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“Four thirty? Go awaaaay.”
“I was still up working when I saw the message. Plumber said this was the only time he could fit us in. He’ll be here in twenty minutes.”
Derek groaned. This wasn’t that much earlier than he often woke up to go to the gym, but for whatever reason, Derek slept like a rock here. He couldn’t remember the last time he had slept so deeply.
“Sorry. Can you repeat all that?” Derek logrolled himself into a seated position, and a shirt thwacked him in the face.
“Can you, like, not sleep mostly naked here?”
“Kay.” Derek pulled the shirt over his head, hiding a smile. That hint of attraction was back on Dylan. Derek steeled his features to neutral before sliding his arms into the sleeves.
Dylan was wearing another of his collection of T-shirts covered in so many paint splatters and holes you couldn’t make out the word across the chest. The arching black lines of a tattoo were visible just above the back collar. His hair fanned out on either side of his face beneath a backward Orioles cap. His bright-blue eyes were on display because he still wasn’t wearing glasses.
“Sorry, dude. Didn’t know my body would make you uncomfortable.”
“It doesn’t, and stop calling me dude.” Dylan took off his cap and smoothed his hair back like it was bothering him before pulling it back on again. The hair looked exactly like it did before. “I need caffeine.” Gallagher hustled out.
Derek shook the sleep from his head and looked down. He’d kicked off the comforter at some point and his dick was evidently more awake than he was. Maybe that was what had Gallagher all flustered. It wasn’t exactly a subtle presence. Derek hadn’t considered that sleeping in his underwear would be weird. He’d just done what he always did. He wasn’t trying to make the guy uncomfortable. Gallagher needed to communicate his needs better. Damn it.
And maybe not wear that hat ever again.
Seeing Dylan’s hair fanning out under the cap made Derek want to touch it.
Yikes.
Must be early signs of Stockholm syndrome. Dylan’s destruction of his apartment forced him into captivity. Derek was a sad, lonely, heterosexual pirate seeing a manatee as a mermaid.
That was what this—er—response was.
Once he was dressed, Derek felt better than he had in days. He hadn’t had a single nightmare. Strange, but welcome. He’d might even feel up to hitting the gym. He’d missed several workouts, and that probably explained the pent-up energy he was feeling around Dylan.
He’d probably need to up his weight to manage the stress after the conversation with the plumber.
Mold.
The word struck fear in his heart.
When Derek emerged, Gallagher was sitting on the couch wearing noise-reducing headphones and furiously typing on his laptop. The hat was beside him, resting on the back of the couch with the Oriole side facing Derek. The hat stared, as if it knew the image of it on Dylan’s head had turned Derek on in a completely inexplicable way.
“Kinky,” Olive would say if she were here.
Which she wasn’t. Derek checked his watch. Olive should be getting in the car to go to the airport. Derek smothered the urge to smack the hat off the couch. If he did, they’d probably never find it again. Gallagher’s uncle’s apartment was a cluttered disaster. Not dirty except for the areas in the bathroom that were unfinished, but exactly the kind of chaos that drove Derek bananas. It was like the guy never actually moved in. Or maybe his uncle just never moved out, and maybe that was why he’d been indignant about Derek’s freeloading assumption.
What was he supposed to assume? He saw the guy at all kinds of weird hours doing all kinds of weird things, but this was the first time he’d even seen him with a laptop that wasn’t covered in rainwater. He must do something in between all the renovation work, but none of it added up.
Derek yawned. One of those enormous Olive-type yawns.
The yawn movement must have caught his eye, because Gallagher snapped his computer shut. Gus lifted his head and perched it on the back of the couch to look up at him. Next to the hat. After a second, he looked back at Gallagher as if to inform Derek, “This lanky, mop-topped human is my new best friend.”
“Traitor,” Derek said in a low grumble.
Dylan pulled off the headphones. “What?”
“Nothing.” Derek shrugged. “How’d you pull off getting a plumber here before five A.M.? Who is this guy? An ex?”
God, why did he say that?
“No. My uncle.” Emotionless. Not cold exactly.