Rough [01] - A Bit of Rough (18 page)

Bram slung and arm around James' shoulder and beamed proudly at his work force and friends and growled. "Jamie is an architect, so don't try to dazzle him with your bullshit.

He'll make mincemeat out of all of you grunts." There were a number of half-hearted and playful grumbles from the men, but Bram ignored them.

He jerked his chiseled, clean-shaven chin in his construction friend's direction. "Mitch, find Jamie a hard hat for later, will you?" His gaze returned to James' face and his expression softened. "I want to make damn sure nothing bad happens to him." He winked at James.

James smiled at the lopsided grin on the man's love-struck face, just barely catching Bram's final, whispered word that made his heart race. "Forever."

***

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Energized by lunch, Bram's company, and promises of an active and interesting night at Bram's house ahead of him, James returned to the office and plunged back into his work.

By four o'clock, James was deep into the groove, designing, planning, and brainstorming ideas with two other architects, exchanging ideas and making and accepting numerous calls on fact-finding missions from within the company.

So when the phone rang for the umpteenth time, he didn't bother with pleasantries, answering with a distracted grunt. "Yeah? James, here."

"Mr. James Justin? Apartment 4C in the Butler Building on West 12th Street?" The voice was sharp, disapproving and female.

"Yeah, that's me." James couldn't decide whether to be worried or just curious. "Who is this?"

"This is Mrs. Susan Fibbs, one of your building superintendents." Her tone reflected a belief that he should already be aware of her identity.

"Oh." James settled on being confused and curious. "Well, hello, Mrs. Fibbs. What can I do for you?"

"I'm calling regarding a complaint we've had from one of our other tenants." The sharpness took on a prim edge.

"A complaint? About me?" James lost interest in the layout he had been studying for the first part of the conversation and concentrated on the women at the other end of the line.

"I'm afraid I don't understand."

"Not about you, per se, Mr. Justin. About your 'friend'." Mrs. Fibbs managed to put just enough emphasis on the word 'friend' to make it sound dirty.

"My 'friend'?" James let her know he understood her prejudicial inference.

"The very large friend you have been, shall we say, 'keeping company with'?"

"You mean Bram?" James hesitated for a just a moment before adding, "My boyfriend?"

"Yes, well." Mrs. Fibbs cleared her throat, her tone flustered and irritated. "Whatever he is, we've received a very serious complaint from Mr. Williams in apartment 4A about him. As your 'guest', you are responsible for his behavior."

"He's not a guest, he's my boyfriend, Mrs. Fibbs."

"Very well, if you insist." Mrs. Fibbs huffed, irritated at having to use words she found distasteful. "Mr. Williams claims your 'boyfriend' assaulted him and invaded his home, threatening more bodily harm on two more occasions, all in the past week." Her voice
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became mildly outraged. "The poor man had a very impressive array of injuries, Mr.

Justin. Very impressive indeed. Your 'boyfriend' must be a brute!"

James worked to keep his voice calm. "First of all, Mrs. Fibbs, Bram is
not
a brute. He's a kind, wonderful man. He was protecting
me
from an assault by Williams."

"So he is responsible for the man's injuries. I knew it." Her tone left no question she considered the matter closed.

"Let me explain the situation, Mrs. Fibbs. It's not what it seems."

"I've heard enough. The man assaulted a tenant and then harassed him in his home on two additional occasions. We have the safety of all the building's occupants to think of, Mr.

Justin. It's obvious having you and your type of 'friends' in the building is an unacceptable risk."

"Bram has only interacted with Williams twice and both times were to protect me." A nagging sense of unease nudged at James' insecurities. Bram had said he couldn't meet him for lunch on Monday because he'd had 'something personal to take care of'. Could he have gone to see Williams without James knowing about it? Would Bram have broken his promise to let James handle the situation? "Mrs. Fibbs, if you'd just let me explain --"

"I'm sorry Mr. Justin, but we'll be issuing you a sixty day eviction notice as of today.

There are small children living on your floor, Mr. Justin. We have to think of the children."

"Williams is keeping pit bulls in his apartment, Mrs. Fibbs! How safe is that for 'the children'?"

"How dangerous can they be? They didn't stop your brute of a boyfriend from inflicting injury on the poor man. No, Mr. Justin, the eviction notice stands."

"Mrs. Fibbs!"

"Good day, sir."

James stared at the silent phone in his hand then replaced it on the base. "Christ. I've managed to lose my sense of self-preservation, my perspective, my identity, my heart
and
my apartment all in one week."

James pushed off the desk as he jumped from his seat. He walked right past his coat and out the door, slamming it as he strode down the hall. "Now I hope I don't lose the only thing that really matters."

***

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Bram’s truck was parked in front of the office trailer, but the man was seven stories up and out on a steel girder when James returned to the construction site. The foreman radioed him he had a visitor again and Bram began the long descent to the ground. James spotted the man high up on the skeletal structure, but he couldn't watch the powerfully built, athletic man jump from narrow steel beam to beam without wanting to throw up.

The sharp breeze cut through James’ dress shirt and fluttered his tie around his neck. He hunched his shoulders against the increasing cold and paced back and forth beside the truck, drawing curious glances from several of the workers. By the time Bram made it to the ground, James had worked himself up into a cold sweat despite the falling temperatures.

Bram hit the ground floor at a hurried pace. His vest flapped in the wind, jeans dust-covered and hair sweaty and out of place from the tight band inside the hardhat. He tossed the bright yellow hat and his tool belt onto a nearby bench as he passed it, never breaking stride or taking his concerned gaze off of a shivering James.

Eyebrows knitted together in confusion, Bram strode over. "Jamie? What’s the matter?"

Seeing James coatless and freezing, he slipped out of his own down-filled vest and tried to wrap it around James. "Where’s your coat at?"

"I forgot it." Shrugging off Bram’s attempts to warm him up, James pushed Bram’s hands away. "That’s not important."

"Well, it should be." Bram open the truck's passenger door and pulled a quilted flannel shirt from behind the seat. "And it is to me. It's forty-two degrees out here, Jamie." He tossed it to James, who automatically caught it.

Gripping the bulky shirt in both hands, James' knuckles turned white. "I have to ask you something, Bram." He twisted the shirt, strangling the fabric. James felt lost and hurt, anticipating an answer he didn't want to hear, but was sure he would. "I don't want to," he blinked against the sting of unshed tears, "but I have to."

Looking even more confused than before, Bram slowly nodded. "Okay. I don't have anything to hide, Jamie."

James paced and distractedly mauled Bram's shirt. The moment his lower lip was sucked between his teeth, he began to gnaw on it hard enough to rake a layer of chapped skin off.

Bram's expression grew serious. "Just ask me."

"Did you go see Williams this Monday, on your own?" James' words were fast-paced and hitched between tight little gasps of breath. "When you said you couldn't get together for lunch?"

"What?" Bram's mouth dropped open and his clenched fists rested on his hips.

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James' voice went an octave higher and several nearby workmen stopped what they were doing to listen. "Did you go harass Williams?" His pace slowed and James stopped in front of Bram. "At his apartment? Behind my back."

"Behind your
back
?" The extra emphasis Bram put on the last word accented how incredulous he felt.

"I have to know, Bram!" James was shouting now and his pacing resumed at a frenzied rate. He stopped every few words to slap a palm against Bram's broad, heaving chest.

"Did you break your promise? Did you just decide that how I wanted to handle the problem wasn't important and take over?"

"When would I have done that?" Bram glanced down at the small hand periodically thumping on his sternum, but ignored it otherwise. "And
why
would I have done it?"

"Monday! When you said you had something personal to take care of?" James worked himself into a fevered pitch, terrified he was losing Bram, but helpless to stop himself from forcing the man farther away. "You never said what you were doing, but it was important enough to you to keep from seeing me one more time before you left town."

"Why you egotistical little shit." Bram moved closer, his eyes narrowed and his breaths coming in angry, deep, controlled huffs.

Mindless of the significant differences in their sizes, James pushed at Bram again. Silent, Bram allowed himself to be shoved back an inch or two. "This isn't about me, damn it!

It's about you! Us! And about whether or not you're going to try and run my life!"

Bram reacted instinctively to the growing panic in James' shaky voice and wide eyes. He grabbed James by the shoulder, keeping him in place. "What's this all about, really, Jamie?"

Trying to regain his control, James closed his eyes and took several deep breaths then looked up at Bram. "It's about my getting a call this afternoon from my building's superintendent complaining about you!" His moment of control deserted him. "It's about my losing my apartment!"

"Your apartment? Why?" James jerked under Bram's restraining hand and Bram tightened his hold.

"Williams." James spit out the name like it was venom. "He told the building superintendents you went to his place and threatened him a third time." James pulled out of Bram's grip and began pacing again. "You promised you'd let me handle it! You promised me you wouldn't interfere!"

Shaking his head, Bram threw his hands up in frustration. "I
didn't
, Jamie."

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James stopped and got up into Bram's face. "Then where did you go Monday?" He thumped the hand holding the mangled shirt against Bram's tense shoulder. "What was so important? Why won't you just tell me?"

Voice deadly calm and measured, Bram's jaw set into a grim line. "It's very personal."

Outraged, James missed the hard glint in Bram's eye. "Personal! Personal!" James slapped Bram's chest with both hands, but the big man didn't budge an inch this time.

James didn't notice. He shouted up at Bram's closed, guarded face. "You tell me you love me and want to spent all our time together, but you can't tell me something 'personal'?"

Never-ending shivers began to quake through James' slender body, but he didn't notice them. He backed away from Bram, rapidly shaking his head. His curls flew in his face, aided by the increasing cold winds. "That's not going to cut it, Bram. Not by a long shot."

Tears welled in his eyes and his voice hitched, but his tone was determined. "I can't stay with someone who'll betray my trust. I've had enough of that my life."

James turned to walk away, head down and shoulders hunched then realized he was still holding Bram's shirt. He turned sideways and thrust it at Bram, in a hurry to walk away and not let the man see the extent of his anguish.

Instead of the shirt being taken, James' wrist was encased in a firm, leather-covered grip.

Bram tightened his fingers and yanked James closer, pulling the smaller man off his feet.

He loomed over James, his face set in a mask of tense control, his eyes flashing with scorching anger.

"Oh, no, you don't, Jamie." Bram moved them both the five feet to the truck. He opened the passenger door with one hand while keeping a grip on James with the other.

"You can't just come here and accuse me of lying to you, betraying you, and then just walk away like our relationship doesn't mean anything." Bram shoved James toward the open cab. "You want to know what I was doing on Monday so badly, what I didn't want to weigh you down with yet, then I'll show you." He pointed over James' shoulder at the bench seat, his voice curt and unquestioningly authoritative. "Get in the truck."

Desperately glad Bram wasn't going to let him walk away without an explanation, but afraid to say so, James moved slowly.

Just like he had on the first night they met, Bram grabbed James by the waist and tossed him into the cab. Before slamming the door shut, Bram pointed an accusing finger at him.

"And put on the fucking shirt! Your goddamn lips are turning blue!"

Settling onto the leather seat, James didn't utter a word of complaint. He slipped the too-big shirt on and hugged the thick fabric to his body, wrapping it around and crossing it
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over itself to seal in any body heat he might have left. Suddenly aware of how cold he really was, James began shaking so hard his teeth chattered. Not wanting to upset Bram further, he pulled his lips between his teeth to deaden the sound.

Walking around the truck, Bram looked over his shoulder at the men nearby. "Mitch, tell Eddie I've gone. I'll call him later and check on the schedule for tomorrow."

"You got it, boss." Mitch's voice was an attempt at neutrality, but even James could hear the genuine concern in it.

James silently groaned, realizing Mitch and two other workmen had been standing several feet away during the entire conversation. He had been so worked up, his natural abhorrence for public displays had taken a backseat to getting a straight answer from Bram. James slouched and pulled the collar of the shirt higher around his face.