Faith Read online

  “Faith”

  M/M Straight to Gay First Time Romance

  Max Hudson

  © 2017

  Max Hudson

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

  This book is intended for Adults (ages 18+) only. The contents may be offensive to some readers. It may contain graphic language, explicit sexual content, and adult situations. May contain scenes of unprotected sex. Please do not read this book if you are offended by content as mentioned above or if you are under the age of 18.

  Please educate yourself on safe sex practices before making potentially life-changing decisions about sex in real life. If you’re not sure where to start, see here: http://www.jerrycoleauthor.com/safe-sex-resources/ (courtesy of Jerry Cole).

  This story is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner & are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Products or brand names mentioned are trademarks of their respective holders or companies. The cover uses licensed images & are shown for illustrative purposes only. Any person(s) that may be depicted on the cover are simply models.

  Edition v1.00 (2017.06.18)

  http://www.maxhudsonauthor.com

  Special thanks to the following volunteer readers who helped with proofreading: Scotty Z, SamanthaMary, Ann Attwood and those who assisted but wished to be anonymous. Thank you so much for your support.

  Table of Contents

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter One

  “And in Christ’s name, amen.”

  “Amen,” the crowd says.

  “Amen,” Owen murmurs under his breath, unable to put any emphasis into his voice. Tired and not looking forward to the next few days without his daughters, he finds it difficult to have any energy this morning. He sighs, glancing over at his daughters. Rebecca, only eleven years old, sits impatiently, kicking her legs back and forth while she grips the edge of the pew. He can tell she isn’t paying attention, but simply waiting for the sermon to be over so she can get back on her phone. Grace isn’t much better. At fourteen, Owen would have hoped she’d listen a little more attentively, but her eyes are glazed over as she stares at the space just above the pastor’s head.

  Faith, on the other hand, is erect in her seat and appears enraptured. Her eyes are bright and inquisitive, and Owen’s heart melts at the sight. He hopes the other two will grow into the kind of demeanor Faith possesses, but he doesn’t hold high hopes for that. Faith had always been this way, never bored, always attentive and respectful even at her sisters’ younger ages. He’d been blessed to have her as his first child. She’d been a breeze to raise, and it makes his heart twinge a bit to realize that, at almost seventeen, she’s basically fully grown. Turning his gaze back toward the front of the room, he tries to follow her example and really listen to the sermon.

  He can’t focus, though. A muffled laugh emanates from the other side of his daughters, and he looks over to see his ex-wife covering her mouth and attempting to stifle her giggles. She places her other hand on the knee of the man sitting next to her, squeezing it. Owen simply turns away and tries to block her out. Seeing Jenna with other men used to bother him and turn his mood sour, but now it barely ruffles him, and he no longer feels hurt or jealous when she shows up with a new man. She only elicits irritation from him now. It isn’t even the men that bother him, necessarily. She hasn’t been reckless with bringing strange people into her children’s lives, and for that he’s grateful. She always waits until they’ve been dating for a couple of months before introducing them to the girls, but despite her being careful with their daughters, he can’t help but think that she acts obnoxiously when she’s with a lover.

  Owen starts when everyone around him begins to get up. He’d been zoning out, staring at the podium and letting the pastor’s voice become a din in the background as his mind wandered. He quickly stands as well, rubbing the tiredness from his eyes as he does. He shuffles out behind the rest of his family. Faith turns her head to look behind her, smiling softly and reaching for his arm as they exit the row. Grinning back at her, he takes her arm and lets her rest her head on his shoulder as they get swallowed up by the crowd.

  They move outside, and the sunshine warms his skin, despite the bite in the air. A light dusting of snow covers the ground, blanketing the road and the cars in the parking lot.

  “First snow,” Faith murmurs, giving his arm a squeeze. “Early this year, isn’t it?”

  “Mmm,” he mutters, glaring at the white on the ground. Owen wasn’t fond of snow. It made driving harder and being outside miserable. He would have moved somewhere warmer long ago if he hadn’t seen how much his children loved it. When they were young, the first snow would elicit shrieks of joy from them. They would all immediately pull on their snow pants and coats and dash outside, even though there was never enough to do anything but sprinkle the sky with. They’d all been mesmerized by the white flakes falling from the sky, and he’d never had the heart to take it from them.

  A hand touches his other shoulder. “Can I talk to you for a sec?” Jenna asks.

  He nods, giving Faith’s hand a gentle squeeze before following his ex-wife a few yards away from the rest of the group. He can’t help but notice how she’s dressed – too young, though not untastefully. Leggings and a long sweater, makeup caked on her face a little too thickly, eye shadow a little too bright and a little too exaggerated. Glancing back, he affirms that her new beau is younger, most likely too young to find crow’s feet and worry lines attractive in a woman. Owen shakes his head, disappointed but not shocked that Jenna would try to recapture her youth in this way. Most of the men she dates are her age, but perhaps she’s starting to feel old herself.

  She turns to face him, clasping her gloved hands in front of her. “So, Jake and I—”

  “Jake?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

  She gestures behind him. “Yeah, Jake. That’s him, over there. Jake and I were wanting to take a trip this weekend by ourselves. He has a cabin up by the lake, but he only has this weekend off for the next couple of months, so I was wondering if…?”

  “You want them the weekend after.”

  She puts a hand on his shoulder, sighing in relief. “Yes, thank you, I thought you’d be upset about this.”

  He shakes her hand off his shoulder. “I didn’t say you could have them. It’s Faith’s birthday that weekend. I haven’t seen her on her birthday in two years. So, no, you can’t have her that weekend.”

  Jenna narrows her eyes and takes a step away from him, crossing her arms across her chest. “Look, it’s not that big of a deal.”

  “Her birthday isn’t a big deal?” Heat flushes through his face and his chest. Jenna often blew off holidays and birthdays like they meant nothing, and she didn’t discriminate in who it affected, including he
rself. She forgot Christmas gifts, birthday gifts, for everyone, and normally it didn’t bother Owen. She’d forgotten his multiple times while they were married and, while it stung a little, it didn’t make much of a difference to him. She didn’t even care when people forgot her own and sometimes even seemed surprised when people gave her gifts on holidays. When she tried to do the same with their children, however, he couldn’t help but be angry—she birthed them, for God’s sake.

  “That’s not what I said, Owen,” she spits. “I just mean that you’ll see her a couple of days later. You know she won’t mind. She understands that one of us can’t be there on the actual day.”

  “That doesn’t mean I should have to give up this one. Every one of her birthdays is special, and I am going to spend this one with her.”

  "Look,” Jenna hisses, her voice rising slightly. She points a finger at him and takes a step forward. “I have swapped days with you so many times. I have given up dates and holidays so you could see them. So, for you not to give me this one weekend is absolutely ridi—”

  “And I haven’t?” Owen blurts, his voice rising to match hers. He can see in the periphery that others are looking up at them, worried at the tone of their voices, but he can’t lower it. “You want to switch ten times more than I do! I’ve asked to switch for work, when I’m sick – you’ve wanted to switch so that you can get fucked by whatever mouth-breather you happen to be seeing that week!”

  She flinches, taking back the step she’d taken before.

  Owen takes a deep breath, trying to keep his voice under control and wincing at what he just said. He didn’t really mean it. Yes, she’d asked to switch for dates, but he’d never truly disapproved of any guy that she’d been seeing. They’d all seemed nice enough to let around his daughters. “The answer is no, Jenna. You cannot switch this weekend with next. I am seeing Faith on her birthday and that’s the last I’m going to talk about this.”

  He turns on his heel sharply, rounding up his daughters and allowing them to say goodbye to their mother before herding them toward the car.

  Chapter Two

  Clicks and the clatter of keys fill Owen’s ears, though he can’t see the source of the noise. Every once in a while, a muffled laugh or a muted sentence or the shrill ring of a phone punctuates the din, but aside from that, Owen remains contained in his own cubicle, trying to ignore the sounds of others around him. He creates his own noise, tapping away at the keys and filling spreadsheet after spreadsheet, adding to the white noise of the office.

  Pictures of his girls surround him and catch his eye every so often. They’re some of his favorites, these pictures, ranging from when Faith was an only child to last year. Their toothy grins beam at him and brighten the otherwise dull space, and each time he looks at them his motivation to push forward increases.

  Owen had been working in the same office at the same cubicle for over fifteen years. It was steady, well-paying work, though some days he would rather claw his own eyes out than type out another spreadsheet. He’d considered leaving more than once, but his girls’ smiles always made him stay. He’d never risk losing the stability of this job and the source of income to feed his girls for his own happiness. So, day after day, he returns to the familiar gray walls around him and hunkers down to work.

  “Hey, can I borrow a pen?”

  Owen starts, knocking his knees against the bottom of the desk. Hissing in pain, he looks up at the source of the voice. A man’s head pokes above the cubicle walls, a crooked grin on his face. His honey-colored hair is flopped over his eyes, and he pushes it back casually with his hand. Owen’s heart skips a beat. This man is far more handsome than anyone he had seen in person, and he is young enough that wrinkles aren’t appearing yet but deep laugh lines are already forming in the sides of his mouth.

  “W-what?” Owen stutters, his mind muddled.

  The man raises his eyebrows. “A pen. Can I borrow one? I just started and I can’t find a damn pen to save my life.”

  Owen nods quickly, rifling through his drawers and pulling out a pen. He hands it to the other man, carefully keeping his hand on the far end of it and ensuring that their skin wouldn’t touch.

  “Thanks.” The man reaches for the pen, snagging it casually and dipping down below the wall. Owen snaps his eyes down, taking a deep breath and closing his eyes.

  “Hey,” the man says, head popping back over the cubicle wall.

  Owen’s head snaps up, a strange excitement blossoming in his chest.

  “I’m Mason, by the way.”

  “Owen,” he murmurs.

  Mason nods and smiles, ducking back behind the wall.

  Owen inhales unsteadily, doing his best to keep his face smooth and neutral.

  Chapter Three

  “Hey man, you got a sec?” Mason asks at the end of the day, again peering over the wall.

  “Sure,” Owen replies.

  “Can we go get a coffee or something?” Mason runs his hand through his hair, pushing it out of his face. He grins ruefully. “I seriously have no idea where to go in this city, and I have some questions about this place.”

  Owen nods before really processing what Mason has said. It’s not until they’re on their way out that he remembers his daughters are with Jenna and he actually doesn’t have anywhere to be tonight. All he can think about is that Mason has actually asked him to do something outside of work. Though he’s generally liked at work, in the decade and a half he’d worked there no one had ever invited Owen to hang out aside from dinners and parties that everyone in the office was invited to. He’d never asked anyone to hang out, though, either. It had never seemed worth it to him. Other people came and went so frequently that it felt like almost every year he was working with a new group of people. Some left for other jobs, some got promoted, and some moved to different divisions in the company. But, no matter how they left, it was almost guaranteed that they would eventually, and Owen rarely saw the point in trying to make friends that he knew would eventually be gone.

  Yet, instead of feeling dread at the thought of interacting with a coworker, he finds himself batting down flutters in his stomach and an excitement that he doesn’t have a name for. He’s actually looking forward to getting to know Mason, and he’s grateful that Mason initiated the friendship.

  They head to a coffee shop nearby, bundling up against the bite of the winter wind. As they enter the shop, Owen notices that Mason’s cheeks are bright red and his hair is tousled in disarray.

  They order and grab their coffee, Owen leaving his strong and black while Mason heads over to a side table and loads it with sugar, crème, and syrup. As Mason joins him at the table, Owen scrunches his nose and looks at the cup of muck in front of his coworker.

  Mason cocks an eyebrow at Owen’s face. “What?”

  He gestures at Mason’s coffee. “Is there any actual coffee in that cup?”

  Mason grins, sipping the drink and holding it close to his face, closing his eyes in contentment. “Just enough to warm me up,” he laughs.

  Owen laughs with him, silently wondering what else it would take to warm Mason up.

  His laugh stops cold. What the hell? Where did that come from? he thinks. He feels blood rush to his cheeks and is thankful that the cold had bitten his skin as it had Mason’s. Shaking off the feelings of unease and embarrassment, Owen pushes aside the alien thoughts and focuses on what Mason is saying.

  “So, Greg’s kind of nuts, yeah?” he asks as he sips his sugared coffee.

  Owen laughs. “Yeah, he is. Don’t get me wrong, he’s a decent boss, but he can be a bit much sometimes.”

  “I’ll say. He greeted me today by trying to make a weird handshake thing with me.” He laughs. “I hadn’t even met the guy before I interviewed with an HR lady. Just right off the bat, fist bump and an awkward attempt to bring it in for a half-hug.”

  Owen chuckles and sips his coffee. “Don’t worry – he’s most awkward when you first meet him. Doesn’t really go away, but you get us
ed to it and he calms down a bit. I think it’s anxiety about meeting new people.”

  They sit in silence for a few moments, and Owen’s stomach starts to tie itself in knots. He hates this part of getting to know someone. Conversation is fine, but moments of silence are the worst. He never knows what to say, how to act, and this moment is no different—except the anxiety is heightened. Unexpectedly, he truly wants Mason to like him and worries that he’s making a poor impression. He’s probably thinking that Owen is boring or uninteresting.

  Trying to make sure those interpretations of his silence don’t come true, Owen finally speaks. “So, you said before you don’t know the city. Are you new here?”

  “Yeah, just moved in last weekend.”

  Owen raises an eyebrow. “Here? As winter is setting in?” He chuckles. “Good luck. It’s a beast.”

  Mason laughs with him, leaning back in his chair and tilting his head back. “Yeah, I worried about that. But I was out of a job for a while, and this company offered a position. I couldn’t really pass it up.”

  “Trust me, you can do better than this job. It isn’t the best.” What am I saying? Owen kicks himself. The last thing he wants to do is help Mason figure out he could have a much better job somewhere else.

  He shrugs. “Like I said, I needed a job. I don’t mind having a shitty one for a while. Whatever brings in the dough, right?”

  Owen hesitates, unsure if he should ask the next question on his mind. “It’s probably none of my business, but why were you so desperate for a job that you were willing to take this one? To move to a whole new city?”

  Mason looks away, rubbing the back of his neck.

  “I don’t mean to pry,” Owen blurts, trying to cover up his blunder. “You don’t need to answer that. I was just curious.”

  Mason shrugs again, smiling ruefully and turning back to face Owen. “Nah, I don’t mind. It’s not interesting or anything. I’m not a felon or a drug lord,” he laughs. “No, I got laid off from my previous job. Budget cuts. Went on a dozen interviews in the last couple of months, but no one offered a position to me. And then my girlfriend broke up with me, and it just seemed like a good thing to get away and start fresh somewhere.”