Bobby
He was his usual.
Bobby hadn’t planned on calling again. He told himself that every time — that it was a one-off, a rare moment of weakness, a necessary release before another week of endless meetings and boardroom wars. But then he’d find himself on the phone with Bellamy’s office, his voice low, asking for Jules. Always Jules.
They’d been seeing each other for almost a year now, though seeing wasn’t exactly the right word. It wasn’t friendship, it certainly wasn’t dating, it wasn’t even habit. Jules came when he was called. He poured the wine, he asked the right questions, he laughed, he touched the right places. He knew how to make Bobby forget the noise, the pressure, the constant hum that filled every other hour of his life since the divorce. And then, as quietly as he arrived, he’d be gone by morning.
That was the arrangement. No mess, no expectations, no conversations that reached past the surface — Bobby made sure of that. Jules was the first name Bellamy had suggested, and the only one he ever called back for. He told himself it was just convenience. In truth, he didn't want to explain himself again. He didn’t want to perform. He didn’t want to think about what any of it meant. That was part of what he paid for. The other part….
“Fuck, yeah. Oh, my…God!”
Jules rocked his hips back and forth on the bed, moving in smooth, practiced circles. Bobby shuddered and steadied himself, holding onto Jules’ shoulders. With a low growl, he thrusted forward, and surrendered himself to the rhythm.
“Oh, fuck me, sir,” Jules moaned in between breaths. “Fuck me hard! Please, sir.” He threw his head back in pleasure, almost like an invitation for Bobby to grab a fistful of his tousled, golden blonde waves. Bobby accepted, and he gripped his hair, pulling his head back further. Jules let out a soft moan that sounded like, “Y-yes….”
Bobby started fucking him harder now, faster and frenzied. With his other hand, he smacked him on the ass cheek and gripped the smooth, tanned flesh, not letting go until Jules whimpered. He left an angry red handprint behind. He bucked forward again. He was already balls deep, but it wasn’t enough. With each thrust, the trained, silky muscles of the boy’s hole flexed and massaged Bobby’s cock, but he still felt that searing heat in his thighs and that deep, sweet ache in his knees. He glanced at the clock on his nightstand. It was half past midnight. He was too old for this… for all of it.
With a disappointed sigh and a wet, slightly sticky plop, he pulled out. “I’m sorry,” Bobby said, almost embarrassed. He sank down into the bed, leaning against the leather headboard. “I’m just… tired.”
Jules turned to face him and smiled. “Hey, don’t be. It happens all the time.” He ran a hand through his hair, unbothered and then crawled across the bed, nestling under Bobby’s arm like he was picking up on some invisible cue. “You don’t have to be sorry.” He reached for Bobby’s hand, their fingers interlocking. “You don’t have to be anything you’re not.”
According to the website, Jules was only twenty-seven, almost exactly half Bobby’s age, though he moved through the world like someone much older and wiser. He was smooth and supple where Bobby was rough and hard, deliberate where Bobby was cautious. He had that easy, boyish beauty that didn’t beg for attention, that made people watch him without realizing.
He was sculpted and toned with a warm, natural tan and tattoos up his arms. Bobby traced the black outline of the 1998 in the middle of his defined chest, rising and falling as Jules exhaled a soft laugh. It sounded so unselfconscious and easy. Bobby felt that sting of longing for a version of himself he’d buried so deeply. He could barely remember what his own laugh sounded like back then.
As Jules was showering, humming softly under the rush of the water, Bobby found himself wondering where he went when he wasn’t in this bed — what his life looked like when he wasn’t being whoever Bobby needed him to be, when he wasn’t Jules. He knew better than to ask, of course.
The shower shut off. A minute later, Jules padded out, a white towel draped carelessly around his slender hips, his hair damp and already starting to curl against his temples. He moved through the bedroom with quiet familiarity, collecting his clothes from the floor. Bobby watched him. Jules didn’t ask if he should stay the night — he never asked.
“Your room’s made up,” Bobby said suddenly. His voice sounded lower than normal, somewhat rougher.
Jules nodded from the doorway where he lingered, holding his clothes in his arms. He smiled knowingly, like he’d been waiting for Bobby to say exactly that. “Thanks.”
He left the door open as he went down the hall, bare feet soundless on the hardwood. Bobby popped a sleeping pill and lay there for a long while as the silence came roaring back. During the day, he could close million-dollar deals without breaking a sweat, but the quiet that always came at night unnerved him. His penthouse apartment was mostly glass and concrete, too high above the city for the sounds of traffic to reach him. The ceiling faded in and out of focus. The lights of San Francisco below shimmered like something mechanical, blinking in the darkness. He rolled over onto his side.
On the nightstand was a framed photo that he should’ve put away a long time ago. It was turned over, facedown. A woman, two boys, a summer that felt like another lifetime. He reached for it, then stopped halfway, hand hovering. He couldn’t even remember why he still kept it there. Maybe to remind himself what it used to feel like — the laughter, the weight of being known and loved. The real thing, not the version of it he paid for by the hour.
That was what Bellamy sold — the illusion of intimacy, bound tightly by silence. That was what kept him coming back. Bobby closed his eyes, rubbed the bridge of his nose, and tried to will away the ache in his chest that always came after.
No, he thought. That was it. Tonight’s the last time. I can’t see him again.
By the time Bobby’s alarm went off at quarter past five, the guest room was empty and cold. The bed was made and the towel folded neatly on the dresser. He stood in the doorway for a few moments, then turned back and headed downstairs to the kitchen. He switched on his espresso machine — one shot, no sugar, never milk. He checked his phone to see eight new overnight emails from London, Hong Kong, Singapore. Markets never sleep.
He ran until his legs burned, the treadmill whirring in the quiet of his penthouse, morning fog pressed heavy against the glass. Sweat pooled at the base of his throat, soaking through the grey of his T-shirt. He showered until his thoughts stopped circling, steam clouding the mirrors, the faint sound of CNBC murmuring from his bedroom TV. He dressed in ritualized silence. Crisp white shirt, navy suit, cufflinks he didn’t remember buying, his Swiss-made watch. By seven, the Bentley waited in the porte-cochère below his building, black and spotless, engine purring low and steady. Luis stood beside it, collar turned up against the cold, the door already open.
“Good morning, Mr. DiAngelo.”
“Morning,” Bobby said, sliding into the back seat. The car door closed with a soft thud, sealing the city away for a few short moments.
The car slipped through the early morning traffic of the Financial District, the city still waking up beneath the pale fog. Dominion Tower rose out of it — glass and steel, fifty-two stories of ambition, money, and power. Luis turned into the underground entrance reserved for executives. A security guard was waiting at the elevator bay. Bobby nodded once, and the man straightened and pressed a keycard to the reader. There was a soft chime and the doors slid open for him.
Inside, the mirrored walls threw his reflection back at him from every angle — perfectly tailored and pressed suit, dark tired eyes, the silvery streak of grey that shot through his dark, thick Italian hair, pushed back from his forehead like he’d run a hand through it a hundred times already. His face had settled into its lines, which came not just from fatigue but from experience. There were faint creases at his eyes, small furrows in his brow, a seasoned roughness around his jaw. The elevator began its climb with barely a sound. Floor numbers blinked past on a discreet display: 14, 28, 37, 45…
San Francisco unrolled beneath him as the elevator rose to the C-suite levels of the tower. The doors opened with another chime to stillness and glass. Bobby crossed through the reception room, his shoes clicking on the polished floors. Claire was at her post behind the curved reception desk, her smile too warm and her voice too chipper. “Good morning, Mr. DiAngelo.”
He nodded in passing. Junior executives walked briskly along the outer offices, murmuring over tablets and folders, but they kept a respectful distance as he passed.
His CFO, a tall man in a slate suit crossed the corridor, coffee in hand. “Morning, Bobby.” He clapped him on the shoulder.
“Morning, Mark.”
When he finally reached his office suite, the air was cooler, quieter — the kind of silence that came with money and respect, not the silence that suffocated him at home. Soft morning sunlight shone through the floor-to-ceiling windows, gleaming against marble and polished walnut panels. Then he saw movement in his office. Someone was crouched halfway beneath his desk, one hand braced on the floor, the other fumbling around for something just out of reach.
Bash.
His assistant was dressed as he always was — fitted shirt, sleeves rolled to the elbow, the faintest trace of a cologne that didn’t belong in a boardroom, and those pants…. Bobby had dreams about those pants. Bash’s perfect, little butt stuck out in the air, wiggling with every swipe of his hand under the desk.
Bobby lingered in the doorway for a few seconds longer than necessary, hungrily taking in the view. “You okay down there, London?”
He startled, bumping the underside of the desk before rising, breathless with a crooked grin already spreading across his face. “Ah—pen cap. Didn’t think you’d be in this early, Mr. D.” A smooth English lilt curled around his words, his voice deeper than one would expect, given his lanky frame and boyish face. He held up the small piece of plastic, triumphant, his cheeks a little flushed.
Sebastian “Bash” Crawford was twenty-two, fresh out of the London School of Economics, Dominion’s latest imported prodigy. He’d come through the company’s executive fellowship program, bright-eyed and brilliant, though half the senior partners still thought he was too young to be trusted with anything important. Bobby disagreed.
“Well, I am,” he said, too quickly. He moved past him, setting down his briefcase on the credenza. “You’re early.”
“Wanted to get a head start today,” Bash said. He straightened papers on Bobby’s desk that didn’t need straightening. “Busy one today, yeah?”
Bobby nodded, sinking into his chair. “Everything with the people from Umbral should be wrapping this afternoon. The press has been crawling all over it.”
Bash leaned over Bobby’s desk, his dark brown eyes fixed on the skyline. “Dominion takes Umbral,” he said with a half-grin that hinted he’d been practicing the future headline.
“I’m looking forward to this whole damn thing being over,” he muttered, tugging at his tie. “Umbral’s a goldmine, but their board makes me want to walk into traffic. I mean, you’d think the people who founded a tech startup would be at least somewhat intelligent, no?” Bobby sighed, a little too heavy, a little too real. “Let’s just hope it doesn’t all fall apart at the eleventh hour.”
Bash laughed, low and bright. “You say that now. Give it a week and you’ll be bored without the chaos.”
Bobby glanced up from his monitor, one brow raised. “Ah, you need coffee,” Bash said, clearing his throat. “I’ll have some brought up.” He slinked out of the office with a wink and that disarming smile. Bobby’s eyes followed the smooth, rounded shape of his assistant’s ass out the door. Those fucking pants, Bobby moaned in his mind. He must know what he’s doing.
Bobby’s hand ended up in his lap, squeezing the thick bulge that was growing in his own pants. He didn’t cum last night, and he was paying for it now. Those unthinkable thoughts slithered back into his mind. He imagined the thrill of bending Bash over his desk, pulling those pants down to his ankles, tearing through his underwear, and then the rush of slipping his cock into that tight, pink, sweet, untouched—
Riing—riiiing.
His office phone lit up. PR again. He rubbed his face, sighed, and tucked himself back together before he answered.
The next six hours passed in a haze of boardroom droning and caffeine. At ten, overseas partners called in from London and Seoul, all lag and static and too many voices at once. Bobby just let them talk. By two, the deal with Umbral was signed. Hands shook, cameras flashed, champagne bottles hissed open, and somewhere in the blur of white smiles and gold pens, Bobby’s jaw tensed. He ducked out as soon as he could. The bubbles made him queasy at his age.
By the time four o’clock rolled around, he was back behind his desk, jacket off, tie hanging loose, his voice a low growl on yet another call with the board. The numbers blurred together — profit margins, market share, all the usual ghosts. His shoulders ached and his patience was thinning. Success had its weight, and it was starting to press down harder these days. When the call finally ended, he let the silence settle for a moment, breathing it in like a reprieve. Then, from the corner of his eye, he caught a flicker of colour through the glass wall.
“Got your guests here, Mr. D,” Bash said with a knowing smile before stepping aside.
Carter hurried inside, a burst of energy in sneakers that squeaked on the floor. He stopped by the window, pressing both hands to the glass. He breathed, eyes scanning the city below. “Hey, Dad,” he said finally, shuffling over to where Bobby stood and hugging him around the hips. Bobby mussed up Carter’s hair, thick and dark like his own. Jackson followed close behind, all long limbs and teenage indifference. He looked more like his mother.
He nodded coolly and slouched into one of the leather chairs opposite the desk. “Hey.”
Bobby smiled weakly. “Hi.”
Jackson typed something on his phone with his quick thumbs. Carter threw himself onto the other chair, swinging his legs over the edge.
“So,” started Bobby, “how was school?”
Carter glanced up at Jackson, as if asking for permission to speak first. Jackson said, “Yeah, it was okay.”
“Did you have soccer today?”
Jackson finally peeled his eyes off his phone and shot his father a look. “I quit last month.”
“Oh.” Bobby nodded like it was old news to him.
Carter filled the silence before it got too heavy, scrambling off the chair almost as soon as he sat down. “Dad! Dad, guess what.” He was already bouncing off the balls of his feet, one hand gripping the edge of Bobby’s desk for balance. “We had a bird man at school today.” He said it like it was the most important thing that had ever happened, eyes bright.
“Yeah….” Bobby said tentatively, unsure what exactly his youngest son meant.
“He had a whole bunch of birds, like real birds. He brought a hawk! A big one. Her name was Goldie, and she sat on his arm, like this—” He held his arm out, stiffly mimicking the stance. “She was staring at everybody, and the guy said she used to live outside, but she got hurt and now she can’t fly anymore, so she just goes everywhere with him.”
He climbed up onto one of the chairs, still going. “He said if he let her go, she’d probably die ‘cause she doesn’t know how to hunt now. But he takes her to schools so people can see her up close. Isn’t that kinda sad? But also kinda cool?”
Bobby smiled, resting his elbows on his desk. “Yeah, buddy. That’s pretty amazing.”
“Yeah,” Carter said, catching his breath. “She kept turning her head like she wanted to go, though. But she would die.”
Jackson sighed through his nose but the corners of his mouth twitched into an unwilling smile. The door opened again and Bash reappeared with two greasy paper bags from the burger place down the street. He set them down gently on the small glass side table between the chairs and then slipped out.
“Lunch,” Bobby said, clearing his throat. “Let’s eat.”
Carter dug in immediately, still talking about the hawk with the broken wing in between bites, his words spilling out like wind-up chatter. Jackson ate in silence, eyes still fixed on his phone. Bobby watched them both — the small movements, the natural rhythm of them just being. It struck him how rare it was to have them here, sitting across from him. For a moment, it almost felt normal.
After lunch, Bobby leaned forward in his chair as Carter’s story finally wound down. “Hey,” he said, “I got something for you guys. An early Christmas present.” Carter looked up, eyes wide. Jackson was more wary.
“We’re still, like, two weeks away from Halloween, Dad.”
“Bruins tickets,” Bobby said, smiling despite himself. “December twentieth. In Boston. Center ice.”
Carter’s mouth dropped open and he shot out of his chair again, spinning in quick, uncoordinated circles around the office. Jackson blinked, his suspicion faltering.
“Actually?” he asked, his voice quieter now. “Like, really?”
“Actually,” Bobby said with a slight laugh. “And really, too.”
Jackson broke into a grin — a real one, not a sarcastic one. The kind Bobby hadn’t seen in months, maybe even years. “What game?”
“Against the Leafs,” Bobby said.
That earned him a low whistle. “Damn, Dad. That’s fu—” Jackson caught himself, glancing toward his little brother. “—that’s awesome. That’s… a big game.”
“Only the best. I thought maybe we could make a weekend out of it. Just us guys. We could see Nonie and Papa, too. Aunty Gina, hey? It’s been so long since we’ve all gone back East.”
Jackson gave a small nod, a faint smile, suddenly unsure. “Sounds great, Dad — if it fits your schedule.”
Bobby’s grin faltered, screwing into a frown. “What’s that supposed to mean? It will. I’m making time for it.”
Jackson leaned back, studying him — not angry, just skeptical. “Nothing. It’s just—half the time you’re in New York or Los Angeles or London or wherever. You miss stuff, Dad. You say we’ll do something and then work blows up. Remember when we were supposed to go to Thailand last year?”
“That’s not fair,” Bobby said, sharper than he meant. He sounded like a CEO, not a father. “That was different. Last year was…. different. I make time when I can.”
Jackson looked up then, a flash of something raw behind his composure. “Yeah, well, Mom says that she stopped believing that a long time ago.”
The words hung there. Carter shifted by the table uncomfortably, poking at the last of his fries, unsure of who to look at.
Bobby exhaled, forcing a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “I’ll make this happen, okay? I promise.” His voice sounded tight.
Jackson’s gaze flicked toward the window. “Sure.” He said it softly, almost politely, but it landed harder than anything else. The moment had passed, but it left the air thinner somehow, like something had cracked. For a long moment, neither of them spoke. The city below glared back up at them through the glass.
A sharp knock broke through the quiet. The door eased open, and Bash leaned in, phone in hand. “So sorry to interrupt, Mr. D,” he said, his accent soft but urgent. “It’s Mr. Menendez. He’s on the line. Something about the Umbral term sheet.”
Bobby’s stomach sank. Of course.
“Tell them I’ll call back,” he said automatically.
Bash hesitated. “They said it can’t wait, sir.”
Jackson was already standing up. “It’s fine. We should probably go anyway.”
“You don’t have to—” Bobby started, but Jackson walked toward the door and slung his bag over his shoulder.
“It’s okay, Dad,” he said after a beat, his tone practiced. “You’ve got work. Luis is already downstairs, so… don’t worry about it.”
Bobby started to say something, but the phone on his desk blinked insistently. He looked at it, then back at them — and that was enough.
Jackson pushed his chair back. “Come on, Carter.”
Carter’s smile wavered just a bit, but he gave a little wave anyway, his voice bright and thin. “Bye, Dad.”
“Bye, bud,” Bobby said, forcing a smile of his own. Bash clicked the door shut behind them, and the office felt too big again, too clean. Bobby pinched the bridge of his nose, then nodded at Bash. “Put them through.”
—||—
The rest of Dominion Tower had gone dark hours ago. Only the 48th floor was still awake with light — two offices side by side, the sound of muffled voices breaking through the stillness. The skyline glowed faintly through the glass. Empty coffee cups and discarded printouts were scattered across Bobby’s desk. It was nearly midnight, and the air hummed with the strange, restless calm that came after a storm.
“That’s it,” Gabriel said, perched on Bobby’s desk, the ghost of a smile tugging at his mouth. His voice was lower than normal, rough from hours of talking. “The board’s happy, Umbral’s happy, and we’re not getting sued. I’d call that a win.”
Bobby exhaled a low laugh and rubbed at the back of his neck. “That might be a first.”
Gabriel chuckled softly, the sound deep and warm and real, filling the silence in a way Bobby found almost disorienting. He was only half a decade younger than Bobby, but he looked youthful in this light — his dark curls loosened, greying stubble shading his jaw, his tie abandoned somewhere back in the conference room.
Gabriel Menendez was Dominion Capital’s Chief Operating Officer — five years in, a rainmaker Bobby had poached off Wall Street to run M&A in what proved one of his sharpest moves. He hadn’t built the company, but he made it run. Where Bobby brought vision, Gabriel brought precision.
He had that rare kind of calm, the kind that steadied a room just by walking into it. Even now, with his collar open and his sleeves rolled high, there was a composure to him — unhurried, unflappable — that made Bobby feel both grounded and exposed. Maybe it was the way he listened, or the way his dark, searching eyes seemed to strip everything down to its essentials. Bobby told himself that was why he trusted him — why he let him in more than anyone else — but lately, he wasn’t so sure it was only trust.
“You do realize,” Gabriel said, watching Bobby pour two fingers of scotch, “this mess should’ve taken a week to clean up.”
Bobby handed him a glass. “And we did it in eight hours. We should bill ourselves overtime.”
“And we just saved a hundred million. I think we deserve more than overtime.”
They raised their glasses and the scotch caught the light — amber and molten between them. Bobby said, “Not bad for a Monday night.”
Gabriel’s smile curled before they emptied their glasses. For a moment, Bobby’s office didn’t feel like an office at all, but two men who’d fought a battle together and somehow won.
Gabriel set down his glass first, the faint clink echoing louder than it should have. His hand brushed Bobby’s — not by accident, but not quite intentional either. A pause hung in the air between them, low and heavy.
Bobby didn’t pull away, not at first.
“You look wrecked,” Gabriel said quietly, his eyes searching Bobby’s face with that same analytical calm that could level a boardroom.
Bobby stroked the back of Gabriel’s hand with his thumb and then pulled away. “You don’t look so fresh yourself,” he said, trying for humour, but it came out hoarse.
Gabriel smiled — slow, tired, real. He was closer now, somehow, standing behind him instead of sitting on his desk. Bobby didn’t remember him moving. He just felt the warmth of him — the faint scent of the scotch on his breath, the sweet musk of his cologne and the long day they’d shared — and suddenly the silence felt dangerous.
He felt Gabriel’s hands on his shoulders, thumbs working the tender muscles of his neck. Bobby exhaled.
“You’ve got a bad habit,” Gabriel murmured in Bobby’s ear.
“What’s that?”
“Carrying it all yourself.”
Bobby laughed, but it died fast. Gabriel’s hands moved smoothly down his front, slipping under his shirt, exploring his hairy chest. Bobby’s pulse kicked when he felt Gabriel’s tongue on his neck, the hungry suction of his mouth as he tasted him. Instinctively, he reached a hand behind him and cradled the back of Gabriel’s head.
“Oh—” Bobby let out, surrendering.
It happened the way exhaustion does — all at once, and then nothing else mattered. Soon, Gabriel was in front of him, on his knees, his hands undoing Bobby’s belt, working down the waistband of his pants, and rubbing his hard cock through his briefs. Gabriel craned his neck up and Bobby stooped down, and they kissed fervently, messily. Gabriel pulled away and searched Bobby’s eyes — not seeking permission, but submission. Bobby leaned back in the chair, eyes closed, fingers still playing with Gabriel’s thick hair. He was his in that moment… entirely.
Bobby gasped, a sharp exhale, when he felt the warm, wetness of Gabriel’s mouth slip around his cock head. He bobbed up and down, murmuring and gurgling as he took the whole ten inches down his throat. Bobby looked down at him. Tears pricked the corners of Gabriel’s eyes and the lower half of his face was already slick with drool, but he stayed down, his nose buried in Bobby’s bush. Bobby then gripped his head with both hands and flexed his hips upward. Gabriel’s eyes widened.
“Hhhk—ghh…” he choked. His hands gripped Bobby’s thighs, but he didn’t try to come back up for air.
“Fuuuck,” Bobby moaned as he started to fuck Gabriel’s throat. He kept his hands on Gabriel’s head, pushing him even deeper down onto his crotch. His breath started to catch in his throat, his eyes rolled. “Fuck, Gabi…. I’m gonna come.”
Gabriel pulled off, gasping air into his lungs, and wiped his arm over his mouth. He gripped Bobby’s slippery cock and rose to kiss him, half straddling him in his chair. Bobby could almost taste himself.
“Yeah, cum for me,” Gabriel commanded in between sloppy, breathless kisses.
“Ah—aahhhh,” wailed Bobby as he felt the searing heat shoot out of him and up his shirt. His arms wrapped around Gabriel’s shoulders, his face buried in his neck. He caught his breath, not daring to move. He wanted to stay in this moment forever.
The office was quiet again, except the low mechanical hum of the air vents. Papers still littered the desk and the floor. He noticed Gabriel’s shoeprint marked across one of the earlier drafts of the term sheet. The city still glittered below them, oblivious, indifferent. Gabriel was buttoning his shirt by the window. Bobby slipped out of his own soiled shirt and watched him move, and then that familiar ache set in. That low drop from the heat of pleasure into something colder. Something he couldn’t name. Something he didn’t want to.
He hadn’t meant for it to happen again. The first time — nearly two years ago — should’ve been a fluke, a mistake both men should’ve just forgotten. But they’d drunk too much that night, tucked away in the corner of a hotel bar in Tokyo after another acquisition dinner, sleeves rolled, ties undone. He remembered the first touch back in his penthouse suite—Gabriel’s hands, his mouth. It was Bobby’s first time with another man since college, though it didn’t feel like a return to anything he knew. It felt like something waking up.
He’d told himself it didn’t mean anything — that it was just exhaustion, too much Japanese beer, the simple animal need to be seen. But the way Gabriel touched him, steady and unafraid, stripped every logical defense clean. There was no panic, no guilt. Just the quiet, shocking recognition of something that had been waiting for him all along.
Afterward, they hadn’t spoken about it. They didn’t need to. Gabriel dressed, offered Bobby a glass of water, and slipped back to his own hotel room. Later, Bobby went home to Cara, to the cold half of the bed, to the safe language of denial. But something had shifted after that — small, invisible, irreversible.
Now, the truth pressed harder. His tie hung from the back of his chair and the smell of Gabriel’s cologne still stuck to him. Bobby rubbed absently at his chest through the thin cotton of his undershirt, trying to press that feeling away. The silence between them wasn’t tender; it was thick with things better left unsaid.
Gabriel murmured something quick about a car waiting downstairs. Bobby nodded without looking at him. When the door finally clicked shut, he was alone again with the skyline. The lights of the city shimmered within the glass of his tower, caught somewhere between reflection and reality. He reached for his tie, then stopped halfway, fingers slackening. The ache hadn’t faded. It never did — it only ever changed shape.
