Winter's Gamble by Mechele Armstrong Page A

Pity.” His voice was brusque, as though he were discussing something simple.
    “I’ll quit if you want.” This was the best gig he’d had since graduating bartending academy. It wasn’t only Neo’s presence. He made more up front without having to depend on tips and had a better schedule. But again, it was what he deserved for what he’d done to Neo, so he’d not fight it.
    Neo still didn’t look at him. “Nah. That wouldn’t be fair to the bar. And I guess you gotta make a living.”
    Phil’s breathing resumed. Not to mention he did like working where he could at least watch Neo. “Thank you.”
    They stood in silence for a minute. Phil couldn’t stop looking over Neo’s body. And that’s when he noticed the rise to Neo’s jeans. Even denim couldn’t disguise his thick erection. Phil swallowed, trying now to look anywhere but Neo’s crotch. The idea that the man had a boner wasn’t an easy one to walk away from. It’s probably adrenaline. There was no way it had to do with Phil’s presence, even if it would be a shot in the arm to find out it did.
    “Why the hell did you walk away?” Neo finally looked him in the face as he asked the question, as if searching for the answer there.
    Phil’s laugh this time was anything but good-natured. It was the first time Neo had ever asked the question. Probably because it was the first time they’d been in the same room for this long without a bar or a stage between them. “I was a fool.” He’d reacted instead of thinking it through, and it would be a regret he had until his dying day.
    “Well, that’s a given.” Neo sat on a stool facing Phil. “But it explains nothing about what happened.”
    Phil nodded. “It doesn’t.” How did he put this? Could he ever make Neo understand? Neo had been out of the closet so long, would he understand someone who hadn’t been? “It’s a long story.”
    “Tell me. I got time apparently, according to Rose.” Neo settled down, drawing even more attention to the evident erection that still poked up. “And I’ll know if you lie. I can always tell.”
    “All right.” Phil took his hands from his pockets and put them together in front of his face. “I grew up in the sticks. The country. Redneck central. Where football is king, and if you don’t hunt, you’re a wussy.” Probably a place Neo had never even gone to visit. But it had been all Phil had known until college.
    “Sounds hellacious to this dark-skinned queer boy. But go on.” Neo tapped his hand on his leg.
    “Being gay? It wasn’t even thought of. Or talked about. Everyone assumed you were hetero. I knew I was…different? I wasn’t sure how. I didn’t know anyone who was gay until college. Then I met you. I knew why I was different then.”
    Neo leaned forward so quickly, he looked like he might fall over. “Wait a fucking minute. I was your first?”
    “Kind of. Yeah. No. I’d had…a one-night thing in college, but it…wasn’t…it was experimenting only… I mean, in the morning he acted like he didn’t even know me. Like I said, being gay wasn’t on the radar. It was something for the big-city folk and movie stars. Not regular people like where I was from. Like me.”
    He could still remember the coldness from the college boy he’d had the encounter with. The way the young man hadn’t even wanted to be around him after that. It wasn’t like Phil had made him. Or raped him. Phil had figured it out a few years later. The college student had been afraid Phil would talk. This guy was so fully in the closet, the moths couldn’t visit. Phil had been almost as bad. Even after college, he hadn’t known he was gay, just thought it was a onetime thing.
    “I wasn’t just in the closet—I was in the back corner with miles and miles of room around me to the door. And then I met…you.”
    “I do have that effect on people.” Neo motioned a hand as if to say, “Go on.” Was he believing Phil, or did he have doubts?
    “You were open