My brain said to leave it alone, but my gut had me striding forward.
What if Nolan was cheating on my brother? I mean, Nolan was a sweet guy, but no way in hell was I letting him use my brother like that. And if on the off chance it was Dallas? Well, I’d kick his ass too, because he had an amazing thing going with Nolan.
I trotted across the two-lane highway and reached the door within a couple of minutes. There was only one other car parked in the lot and it was right next to the truck.
I didn’t even bother to knock on the door, because I wasn’t interested in making my presence known. I figured it would save a lot of time if I caught my brother or his lover in the act and didn’t have to listen to excuses that the whole thing wasn’t what it looked like. I could get around to kicking the stranger out much faster that way and asking Dallas or Nolan, whichever one of them it was, what the hell they were thinking.
It took practically nothing to use my shoulder to break the door. The damn thing was so flimsy it almost seemed like a waste to leave some cash behind to pay the motel owner for breaking it. Both the door and the frame were so rotted through, he could probably use tape to put the damn thing back together and have it be more secure than it’d been.
Despite how easy it’d been to break the door down, it made a lot of noise, so I had no trouble finding the two occupants of the darkened room the second the sunlight filtered through the open door.
And I recognized them both.
But it wasn’t the man I’d seen coming into the room that interested me. It was the man kneeling at his feet that I had my eyes on.
“What the—” the standing man sputtered, his eyes going wide with shock as he suddenly reached down to try and grab the pants that were currently at his ankles. “Oh, God!” he whispered.
I knew who he was right away. His name was Arthur Tomlinson and he’d been Pelican Bay’s librarian for years. I felt sick as I watched him yank up his pants and try to get them closed. I didn’t miss the fact that his small but very hard dick was shiny with moisture.
Bile rose in my throat as my eyes went to Isaac who hadn’t moved, even after Arthur had shoved him out of the way to reach his pants.
“I’m sorry!” Arthur shouted. “Please, I’m sorry!” he said. “Don’t tell my wife!”
There was a wad of cash on the bed that Arthur actually tried to grab, but when his beady eyes met mine, his mouth opened into what looked like a silent scream and he only managed to snag a few of the bills, then he was darting past me and out the door, the sun glistening off his wedding ring and the buckle of the belt holding up his still half-undone pants.
Isaac didn’t move for several seconds. When he did, it was only to get up off the floor. My gut clenched when he wiped the back of his hand over his mouth.
In my mind, I understood what I’d walked in on, but in my heart, I didn’t want to believe it.
Isaac glanced at the cash, then went to the bathroom. It was the kind where the sink was outside the actual bathroom. I saw him reach for a toothbrush and a small tube of toothpaste. Besides the strip of condoms and bottle of lube on the nightstand, they were the only other items in the room that didn’t already belong there.
I felt like I was going to be sick.
Isaac calmly brushed his teeth, never once looking over his shoulder at me. When he was done, he turned around and leaned back against the vanity, then pulled out his phone.
“You mind?” he said as he nodded toward the still-open door. “Since you just cost me a client, I need to book another one. And my next one should be here in a few, so you should go.”
I wasn’t sure if it was his lackadaisical attitude or the talk about more clients that had me slamming the door shut and striding toward him. I snatched the phone from him and slammed it down on the countertop behind him. “Are you fucking kidding me right now?”
If I hadn’t been so close to him, I would have missed the fine tremor running throughout his entire frame. He might have been pretending to be unfazed, but he sure as shit wasn’t. His makeup was heavier than usual, and his mouth was stained bright red with heavy lipstick.
No doubt the same color was on some part of Arthur Tomlinson’s dick right now.