“Oh, well, lucky you. We were out of power for almost two days. Me and Mike, we got up and came here for hot showers in the gym those mornings before work. What a pain in the butt. Fortunately, we have a generator for storms and were able to keep the fridge and freezer going.”
He stood, realized that action would look weird, that he did it so randomly, and started to gather his things.
“You okay?”
“Yeah, I just remembered I was supposed to meet someone later for a movie. I do need to get out of here.”
“Good for you. I’ll see you Monday morning.” She headed for the door. “Oh, your sub’s confirmed.”
His heart hammered as his head snapped around to look at her. “What?”
She turned, frowning. “What?”
“What’d you say?”
“Your sub for Tuesday. I confirmed her earlier. That was the other thing I came to tell you. Your sub’s confirmed, to cover you for the county commission meeting. She’ll cover you all day. What’d you think I said?”
He tried to calm his pulse. “Nothing. Never mind. You’re right—I need to go home and chill.”
“I thought you were going to see a movie?”
“I might call them and ask to reschedule.”
She eyed him for an uncomfortably long and silent moment. “Well, have a good weekend.”
Once he was alone again, he pulled out his personal cell, switched off the Wi-Fi so it would force it to use his cell data and not trigger a trail on the school’s servers, and searched for stories about the explosion.
One of them, a story from the Sarasota TV station, quoted deputy county administrator…
Noah Mayes.
Shit.
Okay, well, that explained the man’s desperate need for privacy, and why he’d bolted out of the room after the phone call. Jackson could cut him slack for that. And yeah, this had been a legit emergency, more slack to cut there.
But…it was almost a week later, and the emergency had passed.
Still no contact.
Just for the heck of it, he pulled up FetLife and…no friend requests or messages.
He fought the urge to start Google-fuing the fuck out of Noah right there, but he knew he needed to go home first.
And finish grading papers.
I will not chase.
Maybe there was a good reason Noah hadn’t contacted him. Or maybe he’d really not been that into Jackson. But he’d sure sounded like he’d had a good time when he’d left.
Or maybe when he’d had time to think about it the age difference had weirded him out more than he’d let on.
I will not chase.
Taking a deep breath, Jackson gathered all his things and headed for his car.
Long ago, Jackson had made a personal rule based on what he’d seen others do—he would not chase. He’d adult, put his feelings out there, and either they’d be reciprocated by a functional adult who could verbalize their needs…
Or they wouldn’t.
If they weren’t, he’d move on.
He wouldn’t play games, get sucked into an emotional tug of war trying to “prove” something to the other guy.
That wasn’t him, that would never be him. The one time he’d foolishly done that, it’d been a disaster, had nearly ruined his life.
Never again.
He wouldn’t chase, but he also wouldn’t run. He’d wait, for a reasonable amount of time, before moving on.
Except in this case it seemed he’d be moving on sooner rather than later.
And the thought of that was nearly as painful as the thought of never seeing Noah again.
* * * *
Once home, Jackson cracked open a bottle of hard cider, nuked some leftover wings, and settled on his sofa in front of the TV with his personal laptop.
He didn’t want to grade papers. He didn’t want to go through the presentation for the county commissioners.
He didn’t even want to clean his fucking house, which was, quite honestly, starting to look like day three of pledge week at a frat house, something totally unlike him, but he’d been a little busy.
What he wanted to do, right now, was learn as much as he could about Noah Mayes, deputy county administrator for Sarasota County.
There wasn’t a lot, though. He had a Facebook account—and yes, Jackson was pitiful enough he downloaded Noah’s profile pic. But Noah didn’t have much publicly visible. That, or he didn’t post a lot. Just a couple of obligatory Sarasota beach sunset photos without a caption.
No Twitter or other social media accounts, as far as he could tell. Jackson found Noah’s page on the county’s website, with his contact information there—
No, will not e-mail him at work!
—and noted it.
Not that he was sure what he’d do with it.
Yeah, it stung a little. He’d thought Noah had left as into him as he’d been into Noah.
And he hated waiting around, for a variety of reasons. He was the kind of guy that when he said he’d contact someone, he did. Boom, done.
And he didn’t like being kept spinning in the wind.
This wasn’t something where he could e-mail Noah at work. For one thing, that’d be a dick move. Secondly, he knew there were public records laws, and didn’t want a private e-mail thread being relegated to permanence for anyone to browse later. Especially about something as personal and private as this.
Third, like a vampire, he wouldn’t go somewhere he wasn’t invited.
Especially considering the circumstances under which they’d met.
Maybe he got “being gay” out of his system and thought he was being nice.
Yet that didn’t feel right, either. Jackson was a pretty damn good judge of character and motivations.
Had to be, teaching tweens and teens.
At least, he was now. A damn sight better at it than he’d been as a kid, fortunately for him.
Nothing Noah had done had pinged any of Jackson’s usual bullshit buttons that would, normally, make him stop an evening dead in the middle of a date, if necessary, to extricate himself from the situation.
He was going to shut down the browser tab with the county’s site when he spotted another name.
Nooo…
He clicked on it, and hellooo, Boyd.
He let out an amused snort and took another swig of his hard cider. Boyd Nyberg, picture and all, head of Planning.
Had I been a subby, I could have had him.
The man he’d sat next to briefly at the munch he’d attended.
Small fucking world.
And that was exactly why he couldn’t get in touch with Noah at his job. He wouldn’t be a dick and accidentally out Noah to anyone else. If there was one person kinky at the county that he already knew just from his limited entry into the local scene, he could only imagine how many people he’d get to know if he stayed there for any length of time.
Fuck.
He switched back to Noah’s picture. His sweet blue eyes, that brown hair, he was fucking adorable.
Why couldn’t you have just gotten in touch with me? What’d I do wrong?
Knowing that wasn’t going to get him any answers tonight, he carried his hard cider into the master bathroom to take a shower. If nothing else, he could rub one out while taking a shower and thinking about the man’s delicious body.
Then he’d get back to fucking work, because he refused to fuck up the presentation on Tuesday.
Chapter Eight
After arriving at work Tuesday morning, Noah went over the final version of the day’s meeting agenda with a fine-toothed comb, comparing it to his notes. He’d have to be downstairs and in chambers for it, at least during the afternoon public comment portion for the Sorrellson Academy zoning expansion hearing. It’d passed through the Planning Commission with flying colors, and while everyone expected it to be a slam-dunk in the school’s favor, it wouldn’t shock Noah if one or two NIMBYs showed up to protest.
It would honestl
y shock him if they didn’t.
After a shitty week on the heels of the explosion and aftermath, everyone wanted a PR boost that would help lift spirits.
Hell, Sorrellson had owned the property for ten years, and it’d been used in the past for holding fund-raising carnivals and overflow parking for school events. Now they wanted to expand their campus. If anything, traffic would be lighter overall, because they’d lose that as a carnival venue. A mix of buildings, parking, and a new soccer field, with a quarter of the land earmarked to remain undeveloped greenspace and used for nature trails and a wildlife refuge.
It was a win-win for the county and the school, greenspace the county could proudly point to in an area that was quickly being chewed up by developers who wanted to do the bare minimum when it came to preserving natural habitats.
And Sorrellson was offering to put in sidewalks on all sides of their property instead of just in front of the school, on both sides of the street, and put in crosswalks, school zone lights and signage, as well as two additional traffic signals, which would save the county well over nine hundred thousand dollars in public works dollars.
Add to that one of the buildings being expanded as part of their development was the gym, and the hardened structures they’d add would not only surpass current storm codes, the property’s location outside flood zones meant they’d offered to be added as an official Red Cross shelter for hurricane season.
One or two snowbirds who hated kids and griped about the school would easily be drowned out not only by the parents and staff expected to appear as supporters, but by the common sense of the BCC, who would no doubt give heavy weight to the unanimous approval stamped on the project by the Planning Commission.
Still, Noah knew he’d need to stay on his toes. Sometimes monkey wrenches were tossed into projects at the last second, legal challenges—bullshit or not—permitting issues, USACE issues, DEP. Any number of things could stall or totally derail what looked like an easy agenda item.
Everyone on staff wanted this to go through. Sorrellson was a prime gem in the county’s educational crown, an attractive school for parents to enroll their children, drawing a younger demographic to the region—growing families, and their tax dollars.
Another plus to being so caught up in his work meant he’d had little time to think about Jackson, or about doing something stupid like pulling his personal cell out, switching the Wi-Fi off, and hitting FetLife to look for him.
Hell, even if he did find Jackson at this point, would the man even believe his excuse? It’d suck doubly to find him at this point just to be rebuffed for not getting in touch with him sooner.
Perhaps that rock was best left unturned.
He’d had the hottest night of his life, with a gorgeous man he could too easily envision himself falling hard for.
Falling? Hell, he was flat on his face already.
Which was stupid. He didn’t know the damn guy. And with his job, it meant he was too vulnerable to anyone who wanted to…
Well, okay. Not his job. He was a civil servant, and Sarasota County would not fire him for being gay. Not even for being kinky.
His parents, however…
His family would disown him. He’d never forget the creeping discomfort during the recent election cycle when he’d driven to Arcadia and seen the wave of campaign signs supporting the local conservative candidate, a man who’d been caught on audio saying he thought gays should die.
Including a campaign sign in his parents’ yard, since they were wholeheartedly voting for the guy.
The guy had lost—barely, and only because he’d refused to budge on helping pass common-sense gun reforms. He did garner more than enough votes to remind Noah that the closet was the safest place for him to stay, no matter how much he craved Jackson, or how much he wanted to find him and see him again.
Although it was self-inflicted cruelty for him to get his hopes up just to dash them by his own stupidity.
* * * *
Jackson opted to drive over to the county administration center building separately from the others in case he needed to stay behind and speak with county officials or the media.
At least, that’s what he told everyone.
He refused to admit to himself he was hoping to see Noah.
He damn sure wouldn’t go looking for the guy.
At least, not before he finished this presentation and had knocked it out of the park. Until then, he couldn’t let himself get distracted.
Too much was riding on his success to let that happen.
Jackson had his talking points honed to fine, piercing perfection, perfectly matching the presentation. He’d practiced for hours over the past weekend and last night, still hadn’t even cleaned the damn house, he’d been so busy working and worried about this. He had a sub taking care of his classes today, so he didn’t have to worry about that. Even the fricking Planning Commission had signed off on the project.
If he could keep his mind on his job and off Noah, he could do this. His only focus today was to hit the game-winning home run. He believed in Sorrellson and the work they did. Their students were happy, academically successful, and their school’s performance rankings proved they deserved a chance to expand their campus. They’d be able to serve up to four hundred more students, meaning adding to their staff.
Meaning new, permanent jobs.
And this was a great focus for him to have, because it meant he wasn’t obsessing over Noah. Either Noah had hated their encounter, or had decided to dive back into the closet.
He wouldn’t chase him.
Even though that’s exactly what he wanted to do.
The memory of the man’s beautiful blue eyes widening in shocked pleasure as he’d fucked him for the first time would never leave Jackson’s mind. The sweet, needy sounds he’d made as Jackson showed him how good it could be.
The slide of his flesh across Jackson’s, the feel of the man’s warm mouth as he tentatively sucked his cock for the first time before quickly taking to it and enjoying it.
Fuck.
He’d even sketched Noah in pencil earlier in the week, before he’d discovered the man’s true identity. Capturing the look on his face as Jackson had entered him.
Not that it was a sketch that would ever see the light of day, but he’d wanted…something.
Anything.
It’d been the first thing he’d sketched in months.
When he reached the county admin complex downtown he found parking in the visitor’s lot and made his way inside to the commission chambers. There were already a few parents there, wearing their bright teal collared shirts with the Sorrellson PTO logo embroidered on them. He wore his usual, a long-sleeved button-up light blue chambray shirt with the logo embroidered on the chest, but he kept his sleeves rolled down today. He’d added a tie, a simple charcoal one with the school’s initials embroidered on it in a continuous pattern.
They were the first big item on the afternoon agenda after the commissioners’ return from lunch break and handling a few minor issues. Jackson found the school’s land use attorney and had one last quick consultation with him before the session was called to order. The attorney had made sure their presentation was ready to display on the big screen for the commissioners and everyone in the audience.
His nerves jangled at the sight of the Sarasota TV station’s camera there, their photojournalist ready to film as soon as he started.
Jackson had snagged a bottle of water in case his throat dried up. He could teach—did it all day. He could present. He could talk to a whole damn gym full of kids, if he had to.
This was different.
This was big.
This was the school depending on him to bring this home, and a lot of jobs were riding on this.
He’d shepherded the project’s initial phases this far, and this was his final piece of it. Once this was done and approved, it’d get handed off to the school’s board of directors and the engineers and architects and those people.
He was the midwife, him and his committee.
His right leg nervously jiggled as he awaited the attorney’s nod for him to stand and take the podium.
* * * *
After lunch, Noah grabbed his large yellow notepad and headed downstairs for the meeting. He was running a couple of minutes later than he’d planned, but that was okay, because they never started perfectly on time anyway. After lunch there were always little items to be taken care of before the meat of the meeting—special days honoring people, proclamations that usually meant little except to the people receiving them, recognition of retiring employees, things like that.
He eased his way into the back of the chambers and surveyed the packed house. A wave of teal shirts likely marked the Sorrellson Academy supporters.
Moving to the left, all the way to the aisle along the northern chambers wall, he slowly made his way down front, closer to the dais, where he usually stood partially hidden from the main audience by a pillar. Close enough his boss could see and signal to him if he needed him for something, and able to scroll through his phone and e-mails without being a distraction to the audience.
They hadn’t started the main meeting yet, still handling the recognition of a retiring employee. So he leaned against the back side of the pillar, pulled out his work phone, and started scanning e-mails.
He was in the middle of replying to a quick question from Boyd Nyberg, the head of Planning, when the meeting was officially called to order and the first speaker announced after the Sorrellson agenda item was introduced.
“Good afternoon. My name is Jackson Crowder, and I’m the head of the development and expansion committee for Sorrellson Academy. I’m also a teacher there, and have taught there for eleven years now. In addition, I’m the head of the Social Studies department, and teach both that and art classes.”
At the sound of the familiar voice, Noah’s phone slid from his hand before he could stop it, heading for the fortunately carpeted floor. Still, he stuck a foot out, wincing as the corner caught him right in the big toe, and he still managed to drop his notepad with a loud ruffle of papers that drew his boss’ attention from where he sat at the far left end of the dais.