Put a Ring on It Read Free Page A

shifting as he tried to catch his reflection on the glass door. Theo warmed from the inside out. He hadn’t needed the whiskey. Seeing Kieran was all Theo needed to know everything would be perfect.
    “Your hair is fine.” Theo slung an arm around Kieran’s neck and kissed his cheek.
    “It’s never fine.”
    Theo thought the untamable tufts springing up from the center of Kieran’s hairline to the crown—as fluffy as the feathers on a baby bird—were adorable. But saying that aloud tended to lead to a bad mood and a distinct disinterest in letting Theo play with the silky thickness while Kieran sucked him off.
    “It looks better now that it’s grown out.” An attempt at managing it by shaving him almost bald had led to six weeks of Kieran looking like he’d escaped from a prison camp and Theo breaking up with his stylist for crimes against cuteness.
    Kieran let Theo lead him into Times Square. As always, the sight of it, day or night, made Theo’s breath and pulse come faster. Kieran, as usual, seemed unaffected, though he knew that over the year they’d been together more than a few show tunes had migrated over to Kieran’s playlists. Theo took Kieran’s hand as they walked across Broadway to the plaza. Geoff, easily spotted in his bright red baseball cap, watched Theo for the cue.
    Hand tight around the box in his pocket, Theo took a deep breath, met Geoff’s eyes, and nodded. As the first notes of “Get In Trouble With Me” poured across the plaza, Theo squeezed Kieran’s hand and whispered, “I love you,” then let go and slipped into the crowd forming around the singers.

Chapter 3
     
     
    KIERAN SHOULD have known the trip downtown was more business than lunch. If Theo ever really took a break from work, Kieran had never seen it. Not that he minded. It was part of why things worked between them. Theo having this huge other thing in his life kept him from being like Kieran’s college boyfriend, who had spent every other minute asking Kieran what he was thinking and what he wanted to do and where he thought things were going. That had been the longest six weeks of his life. But Kieran had been living with Theo for six months, and never once was he called on to create a detailed report on what he was thinking.
    When the music started and Theo disappeared, Kieran knew this had to be a promotional thing for Theo’s new show, a musical version of the eighties movie, Desperately Seeking Susan , though Kieran knew the show was sold out for at least the next two months. Theo hadn’t pushed when Kieran didn’t want to go to opening night, but he’d been twice—okay, four times—since, and he liked it. He’d have to ask Theo when they planned to record the soundtrack. This was his favorite song, a good one to get audience attention, “Get In Trouble With Me.”
    It had an old-school punk beat, the lyrics full of witty exchanges as Jim tries to convince his wild girlfriend, Susan, to come with him and his band on their gig. As the flash mob grew in size, enough of the backup singers and dancers peeled away from the crowd near Kieran that he had a front row view. The actor playing Jim had been so close, he picked up his cue right in Kieran’s ear.
    As he watched, Kieran’s toes moved inside his boots and he sang along inside his head. Theo didn’t write the music, but he polished and tweaked until the songs in his shows were a magic combination of storytelling and catchy tunes. Kieran had heard him lots of times, reworking one phrase over and over on the piano in the condo. When it got to be too much, Kieran just stuffed in earbuds.
    He looked around for Theo now but couldn’t find him. Kieran wanted to catch Theo’s eye—give a thumbs-up to let him know from the crowd’s point of view, this little show was going great. The tourists around him were smiling and laughing and recording on their smartphones, creating the kind of viral word-of-mouth marketing no ad agency could buy.
    Kieran liked the