This time, Nathan’s nod was tighter. “Like I said, it was a long time ago. We were young. I… I was stupid.” His gaze dropped from Luke’s eyes to his lips before rising. “Besides, we worked it out.”

“By hooking up if our paths crossed?” And why did this part bother Luke so much when plenty of other men were happy with no-strings arrangements? “And then by sleeping together even more regularly when Hugo came to work here?” Luke had given up trying to understand why each time they’d reconnected felt so much more than casual to him—and yet had felt so much less at the same time. All he knew for certain was that each time Nathan left, a wound reopened instead of healing.

He clenched his fists at his sides, stopping his arms from crossing to send a signal that something in his chest needed protecting. Nathan didn’t need to know that. Not if it made those laugh lines deepen again.

Luke spoke as clearly as he could manage. “Before I knew it, we were having sex every single time you came here.”

In hindsight, that had felt like turning on a tap at the bottom of a huge dam. Hadn’t he always thought the trickle of feelings that barely wet him was nothing compared to what Nathan kept walled off? He had no way of telling whether that was his imagination or whether Nathan truly rationed what he’d spare him. “But we never talked between times. Real friends don’t do that, Nathan.”

“Yes, they do. We did. And it wasn’t only sex,” Nathan said, sounding so genuine that whatever had tangled tight in Luke’s chest loosened, starting to unknot until Nathan added, “It was great sex. Remember?” he asked, as if Luke had forgotten. As if parts of him weren’t already responding. Stirring. Reacting to Nathan’s closeness like Pavlov’s dogs would to a bell’s ding. Maybe Nathan was similarly conditioned. “Exceptionally great sex,” he murmured, inching closer. “Doesn’t that make us friends with amazing benefits?”

Luke didn’t have it in him to say that aloud. Instead, he gritted out, “Oh, it makes me certain of something, all right.”

“Which is?”

“That I’m not making that mistake with you again.”

“What mistake?”

And this was the sticking point—the truth that Luke would have found ways to help his students verbalise instead of hiding. Would have helped them to shout at the top of their lungs if that helped release what hurt them. His own voice came out gravelly.

“Of thinking I could handle something casual with you.”

He stepped around Nathan, or tried to at least, because Nathan matched that movement and also reached out, the pad of his thumb brushing the beard at the hinge of Luke’s jaw, exerting pressure until he met eyes that were so dark he couldn’t see the divide between iris and pupil.

“I can’t be casual about you,” Luke confessed, raw, honest, and aching. “So, I won’t do it. Not with you. Never again.”

“No more no-strings sex?” Nathan asked, his voice pitched even lower as if someone might overhear them. “Why not?”

Luke couldn’t answer. Wouldn’t let himself say that sex without connection was the tip of an iceberg that did so much more than freeze him. It added to a blanket of snow over his soul each time Nathan didn’t seem to miss him. He couldn’t have done, even if he stared at Luke now as if soaking up what he saw. Luke shook his head and swallowed.

Nathan’s gaze fixed on his lips, and his thumb moved from the hinge of Luke’s jaw towards them. He brushed it against the corner of Luke’s mouth before he leaned in. “Does that mean you won’t even kiss me hello like usual?” he asked before nearly doing just that, so close to landing a kiss that Luke almost felt their lips brush. “Or kiss me goodbye? Never again?” he asked, their mouths almost meeting again.