No, the music would always matter. Regardless of what the world did to him, Rafe would always submerge himself in his music. It was one of the few constants of Quinn’s horrible teenage years, discovering a lanky Rafe sprawled out on one of the beds in the attic room, cradling a bass to his body, and working through deep threads of rolling grumbles.
Rafe fucking Andrade.
Quinn hated how Rafe made him feel. Or loved it. He wasn’t sure about that either.
“Hey, hold up there, Q.”
Rafe’s fingers were a hot sear through his shirtsleeve where he grabbed at Quinn.
“And come on, dude. When have I ever been the one you’ve run from?”
“Nearly every single fucking time,” Quinn muttered under his breath. A part of him wanted to shake Rafe off and push him back inside where he belonged, with all of the people who didn’t stumble over their own brains to make conversation. “It’s okay. I’m not—”
“You’re not what, dude?” His fingers gentled, but they stayed wrapped around Quinn’s upper arm. “I think I ran over one of the kitchen guys to make it out the back door before you took off. I’m sorry. I fucked up. I always seem to say the wrong damned thing and—”
“So not you. Mum says you out-Irish the Irish.”
“Your mom’s pretty easy to con shit out of,” Rafe shot back, giving Quinn his mad-pirate grin when Quinn yanked his arm away. “Sure, deny it, but she’s like Wendy with the Lost Boys. Or Little Bunny Foo Foo—and we’re the field mice. Come on, dude. It’s me. Rafe, long-time friend and even longer time fuckup.” Rafe’s expression sobered, the cavalier light in his eyes replaced by something more serious, more soulful. “I’m sorry, Q. I didn’t mean to make you feel like shit back there. Really.”
“And here I thought I was the one who fucked up.” The wind kicked up, brushing an icy chill into Quinn’s skin. “What I said in there? Really stupid.”
“So the virgin thing isn’t for real?” Rafe made a show of eyeballing Quinn’s body. “Because I didn’t think all the guys in this damned city were blind.”
Quinn shoved Rafe away, giving himself a bit of space to breathe. “Shut up, Rafe.”
“Look, it’s fucking freezing. How about if we go grab a cup of coffee and catch up?”
“We just left a coffee shop.”
“How about one with less cops? And maybe more food.” Rafe patted his flat belly. “I could eat.”
“You always could eat.” Quinn snorted. “You went away, and Mum couldn’t figure out why she had so many leftovers.”
“That’s a fucking lie. I’ve seen Kiki chow down.” Rafe bobbed his head toward the parking lot. “Come on. Let’s get out of the wind and someplace warm. Probably need to take both cars. Your family’s crawling with cops. They’ll notice if one of us left our car here, and then they’d be all in our shit.”
“Yeah, probably not. About the noticing. Mine kind of got in a wreck, so I have a loaner.” Quinn shook his head, stalling Rafe’s questioning look. “Follow me. I know where to take you.”
Rafe grinned wickedly. “Q, you have no idea how long I’ve waited to hear you say that.”
“WHYBORNE’S COFFEE House?” An elegant gold script on the storefront’s frosted window was the only hint Rafe had of what lay beyond the Nob Hill shop’s heavy wooden door. “How long has this been here?”
“A few years now. One of the professors I’m friends with owns it. Well, he and his husband own it, but someone manages it for them. They live upstairs.” Quinn opened the street-facing door and waved Rafe in. “I almost bought one of the apartments in the building, but then the house came up, and well, I really liked it.”
Built a decade after the great earthquake, the multistory building’s street level discreetly offered not only a coffee shop but a bento deli and a dance studio for the uninitiated. Rafe grinned at the flock of tiny purple-haired elderly women pouring past them, their chattering punctuated with admiration for their salsa instructor’s ass and one woman’s chocolate Thai plant she’d been cultivating for the past month. One of the city’s trolleys clanged by, swaying as it chugged up to the hill’s crest. Rafe spotted his own apartment building among the spires rising above them, then had to duck out of the way as a young woman with bouncy blonde pigtails careened past him on an old red bicycle. She tossed off a few rings from the bell on her handlebar as a thank-you, speeding off toward Japantown.
“Coming in?” Quinn’s throaty Irish purr drew Rafe back. “Or do you want to keep sightseeing?”
“You never were the impatient one, Q,” he tossed back to the Irish man waiting by the door.
“I’m standing on a corner where the winds cut up from the Bay and wearing too thin of a shirt. I’m going to be impatient.”
Rafe glanced at the prick of nipples under Quinn’s shirt, letting his gaze slip over Quinn’s chest and shoulders.
“Where’s your jacket, Q?”