Detective Nathan Wolf might just be a junior detective, but he tackles every case with the passion that he lacks in his personal life. A series of failed relationships with women has left him still single at thirty-four--because he's too scared to admit to his longtime crush on his best friend James.
Dr. James Taggert likes to keep his profession as a psychiatrist separate from his party-animal persona. Known around the gay clubs as Tag, he’s the guy who screws them, leaves them, and never looks back. But James’s drinking is getting heavier, and when bad memories from the past resurface, he’s close to becoming the worst version of himself.
After a drunken blackout ends in a hot and heavy make-out session with his very straight best friend, James has no memory of the steamy affair. But Nathan isn't sorry for the kisses that James can't remember. Nathan finally musters the courage to tell James how he really feels, but a life-altering event might force them apart before they can ever be together.
Book Excerpt:
He smoked
his way through two more cigarettes before Nathan’s beat-up Ram pickup pulled
alongside the curb. For a city cop, he was still adorably country. Nathan
leaned across the console to shove open the passenger side door, and James
gratefully slid inside. The simple, familiar presence of Nathan nearby made
James’s nerves unfurl a little bit more. Nathan was the one thing in James’s
life that had always made sense. Had always been easy.
Weariness
settled into his bones, turning his drunken daze into extreme fatigue. He
wanted to pass out and soon.
Nathan
shoved a bottle of water at him, then eased the truck back into the street. He
cracked both of the front windows, probably because James reeked of smoke.
Nathan had never been shy about telling him how gross his habit was. Nathan was
also smart enough not to engage in conversation until they were shuffling up
the short sidewalk to Nathan’s half of a two-story duplex. Nathan slung an arm
around James’s waist, and the heat of the other man’s body so close felt
amazing. Real. Not like the fake closeness of dancing with strangers in a
crowded bar.
He finally
got a good look at his friend as Nathan crossed the narrow living room to the
kitchen in the rear. Flannel pajama pants and a spring coat. James had woken
him up.
Yeah,
I’m a douche bag.
“You
hungry?” Nathan shouted from the kitchen.
“No.” In
the familiar, somewhat cluttered warmth of Nathan’s home, he had a safe place
to wallow in the shame still burning in his gut.
Nathan’s
place was the definition of a straight bachelor’s pad—which worked since Nathan
was a straight bachelor. Dark leather furniture right out of a magazine’s page,
decorated exactly the same because he couldn’t be bothered. A monster,
sixty-inch flat screen mounted on the wall over an entertainment console
boasted two gaming systems, alongside a Blu-ray player and hundreds of movies.
Only a handful of photos hung on the wall, mostly of his rather large extended
family that lived in southern Delaware.
James
paused to stare at a familiar photo of himself with Nathan, taken right after
Nathan had graduated from the police academy. They were both grinning, arms
slung around each other’s shoulder. Nathan so handsome in his uniform, James in
a gray suit that hadn’t been stylish in a decade. Because that’s how long it
had been. Nathan had made detective last year, so he didn’t wear his uniform
anymore. James sort of missed it.
Nathan
came back into the living room sans coat, a white wifebeater showing off his
muscled arms and flat stomach. He was one-eighth Nanticoke Indian on his
mother’s side, which gave his skin a lovely golden hue. His short hair was
shiny black, and was always soft on the rare occasion James had a reason to
touch it. His dark brown eyes often seemed to be smiling at him, even when
things were serious, like right now.
He was
carrying a bamboo tray loaded down with two shot glasses, a bottle of Kentucky
bourbon and a bag of barbecue potato chips. He settled the tray on his
magazine-covered coffee table, then poured them each a shot.
James sank
onto the couch next to Nathan and accepted the glass. After a silent toast, he
threw it back. The harsh, smoky liquid burned its way into his stomach.
Nathan
refilled both glasses. “Does your mom know?”
- Getting It Right is
available at Amazon.
- Pick up your copy at Barnes & Noble.
- Order your copy at iTunes.
- Pick up your copy at All Romance eBooks.
- Also available directly
from Carina Press.
No
stranger to the writing world, A.M. Arthur has been creating stories in her
head since she was a child and scribbling them down nearly as long. She credits
an early fascination with male friendships and "bromance" (and "The
Young Riders") with her later discovery of and subsequent affair with m/m
romance stories. When not writing, she can be found in her kitchen, pretending
she's an amateur chef and trying to not poison herself or others with her
cuisine experiments.
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