Length: 54,094 words
Publisher: JMS Books
Blurb
He’s also been in love with his best friend Dustin for nearly a decade. Years of keeping those feelings under control are put to the test when they begin a summer project together.
Dustin Vance builds furniture for a living, has just earned his pilot’s license, and has an amazing best friend. When he buys a 1976 Cessna Skyhawk, he asks Rafael to help restore it, then travel with him to Wisconsin for the largest aviation convention in the world.
As they spend their days working on the plane, they begin to spend their nights together. Will they find love in the clouds, or will they stall out before they even take off?
Excerpt
As he turned onto his street, he saw a vehicle in his drive—Dustin’s Honda. His best friend had a key, so was probably inside.
He eventually found Dustin sprawled on his sofa, sound asleep, his arm crooked over his head. Rafael felt drawn to him like a magnet, but being too damned tired to fight his urges, he let himself look. Dustin’s T-shirt had ridden up, showing a stripe of pale skin, and Rafael imagined it soft and silky. His fingers itched to slip under the hem. He stared a little too long, though, and by the time he dragged up his gaze to
Dustin’s face, he found his friend staring back at him, smirking.
“You want to take a picture of…something?” he drawled teasingly.
Heat flooded Rafael’s cheeks and he forced a chuckle. “Whatever.”
Dustin rose and hugged him hard, as if just remembering what had happened. “God, I’m so sorry, Raf. Is the girl going to be okay?”
Rafael nodded, but wrapped Dustin in his arms, his head falling on the man’s shoulder. They stayed like that for a while. With anyone else, Rafael might have been embarrassed that he was fighting the urge to cry. Dustin held him tight and shared his strength. It crept into Rafael, shored him up. Helped him get past the image of Daisy huddled in that hospital bed. At least for a while.
When he finally pulled away, Dustin kept his arms around him and Rafael was too exhausted to read anything into it.
“Why are you here?”
“Because I know you, Raf. I know you care about your students—you open your heart to everyone. But I also know you’ve been particularly worried about this girl. I just didn’t want you coming home to an empty house.”
Rafael’s heart cracked more and he felt raw, open, and vulnerable. The world had reared its ugly head and shown its hideousness. He also felt lonely. Bone tired and so lonely. And he didn’t want to be lonely. At least not for the night. He swallowed hard. “Will you…stay?”
Dustin nodded, no hint of hesitation in his blue-green eyes. “Is there anything else I can do?”
Sarah Hadley Brook lives smack-dab in the middle of the Heartland and is the mother of two wonderful young men, as well as two cats. During the day, she works in the nonprofit world, but reserves evenings for her hobby-turned-passion of writing, letting the characters she conjures in her mind take the lead and show her where the story will go. When not working or writing, she can be found reading, working on dollhouses, trying her hand at new recipes, or watching old movies and musicals. In her ideal world, Christmas would come at least twice a year, Rock Hudson and Doris Day would have costarred in more than three movies, and chocolate would be a daily necessity. She dreams of traveling to Scotland some day and visiting the places her ancestors lived. Sarah believes in “Happily Ever After” and strives to ensure her characters find their own happiness in love and life.
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