Book Title: Secret Admirer
Author: DJ Jamison
Publisher: DJ Jamison
Cover Artist: Cate Ashwood
Release Date: June 25, 2020
Genre/s: Contemporary M/M Romance
Trope/s: Brother’s Best Friend, Secret Admirer
Themes: Bisexual awakening, friends to lovers themes
Length: 59 000 words
It is a standalone story.
Buy Links
Universal Link | Amazon US | Amazon UK
Blurb
You deserve all the kisses you want …
Benji,
I just want you to know how amazing you are. You won’t believe me, because I’m just your brother’s best friend. But everything I feel is undeniable.
A few anonymous love tokens change everything, though. I finally have an outlet for all the things I can’t say, and with each gift and note, you smile. For me. Not your brother’s friend, but something new. Something more. Something that will change everything if we can both find the courage to believe.
All I have to do is confess who I really am:
Your Secret Admirer
BENJI
I crossed another book of my list, muttering to myself about useless resources. Google would be so much easier, but that wouldn’t fly with my art history professor — and with my first major paper due for the year, I was freaking out a little. I had an algebra test coming up and no hope of passing it, much less acing it, and the stress was getting to me — hence the muttering.
Tossing down my pencil in disgust, I glanced up and froze. Ace stood by the table, backpack hanging from one shoulder. When our eyes met, he smiled lazily, and I quickly averted my gaze. The shameful fantasies I’d had about him were too fresh. I couldn’t look at him without remembering that fucking sketch and the dirty things I’d done to my own body while thinking of him.
“Everything okay?” Ace sounded more uncertain than I’d ever heard him. He pulled his phone out and thumbed through his texts. “We did say Tuesday, right?”
I had to get it together. It wasn’t Ace’s fault I was perving on him. He couldn’t possibly know how one small kiss on the cheek would affect me.
How ridiculous I was.
“Everything’s fine,” I said, throwing down my pen. “Just stressed is all.”
Ace placed his bag on the table. “Good thing I’m here then. Just let me get organized.”
I nodded wordlessly, watching as he pulled out a notebook, a mechanical pencil, and a glasses case. Flipping it open, he removed his dark, square-rimmed reading glasses and put them on.
Oh, Jesus. He was so freaking hot.
I stared, unable to help myself. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen him in the glasses, but it always affected me. It was a total stereotype, but those glasses elevated Ace from hot to hot and smart, and it was almost more than my poor little freshman heart could take.
“I know,” he said with a little laugh. “These glasses are geeky, right?”
“No,” I scoffed. “You could never look like a geek.”
“Not me,” he agreed easily. “I’m super hot. I meant the style of glasses.”
My heart skipped as I realized what I’d admitted to him, but he just laughed. “I’m kidding, Benji. I don’t have that much ego.”
I looked down at my math problems, anything to avoid looking at that face. “You got me,” I said lightly.
“Let me see what you’re working on.”
Ace reached out, snagging my book and turning it toward him. As he did, I caught sight of the friendship bracelet on his wrist. It was dark blue and purple and frayed with age.
“Wait, is that…” I skimmed my index finger over the bracelet, inadvertently brushing a bit of soft skin on his inner wrist. Warmth rushed through me when I touched him. Fuck. This is why I was freaking out. No matter how many times I told myself Ace wasn’t for me, my body didn’t get the message.
“The bracelet you made me, yeah,” Ace said, glancing down at it with a smile. “You gave it to me, so of course I still have it.”
Maybe if I touched him more often, just casually, he would stop affecting me this way. Maybe then a kiss on the cheek wouldn’t send me into a tailspin. With that in mind, I made myself fiddle with the bracelet a moment more before drawing back.
“Jeremy thought it was girly,” I said.
“Jeremy’s just insecure in his masculinity.”
He surprised a small laugh out of me.
Ace fidgeted with the bracelet I’d made all those years ago. A strange tension seemed to rise up between us, one I’d never before noticed, even with my secret crush.
“So, algebra—” I said, just as he spoke.
“There’s a party this weekend.”
I blinked.
“At the house,” he said.
“Oh.” I nodded. “Frats and parties go hand in hand, I hear.”
He chuckled. “Yeah. Maybe you want to come?”
My answer spilled out before I’d even thought it through. “Parties aren’t really my thing.”
He bit his lip, looking down at the textbook. Nodded. “Yeah, no. I figured.” He glanced up. “I just want you to know I like hanging out. As friends. And not just for math, even though I totally love math.”
I wrinkled my nose. “That’s disturbing.”
He smiled at me, and I knew I’d made the right call. As much as I liked spending time with Ace, as much as I liked the idea of going to a party with him, it wouldn’t really be with him. And if I did go, and I had too much to drink? Fuck knew what I might say or do to embarrass myself. And if I went and he acted like a big brother, making sure I didn’t drink? Well, that might be even worse.
“Besides,” I joked, “we both know Jeremy’s already claimed you as his friend.”
“I can’t be both?”
“Jeremy wouldn’t even share his Transformers with me. You really think he’s going to share his best friend?”
DJ Jamison is the author of more than twenty m/m romances. She writes a variety of queer characters, from gay to bisexual to asexual. DJ grew up in the Midwest in a working-class family, and those influences can be found in her writing through characters coping with real-life problems: money troubles, workplace drama, family conflicts and, of course, falling in love. DJ spent more than a decade in the newspaper industry before chasing her first dream to write fiction. She spent a lifetime reading before that and continues to avidly devour her fellow authors’ books each night. She lives in Kansas with her husband, two sons, one snake, and a sadistic cat named Birdie.
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