Snow Storm

Chapter 1

Harley

“So you think the one-year anniversary of my father’s death—which is also fourteen days since learning that my fiancé has left me for our therapist—is the day I should do a book signing?”

Harley liked to think he was a reasonable man. Really? He was a calm guy who rarely ever said no to people when they asked him for something. But this felt over the line, and he wasn’t sure if he was being irrational or not.

Harley was nothing like his namesake—which, yes, it was the motorcycle, and no, he was not carefree or wild or rough. The name was more ironic than anything now. A testament to his mother’s fucked-up sense of humor and the kind of person he’d become. And right now, he did feel a bit like flying off the handle.

He hadn’t slept a full night since Darren had dropped the bombshell on him that he wasn’t calling off the wedding, he was just replacing the groom. With their couples therapist. The man who had convinced Darren and Harley to take separate vacations so they could find themselves and be in a better place for a marriage.

Harley had sequestered himself at home to work on a manuscript he was hoping to pitch to his publisher—it was a novel that was nothing like the ones that were currently selling. And granted, he was going against his therapist’s orders that the vacation not involve work, but writing was Harley’s idea of fun.

He knew that Darren was going off to some tropical beach for sun, relaxation, and access to a twenty-four-hour spa. He had promised to call every night—and he did. At first. But slowly, that tapered off to passive-aggressive texts that eventually broke Harley.

He confronted Darren the night before his return flight, and Darren hadn’t bothered beating around the bush.

“I met someone, and it made me realize that this separate vacation thing did work, just not in the way I expected.”

Harley sat in silence for what felt like an eternity but was probably only thirty seconds or so. Eventually, he swallowed through a thick, painful throat and said, “Who is he?”

“Does that matter?” Darren asked him.

Harley closed his eyes. “I don’t know. Maybe. Just…you owe me that, at least.”

“Fine, but I want you to know that this wasn’t supposed to happen. I did love you, babe.”

“Don’t,” Harley whispered, but Darren carried on like he didn’t care Harley was protesting.

“I think we’ve just been more friends and roommates for a long, long while, and it took doing this to see it. It took someone understanding me to make me realize things like love at first sight do exist. But it doesn’t exist for us.”

“Darren,” Harley said, his voice louder that time.

Darren gave a big, heavy sigh. “Fine, but don’t freak out.”

Harley was freaking out. “Who is he?” Don’t say Wes. Don’t say Wes. His brother was married, but considering they’d had a contentious relationship most of their lives and Wes didn’t like him very much, a small part of him thought it could be possible.

And his mother would have found it hilarious.

“It’s Jacob.”

It took Harley a little too long to realize who Darren was talking about. Jacob. Jacob Masters. Their couples therapist. The man responsible for this godforsaken separate vacation idea.

“How?” Harley whispered, and without any sort of care or shame, Darren told him the truth.

“He gave me the suggestion of Barbados, but I think he thought I was coming a different weekend because he already had his trip booked. We ran into each other on one of the sightseeing excursions. Then we had dinner and drinks, and I’m sorry, babe, but he made me feel heard for the first time in a long time. He and I both realized that this was it for us. And I need to respect my truth, okay? And my truth is that I’m in love with him.”

“You barely know him,” Harley whispered.

Darren sighed. “We’ve known him for a year now, babe?—”

“Please stop calling me that!”

“And he and I have more in common than you and I ever did. It just…is what it is. I don’t want to hurt you, but I have to follow what my heart wants, and my heart wants to marry him.”

And that’s when Harley realized what was happening. “You’re marrying him. You’re not going to cancel the wedding, are you?”

“It’s nothing personal. It just makes sense not to lose our deposits for everything and have to rebook. Jacob said he’d make sure to cut you a check for your half of what you spent, so you don’t have to worry about that.”

Harley had paid for everything. He had always paid for everything because Darren didn’t work.

“Oh, and we were also talking last night, and we think it’s a good idea if we sell the condo.”

We. We. If we sell the condo. The condo in his name? Darren had contributed two thousand dollars to the down payment, but he’d never given a red cent toward the mortgage. Harley felt like the room was crumbling around him.

“Though Jacob did also suggest buying you out of your half, and he and I could live there. Do you really want to stay in that big place by yourself?”

Harley’s throat felt like it was full of razor blades. “I have to go.”

“Babe,” Darren whined.

“Don’t call me that!” It was the first time he’d ever raised his voice to Darren, and it shut him up quickly. “I have to call my lawyer.”

“We’re not even married. Not even common-law, so I don’t know what the problem is.”

“The problem is legally, all this is mine!” Harley took a deep breath so he was no longer shouting. “I…I have to go. I have a deadline. Don’t call me back.”

Then he hung up, buried his face in his pillow, and screamed until he swore his throat was full of blood.

He hadn’t even spoken to Darren face-to-face since that night. The rest of their communication had been through his lawyer or over text. His world had crumbled to the ground in one fell swoop. His thoughts of what his forever was supposed to look like had been ripped away from him.

He didn’t cry, of course. He rarely cried. He threw himself into work instead so he didn’t have to think about how Darren and Jacob were God knows where doing God knows what—probably laughing about what a pathetic, lonely loser he was. Darren would take Jacob home for the holidays, and he was willing to bet every book on his shelf that Darren’s family would love Jacob more than they ever even slightly liked him.

Jacob was gorgeous and charismatic, soft-spoken and pretentious in a way that came off sweet. Harley was awkward small talk and hiding behind Darren so he didn’t seem like such a weirdo. And now, everyone in their life would know that Harley was so forgettable, so replaceable, his ex could swap one body for another, and nothing would change.

Except no. That wasn’t true. Things would change. Darren had someone better.

He had a couple of nights of insomnia where he fantasized about jumping on a plane and showing up wherever the fuck Darren and Jacob were, and he’d be able to win him back. He could join an abs boot camp and get ripped, then buy a new wardrobe, and his glow-up would make Darren regret ever leaving their quiet life in their little waterfront condo.

Except he hated sit-ups. Like, more than anything , he hated sit-ups. Also, he hated clothes shopping. And he wasn’t overly fond of flying either. He usually had to pop a Xanax and plug his ears with Loops and noise-canceling headphones to get through it.

Plus, the idea of confronting someone in public made him break out in hives. Literally. The last time he had to get firm with a fan who was getting a little too friendly, he literally had to take a Benadryl because he’d broken out all over.

And the harshest, most painful truth about it all was that if he did manage to win Darren back, he wasn’t sure he wanted him. Once the initial shock wore off and the pain of having his pride ground into dust at his feet, he realized he wasn’t more miserable without Darren.

He no longer had to walk on eggshells in the mornings. He didn’t have to justify his expenses because Darren wanted a new pair of boots and Harley wanted to pay for a magazine ad for his latest release. He no longer had to feel like shit every time Darren mocked him for rubbing one out in the bathroom, and he no longer had to feel like some kind of absolute reject because every time he made advances, Darren had a headache, or he was busy, or bored, or just heading out.

He was starting to feel like himself again, actually. And he might not have careened toward an emotional breakdown, except the anniversary of his father’s death crept up on him like a quiet ghost, haunting the hours he finally found peace.

One year ago, he’d gotten a call at two in the morning. His brother’s voice had been flat—shock, he figured, but it was strange to hear Wes so quiet and lifeless, especially about their father because Wes and his dad had never gotten along.

And Harley was still processing the fact that Wes had found out before he did. He and his father were close. He was the only person in the world Harley cared about besides Darren—or so he thought—and knowing that he’d missed his chance to say goodbye had nearly destroyed him.

“He died in his sleep. They don’t actually know what it was,” Wes had said when Harley found the words to ask what happened.

Their dad was old. He was in his mid-forties when Harley was born. And everyone used to make fun of him for it, but Harley never noticed or cared that his dad wasn’t as young and spry as most people. His dad loved him—even when he was a strange and lonely child. His dad supported him when his mother had taken her anger out on him. His dad protected him when Wes’s bullying had been at its worst.

And now he was gone.

He had only his mother left, but she had divorced his dad years and years back, and she hadn’t fought even once when Harley said he wanted to live with him.

Christ, he’d loved him so much. His dad had been the only one in Harley’s life to tell him that he was okay. That he didn’t need to be macho or live up to someone else’s idea of strong or brave.

“Just being yourself is brave enough,” his dad told him when he was worried that his life would never measure up to his brother’s. “You don’t need to compare yourself to Wes or anyone else. Just be you. Harley James? That guy’s great.”

He’d never really believed that, but he wanted to. And a year later, he was still trying. He was living the life he’d chosen and not the life that his mother had attempted to force him into. And while he loved her as much as he could, her being the only one left was killing him. And it wasn’t like she was making an effort to see him. She hadn’t even asked how she was doing in the whole year he’d been gone.

Harley knew he reminded her too much of his dad, and she’d always resented that about him. She hadn’t tried to conceal her favoritism of Wes, and she’d spent all of her time with Harley talking about how much she wished he was like his older brother.

Harley tried to ignore her. Really. But her words had crawled under his skin and made a home there. He couldn’t shake the constant comparisons, and even today—even after his brother had finally started trying to get to know him as a person—he was trapped in the cycle of thinking he wasn’t good enough.

Wes had graduated top of his year. He got accepted into three Ivy League schools. He worked for the DA’s office. He was smart and good-looking and kind.

And Harley was just…different. He was smart in his own way. He was good-looking to the people who wanted someone on the chubby side of the body spectrum. His luck got a little better when the “dad bod” started trending, but even then, he got more side-eyes than phone numbers because no matter how he looked, he was still an awkward weirdo in public.

He wasn’t a top-performing lawyer. He was a writer. He didn’t go to an Ivy League school. He didn’t go to college at all.

The only thing going for him was that he was good at what he did. When he first started, the market had been starved for stories like the ones he’d written—fantasy with a twist of queer and a hint of love story. Action-adventure where no gays were buried and there was more than one kind of happily ever after.

He was well-liked and well-off and maybe even a little famous now. But he was never sure of himself. Not entirely. And the one person who was proud of him was now gone, and he was facing the reality that his one accomplishment—holding on to a boyfriend long enough to make him a husband—had replaced him like he was a piece of clothing.

And with all that looming, now his agent wanted him to do some big, public book signing on the anniversary of his father’s death, right on the heels of his breakup, a week before he’d be spending his first Christmas completely and utterly alone?

No .

“I’m sorry. I can’t do it.” He forced the words out because he never, ever told his agent no, and he could sense from Ethan’s silence that he was surprised.

“Well, the contract you signed says you can,” Ethan said. Harley could hear him clicking his pen, and he swore he could feel that noise vibrating against the bones in his hand.

“I’m pretty sure a judge would grant me some leniency and grace if he knew what was happening in my life,” Harley argued back tiredly. “I haven’t slept in weeks, okay? I’m exhausted. I keep getting emails from Darren’s goddamn lawyer because he’s demanding half of a condo he didn’t pay for while also planning his wedding to our fucking couples therapist, and I’m just…I can’t. Okay? I just can’t.”

“Look, I feel for you,” Ethan told me, and it was all Harley could do not to call him out on the lie. “But we can’t piss off the publisher. Not with your next series hanging in the balance.”

Ethan was right on that account. Yes, Harley’s books still made bestsellers lists, but not the way they used to. And his royalty checks were notably smaller. They had been for a while. For the duration of his relationship with Darren, if he was being honest. He just wasn’t sure he was ready to face that his career might be on the downslide because what else did he have? Who else was he if not a writer?

In truth, he was burning out and tired of writing to a market he was no longer interested in. He wanted to write something else—stories that were deeper. Ones that resonated with him about what it was like to feel in the cold world he walked every day.

But he could tell his publisher wasn’t thrilled with that idea, and with a job like his, there were no guarantees that they’d keep him if he didn’t produce exactly the way they wanted. He could be dropped for one small faux pas.

And he wasn’t ready to lose his career after losing everything else in his life.

“Can we at least cut down the whole Q and A thing to half an hour?”

“The tickets are sold out. There’s not a chance in hell. People are interested since Disastrously Dead was so fucking steamy.”

He felt himself blushing. He was a sexual man, so it wasn’t like he didn’t have those sorts of feelings. But he was also incredibly private, and he had always been terrified that writing an explicit sex scene would trigger people into asking him if he was writing from experience.

Because yes.

But also no.

And he wasn’t sure he could handle having to navigate those questions from total strangers.

“Look, I’ll make sure the moderators screen everything, and we’ll have a list of topics you’re not going to speak about,” Ethan said like that was some kind of compromise instead of standard requirements.

Harley pinched the bridge of his nose and wished there was a hole he could crawl into. He glanced out the window at the dark, heavy clouds in the distance. It was going to rain, which would turn into sleet because it was a goddamn cold winter.

There was exactly one week before Christmas. This holiday, he would be completely alone. Maybe doing this was a good idea. Maybe it would be just the distraction he needed after everything had crashed and burned. Maybe if he could get people excited for his work again, he could stop worrying about what came after this book.

He could handle the chaos. After all, it was only one day. Just a few hours of his time, and then he could go back to his condo and pretend like he wasn’t going to have to fight his ex to keep the things he’d worked so hard for.

“Fine. Send a car, please. I really don’t want to drive right now.”

“You got it. See you tomorrow,” Ethan said, then hung up.

Harley dropped the phone to his side and turned to look in the mirror hanging in his hallway. His eyes had dark circles, and his mouth was in a permanent frown. He sucked in a breath. “Okay, Harley. It’s just one day,” he said aloud. “You’ve got this.”