Ben Haggerty is devastated when he returns home from work to discover his lover of eight years has gone off to complete his master's degree at another college -- and left no forwarding address. Not only has Ben chosen Rick over his beloved family, but he's supported his boyfriend both financially and emotionally the entire time. Unable to remain in their shared apartment, Ben moves and spends a miserable holiday season alone. With the New Year, however, he's determined to make a fresh start, so he manages to obtain Rick's address and sends him a card asking if Rick ever plans to return. Somehow, the card winds up in the wrong mailbox.<br><br>Jason Prescott is a genius, having obtained his first master's degree at twenty-one and now working on his second. When he receives a card in error, he returns both the card and a card of his own to be courteous, expressing his hopes Ben can get in touch with his boyfriend. This begins a correspondence that leads to friendship, and ... the start of something more? Jason introduces Ben to his family and reunites him with his own.<br><br>But will Jason, who's even smarter than Rick, be satisfied with someone as ordinary as blue-collar Ben feels himself to be? Or will Rick, realizing what he's let slip through his fingers, manage to persuade Ben to take him back?

Always, Ben

Ben still saw red when he pictured that son of a bitch kissing his boyfriend. He hadn’t even stopped to think how Jason would react to what he did. Rick would have been so pissed, but Jason…After he’d taken the bag of broccoli flowerets from the freezer and gently put it on Ben’s sore hand, Jason had slid an arm around Ben’s neck, kissed him, and murmured, “My hero.”


Ben liked being someone’s hero. Now he pulled Jason’s body closer to his. “Tomorrow, we’ll go shopping for our own Christmas tree,” he whispered. “Our first tree.”


“Our first Christmas.” Jason ran his fingertips along the muscle of Ben’s thigh.


“I haven’t had a live tree since I left DeKalb. It’ll be nice, won’t it?”


Along with an eight-foot blue spruce, they’d also bought a wreath for the front door and enough garland to swag the entire front of the house, which now had the green shutters and trim they’d both wanted.


Chapter 51