Okay. Shock. His boss didn’t generally seem the type to hug anyone, or babble gratitude, but these were unusual circumstances. Dalton patted his shoulder. “You’re welcome.”
Ian let go of him so suddenly it knocked Dalton off-balance. “Sorry, didn’t mean to freak you out.”
“It’s okay.” He patted some more before stepping back.
They stared at each other for another few moments.
“I should put this in the kitchen. You want to see Sam? I mean, is that why you came over?”
Dalton jumped on the offer. “It is. I thought since, you know, we survived the, um, incident together, I should introduce myself.”
Ian led him a couple of steps into the living room, announcing, “There’s someone here to see you, kiddo.”
Sam’s upper body appeared over the back of the couch, his eyes wide, a book in his hand. He tilted his head. “Oh.” A line grew between his brows. “Hi?”
“This is Dalton,” Ian said.
“Oh. Ooooh. Oh, hi!”
Dalton pasted on a smile, suddenly jittery. “Hi. Sam.”
“Hi.”
“You aren’t really showing your vocabulary to its advantage,” Ian said.
Sam turned pink, ducking his head and grinning. “I guess not, huh?”
“It’s nice to meet you,” Dalton blurted. Awkward. So of course then he started with the inappropriate laughter, trying to stifle it behind his hand, which resulted in snorting.
Thank God Sam busted up too, giggling and honking, squeezing his eyes shut and rocking with it.
“Dalton brought us food,” Ian said when they’d quieted down enough to be heard over. “I’ll let you guys get to know each other while I put this away.” Maybe he said more, or rolled his eyes, or started laughing at them, but Dalton was still caught in the grip of his emotions and the release of tension he’d been carrying around for days. He leaned against the couch, trying to catch his breath. God, he’d needed that, hadn’t he?
“It’s nice to officially meet you too,” Sam said, calmer but still smiling. “Want to sit down?”
“I really want to.” Dalton flopped onto the chair next to the sofa, letting his body sink into it. “This is a nice chair. I need one like it when I get my own place.” It had beautiful lines, although Dalton would prefer a solid color.
Sam shrugged. “I don’t know where Ian bought it, you’ll have to ask him. Maybe in California.”
Dalton wasn’t sure where to go from there, because it was the first time it occurred to him that Sam didn’t live here. But obviously he stayed a lot, or at least he did when he had a head injury.
Sam cleared his throat. “I need to—I want to thank you. For what you did the other night.” He waved a hand in the air. “You know, helping me.”
Dalton lurched forward, sitting upright. “I’m so sorry I didn’t stop him from hitting you.”
“You tried,” Sam said. “It means a lot. And you caught one of those guys—Jurgen couldn’t have done it all himself.”
“But you got a concussion. If I’d been able to st—”
“Oh my God, do not get your guilt all over me. Ian’s shed his everywhere in the last three days. I mean, thank you, but it’s not like you were the one who hit me.”
Again, not sure where to go now.
Eyeing him, Sam said, “I forgive you. Does that work?”
“I guess. Um, how’s your friend?”
Sam blinked. “My friend? He’s in the kitchen.”
“Uh, no. I meant the guy who was with you that night. My, well, date. Miller.”
“Oh God, it’s awful. He’s in the hospital still—he had to have emergency surgery because he was bleeding internally. One of his ribs, like, broke and punctured a lung. He had other cracked ribs and lots of contusions, whatever those are, and stitches.”
More guilt—he’d done nothing to help Miller. “I feel nauseous.”
“He’s the one those guys came after. I was just, like, collateral damage. They didn’t even know my name.”
“I’m sorry,” Dalton said, uselessly.
Sam chewed on his lip for a few seconds in silence. “I don’t want to be a dick, but can we talk about something else?”
“Please.” Thank God. “What are you reading?” He turned his head, trying to see the title of the book Sam had set on the coffee table. Were there really two bare-chested, headless male torsos on the cover?
“A romance novel,” Sam said.
Dalton looked at him.
Sam tilted his chin up. “I read them, and I’ve stopped attempting to justify it to people.”
“You mean they try to tell you that reading them is wrong or something?”
“I know, right?” He threw his hands in the air. “It’s always someone who’s never read them, either, so they have no clue what they’re talking about. It’s prejudice informed by ignorance, and it needs to stop.” He wrinkled his brow and cocked his head. “I’ve been thinking about starting, like, a pro-romance nonprofit that educates people about their literary value. Skillful wielding of genre tropes is an underrecognized art form.”
Dalton nodded politely.
“You don’t read them, do you?”
“No.” And he’d never felt badly about it before. Or thought about it. “Maybe you could recommend—”
“Oh! I’ll make you a list. Do you think you’d prefer gay romance or straight?”
Duh. “Gay, for sure.”
Dalton learned more about romance novels in the next ten minutes than he had in his entire life up to that point before they moved on to other subjects. Ian never came back into the room, and after initially suspecting he wasn’t going to in an attempt to let them “get to know each other,” Dalton forgot about him. Sam was interesting. Chatty and gossipy and not at all reserved. He started telling Dalton stories about his friends, Nik and Jurgen, who’d shown up that night after Dalton had. Nik—“my best friend”—was the guy who’d been so freaked out about Sam, and Jurgen—“Nik’s boyfriend. Oh, and he’s also Ian’s cousin”—was the one who’d caught some of the assailants. Then Sam wandered on to other people’s business.
He’d just finished telling Dalton about Ian coming out to his father—in a hushed tone, since, as he admitted, he probably shouldn’t be—when the doorbell rang.