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Fuck. Seth burst out of the phonebooth like it housed a pack of wolverines. He had to get away from Carson before he did or said something he couldn’t take back. How had they gotten into this mess? Sure, it’d been his idea, but Carson usually nixed his more preposterous ideas. And this was his most preposterous idea yet.
He was never getting married. That was what he’d always said. Not because gay marriage was only legal in a handful of states when he first came out. Not because he couldn’t settle on a single guy. But because he could only settle on a single guy. Carson. It’d always been Carson. And now he was supposed to marry Carson, but only for money. Only for pretend.
It’d seemed like a pretty slick trick until he realized that the two of them living together in close quarters with the pretense of a marriage to keep up meant not sleeping with other men. And sleeping with other men was the only way he kept himself from jumping on his best friend every time he saw him. Living with Carson—horny and desperate—and not touching him? No way he could do it.
But this new idea of Carson’s, the one where they fucked around with each other as part of their fake marriage, was even worse. Seth might be a brilliant actor, but how was he supposed to pretend that he was only pretending to feel exactly what he actually felt? And how was he supposed to get a taste of what he wanted and then let it go again?
Back when they were sixteen, he’d been on pins and needles coming out to his best friend—his best friend he’d always had a crush on—only to have Carson casually come out to him in return. But Carson had already been with Allie by then, and by the time that relationship ended five years later, it’d been too late. Seth had been all the way friend-zoned by then.
So he fucked other guys while lusting after Carson in his heart, and that had been working fine until the money came along and he conceived the brilliant idea of getting married, which Trisha and Leslie were waiting to witness. How the fuck was he supposed to get himself out of this? He raked his hand through his hair, undoing whatever Carson had just done to fix it as he paced back and forth outside the booth.
“I didn’t realize it would be such a horrifying prospect.” Carson had followed him out of the booth, but he was still leaned up against it, watching him pace. “I’m not your type, huh?”
“What?” Seth stopped pacing to face him.
“Or is it because I get too anal about things?”
“Is what about you getting too anal?”
“That the thought of having sex with me has you running for the hills.”
“Geez, Carson.” How could Carson possibly be insecure? With those soulful brown eyes and that build? He was exactly Seth’s type—the type which could be categorized as “Carson, population one.”
“I guess if I want to date men, I need to dress with more flair, huh?” Carson looked down at his suit like there was something wrong with it.
It was a classic dark blue, the sort of thing a CEO would wear, and he wore it with the commanding posture of a CEO. If Seth didn’t know the man beneath the suit, he might come across as uptight, but the contrast between the rigidly formal attire and the neurotic goofball wearing it was irresistible. Seth wanted to undo all his buttons, fuck him giddy, and then watch about a million episodes of bad 80s sitcoms with him. In short, Seth wanted to marry him.
“Any man would be lucky to have you.”
“Then could we try? One kiss. If it’s too weird, we’ll abort and come up with another plan.”
“It’s going to be weird,” he warned. “We’ve been friends forever.”
“But that’s what I like about it.” Carson held out his hand, and Seth felt himself drawn forward to take it. “For me, knowing who I’m kissing isn’t weird. It’s nice. But I understand if it doesn’t work for you.”
“It’s not like I can only kiss strangers.” Just that he mostly only had.
“One kiss,” Carson wheedled.
One kiss. All he had to do was pretend it didn’t work for him, and Carson would give up on this outlandish plan that was all his fault in the first place. He tipped his face up, keeping his eyes closed so he wouldn’t have to watch as the love of his life fake-kissed him. There was a warm, light press of lips, fleeting but perfect.
Was that it?
He opened his eyes to find Carson hovering over him. Their breath mingled together as their eyes caught and held. All the noise and clamor around them faded into nothing as time froze. Carson’s mouth dipped again, his own rose to meet it, and—
“There you are.” Trisha’s voice broke them apart. “If you two lovebirds don’t save it for after the ceremony, there isn’t going to be a ceremony. The clerk just called your names. Come on.”
Carson raised their joined hands and pressed his lips to Seth’s hand. “Shall we?”
Understanding all the import behind the seemingly innocuous question, Seth swallowed back his nerves with a nod. He had a reputation for making terrible mistakes, but this was going to be the worst one ever. One tiny taste of Carson, and he already knew he’d never be happy with less than all of him.
They walked hand-in-hand back to the courtroom where a magistrate was waiting to perform their ceremony. The courtroom echoed with just the five of them in it. The ceremony was short, devoid of the usual rigamarole, and Seth didn’t hear most of it. Only Carson’s hand wrapped firmly around his own kept him upright as the magistrate recited familiar words he’d never expected to have directed his way.
“Do you take this man...?”
Carson’s deep, familiar voice said I do without any hesitation or the least bit of tremble. When his own turn came, the words came out shaky and quiet, but the magistrate accepted them, continuing on as if it didn’t make any difference to her whether he said yes or no. She made a solemn-sounding proclamation and that was it. They were married.
“You’re supposed to kiss now,” Leslie prompted.
Carson squeezed his hand like it was a question, and Seth stepped forward until their bodies brushed. A shudder ran through him as Carson lowered his head and placed another of those soft but certain kisses on his lips.
“You okay?” Carson asked as he stepped away.
“Yeah, sure.” He ought to make a joke, but he couldn’t think of anything funny to say. He’d just married his best friend. It was fucking unreal.
“Well,” Leslie said. “What’s done is done, I guess. Congratulations.” They offered their hand, and Seth dropped Carson’s hands to take it. Trisha gave Carson a hug, then came for him.
“I’m so happy for you,” she whispered into his ear. “I always knew you belonged together.”
“Yeah, me too.”
“So where’s the honeymoon?” Leslie asked as they all trooped back out of the courtroom.
“New York,” Carson answered. “We’re moving this weekend. Just wanted to do the deed first.”
And pick up their money. Tomorrow morning they would sign the paperwork to trigger a lump sum payout, and then their adventure would begin. But where would it end? In another courtroom—this time in front of a judge granting them a divorce?
“You have to have a honeymoon,” Trisha said, ever the romantic. “Or at least, you know, a wedding night.” She made an obnoxious wink-wink face. “You can’t spend your first night as married men with Carson’s parents or Seth’s roommates.”
“We don’t really have anywhere to go,” he hedged. Bad enough they’d soon be spending every night together. His torment didn’t need to start tonight.
“You know what? Take my place. I’ll stay at Leslie’s. Just let me dash home and change the sheets. Don’t worry. I’ll make it nice.” She rushed away, towing a smirking Leslie along with her.
“I don’t think we fooled Leslie,” Carson said.
“We’re not going to fool anyone. This was such a bad idea.”
“We don’t have to.”
“We already did!”
“That was just somebody saying words. It’s not official until we sign this thing and file it.” Carson waved the certificate the clerk had handed him. “We can just rip it up. I feel like I forced you into this.”
“You didn’t.”
“Well, Trisha helped. But you didn’t get a chance to say yes or no before she barged in. And we didn’t really finish that kiss either. Tell you what—let’s hang on to this certificate for now. We’ll take Trisha up on her offer, spend the night together, see how it goes. Tomorrow, we’ll know.”
Tomorrow, Carson would know all right. He’d know Seth was mad gone on him. And then what? Seth hung his head, resigned to his fate. He would have this one night with Carson—their wedding night—and then he’d let Carson go.
Stupid money. From the moment they’d won it, the money had been trying to come between them, and now it looked like it was going to win.