“Well,” Ace said after a pause, “looks like your front door is good to go. No flowers here on the steps, and I promise I won’t suggest any. How about the rest of the house?”
Steven shook into action. “Right. Yes. Forgot we were still outside. Come on in.”
Ace stepped in to a pretty standard 1950s ranch house. He took in what he had to work with: blank cream colored walls, little to no artwork, nice hardwood floors, probably original to the house. Dark leather furniture, a well-used recliner and the biggest flat-screen TV Ace had ever seen inside a house this size.
Oh, he’s not going to like what I want him to do with that TV.
It was every bit a bachelor pad, but not in the swinging lady trap kind of way. More in the “I have no idea what to do with this place so I’ll leave it blank until I get married” kind of way.
Across from the TV, Ace was a little startled to find one wall painted deep burgundy. It was a lovely color, but so entirely out of place with the almost colorless palate of the rest of the house. Doesn’t seem like something this guy would do, he thought.
“That was Holly’s idea. My fiance,” Steven said, reading Ace’s expression. “She thought the place needed color.”
So she spent all her color in one place.
“She wanted to be here, but it’s the end of the school year, so she’s stuck at work,” Steven continued. “So I asked my brother to be backup instead.”
“To protect him from pink flowers.” A deep, rumbling, familiar voice sounded behind Ace.
His heart stopped and his cock twitched in the same instant. He’d know that voice anywhere. It had haunted his restless dreams for days as Ace replayed every dirty word he’d rasped into Ace’s ear as he’d pounded hard behind him.
Ace slowly turned around, swallowing thickly to clear his throat.
“This is my brother, Paul McDonnell,” Steven said.
A pair of cool grey-blue eyes studied him, and Ace felt the bottom of the floor drop out.
Ho. Ly. Shit.
It was Paul’s hot birthday fuck. In his brother’s living room. On a Wednesday afternoon.
Thoughts waged war for supremacy in Paul’s head:Wasn’t the home stager going to be a woman? Christ, his ass looks good in those pants. Don’t, for the love of God, get an erection right now. Calm, be calm.
Paul wondered if Ace even remembered him. Hell, most of the time they were together, Ace was bent over, facing the wall. Maybe he forgot Paul as soon as he was gone.
Paul watched the color rise in Ace’s cheeks, and his fingers twitched to feel the heat there.
Oh yeah. He remembers. They both did.
Then Ace’s mouth dropped open enticingly, and Paul’s thoughts took a much naughtier turn.
Those lips. Those soft, juicy lips. How they looked wrapped around his …
He shifted his stance, trying madly to calm his rebellious dick.
This. This right here. This is why there are rules.
“Turns out Acelin is a guy’s name,” Steven said.
Paul flashed cold for a second, worried that Ace would let on that they’d met already. He wassonot ready to tell Steven how that happened.
“Nice to meet you, Ace,” Paul said, polite and cool. He offered his hand to shake.
Ace started for just a moment, then took the hand to shake.
Shaking a man’s hand shouldn’t affect his whole body like that. Paul shouldn’t feel the warmth spread so deliciously along his nerve endings. He shouldn’t long to let his fingers run along the rest of that tempting skin.
“Likewise,” Ace replied, suddenly hoarse. He roughly cleared his throat and turned to Steven. “So, how about you show me the rest of the house, and then I can get started.”
Paul trailed behind, his attention split between watching Ace take notes about the rooms and watching the sinful way Ace’s ass moved inside those pants.
“Do you mind if I take some before photos?” Ace asked Steven.
“Oh damn,” Steven groaned. “It’s that bad? My house is a before picture?”
Ace laughed, and the sound spread warmly through Paul’s body. He liked how that felt – and what it did to Ace’s already beautiful face and deep blue eyes.
“Nothing like that, really,” Ace said. “I’m trying to get more content for my Web site, and before and after photos are the best way to show what I can do for a house. Yours is far, far from my biggest challenge, believe me.”
Steven narrowed his eyes slightly. “But it’s not the easiest one, either, is it?”
Ace took a deep breath. “No. But it’s not because you’ve done anything wrong. It’s just a little … blank. Usually, I have to remove personal photos left and right and cull down the mess on the walls. But you … well, that’s not an issue here.”
“So what do you do about that?” Paul asked. He wasn’t exactly sure what his job as backup entailed anymore, now that he wasn’t on flower blockage patrol. But despite himself, he wanted an excuse to talk to Ace.
“First, I think we’ll attack the low-hanging fruit,” Ace said, not quite meeting his eyes. “Let’s move some furniture around.”
“Might as well, since my muscle is here and everything.” Steven slugged his brother lightly on the arm.
Ace pursed his lips quickly, as if to stop himself from saying something.
“Then let’s go to the bedroom,” Ace said.
Oh let’s. Paul shook his head. Cut it out, McDonnell.
The room Steven used as the master bedroom was smallish, like all the rooms in this older house, and Steven’s king-size bed took up most of the space. He’d placed it so that you would fall into it after taking two steps into the room.
“I’m guessing this is where you put the bed the first day you were in the house, right?” Ace said.
“More than likely,” Steven said.
“Once you finally get your stuff into a new place, you’re usually too tired to even think about moving it later, and that’s especially true of bedroom furniture.”
“I think I put the bed here because of the phone jack,” Steven said.
“Makes sense,” Ace said. “But it’s sort of blocked your entry into the room. I know you have made this work for you, but people are going to walk in here and think they will never fit everything they need.”
“But all my stuff does fit,” Steven said.
“We can make it fit better,” Ace said. “You want the layout to welcome people into the bedroom, make them want to explore further.”
Okay, this was getting ridiculous. Paul was taking everything Ace said in a much more interesting way. Like, I would definitely welcome you into the bedroom. Or, you already know everything important fits.
Paul shook his head to clear it and realized that both Ace and Steven were looking at him.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “Did I miss something?”
“Could you grab that bedside table and move it into the hallway?” Ace repeated.
Paul grunted softly and went to work, grateful for the physical distraction. With a few adjustments and new positions for Steven’s furniture, the bedroom was quickly transformed. The entry was unobstructed, the furniture was tucked into new homes, and the room surprisingly looked bigger.