The last day of filming was done.
Jordan, Micah, Angie, and the rest were returning to LA, working on that long list of things that Jordan had explained about. The postproduction and sound and footsteps.
There was one last thing to do, stills for marketing. The characters were in costume, standing in various poses, several with the tiny kittens who had made themselves at home with the crew.
Tomorrow was Jordan’s last day, and the wrap party would be in his cabin tonight. Of course Ryan was invited. Jordan had texted him and told him to be there if he could, and that they needed to make the most of the night.
Today had been a weird day. An article from Thomas Ivory had appeared on a blog he ran, using the picture of Ryan and Jordan together. But it was a soft article. Nothing about Jordan and Micah’s dad, just a pointed exposé on double standards in the B-lists of Hollywood.
Jordan linked Ryan to it in the simple text that read, I can handle this kind of post.
There were kisses as well, which made Ryan smile.
And now he was getting ready for his first studio party, and while it wasn’t exactly walking down a red carpet with Jordan on his arm for a premiere, it felt pretty damn big.
Ryan stood in front of the mirror, staring at his reflection as though if he looked at it enough, it might change. How would they make long-distance work? How the hell could one of them being in Montana and the other in LA ever be more than a disaster?
He fussed with his hair. The shaggy mess was getting to be more unruly than cute, and he was well overdue a cut. He was in jeans, the ones Jordan said made his ass look a hundred times wonderful. He half turned to see said ass, but it looked quite normal to him. Then he pulled on the dark red sweater that went with his dark brown eyes. That advice came from Ashley this morning, after he’d eaten two pieces of cake in Branches and she’d asked him what was wrong.
He’d said, “Justin’s gone, Adam’s a mess and keeps calling me, and I don’t know what to wear for the wrap party.”
Pathetic, really. He was thirty-three, not thirteen.
“Justin will still be gone whether you worry or not,” she’d said, topping off his coffee. “Adam is just freaking out because Justin has vanished. And as to what to wear, I love your dark red sweater, the V-neck. It looks lovely with your brown eyes. Now eat the last of your cake and stop fretting.”
So here he was: red sweater, check; ass-enhancing jeans, check; hair tidy… sort of. He’d shaved, used aftershave, and was ready. Tonight he wanted to talk to Jordan, find out how they could make this work.
Because he wanted it. Desperately.
He went down to the bar, collected Saul and beer, and together they drove to Crooked Tree.
The wrap party was in full swing. Thirty crew, friends, and staff from Crooked Tree were all in and around the cabin and the tents, which had been attached to the cabin with various ties. There were heaters, tables of food, and drinks, but no sign of Jordan.
“He’s in his room,” Micah said, after finding him. “He said to go in.”
Ryan’s stomach twisted. So this was it; this was Jordan saying that he wasn’t coming back for the wedding in June, and that actually, while this had been fun, it wasn’t going to work long-term. By the time he reached Jordan’s door, he’d wavered between sadness and acceptance, and he didn’t bother to knock.
“Hey,” he said as he closed the door behind him.
God, Jordan looked good. His short hair was styled, and designer stubble was the look he was going for, in an off-white form-fitting shirt over a T-shirt and jeans, and he looked fucking edible.
Jordan said, “I wanted to talk, before….”
“Before what?”
Jordan moved from the window and came to a stop right in front of Ryan. “Before I had beer and you thought I was just making shit up.”
“Okay.”
Ryan pressed himself against the door which gave him a couple more inches of distance between them. Jordan didn’t seem to notice; he turned away from Ryan and began to pace the length of the room. Step, step, step, turn… rinse and repeat, all while Ryan’s stomach was doing its best to jump into his throat and strangle him. Finally, Jordan stopped.
“On paper it won’t work, right? The sheriff in Montana, with all his responsibilities, and the flaky LA B-list actor. You see that, don’t you?”
“On paper, yes,” Ryan said cautiously. He wasn’t going to be the one who said anything out of place and caused the whole house of cards to collapse in on them.
“I’ve been offered a part in a soap opera—the gay son.” He grimaced. “Of course I’m the gay one. Already I’m being stereotyped.”
“You’ve had a lot of offers for gay characters?”
“No, just that one.”
“That’s not exactly stereotyping, then,” Ryan said, and he wished he hadn’t when Jordan grimaced again.
“It’s the tip of the iceberg. All it takes is one role and then I’m the gay guy in all the shows, and no one will have me in their movies as the straight lead.”
“Neil Patrick Harris manages it—”
“Did you miss the bit where I am just a B-list actor?” Jordan said, with heat.
Ryan could see where this was going and his temper spiked. Jordan was sabotaging this from the very beginning.
“Jesus, I should have known, You don’t want to even try.”
Then he left, because if he stayed, it would be a circle in which they argued and it would end everything anyway. He slammed the door shut behind him and selected the quickest way to the front door, not stopping to talk to anyone.
The cold hit him like a sledgehammer, and it was only then he realized he’d left his coat inside. “Fucking hell,” he muttered and headed for the car.
“Ryan! Wait!”
He stopped and turned to see Jordan jogging after him, sliding to a stop three feet away.
“What?” he snapped.
“Don’t leave.”
“I’m not staying to be pushed into arguing with the man I love over something he has created in his goddamn head. So, no thank you, but I’m leaving until you get your head straight.”
He turned away, but Jordan sprinted around him, sliding on the ice and grabbing at Ryan’s arm to stop his fall. “Wait, I’m sorry. I love you too.”
Ryan wanted to say he’d never told Jordan he loved him, then he realized that was exactly what he’d done. “But it won’t work,” Ryan finished for him. “Yeah, you said.”
“No, I wasn’t going to say that.” Jordan wrapped his arms around himself. “Please. I want you to say we can work this out.”
Ryan ignored the instinct to make him go back inside with his pansy-ass LA cold aversion. “Wait, it’s up to me to convince you? Is that what you’re saying?”
“No, fuck…. No… I fucked this up.” He relaxed his arms at his side and shook his hands as if attempting to rid himself of the tension inside him. “We can make it work, right. This is your home, and my home is wherever Micah is. I want to be with you, and I think, with enough patience, we could work around me being in LA for some parts of the year. And if we played things right, I could make a home here with you.”
He stepped forward and curled his hands into Ryan’s sweater. “I know it’s a lot, and you might not even feel like I do—”
Ryan covered Jordan’s mouth with a hand to stop him talking. “Yes.”
“Yes what?” Jordan asked, his words muffled behind Ryan’s hand.
“Whatever we need to do to make this work. That’s what.”
And then they were kissing, and the cold was the only thing that eventually made them separate.
Hand in hand they went back into the cabin and through the tent, getting a couple of wolf whistles, and Ryan underscored what had happened by bending Jordan back and kissing him with the best kiss of his entire life.
They didn’t let go of each other’s hands all night.
That was what love was like.
Being apart was hard. The hardest. With Skype and texting, they managed to make it to June.
The snow had long since melted and the days were warmer. Ryan had flown out to LA once, hated it. A lot. But he’d tried his best. After all, Jordan was changing his whole life for Ryan, so Ryan felt like he needed to do something back.
They’d rented a house together. That was the first thing that shocked the hell out of Jordan. He and Ryan had actually gone from “I love you” to renting a property together in Montana, a couple of miles from Carter’s bar. Ryan hadn’t properly moved in yet; that would be tonight after Eddie and Jenny’s wedding.
Jordan was sitting with Adam and Ethan, not quite ready to be a part of the whole brother show that was going on at the front. Anyway, from here he got a very good look at Ryan in his suit, even better when Ryan came over to talk to sit with Jordan, leaning forward when Adam began to speak.
“Ryan, can we talk after?” Adam asked in a soft voice.
Ryan nodded and held Jordan’s hand as the music started; Jake and Milly began the bridal procession.
The wedding was beautiful. Eddie grinned from ear to ear and Jenny smiled just as hard, but it was nice to get out of the church and into the early-summer warmth. Weirdly enough, he missed the snow and the utter stillness of the Montana winter. Maybe his LA-ness was slowly fading with each visit back to Montana.
Afterward Jordan, Ryan, Ethan, and Adam moved away from the other guests, and Adam began without any introduction or hedging. “I need you to track down Justin and get him to come home. I want him and Gabe as joint best men at our wedding on Christmas Eve.
Ryan crossed his arms over his chest, tense and stern-looking, and Jordan wished he wasn’t standing in the middle of this.
“I have an emergency number,” Ryan said with a nod to Ethan.
Adam drew himself tall. “Tell him this. Tell him that if he isn’t home by Christmas Eve, then I won’t be marrying Ethan.”
Jordan glanced at Ethan, who looked utterly destroyed and tense. Was this a joint decision, or did Ethan want something very different?
It seemed that Ryan picked up on the same vibe. “Ethan?” he asked softly.
“I want my brother home,” Ethan said immediately. “But he has to know that he and Adam have to talk. There are things Adam needs to know that will give him and Justin some kind of peace. Add that to the text.”
“I will.”
“What if he doesn’t come home?” Jordan asked, because he wasn’t sure either Adam or Ethan were really thinking this through with their ultimatum.
Neither of them seemed offended that he asked that. “If he loves us,” Ethan began, “either of us, then he’ll come home.”
“I’ll try,” Ryan said.
Jordan slipped a hand in the crook of Ryan’s arm and leaned on his shoulder, just to be there for support. Ryan relaxed at the touch.
Jordan pulled on Ryan’s hand. “Come meet Jenny’s family.”
That was Ryan’s out from the conversation. At that point, Ryan could leave it to Jordan to go alone. After all, Jordan would understand Ryan was in serious mode, but not only did Jordan want to meet this new part of his family, but he wanted to get Ryan away from the intensity of Adam and the fear in Ethan’s eyes.
“Are you sure you want him home?” Ryan asked.
Adam paled. “I never wanted him to go,” he said, his eyes bright.
“His concern was that he was detrimental to your progress.” Ryan sounded like he was quoting from a sheet of notes. Then he added in a softer tone, “But he asks about you when he asks about his dad and Ethan.”
“Please tell him, Ryan, tell him I want him to come home, that I know real from nightmares now.”
“Do you though?” Ryan asked.
Adam closed his eyes briefly. “Every day I try.”
“I doubt I’ll be able to change his mind.”
“But you’ll try?”
“Yes.” Ryan moved away, but before they’d taken two steps, he turned back to Ethan and Adam, and nodded at them. “I will do everything in my power to make sure Justin and Sam come home. I promise.”
Jordan hoped to hell Ryan could make that happen.
July moved into August, and every time Jordan visited Ryan and then went back to LA, he left a little more of himself back in Montana.
He didn’t want to leave Ryan, aware he was building a life in the small town close to Crooked Tree. He knew where to get the best coffee and that Martha had Saturday morning off from the counter at the grocery store to get her hair done, ready for date night. He also knew that she was seventy-three and her boyfriend was a scandalously younger sixty-five. He’d found the best places to park, the perfect sandwich shop, and even gotten an account at the hardware store because he was working on the garden in their rented place.
He wished they weren’t renting. The house they were in was a gorgeous two-story colonial-style house, with a large yard and plenty of flower beds to fill with color. He wanted to buy the place.
Every day he was there—hell, every minute—he was at peace, and his script was coming together nicely.
The righteous uproar over his accidental outing had died away. Some other B-list actor was currently front-page news, and when Brad and Angelina split, Jordan was consigned to yesterday’s news.
Everyone seemed to have forgotten apart from the channel buying Snow in Montana, who’d made some pointed accusations of “planning to deliver a flawed product,” whatever the fuck that meant. Something about viewers not being able to “buy into” Jordan’s character.
He wrote an email full of explanation, when all he wanted to do was tell them to get lost. But he couldn’t alienate them. Darby Films was new, and if it went under, then every penny of their father’s estate that had passed to them would be gone.
He didn’t care about himself, but Micah, Angie, and the five staff they supported in LA would be destroyed. So, he bit his tongue and played nice, even attended an awards show representing the channel.
No one asked him about his being gay or about Ryan, and he managed to turn the conversation around to the fact that Snow in Montana was a romance full of drama. And snow.
That made the interviewer laugh, and Jordan moved on before she could ask any more questions.
When he was next with Ryan, he held him extra close, and Ryan didn’t ask why.
Ryan was quiet. He’d contacted Justin, told him that Adam wanted him home. The only reply was from Sam, who said they’d be home. Sam didn’t say when, and Justin never spoke about it when he checked in with Ryan.
Seemed that Ryan didn’t take making a promise lightly, and he had slipped into worry mode. Adam spent a lot of time talking to Ryan, not about Justin, but about the memories that were slipping into his head at random moments. Not that they made much sense, at least when Jordan was there listening as well. Adam’s dreams seemed like things he was making up. Every time, the newest one contradicted the last, and he collapsed again in the middle of September. He was convulsing when Ethan found him.
Ryan called Jordan, to say that Adam was in the hospital undergoing tests, and Ethan was with him.
Jordan wanted to be home. LA was too far away.
Then one day, with Jordan in Montana, the leaves changing color around them and fall promising slower days and colder nights, news reached Ryan and Jordan.
Adam had woken up that morning in hospital, with clear, unequivocal memories of his time in witness protection. Not everything else he’d forgotten, admittedly; there was still nothing about his childhood. He came home, with a possible diagnosis of epilepsy, he was low and needed Ethan all the time.
Just like Jordan wanted and needed Ryan.
Justin and Sam came home in the middle of October, and that was when everything began to change.