A Royal Christmas Cruise: Stonewall Investigations Miami Page 7

  “Hola,” said Catherine Meis, a girl who had been around my family since I could remember, and one whom my mother tried pushing on me almost since as far as I could remember. She was the daughter of the world-renowned Ricardo Meis, the founder of a tech company valued at more than a billion dollars. An entirely different kind of royalty from my family, and one my mother always salivated at the idea of unionizing.

  I didn’t have time or patience for this. Leave it to my mother to try and hook me up with someone only days after I announced my breakup.

  “Sorry, Catherine,” I said, cutting things off before they could escalate, “I’ve got to go. The ship is, uh, rocking pretty bad.”

  She looked confused, probably seeing that I was standing quite comfortably on two feet, no rocking in sight.

  I hung up the call before my mom could get back on. With an exhale, I threw my phone onto the bed and continued to get ready, trying to forget about the drama that awaited me back home. I had to let it all go. I had to focus on the here and now.

  Which happened to be very easy to do when I started picturing Shiro again, here on the bed, lying down and waiting for me, like a Christmas gift I had to unwrap with my teeth.

  Annnd, I’m hard again.

  8 Shiro Brooks

  Silver and red fairy lights twinkled above us, strung up with invisible wire between the classic lampposts that lined the cobbled street. An instrumental version of “Jingle Bells” played through invisible speakers tucked inside holly bushes potted in beautiful white vases, their dark green leaves making the bright red berries pop. We sat in a circle around a table set on the deck, the ocean stretching out around us in every direction. We could see the moon glitter off the dark water as the cruise ship cut through the peaceful waters.

  Lou and his girlfriend—who I’d only just learned was named Elle, and that was because her phone’s battery had died and she was forced to join in the conversation—were sitting next to me, both of them sipping on their candy cane rum drinks. Jada was retelling an animated story of the time Lou and I got locked out of our dorm and had to sneak up the side of the building to slip in through the window. Lou only made it up to the second floor, but I climbed my way up to the fifth.

  “I still don’t know why you didn’t just call me,” she said, laughing after she got to the part where I ended up going into the wrong window.

  “We should have,” I answered. “It would have saved everyone a lot of trouble.” I started blushing remembering the two frightened faces who had looked up from their fellatio marathon to see a virtual stranger crawling in through the window. To make matters all the worse, this had happened after we went to an “anything but clothes” party, so I was wearing a makeshift top and bottom created from holiday ribbons. I looked batshit crazy.

  Thankfully, I had known Paul and Manny after I helped them move into the dorms. They were both incredibly drunk, which helped the situation. They threw on boxer shorts and helped me inside.

  “And we still had to wake up the RA.” Lou shook his head, a smile lighting up his face.

  “The A-B-C party was worth it, though,” I said, spotting Ace walking toward us from across the deck. He had a spring in his step. Rex walked close behind him, same spring. I was surprised to see another figure with them.

  Nick. He lacked the spring.

  They walked around the packed tables, everyone wanting to sit on the deck for the first night out at sea. Ace waved and twirled as he came over to us. I noticed Rex eating him up with his eyes. It reminded me of the way Nick had looked at me inside the bathroom.

  Heat flashed across my chest, down into my crotch.

  “Hey, guys,” I said, moving my chair so that there was space for the three of them. Nick sat next to me, looking as good as ever in a simple white T-shirt and navy blue shorts. I noticed a woman walking toward the table, one I had spotted a couple of times already. At first I thought one of us had dropped something, but she walked past us, going over to the railing and leaning against it, her hat almost getting blown off by a sudden gust of wind.

  “How were your naps?” Lou asked, looking at Ace and Rex, who had clearly done everything except nap.

  “Wonderful,” said Ace, his green eyes glittering. Rex, a man who lived up to his name with big burly arms and a jaw that looked strong enough to bite a tree in half, also had a glitter in his gaze.

  “Oh, these two napped reallll hard,” Jada said, brow arched, straw in her mouth. She took a big sip as Ace burst into giggles.

  “Yes, if by nap you mean Rex pummeled me inside of the massive tub in our room.”

  “Ace!” Jada exclaimed, slapping playfully at his chest. Rex adopted a cocky little smile but said nothing. I had a feeling he was used to Ace’s big mouth as much as we were. “Nice,” she followed up in a stage whisper.

  I wondered what Nick was thinking about all this. He smiled and laughed and dropped a couple of jokes. He seemed comfortable. He also didn’t need to be here. Maybe I should have been more forceful in turning him away. I remember feeling pissed off that he wouldn’t take up my crazy plan on the spot, and I could see how crazy that all was in hindsight, but still, the frustration toward him all disappeared in a flick of his butterfly-winged eyelashes.

  And now he was hanging out with me and my friends as if he were one of the originals. I had to remind myself that he was only pretending to know me for my friends, and for what? So that I could avoid a couple minutes of awkward conversation?

  Or because he just wanted to be around me? Like I wanted him to.

  “So,” Lou said, sitting back in his seat, putting an arm around his girlfriend, who was beginning to look more and more lively as time passed. I wondered if maybe she was a vampire and needed the moonlight to charge up her batteries. “How do you know Mason, Neal?”

  Ah, fuck.

  We never really got a chance to solidify any backstories in this “fake” friendship of ours. We had only talked about ourselves and then got too busy rubbing up on each other to talk about anything else. Which I totally didn’t mind, but it made moments like these complicated.

  “From work,” Nick said.

  Fuuuuck.

  He had no idea what Mason worked as. He couldn’t have predicted the literal grave he dug himself.

  “Oh snap,” Lou said. “Wait, so do you embalm bodies, too? Or are you involved more on the business side?”

  Nick almost spit out the beer he was drinking. To his credit, he covered it well with a follow-up cough. I had to steer this ship in a completely opposite direction because Lou had set us straight toward an embalmed iceberg.

  “Neal was talking about Mason’s last job,” I said, feeling weird using Nick’s middle name, as if I’d known him for years already and gotten used to calling him by his first. “His dog-walker job.”

  “Right. Exactly.”

  I noticed Ace shoot a suspicious look toward us, but I ignored it.

  “So is that what you do now?” Jada asked. Her boyfriend had ended up getting seasick and stayed inside their room to try and sleep it off.

  “Not exactly,” Nick answered. “I do a lot of work with my therapy dog, but that’s not my full-time job, no.”

  I flashed back to the elevator and how Nick took it all the way to the top level. He definitely wasn’t a dog walker, I could be sure of that.

  “All right, you know what, everyone put your fingers up.” Jada held her hands in the air, all ten fingers out. “We’re playing Never Have I Ever.”

  “Oh lordy,” said Ace, who eagerly put his hands up. I had a feeling he’d take off his sandals and throw his toes up in the air, too, if he could.

  I turned to my side, trying to give Nick a look that said you could go. And if the look didn’t do it, I threw a nod toward the doors that led into the ship. I didn’t want him feeling like he was some kind of hostage. He could go have drinks by the bar and hop on Grindr if he wanted to. I was sure he could find a seaman or two who would be more than willing to go up with him to the
penthouse suite.

  Nick subtly shook his head and put his hands up, smiling as he did it. He looked at my hands. “Come on, let’s play.”

  There was my confirmation. Nick was here because he wanted to be. I put my hands up, joining the circle of wiggling fingers.

  “All right, so to recap rules, if you’ve done something that’s talked about, put your finger down. The one with the least amount of fingers wins both in the game and at life!” Jada clapped her hands and started us off, going the nonsexual route first by saying she’d never skydived. I remembered playing this game in college, always being one of the people with the most fingers in the air. I had been pretty innocent back then.

  Ace was next. I expected another softball question but was quickly reminded that with Ace, one could never expect anything.

  “Never have I ever… been double-fisted.”

  Lou snorted at that, and Jada laughed out loud. I put my head in my hands, laughing into my palm.

  “What? I couldn’t say just one fist, since… well. Yeah. Who’s put their fingers down?” Ace looked around the table, his innocent eyes bright with the moonlight and twinkling fairy lights. “Y’all wanted to play, right?” He laughed as Rex kissed the side of his head. Ace seemed to have melted instantly at the touch, slinking sideways into Rex, practically climbing onto his lap.

  “All right, I’m next,” I said, still holding up all ten fingers. I noticed Nick had his fingers up, too, leading me to believe he’d never jumped out of a plane or had two fists up his ass, and definitely not at the same time.

  So, he wasn’t a risk taker. Duly noted.

  “Never have I ever…” I tossed around a few statements in my head, not knowing how dirty to go with my turn. I looked around at my group of friends and knew I couldn’t pump the brakes now. After Ace’s fisting fiasco, I figured I had to keep the sex ball rolling. “Never have I ever gotten my salad tossed.”

  “Oh, Shy! Seriously?” Ace said, sitting back up and dropping a finger.

  Jada put her finger down, too, looking at me with some pity. “Mason needs to step it up.”

  “He sure does,” I said half-heartedly. Next to me, Nick quietly dropped a finger, and my entire body turned into a bundle of live wire. I tried so damn hard not to picture Nick bent over, hands on his cheeks, spreading himself wide open so someone could eat his ass.

  Annnnnd, of course, it was the only thing my brain could now focus on.

  Nick was up next. He sucked on his lower lip, doing even more to my body than I thought I could handle. I started to pump my legs together, which made me focus on the way my dick was growing harder by the second.

  “Never have I ever had sex with a man.”

  I had to work to keep my jaw from dropping. Ace and Rex and Jada all put their fingers down. I followed, working on a five-second delay.

  Assumptions. The worst things to make, and I had made them. With the way Nick had kissed me, and how he handled me when we were alone, it had me automatically assume that he knew his way around a guy’s body.

  Next was Elle, who said that she’d never had sex in a car before. We all dropped fingers for that one. The game continued, the group of us giggling like kids stumbling on bad words in a magazine. At one point, I looked out to the jet-black ocean and realized how lucky I felt. When Mason and I broke up, I was sure my entire trip would be ruined. I thought I’d turn into a sailing grinch, locked up in his room and avoiding all kinds of good memories.

  Instead, the complete opposite happened. Fun was being had, and memories were being made, all while we sailed on a five-star cruise ship decked out for the holidays.

  And, not to forget the star on top of the tree, there had been the practically serendipitous meeting of the mysterious and oh-so-freaking-handsome Nick. If I had boarded this ship with Mason, then I had a strong feeling Nick and I never would have even exchanged words. Now, he was sitting next to me, his knee bumping into mine, lingering, hidden by the table. At one point, his entire leg pressed against mine. There was a palpable heat that rolled off him. It scrambled me like eggs poured onto a hot skillet.

  The game came to an end without too many more realizations. I wasn’t sure if my poker face could handle any more bombs coming from Nick. Once all hands came down, yawns started to take their place.

  “All right, guys.” Ace rested his head on Rex’s shoulder, which I feel could have doubled as a helicopter landing pad. “I think we’re heading to bed.”

  “Same,” Lou said, stretching his arms. Elle seemed like she was about ready to run a marathon, but she didn’t say anything, just nodded and stood up as the rest of us did. Nick stretched, too, his arm lifting over my head, his intoxicating scent drifting in my direction. My knees shivered. I suddenly felt as awake as Elle. Like I could run a marathon, but only if it was with Nick and only if we were naked and only if we weren’t actually running but fucking.

  We walked as a big group to the elevators. Before getting in, Nick said his goodbyes to us, saying he was going to write a quick email. He stepped aside after we all said our good-nights, walking toward the atrium where he took a seat on one of the benches. I was tempted to follow him, to say that maybe I also needed to write an email, and that we could write our emails together.

  Possibly naked.

  But no, I didn’t follow. I figured that would just bring up more questions than I already had bubbling inside me. And besides, I was feeling pretty exhausted. A good night’s rest didn’t sound like a terrible idea.

  We rode the elevators up to our floors and said good night to each other as we all separated. Ace was literally carried down the hall by Rex, his giggles falling behind him like a trail of horned-up breadcrumbs.

  With a yawn I unlocked my room. Inside, I stripped down to my briefs and crawled into bed, exhausted after a full day of reunions, fake friendships, and bathroom hookups. I could hardly believe that I’d been on this cruise for less than a day. It felt like we had already gone halfway across the world with everything that had happened.

  In bed, I grabbed my phone and started to mindlessly scroll through my usual apps. A couple of times, I’d find myself thinking about Nick and what he was up to in his room.

  In his penthouse suite. Jesus. Who the hell did I end up kissing? What if he was some kind of celebrity I didn’t recognize? Those girls at the start of the cruise seemed to have thought he was someone… maybe he was?

  Or maybe I was just overthinking things. He was just a super-hot guy with a ton of money. Not everyone who was rich had to be famous. Who knew, maybe he had won this trip in some holiday contest? There were a hundred different possibilities, and I wasn’t about to keep myself up trying to ponder them all.

  I continued to scroll, a couple of steamy GIFs popping up on my timeline. It was clearly the late-night social media crowd. I paused on one particularly hot GIF, feeling a familiar heat rise inside me. It was of two men kissing, one of them in gray sweats and another in black gym shorts. I slipped a hand under the heavy covers and adjusted my growing boner.

  Before I clicked on the account, deciding that I had plenty of steam to blow off, I accidentally scrolled down on the page, losing the sexy GIF.

  Determined, I flicked my thumb, the different tweets blurring together. The scrolling stopped on a picture, except it wasn’t the photo I was looking for. I was about to keep scrolling but stopped. Something about the photo looked incredibly familiar.

  I focused, realizing I knew exactly where the photo was taken and when.

  Mainly because I was in the center of the frame, Nick holding me, his back turned to the camera, the deck of the cruise ship having been filled as we were leaving port. It had been the briefest of moments. I had fallen into Nick’s arms, and he had caught me. The entire thing happened in a matter of seconds, and yet, in this photo, it made it seem like I was being held as we took off on our damn honeymoon, Nick’s arms wrapped around me tight.

  “What the…”

  Why was there a photo of me and Nick? And
why did it have close to… holy goat cheese balls, why did it have ten thousand likes?

  I read the caption next: Was the Prince of Spain spotted with Mystery Man on a Holiday Cruise?

  Prince of… the Prince of… Prince.

  What in the holy fuck. No, this had to be a mistake. He must have just resembled the guy. He probably had one of those faces, the ones that make you throw a second glance only to then realize he was just another hot guy in the crowd and not someone from a royal family.

  “This is freaking crazy.”

  I started to read the comments. Most of them were in Spanish, which I had a decent grasp on but still needed to tap on the “translate” button so I could make sure I wasn’t hallucinating.

  “That is our prince, I’d recognize his back anywhere.”

  “No way. Prince Nicholas isn’t gay!”

  “Prince Nick is an LGBTQ icon, wow.”

  “The prince can’t be gay, NO.”

  “Can he come cruise with me, ayyy.”

  I felt nauseous and it wasn’t because of the ship’s motion. This couldn’t be real. They had to be mistaken. Either that or this was some elaborate prank. Jada had always been into pranks—maybe she’d decided to go all out for our reunion.

  I switched out of the app and opened up my absolute best tool as a detective. One I couldn’t go a day without, even when I wasn’t on the clock:

  Google.

  There, I typed in “Prince of Spain.” I didn’t hit Search right away. My thumb hovered over the button. I allowed my thoughts to drift for a brief moment into fantasy land. What if… if he really was the prince of Spain? I had shared a kiss with a prince, and it had been one of—no, no, let’s be real here, it had been the best kiss of my entire damn twenty-five years of existence, and I’d put money down that it would remain as the best kiss for the duration of said existence.

  I took a breath and pressed Search, sitting up on the bed, finding only articles at first and seeing a photo of the prince as a child.