Forbidden Desires Collection 1 Read online

  “I was going to meet him around three.”

  “Ah, perfect. Then, I can buy you something for dinner.”

  Roman scrubbed his cheeks. “Y-yeah, you could.”

  “Send me the information for the funeral home, and I will meet you over there.”

  “Okay, cool.”

  “One more thing.”

  “Y-yeah?” Roman straightened his back.

  “It’s good hearing your voice, kid.”

  “Oh.” Roman’s cheeks burned, and he rubbed the back of his neck. He knew Levi’s words shouldn’t have had an effect on him, but his body and mind were two separate entities. Despite how inappropriate it was, Roman’s thoughts drifted to images of his father’s sexy partner’s lips on his skin. “R-right.” Roman coughed. “I’ll-okay-bye.”

  Rubbing his face again, he stashed his cell phone away and focused on his meal, downing his now cold pancakes as he shuffled through his father’s paperwork.

  ***

  Levi Myers left the office early because he couldn’t focus after finally getting a call back from his business partner’s son. He had watched the shy boy blossom into a sweet, intelligent young man, and ever since this past summer, what-ifs plagued his thoughts. Roman wasn’t a child anymore. He was grown and capable of making his own decisions about his own faculties. Roman hadn’t pinged on his radar until the younger man popped up in the network of his dating site over the summer with a filled-out profile and a dating age range from early twenties to mid-forties. Levi fell into that category, and his stomach tingled as he swiped through the collection of photographs on Roman’s profile. Shirtless pictures.

  Roman had swelled into a virile young man with long, lean muscles and a wash of dark curls from his chest over his navel, disappearing past sagging shorts. He remembered them. The images of Roman laid across his leather couch with thick rimmed glasses on the bridge of his nose and his legs spread wide haunted his late-night thoughts. The faintest outline of his cock shadowing the crotch of his jeans and the coy smile playing on his lips made Levi’s head spin.

  There was more than Roman’s virility. The younger man was intelligent and beyond his years in maturity, too. He had been a capable and advanced child years ago when they first met during Levi’s interview. It had been a take-your-child-to-work day, and Roman handled the tasks of the business as well as any of the other entry-level employees. He had to because his father had still been drowning in the loss of his wife. Roman kept their two-person family running.

  Over the years, their relationship grew close in a brotherly sense, in a mentoring sense, in a he’s-your-boss’s-child sense. Levi knew his boundaries, but he still cared deeply for the other man, and the reality of the boy being alone in this world ached his heart and made working impossible. So, he gave up.

  He busied himself with a few errands before he arrived at the Green residence, parking in the front parking lot and walking up to the massive double door entry of the three-level home. He typed in the door code, the bolt lock released, and he opened the door, stepping onto a muted rug. William, Roman’s father, had taken the payroll with him the week before after processing quarterly raises, and he had mentioned leaving the information on the desk in his upstairs office. However, before Levi headed up to the second floor, he checked the kitchen.

  He opened the refrigerator, surveying the sparse contents and making a mental grocery list. He collected the trash and washed the collection of ripening dishes in the sink. After wiping down all the counters, he bagged the trash, dumping it in the outside trash can. Levi returned to the house as his cell phone rang. He answered and put it to his ear in the same movement.

  “Hello?”

  “Hey, Levi. I have a quick question for you.”

  “Sure, Brenna, what’s going on?”

  “Well, I have this client who has been paying her personal loan on time for months, but this month she’s saying she lost her job and is having some setbacks. She’s asking if I can waive the late fee if she schedules a payment on the phone with me.”

  “Mm.”

  “Well, can I do it?”

  “Considering the facts, you would rather her call you and let you know she’s going to be late on the bill rather than say nothing, so I would if I were you.”

  “True. You’re right. I’ll just make a note on her file, right?”

  “Indeed. Is there anything else you need?” Levi browsed the bottom floor of the house before reaching the stairs, ascending them and nestling his cell phone in the crook of his shoulder.

  “Well, there’s one more thing. I hate to ask this because, I mean, I know the boss passed away and you’re dealing with everything right now, but will our raises be processed on Friday’s paycheck or not?”

  “It’ll be processed on Friday’s paycheck. I’m picking up the payroll information right now.”

  “Okay, cool. Um, I’m sorry about everything, but I’ve really been looking forward to this raise.”

  “I understand.” Levi wandered down the familiar hallway and turned the corner into William’s office. The drawers had been opened and the computer flashed with a screensaver. Levi sat down behind the desk and shifted through the opened drawers before typing in the computer’s password and weeding through digital files. He forwarded the payroll information to his computer. As he exited the payroll screen, a message popped up. The sender was Brett Walters, one of their local competitors, and the email headline read “Merger”.

  Levi wet his lips. His fingers sweated over the keyboard before he opened the email, eyes scanning the information. The message was brief, but thorough. William had been planning a company merge with Brett Walters’ smaller law firm, making William and Brett the new co-owners of the company and leaving Levi out of a job. Levi’s blood boiled as he scanned the rest of the correspondences dating back for months. His jaw worked and his lips twitched before he exited the screen and turned off the computer, stalking towards the door. Cursing William under his breath, he closed the door to the office and ran right into someone else. He ran into Roman, and his heart dropped to the floor.

  “Ah!” Roman jumped backwards and clutched the towel around his slim hips. Droplets of water stained his bare shoulders, and his soaked dreadlocks dripped water down his lean body. The tips of his long dreadlocks faded to blond, and Levi flashed back to the twelve hours of salon time where Roman’s mid-back length hair became shoulder-length dreadlocks.

  “I’m sorry.” Levi’s breath caught in his throat as he scanned over Roman’s bare chest. His eyes paused where a fluffy white towel covered the younger man’s bottom half, and his cheeks warmed before he cut his eyes away.

  “Ohhh. N-no it’s me. I should-I knew you were coming. I thought you had already stopped by.” Roman breathed. Water rolled down his toned calves, staining the hardwood under him.

  Levi cleared his throat. “No, no. This is your house. I should have called.”

  “N-no. You’re always welcome here.” Roman’s copper eyes flicked from the ground to Levi’s, and Levi bit his bottom lip. His anger washed out of him, and arousal replaced it.

  He cleared his throat, again. “Of-of course.” His nostrils flared, and his cock strained the front of his flat-front slacks. Roman’s coconut and pine soap tickled his nose.

  “Y-yeah. I-um- I should get dressed. My room is-” Roman motioned passed Levi to the door next to his father’s office, the door behind Levi.

  “Ah. Right. Of-of course.” Levi stepped aside, and Roman squeezed past him, flattening himself against the wall and putting as much space between their bodies as he could even though the air between them was electric. Their eyes met, again, and Levi’s pulse thundered in his ears. The feeling was foreign. He had never felt so strongly for another person as he did for Roman.

  “Y-yeah. Um, I’ll meet you downstairs in a few minutes? We can go to the funeral home together?”

  Levi coughed. “I’ll be downstairs.”

  “Okay.” Roman sucked his bottom lip, a
nd it glistened with spit when he released it. The younger man turned away from Levi. Water rolled down his back, over his shoulder blades and down the length of his spine, pooling at the small of his back above the bunched towel.

  Levi growled, clenching his hands at his sides. He turned away and moved down the stairs, turning the corner into the kitchen and sitting down at the bar counter. He rubbed his hands over his face, groaning softly as he locked his arousal away. There was nothing wrong with being attracted to a younger man, but when the younger man was your deceased partner’s son, things weren’t as cut and dry. As he waited, he made a grocery list of Roman’s favorite foods and general shelf staples.

  Roman descended the stairs as he finished the list. His long dreadlocks swung behind him as he strolled into the kitchen. “You’re making a grocery list?” His lips quirked into a little smile.

  “I was, yeah.” Levi mirrored his smile, eyes wrinkling at the corners. “I didn’t want you to worry about things like groceries when you’re grieving the loss of your father.”

  “Right.” His features wrinkled. “Thanks.” He peered over Levi’s shoulder at the list. “I don’t eat Fruit Smiles anymore,” he chuckled. “I’m not a child.”

  “I know you’re not a child, but there is nothing wrong with having them in the house in case you want a sweet snack.”

  “They’re high fructose corn syrup and artificial flavoring.”

  “You would prefer fruit snacks made with real fruit juice?” Levi lifted his eyebrows.

  “If you’re going to buy a grown man fruit snacks, then at least make them healthy fruit snacks. What else is on your list?” He plucked the handwritten list from Levi’s fingers, stroking over Levi’s hand in the process.

  Levi’s skin burned where Roman had touched him. “We can edit it later. It’s nearly two-thirty, and you said you were meeting the funeral director at three.”

  “I know. And you promised me dinner afterwards. I want to go to the seafood restaurant downtown.” Roman glanced over his shoulder at Levi.

  “Sure.”

  “People are going to think we’re on a date.”

  “Is it better or worse than when they assumed you were my adopted son?”

  “Um. Better, because I don’t want to think of you as my father.”

  “Noted.” Levi led Roman to his vehicle, passing Roman’s sports car in the garage as they climbed into a modestly priced mid-size vehicle. It cost half the price of Roman’s car, and Levi had worked his ass off for it a few years before he became co-president of the current company.

  “Have you ever planned a funeral before?” Roman ran his hands along his slacks, shrugging his shoulders up as he stole glances at Levi. His copper eyes filling with sadness as they neared the funeral home.

  “I have. This is why I volunteered to help you. It can be a little daunting, and I wouldn’t want you to overspend because some money-hungry funeral director is preying on your feelings.”

  “Thanks.” He combed his dreadlocks to one side and braided them, securing the fat braid with a stretched hair tie. “So, um, how have you been?”

  “I’ve been well. The company is doing very well. We’ve grown one percent over last year already even before the holiday season. This year, we’re considering offering a holiday-specific loan with special rates for our long-standing clients.”

  “Oh, cool. How much will that grow the company by the end of the fiscal year?”

  “Ah, maybe another one percent, making it two percent growth for the year.”

  “I guess gone are the days of double-digit growth.”

  “Yes, indeed. Even two percent growth is impressive at this point.”

  Roman nodded. “What about your personal life? Still single?”

  “Yes, Roman. I’m still single.” Levi laughed. “Why, you have any prospects for me?”

  “It depends on what you’re into, doesn’t it?”

  “I suppose it would.”

  “Everyone I know is mid-twenties. Will you date younger?”

  “For the right person, yes.” Levi thought about Roman’s candid photos on the local dating site, and his heart somersaulted in his chest.

  “What constitutes the right person?”

  Levi turned into the funeral home and parked his vehicle between a black hearse and a compact sedan, killing the engine. He looked at Roman. “This is a conversation we shouldn’t be having right before we have to put your father into the ground.”

  “I was trying to make things light-hearted,” Roman whispered.

  “I appreciate it, but this isn’t the time.” Levi climbed out of his vehicle and walked around it, opening the door for Roman and walking inside behind him. Roman led the way down the hall and into the private office, and they both took seats on one end of a desk while the funeral director sat on the opposite end.

  After explaining the order of ceremony, it became a conversation of money. When the funeral director shifted from a kind fatherly figure to a hardened businessman, Levi took the reins and selected cost-effective options for all the funeral service details.

  Roman leaned into him, murmuring his thanks and squeezing his bicep through his summer blazer. Levi flexed, and the apples of Roman’s cheeks flushed with color.

  By the time they left the funeral home, the cost of the service totaled nine thousand dollars, and what little Roman’s mood had improved had evaporated after putting a monetary value on his father’s memorial service.

  “How are you?” Levi asked once they got back in the vehicle.

  “I’m fine. It’s just depressing to think about my father as a number and to think about how much all of this stuff costs. I’m lucky, I have the money sitting in my account for all this, but not everyone is as lucky. This could send someone into debt just trying to bury their family member.”

  “True.”

  “Who did you plan a funeral for?” Roman turned his amber eyes up to Levi.

  “My grandmother.”

  “Why didn’t your parents do it?”

  “Because my parents have never been in my life.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.”

  “There’s nothing to be sorry about. Let’s go eat, and then we’ll go to the grocery store.”

  “The seafood place,” Roman prompted.

  “I heard you the first time.” Levi sparked the ignition.

  ***

  The hostess sat them in a booth in the back of the restaurant away from the other diners, and Roman sat across from Levi. He fixed his eyes on the menu as the older man eased into the booth, bunching his slacks as he sat down. Levi’s sport cut shirt highlighted his hard-earned muscles. His father’s business partner aged like wine, and Roman was parched.

  “Order for me.” Roman slid the menu away and leaned back in his seat.

  “You’re not a child anymore. You can order for yourself.”

  “I can, but I haven’t been here in a long time, and you know the menu better than I do. And you know me, so I want you to order,” Roman continued, tucking a stray dreadlock behind his ear as he flicked his eyes up to Levi.

  The other man studied him. “All right.” He accepted the menu and surveyed it, blue eyes scanning over the small text.

  “And wine.”

  Levi chuckled, “And wine. Have you contacted your professors?”

  “Not yet. Simon sent the information to me this morning, but we’ve been busy all afternoon, so I haven’t gotten the chance to fill it out. He said there’s some sort of forgiveness, um, thing where I can take the semester off and start over next semester.”

  “The semester has barely started.” Levi turned the menu over.

  “I know, but I don’t want to be there right now.”

  “Where do you want to be, then?”

  “I don’t know. Nowhere and everywhere at the same time. I mean, sometimes I feel normal for a few seconds, and then I feel guilty because I should be grieving my father, right?”

  “There is no wrong way to grieve,
Roman.” When Levi finished surveying the menus, he stacked them and set them aside, sipping the complementary water the server brought with their menus. Then, he unbuttoned his sleeves and cuffed them at the thick part of his forearm, showing a peek of inked skin at the crease of his elbow.

  “Yeah.” Roman tilted his head. “Wait. You-you have a tattoo?”

  “Indeed.”

  “Did my father know about it? He hates-hated tattoos.”

  “No,” Levi laughed again, “he didn’t. Your father didn’t know a lot about me.”

  “Can I see it?” Roman reached across the table, stroking the inside of Levi’s arm. Levi flexed, and goosebumps rose on his skin. Roman’s fingertips tingled, and he gasped softly.

  Levi curled his arm away. “Perhaps later.”

  “How big is it?”

  “It’s a chest piece and half-sleeves.”

  “Ohh.” Roman scanned his eyes over Levi’s chest and bit his bottom lip. “Can I see it tonight?”

  “Perhaps.” Levi sipped his water, again. “I think you should go back to school and at least try to finish the semester. Your school isn’t far from here, either, so you could live at home and drive into the campus every morning if it would make you feel better.”

  “Maybe.” Roman rolled his head on his shoulders when the conversation cycled back to his academics. “I’m still in a big house alone or in my small apartment alone.”

  “Simon can move in with you.”

  “Simon’s messy, and he has women over all the time.”

  “Simon is an average male in his mid-twenties, then.” A boyish smile lit Levi’s features, shaving a half-decade from his face.

  Roman chewed his bottom lip. “You were like him in your twenties?”

  Levi’s smile grew, reaching his sparkling eyes. Before he replied, the server approached their table again, and he turned his dazzling smile from Roman to the plump, short-haired female.

  “Are you guys ready to order?” She pulled out a notepad and fished a pencil from behind her ear.