Wynn glanced back and forth between us and a smile twitched the ends of his mustache. “Drive safe.”
“Oh, wait,” I said, reality suddenly intruding. “You checked the zoning for the shelter, right? We’re all good there?”
His easy amusement vanished. I could almost see him putting his lawyer face on. “Yes. Although you need the special-use permit from the council. Do you want to put that application in now?”
“Arthur still doesn’t have his registration. Anyhow, it might be too late. I’m told some guy named Joffrey…Somebody.” My brain was only half engaged at the moment. The other half was eyeing Shane’s ass. “Someone on the council proposed an agenda item for the next meeting on appropriate neighborhood siting for a shelter project.”
“Joffrey Van Doren.” Wynn looked like he’d smelled a skunk. “Guy’s a property shark and real bastard. I should go to that meeting.”
“I’d appreciate it. I figured we’d try to round up some other supporters to come along too.”
“Good idea. I’ll see who I can rope in.” Wynn frowned. “Ask people one by one. No public announcement. No need to give Van Doren advance warning there’ll be opposition.”
“Got it.”
Wynn turned to Shane. “If you’ve been thinking our little town is too good to be true, Van Doren will fix that for you.”
Shane tossed his hair out of his eyes. “Hell, I almost got arrested already. I know a town’s a town. This one has some good people, though.”
I could see Wynn wanting to ask questions, but he only said, “If you do ever get arrested, call me. Either of you. I don’t do criminal defense, but I know all the lawyers in town who do.”
“Kinda hoping it was a one-time thing.” Shane tilted his head. “I guess keying that Van Doren dude’s car is illegal, right?”
Wynn snorted.
I grabbed Shane’s arm. “Come on. We’re heading out. Thanks again, Wynn.”
“See you at the meeting, or sooner if you need me.”
As we drove out onto the winding forest road back to town, Shane looked in the rearview mirror. “Wynn seems like a good guy. I never really had other gay dudes to hang out with.”
“We can invite him and Lance to dinner sometime,” I suggested.Before you move out.Shoving that worry from my mind, I set a hand on Shane’s thigh. “Not tonight, though.”
Shane leaned back in his seat, spreading his legs, and pressed his hand over mine. “Definitely not tonight.” Inch by inch, he moved my hand higher up his leg until my pinky grazed his crotch.
“If we get arrested for speeding,” I said breathlessly, “you get to explain why.”
“Spoilsport.”
The view from the lighthouse had been amazing, but I decided right then it wasn’t close to the sight of Shane grinning at me from the other side of the car.
CHAPTER21
SHANE
“You sure youwant to do this?” Theo eyed the room I’d chosen on the venue’s second floor like it offended him.
“Yeah. Positive.” I sat on the bed we’d just made up with Walmart sheets and an on-sale throw blanket, bouncing a little, then kicked off my sneakers and swung my feet up. It was a good bed. The mattress was firm but cushy. I’d let Theo buy the mattress for me, the fifth time he reminded me he hoped to sleep in my bed too sometimes. He’d had to help me haul it upstairs because the fuck I wanted him paying extra for full delivery. We’d made a deal about his money. Just the bed. So my scant belongings were in a kind of shelf made of stacked cardboard boxes on their sides, and another box held the cheap lamp beside the bed.
Mimsy poked her head into one of the shelf boxes, meowed, then jumped to the top. The stack wavered, but the staples held it together.
“Don’t break anything, baby,” I told her.
Theo stage-whispered, “Break it, Mims, and then I can replace it.”
“No way.” I leaned back against the wall at the head of the bed and surveyed the room. Yeah, after the luxury of Theo’s place, this should’ve felt low rent. Well, it was low rent, but not in a bad way. Ignoring the bed— though it was fucking hard to ignore— this was mine in a way Theo’s place wasn’t, no matter how much it’d begun to feel like home.
“The workmen are done with the drains and floor, but they’re going to be framing in the walls to divide the new spaces downstairs,” Theo told me. “It’s going to be noisy.”
