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kissed him again
     
and said, “Now take off your shirt.”
     
“Take off my shirt?”
     
“Yes,” Jonathan said. “I’m going to pre-soak the stain and put it in the washing
     
machine for you, because I know you’re never going to do it yourself. And after that, I’m
     
going to go back to my hotel and get some sleep.” He lifted the shirt and pulled it over
     
Ed’s head.
     
“You don’t want to spend the night?” Ed asked. There was a confused expression
     
on his face.
     
Jonathan ran his fingertips up and down the back of his neck and said, “We both
     
got what we wanted tonight.”
     
“We did?”
     
Jonathan reached for the handle and opened the Range Rover’s back door. Then
     
he looked Ed in the eye and said, “I’d rather not talk about spending the night. Not after
     
you kicked me out the last time we did this and I thought I was going to spend the night.
     
We had a good time tonight. Let’s not ruin it and get into a fight again.”
     
Ed’s eyes grew wide and he pressed his palm to his chest. “Ah well,” he said.
     
Then he looked at Jonathan’s naked body and asked, “Aren’t you going to put your
     
clothes on to walk back to the house?”
     
He stepped out of the car and smiled. “There’s no one home, and it’s so dark no
     
one can see me out here. I’ll get dressed before I leave. Would you get my clothes in the
     
front seat and bring them in for me?” Then he slowly went to the back door naked, with Ed’s shirt pressed to his chest. There was huge smile on his face; he wiggled his hips on
     
purpose. He didn’t rush, because he knew Ed was staring at his ass the entire time.
     
Chapter Six
     
By the day before Thanksgiving, the old landscaping had been removed and new
     
plantings had been professionally arranged. They’d worked fast to get it all in before
     
Thanksgiving. Ed had decided to keep things simple: rows of neatly trimmed, round
     
boxwoods surrounded the house now, and a few of the original shrubs had been pruned
     
and saved. He wanted to model everything after his house in East Hampton. The
     
California landscaper hadn’t been thrilled, but Jonathan had completely agreed.
     
Ed wasn’t a huge fan of complicated flower gardens; he liked things to look
     
uncluttered and in Yankee good taste. The house next door had rows of mums flanking
     
the front walk, and he thought they looked like the buttons on a clown suit. The house
     
across the street had too many palms and fruit trees; he thought they looked plastic and
     
garish. Ed didn’t even want garden ornaments or statues. When the landscape designer
     
cautiously suggested two large urns for both sides of the front door to add texture, Ed
     
agreed, with the stipulation that the urns would contain two more round boxwoods
     
instead of flowers. Ed was determined to create a monochromatic look with a limited
     
plant palette so the house would stand out above everything else in its setting.
     
And when the landscapers pulled away that day, he stood at the curb with his
     
arms folded across his chest and smiled. The original architecture that had been hidden
     
behind overgrown shrubbery for so many years shined in the afternoon sunlight. The terra
     
cotta roof offered movement and dimension, and the white stucco walls added texture and
     
light. The iron gate at the arched entrance that led to a small courtyard provided a focal
     
point from the street. When he looked up at the round tower in the center of the house, it popped forward and anchored everything, connecting the north wing to the south wing
     
with little effort.
     
And the new plantings were perfect. Each round boxwood was an exact replica of
     
the one next to it, and the two in the urns beside the front door were slightly smaller in
     
scale. For the first time since he’d moved to San Francisco, Ed finally felt like he was
     
almost home.
     
But it wasn’t all perfect. It was the