...“Kenzie, please, we need to go someplace private so I can tell you everything.”

I couldn’t think about anything except getting the hell away from him. “I’m leaving, and neither one of us is going to make a scene. Noel knows the owner here, and I won’t embarrass him. Goodbye, Mason.”

I stood, turned on my heel, and left him sitting there. I needed fresh air, to somehow manage to breathe again. If I could get out the door, I could quiet the pounding Why, why, why beating inside my skull. Was this what people meant by a surreal experience? I fumbled my car keys, dropping them. I bent over to retrieve them without paying attention to how close to the car I was and whacked my head on its door.

“Fucking hell!” I plopped down on the frozen tundra of blacktop and grabbed the right side of my head to make sure my brains weren’t spilling out.

Just fucking great. I’d have a bruise for sure come morning, not to mention the fucking headache already eating through bone.

Every time I went queen-out, something nasty happened and it was usually my own fucking fault. Like now. I welcomed Mason’s body heat as he knelt beside me.

“Kenzie? Are you okay?”

I kept my right palm pressed to my forehead and glared at him.

“What the fuck to you think?” I moved my hand. “Just tell me if I’m bleeding.”

Mason hesitated, then stroked my face with cold fingertips. “The skin isn’t broken, but I think you’re going to have a bump.” He eased down beside me, and I hoped his balls would freeze fast to the macadam through his jeans and stick when he got up. “Please talk to me, Kenzie.”

I suspected there was no way to avoid a conversation with him. Self-induced concussion aside, I seemed to have regained some composure. Maybe. I had one burning question for him.

“Mason, why the fuck even tell me? Why not let me live in blissful ignorance?”

He reached for my hand, but stopped short of taking it. I sighed and held it out to him. His chilly fingers closed around my equally cold ones. My gloves were in the car instead of my pocket. Score another point for the home team.

“I had to tell you, Kenzie. It was the only right thing to do once I realized who you were.” He started to put his arm around me, but I froze him with a look.

Yes, it was. I had to agree with him on that point. He could have kept the information from me. How would I ever learn of it? Dennis and I weren’t in touch, and as far as I was concerned, we never would be again. It was all in the past, his and mine, and it couldn’t be changed. Generally, I held with the belief if there was one thing gay men had no right to judge, it was another gay man’s past sexual history—casting the first stone and all similar pieces of crap.

My immediate thought was he’d blown my philosophy out of the water, but maybe not. He’d taken a big risk by telling me about knowing my ex-partner. Lord, my head hurt.

“So you told me. Now you can fuck me guilt-free.”

Mason blew out a short, tired breath. “Kenzie.”

“Sorry. I’m not at my best when my head is splitting and my balls are freezing.”

This time, I didn’t stop him when he moved to put his arm around my shoulders. “I told you because you deserved to know my side of it, okay? If I could take back that day, I would.”

That day? One day? Dennis had been so unhappy with our life he was willing to trash it over one lousy fuck? Why had we stayed together so long if we were both so miserable? Disgust with myself, and with Dennis, rolled through me.

I certainly saw why he’d be attracted to Mason. The man was smoking hot and, heaven help us all, principled.

“I’m going home, Mason. I need to think about a few things.”

“Will you come to my place so we can talk? And I mean talk. No sex unless you say so.”