After being kicked out of the Chicago condo where he and his boyfriend have lived together for over three years, Scott Parsons is forced to move back to the suburbs with his widowed mother because he's too broke to pay for a place of his own. Angry and humiliated over being dumped and kicked out, Scott tries to make the best of a bad situation by vowing to save enough money from his low-paying job so he can leave his mother's house and get a place of his own. His mother welcomes Scott back with open arms, but reveals she was secretly married her boyfriend during a trip to Las Vegas a month prior. Scott is surprised by his mother's news and even more surprised when he meets his handsome new stepbrother, Alex. Alex, a Stanford grad, has been living and working in LA, but returns to Chicago to pursue an MBA at the University of Chicago while working for a high-powered accounting firm. Scott and Alex initially butt heads, but soon discover there's more to like than dislike about each other. The first time Alex makes a pass at Scott, he ignores it. But when Alex makes a second attempt, Scott decides to take his stepbrother up on his offer and the two start a relationship. Even though Scott knows getting intimately involved with Alex is a bad idea, he also knows that sometimes a bad idea is just too good to ignore.

Fluidity

“I don’t want to interrupt your time together,” I said.


Chloe laughed. “Oh, please. We’ve got the entire weekend to be together.”


And with that, I ended up having dinner with Alex and Chloe at a restaurant not far from his apartment. Surprisingly, the evening wasn’t the disaster I’d feared it would be. Drinking certainly helped, but Chloe’s almost non-stop talking also took the pressure off of me to perform. She told me about her family, her friends, and her medical school studies while I smiled, laughed, answered any questions lobbed my way (there weren’t many), and nodded when necessary.


Alex, on the other hand, seemed almost comatose. When Chloe commented on his quietness, he dismissed her concerns by claiming he was tired. I fought the urge to roll my eyes at him for that. Yeah, I was tired, too, but at least I was trying to make the best of a bad situation. I hadn’t mentally checked out like he had.


When Chloe left the table to head to the ladies’ room, I glared at Alex.


Chapter 33