Fairyville (Fairyville #1)(49)
Author: Emma Holly

As he saw it, he had two problems to attend to. One: Prevent his mother from maiding Zoe the target of her ire, and two: Keep himself from going stark, raving bonkers over losing the prize that was meant for him to his damn cousin. Of the two dilemmas, he suspected solving the second would have the biggest influence on his effectiveness.

Concentration, and the magic he could work with it, was going to be key.

Chapter Thirteen

The moment Bryan caught sight of Alex that night, he knew.

Alex was walking toward him along the sidewalk, half a block from the steakhouse where they’d planned to meet. Bryan had good news about the hotel, and he was feeling happy to see him—a little horny, maybe, but mostly just happy.

Then he noticed the difference in Alex’s stride, a stride he hadn’t realized he knew so well. The swing of his legs was looser, the easiness of his hips. His hair was mussed in a haphazard way, and his lips were fuller, redder, as if he’d been kissing someone long and hard.

Bryan stopped in his tracks and had the dubious pleasure of watching Alex’s steps falter. The air between them seemed to vibrate as they stared at each other. Even at this distance, Bryan saw the guilty rush of blood to his partner’s cheeks.

An idiot could have jumped to the right conclusion. Alex had finally f**ked Zoe Clare.

The knot in Bryan’s throat didn’t surprise him, but the slap of anger did. It was close enough to rage to suggest he really had been hoping Alex would get serious about him. The stupidity of that hope only made it worse. Too angry to have any desire to talk the situation through with him—or not talk it through, for that matter—Bryan turned around and walked the other way.

"Bryan!" Alex called, but he was smart enough not to follow.

Which figured, when Bryan thought about it. Guys like Alex didn’t make wrong moves. Guys like Alex gave idiots like Bryan time to cool off. They waited until the people they’d stepped on in their selfish pursuit of pleasure were ready to crawl back.

That Bryan probably would crawl back was too mortifying to contemplate.

Muttering under his breath, he pushed into the first bar he saw, a dark, sticky-floored place that didn’t look like it catered to the tourist crowd. He ordered what they had on tap and carried it to an empty booth. The crowd was mostly male, blue-collar workers with no one in particular to go home to. It would serve Alex right if Bryan picked someone up, but in a straight-arrow bar like this, he might end up on the wrong end of a baseball bat for thinking it.

Alex never said he was only going to sleep with you, Bryan reminded himself. Ton knew who he was before you started this.

He also knew he wouldn’t have chosen any differently. After all those years of yearning after his friend, no way would Bryan have missed the chance to be with him.

Which meant he kind of had to understand why Alex had grabbed his chance with Zoe.

"Crap," he said into his half-drunk beer.

A shadow fell over his booth—too tall to be a waitress and too substantial to be Alex. Bryan was too irritated with the world to bother looking up. Whoever it was could damn well write him off as rude and take a walk.

"An Irishman like you might like this better," the shadow said, placing a bottle of Jameson’s on the dark, knife-gouged wood. Two empty glasses followed, set down by a large and well-kept masculine hand. Dark hair shaded the strong forearm above it. Intrigued in spite of himself, Bryan decided it might be worth his while to lift his head.

"I know you," he said, recognizing the man who’d driven Zoe to the Vista Inn—though he looked a lot harder-edged tonight.

"And I know you," said the man, his dry suggestiveness telling Bryan he meant more than just his name.

The instant heat that ignited in Bryan’s body did nothing to legitimize the grievances he’d been brooding on. This man, this Magnus Monroe, was enough to give any mostly g*y man a hard-on—and probably a few straight ones, too. He was big all over, and gorgeous to boot, with beautiful, dark-lashed green eyes that promised all sorts of dangerous adventures. This was a man who might do anything to his partners—tie them up, f**k them breathless, force them to have sex with exotic toys…

Bryan squirmed on the booth’s hard bench, his jeans abruptly tighter than they’d been before. He found himself unable to say a word. He was pretty sure he was reading Magnus’s signals right, but if he wasn’t… or even if he was, was he really ready to thumb his nose at Alex?

"Well?" Magnus prompted, his small, knowing smile a wet dream all by itself. Those lips of his were born to do carnal things. "Should I pour you one, or am I drinking alone?"

Bryan shook himself. Oh, yeah, he was reading the signals right. "That would be a shame, considering that’s a ten-year-old single malt. I should tell you, though, I’m only half Irish. The rest of me is all Eye-talian."

"Two fine races," Magnus observed. "Known around the world for the charm and lustiness of their men."

Magnus poured for both of them. Bryan sipped, allowing himself a tiny gasp of appreciation for the fiery nectar. Then he faced his unexpected company.

"Not that I’m complaining, but to what do I owe this honor?"

Magnus smiled, and there was a sweetness to it no amount of ulterior motives could dim. Bryan’s c**k gave an embarrassingly forceful lurch. "I want something from you."

That was enough to make Bryan cough. "Is it something I’ll want to give you?" he rasped once his breath came back.

"Oh, I expect so. Once I sweeten the pot."

"And how are you going to do that?"

"By giving you something you want from me." His eyes seemed to be glowing in the bar’s murky atmosphere, two sexy green lasers that sent a fresh wave of fire lapping Bryan’s groin.

Bryan found those eyes unnervingly hard to look away from.

Not sure where he wanted this to be going, Bryan took another hit of whiskey, which—thankfully—went down smooth. "Forgive me for asking, but I was under the impression that Zoe was the object of your romantic interest. Won’t, um, offering me what I want complicate that?"

"She is a good-looking woman." Magnus leaned back with his glowing, half-lidded eyes. "You think so yourself, don’t you?"

Bryan shrugged. "Sure I do."

"And you could get it up for her if you had to."

This conversation was becoming downright surreal, but oddly enough Bryan had no inclination to cut it short. He was feeling a little buzzed, more so than could be accounted for by what he’d drunk. Magnus was radiating some sort of hum, as if sex appeal could be converted to energy.

"Not a problem," Bryan said. "Those legs of hers could get a rise out of a corpse."