the next.

  While he’d been lost watching Presley, his friend had gotten his s’more ready for him. “Wait! Did you say there are great whites on the Cape?” Drake must have heard him wrong. It was like Jaws come to life.

  Presley nodded, taking a bite out of his s’more, smearing melted marshmallow over his lips and cheek.

  Unable to help himself, Drake reached over to lick the sticky mess off Presley’s lips. He thought he heard Presley moan at his soft touch, which was ridiculous. There was no way his touch could solicit that kind of unscripted reaction.

  Shifting his position, Presley turned his head, while his own tongue slipped past his lips to rub against Drake’s. He slipped his left arm up Drake’s back and leaned in closer.

  Drake’s cock stirred to life with a vengeance in his already tight jeans. He reached out to cup the other side of Presley’s face and gave in to the need pounding through his body. He pressed their lips together and kissed Presley like it was his last day on earth.

  This was the first time in years that Drake had kissed a man based on his own needs and wants and not because it was what Donovan Charles told him to do in a scene.

  Thinking of his former life jolted him out of the kiss. He didn’t want his thoughts of his old job to taint what had just happened between him and Presley. He forced a small smile before taking a bite of his s’more.

  Presley didn’t seem affected by the kiss. He held up his sweet treat and took a huge bite. “Mmm, delicious!” Presley grinned and took another bite of his s’more. This one was thankfully neater.

  Feeling like he was in a trance, Drake chewed slowly. The flavors of the toasted marshmallow and melting chocolate snapped him out of his trance. Up until he’d kissed Presley, he would have said he’d never tasted anything this good in his life, but one taste of those full, rich lips convinced him otherwise.

  It was a good thing he’d pulled back when he had, otherwise he would have ended up doing something he would have regretted, like taking his new roommate right here on the beach.

  His erection was pressing against the zipper of his jeans, threatening to break loose like The Incredible Hulk. His dick was so hard it ached. Never in his life or film career had that ever happened before. The absolute last thing he needed was to fuck up this new job by falling in love with ,or worse, fucking his new boss.

  6

  Two days later, Pres could still feel the ghost of Drake’s lips against his own. After Drake had broken the kiss, they’d spent a few more minutes on the beach before putting out the fire and packing up the picnic basket and heading home.

  Presley had lain in bed that night with his hard-as-nails dick in his hand reliving that kiss over and over until he was coming so hard that it coated his hand and stomach. No one had ever kissed him like that in his life.

  Drake’s kiss had been filled with need, but Presley also got the feeling that Drake would die if he hadn’t kissed him then and there. It only lasted for a few seconds and then something changed. Drake had stiffened up, and not in a good way, before breaking their kiss.

  He’d wanted to pull Drake closer and try to recapture the way the kiss had felt at first, but didn’t want to push his luck. His reluctant roommate had shared so much of himself and Presley didn’t want to make him uncomfortable by dissecting what happened between them.

  That didn’t mean Presley wasn’t dissecting the kiss in his own mind. How was it possible that Drake quickly pressing their lips together was the best kiss of his life? He was thirty years old and had a string of lovers dating back to his time at Andover.

  So what was it about this kiss that had knocked his socks off?

  “Hey, man, where are we with the decorating plans for the guest rooms?” Noble was leaning against his office door.

  “Hmm?” Pres was startled by the sound of Noble’s voice.

  “What is up with you? You’ve had your head in the clouds now for two days.” Noble sat down in one of the chairs in front of Presley’s desk. “Actually, your head’s been in the clouds since Drake arrived.”

  Pres rubbed his temples, feeling a headache coming on. Noble had been his roommate at Andover for four years and was his best friend. As good a friend as Noble had always been, he had a way of getting down to the bottom of things. Sometimes it was just easier to give up the information without Noble having to drag it out of him. “Shut the door.”

  Noble’s blue eyes popped wide. He hopped out of his chair and not only shut the door, but locked it behind him. “It’s Drake, isn’t it.”

  Presley nodded. “He’s everything I could have wanted in a man and I think he sees me the same way.”

  Noble’s look turned serious. “What do you mean you think he sees you the same way?”

  Presley shrugged, wishing for once Noble could just take him at his word. “We had a little fire on the beach the other night.”

  “We saw that. I wanted to join you for s’mores, but Landon told me if I interrupted you and Drake, he’d make me sleep on the couch.” Noble rolled his eyes dramatically. “Whatever.”

  Pres snorted. “Thank God you took him at his word.”

  “Enough about me and Landon. Did you kiss him?” Noble leaned in, setting his elbows on Presley’s desk.

  “No, he kissed me.” Pres knew he was glowing.

  “What!” A huge grin spread over Noble’s face.

  Raising an eyebrow, Pres shook his head. “You don’t have to act like it’s such a surprise. Men want to kiss me.” Once every three or four years…

  “Duh! I know that. I just can’t believe it took you two days to tell me. What’s up with that?” Noble rested back against the chair, frowning and folding his arms over his chest.

  Noble had always been sensitive like that. Pres should have known he’d react like this. “I’m still trying to process it myself. It wasn’t long or wet and sloppy, but it was the best kiss of my life.”

  “Sounds an awful lot like my first kiss with Landon.” Noble sighed, his eyes looking far away.

  “What happened?” He wasn’t one to pry into the love lives of his friends, but he wanted to know if Noble felt anything close to what he felt when he’d kissed Drake back.

  Noble laughed. “You’re not willing to kiss and tell, but you want me to?” He pushed himself forward in his chair again, his full attention fixed on Pres. “We were up on the widow’s walk. Landon had always wanted to go up and see the lighthouse tower when he was a kid. We were looking out at the ocean and I kissed him. It was like the Fourth of July, Christmas and winning the World Series all wrapped into one.”

  Pres nodded. “I didn’t want to tell you because I didn’t want you to think I’d lost my mind, but that’s how it felt to kiss Drake.” Pres was in trouble. Noble and Landon were so much in love with each other. They’d had a bit of a rocky start, but now the two men were as close as any couple he’d ever known.

  If Drake didn’t feel the same way about their kiss, Pres was going to end up broken-hearted and alone. Not that he wasn’t alone now, but being alone and pining over a man he couldn’t have would be worse.

  “Okay, first of all, slow down. I can see your mind spinning in your eyes.” Noble slapped a hand on Presley’s which were clasped in front of him. “Spend some time with him. Get to know a bit more about him and then maybe lay one on him yourself.”

  “He’s been pretty quiet since the kiss. The last two nights we’ve just watched television together while Drake was doing things on his phone.” Pres had thought of a hundred different ways to broach the subject of their kiss, but every time he’d chickened out. He didn’t want to interrupt whatever Drake was doing, which was, of course, a total cop-out.

  “I’d be willing to bet his head is spinning too.” Noble pulled his hand back and stood up. “I think I can help you out, Pres.”


  “No! Jesus, no. I remember what happened when I had a huge crush on Doug Radner back at Andover and you thought it would solve everything by telling him.”

  Noble snorted and started to laugh. “Honestly, man, I had no idea Doug would tell the entire campus that you had a crush on him.”

  “Yeah, well…” Pres shook his head. He might not have gotten a date with Doug, but he did end up getting pity head from a guy or three.

  “The original reason I came in here was to talk to you about the room furnishings. Now that the area rugs and beds are set up in all of the guest rooms, it’s time to get started with decorating them.”

  “I’ve done a bit of research online.” Pres cringed inwardly. He hated lying to Noble. He’d been so busy crushing on Drake he hadn’t given the guest rooms a second thought.

  “Why don’t you head out to Home Goods and the Christmas Tree Shop? See what you can find. We can do a mock up of one room and go from there. Take Drake with you. He seems like the type who’d enjoy decorating.”

  “That’s such a stereotype, that gay men like decorating.”

  Noble rolled his eyes. “While we were setting up the beds, he mentioned a few things he thought would look good in the rooms.” Sticking his tongue out, Noble stretched his arms high over his head. “It will give the two of you a chance to spend time alone together without the pressure of actually being alone.”

  Pres nodded. He had to hand it to Noble. It was a good idea.

  XX

  Drake was in the hotel kitchen with Gregor. Noble didn’t have anything pressing for him to do this morning, so he’d helped the chef clean up after breakfast. Now they were sitting on stools at one of the stainless-steel prep areas in the kitchen looking at seafood recipes on Gregor’s laptop.

  “What’s a New England Clambake?” The idea of baking clams sounded weird. The seafood meals he’d eaten in California were usually sushi or fish tacos. He didn’t even think he’d ever eaten a clam.