Excerpt from Shattered, copyright 2013 by Gem Frost.
Cover copyright 2013 by Carol'sCoverDesigns.
Gabe wasn’t surprised. He knew he looked good. He was wearing a too-tight black t-shirt that clung to his torso, showing off his killer abs, and a pair of old faded Levi’s that stretched over his ass and thighs like a second skin. Over the t-shirt, he wore a battered leather jacket. His hair had grown out, hanging thick and shaggy around his face, and he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days. He’d glanced at himself in the mirror before leaving home, seeing the diamond in his right ear winking seductively through the dark strands of his hair.
Yeah, he looked good. He looked dangerous. He looked exactly like what he was—a guy who was looking for rough, raw sex.
Aware of the gazes on him—basking in them, really—he stalked to the bar and ordered a drink. Not a Coke, which would have been his default order a month ago. Not even a beer. He was all grown up now, damn it. He was a big boy, and he intended to order big-boy drinks.
“Kamikaze,” he said to the bartender. He’d never actually had a Kamikaze, but it sounded like a tough-guy drink, the kind of drink a guy in a leather jacket ought to order. He looked the other man straight in the eye, let his lips curve up just a little, and consciously dropped his voice into a lower register. The bartender instantly blushed and got so flustered he almost dropped the glass in his hands.
It was amazing, the effect he had on guys. He’d never really noticed till recently. He’d thought it was just a sort of magnetism between him and Stephen Dominick, who’d been his lover for a short while. But it had slowly dawned on him that it wasn’t just Dom. A lot of guys found him attractive. Hell, more than attractive. They were drawn to him like moths to a flame.
He wasn’t sure why. Yeah, sure, everyone knew who he was now. He was a minor celebrity, thanks to his association with Dom and his subsequent appearance in the society pages, and even a couple of national magazines. His image had appeared all over the internet, usually accompanied by the words DOM’S ANGEL. The paparazzi had stalked him for several weeks, and everyone in Norfolk—maybe everyone in Virginia— knew his face now. But that didn’t account for the stunned look guys got when they looked at him.
Gabe still didn’t think he was all that handsome. When he looked in the mirror, he saw a face-shaped face, with all the features in the usual places. He had a nose and a mouth and a chin, just like anyone else. Yeah, he had unusually bright blue eyes, but otherwise he thought he just looked like a regular guy.
Maybe it was his body. God knew he’d worked hard on sculpting it over the past year. He’d been a skinny kid when he’d met Dom, but now… now he was a man.
A man who needed sex.
Even the thought of Dom was enough to send a tremor of need through him. The bartender offered him the Kamikaze with a shy smile, and he rewarded the guy with a smile of his own that made the bartender turn bright red. He picked up the drink and took a cautious sip. The first taste of it on his tongue almost made him spit it out, but he tried again, and decided it wasn’t that terrible after all. The alcohol seemed to burn a path down his throat.
It occurred to him that he wanted other substances to burn their way down his throat.
The thought would have made him blush a month ago, but now it only made him hot. Really hot. He turned, leaning on the bar, and surveyed the crowd. Somewhere out there was the guy who could banish the ache in his body, the scorching, hungry need that just wouldn’t go away, no matter how hard he tried to assuage it.
Somewhere out there was the guy he was going to fuck.
