All Star Party- Sid’s POV Pt. 1

I told myself to be patient and let it happen at his pace. I’d suppress the impulse to protect him, bury the world for him and myself inside of him. Wanting someone this bad should feel new, but instead, it’s like the high moments of lifetimes wrapped in silk and returned to me. 

He feels like he’s returning to me.

“He feels like he’s mine.”

“He feels like he’s yours,” Kieran repeated the day after Christmas when Ty left. 

I nodded as he and Tommy exchanged a grin.

“Shut up,” I grunted, pulling the oat milk from the fridge. 

“Rude.” Kieran grinned. “So, when I asked you why you waited so long to invite him for Christmas, and you said—”

“It slipped my mind,” I repeated for the hundredth time. He pressed me on Christmas Eve with the same question. Why’s it so hard to believe?

“Uh-huh. It slipped your mind. But what you really meant was that you were scared.”

I smirked. “Scared?”                                                                      

“Yeah,” he replied, mocking my smirk. “Scared that your crush is real.” 

I scooped the protein powder into the blender and stabbed the start button.

Crush? Pfft. I’m a grown man.

“Well, what are you gonna do about it?” he yelled above the whirring. 

I rolled my neck and stared out the window, the gym coming into view. 

My body flushed with heat remembering the intensity of his run, the scent of his sweat, his panting mouth so close to my dick as I spotted him on the bench press.

“We don’t even know if he’s into guys,” I replied, pouring the protein shake. 

Tommy reached for the glass that I slid his way. “He wants you.”

“How do yo—?”

“Onesie,” he and Kieran replied.

I chuckled. They caught that too. 

"To his credit"—Tommy paused to swallow—"he tried really hard to hide it. He stared at his shoes—”

“Fingernails, ceiling.” Kieran jumped in. “Studied your record collection twice,  checked out the flowers in the gard—”

 “You almost took him out when the buttons popped open during bowling,” Tommy joked, making us laugh.

“Is that why you all turned in early last night?”

Tommy nodded. “Lily elbowed me when we were bowling and said ‘let’s give the lovebirds alone time tonight.’”

I shook my head. “I knew something was up.”

 “So, what are you going to do about it?” 

Kieran’s question taunted me for weeks. I want Ty, yes, but that’s not remarkable. The intensity of my desire…fuck, I wouldn’t begin to know how to shrink the depth of it into an answer to his question.

Scared. 

That’s ridiculous. 

A man fears his fate when confronted with the unknown. What do I have to fear when I know Ty is my future? To be honest, I wasn’t sure why I battled with inviting him for Christmas. I think the answer had something to do with the shadows darkening his gaze and the strain of his smile.​ Or the gnawing that kept me up Christmas night, long after he fell asleep, plagued with a sense that his pain ran deeper than I thought. It’s the devastation that warped a moment of victory into despair as he searched the stands after his college game. I wanted to trade years of my life to free him. An absurd impulse to have for a stranger. Absurd but not unfamiliar. I felt something similar back in high school.

I couldn’t save him. 

If I am scared of anything, it’s answers to questions like, How much of Ty has depression ravaged? Is he teetering on the edge of a fall? Would I be powerless to help him? How could so much be taken from someone so undeserving of cruelty? What reason could there have been to have kept us apart for so long? Is there a name for the grief of lost time?  

​An unshakeable inner voice warns me to be patient and let him come to me, and I'm trying. But he’s there in my thoughts when I wake up and fall asleep. 

The morning after our face-off, when he said he understood why my bed wasn’t empty, I wanted to throw him over my shoulder and take him on every surface. It was so hard to let him go that morning. Only a few minutes before, I held him in my bed. I could have spent years in that moment. 

And, goddamn, I’m horny. I’m at an All-Star party, sitting alone when I’m usually already deep inside of someone by now. I turned down hookups with Kat and Samantha this week. When I fucked Kat on Christmas Eve, I imagined serious eyes and a slim frame with hard plains. She didn’t deserve that. I knew then that it would be our last time. 

“Can he join?” A woman, holding my boy Kevin’s hand, nods to me.  

He takes a drag of his joint, stares at us, and shrugs.

“Want to join?” she asks, extending her hand.

I quirk my eyebrow. “Why’s it always us?” I ask Kev. It’s like we’re on every woman’s All-Star party threesome bucket list.

“Look at us.” He grins. “You down?”

“Nah. Have fun.”

She pouts. 

Cue the bargaining.

3…

2… 

“If you don’t want to share, I can meet you aft—”

“He’ll already be with me.” 

Our gazes follow the voice of Stacy, one of the biggest singers on the planet, and I grin.

“Aww, I'm happy to see you too. Pretend I’m straight,” she whispers, drawing out a laugh.

“She’s still standing there?” I whisper back. 

Stace steals a glance. “Nah, she just left. Nice ass though, look.” I turn my head, and my gaze locks with guarded eyes.

I fly out of my seat. “Yo!” I call out, weaving through the crowd. 

He saw me. Why didn’t he approach?

“Pardon.” I sidestep a woman in my path. 

“Whoa, what’s the rush? My girl and I—”

“No thanks.” I slide past her, scanning the lounge area and coming up short. Slim chance he’s on the dance floor, so I bound up the staircase. 

Searching the first room, my stomach turns, picturing him pressed between the sea of bodies. 

What if I got it wrong waiting for him to come to me? 

I push open another door. 

“You changed your min—”

“Nope.” I pull the door closed before she hops off Kev’s lap and pulls me in. 

“Yo, you saw Ty—I mean, Pretty Boy—come through here?” I ask my boy, coming from the direction I’m headed. 

“Nah, I’mma be up on the roof though.”

“Bet. I’ll meet you up there.” I pull out my phone. My head darts up as soon as I hit send. The roof—the quietest place here! 

“Sid. Good to see you.” 

I grin, pausing to shake one of my favorite PR agent’s hands. 

All white suit, hair pulled up in a braided bun, Catharine’s here on serious business. She’ll probably have poached a bench of clients before the night’s through.

“You’re still happy with your representation?” she asks. 

“I am. You know I’m coming to you if that changes.”

“Glad you know where the love is. Have fun,” she says, patting my shoulder.

I fly up the stairs as soon as she slides by. 

Drawing in a breath, I sweep the roof.

Catching a glimpse of him, I close in, my steps devouring our distance when I round a column, and my legs lock mid-stride. 

He’s not alone. 

I recognize the asshole moving in on him from TV. 

“Yo, Sid.”

“What!”

My boy Bryce raises his eyebrow. “Want to hit this?” He extends his vape pen.

“Nah.”

“Pretty Boy’s over there. Thought you were looking for him.”

Ty’s dimple deepens as he grins at whatever the asshole is saying. Those same dimples I wanted to kiss when I begged for a few more minutes the morning I held him in my arms. I bit down hard on my lip when he made a quiet, sleepy moan and shifted, rubbing my semi. He spent the night nursing me back to health, and maybe it was the fever, but all I could think about was wrapping my hand around his neck to arch his chin up so I could take in the gorgeous expanse of his face. Long lashes, full lips, round eyes too weary for his age, I wanted to press my lips to his temple, dimple, and the crook of his lips. Seeing him in my shirt stirred alive something feral. My fingers ached to pull down his underwear and let my fingers sink into…

“Hey, Bryce and Sid.” 

My head swings right. “Hey, Winter.”

“Congratulations on the Oscar nom,” Bryce adds.

She blushes. “Thanks.”

“It’s your second, right?” he asks.

My gaze snaps back to Ty, hands curling into fists. 

Why is the dickhead pointing his phone at him?

The tightness around my ribs grows as Ty slides his phone out of his pocket.

I have two choices: I could throw the dickhead off the roof and Ty over my shoulder and take him home. Or I could spare the guy’s life and walk over there and break up whatever the fuck this is. 

A chill tickles the back of my neck as Ty raises his head from his phone. 

The urge to sink my teeth in the curve of his neck rattles my jaw as he scans the roof. 

Our gazes lock, and his back straightens like it’s tasered with a low-voltage jolt.

Except he doesn’t move toward me.

The cold chill from my neck spreads down my back. 

Everything in my body is screaming to be next to him…and he just nods. 

Something’s not adding up. 

I’m shifting into a vampire caveman over here, and he just nods?

The fuck?

Spots of disbelief cloud my vision as I watch him turn toward the door with the asshole on his heels. 

Each step toward the staircase boils my blood until an acrid tang of smoke and ash coats my tongue. 

No. 

Fire licking at my heels, I blaze towards the door.

I’m done losing time, and I’ll fucking incinerate anyone who tries to take what’s mine.

“Ty!” I cage the roar in my belly. “Hold up.”

To be continued…

Want more? Part 2 and a brand new bonus scene that catches up with our lovebirds in present day will be included in the Loving the Legend hardcover special edition, which includes illustrated SFW and NSFW scenes and is set to be released in May. Also, get ready to fall in love with Salem and Arnaz very soon. 

Happy First Birthday, Loving the Legend!

Thank you for celebrating Sid & Ty’s love story!