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I Heart That City: Silent Partner by Treva Harte (menage with strong M/M component) Release Date: Mar 17, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-59632-899-0
Publisher: Loose Id
Publisher Link: http://www.loose-id.com/prod-I_Heart_That_City__Silent_Partner-901.aspx
Amazon Kindle: I Heart That City: Silent Partner
Blurb: Joel "Bry" Bryant hadn't lived in New York City for almost a decade, which he figured was almost a decade too long. He was also still not living with the man he shared a restaurant and a lot more with - Chaz Randolph. When he told Chaz he wanted to go back home, he didn't expect what happened next. Why, after all these years, were Chaz and their long-lost sex buddy, Susan, chasing after him? Bry was leaving. No matter how hard or how long they worked to persuade him. Right?
Excerpt:
“What do you mean ‘no green beer’?” Bridget put her hands on her hips.
“Whaddya think I mean? If someone wants to profane good Guinness by adding green dye, he can bring his own frickin’ food coloring.” Joel shook his head as he pushed past the bartender. “Jeez. Pissing green. What a stupid frickin’ holiday.”
Zach shrugged as he checked out the stock behind the bar. “’'Pissing Green’ wouldn’t make a bad name for a drink, though. But we’ll stick to ‘Fuck Me, I’m Irish’ for tonight.”
“Great. Give the whole bar a few. Maybe someone’ll get lucky, but more likely everyone will be too drunk to eff anyone. That’s an Irish tradition for you.”
“Don’t hold back, Joel. I’m not absolutely sure what you’re thinking.” The mellow, amused Southern drawl behind him belonged to Chaz.
Joel almost smiled. He almost turned around, too. But he wasn’t going to let his partner stop a good rant that easily.
“I said frickin’ and eff instead of what I was thinking because of you.” Joel pulled out some gum from under the cash register and began to chomp before he turned to glare at the taller man. “Mealymouthed redneck.”
Chaz looked down at his chinos and cashmere sweater and then, more pointedly, at Joel’s battered T-shirt. “If you didn’t insist on opening your mouth and letting all that Yankee bile out, people might mistake you for the redneck, Bryant. And folks might get the idea you aren’t proud of your Irish name, the way you carry on about St. Patrick’s Day.”
“People can kiss my…” -- Joel swallowed hard -- “half-Irish behind. Ha! No matter how you push, I haven’t sworn a word yet.”
“You said ‘pissing’,” Bridget called out from the other end of the bar.
“Oh, fuck. That’s not a curse.” Joel put his head down on the bar as everyone yelled and stomped. “Everyone in this…er, this place…is keeping score.”
Chaz had made a very public bet that Joel would swear at least a dozen times before closing time on St. Patrick’s Day. Joel now realized he’d been insane to agree to the wager. It wasn’t fair to have to give up cursing and smoking, too.
“You have a foul mouth, Bry.” Chaz leaned over to whisper in his ear. “Makes me wonder why I want to stick my tongue in it.”
“I can think of better things for you to stick your tongue into,” Joel muttered back. Damn it, no one else called him Bry. Just like no one else could make him melt inside with the nickname.
“I’ve got some accounting to tend to this afternoon. Stop by the office in a few hours and we can attend to that. Oh, and don’t scare off the clientele in the meantime, partner.” Chaz made it sound all business.
“This place doesn’t charge enough to have clientele. Customers will do,” Joel called his parting shot to a disappearing Chaz.
The man would spend the next few hours adding and subtracting bills and pay attention to it, too. Meanwhile Joel was going to be thinking about tongue.
