Unconditionally (Brown County #4) Read online

  Unconditionally

  Copyright 2014 Amber Nation

  First Edition

  All rights reserved as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976. No part of these publications may be reproduced, distributed, transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior permission of the Author. For information regarding subsidiary rights, please contact the publisher.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Cover and Formatting by ShoutLines Design

  DEDICATION

  To all of the brave men and women who aren’t afraid to unapologetically be themselves each and every single day.

  Be brave.

  Be different.

  Be unique.

  Be YOU.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  First and foremost the three people who mean the most to me in life: My husband Jarrod and my girls, Alexis and Olivia: Thank you for being my constant support system and encouraging me every single step of the way. I would’ve never ever started this journey if it weren’t for the three of you. I love you to the moon and back!

  Annalisa Nicole, Savannah Stewart, and Delisa Lynn: Thank you for always being there for me whether to bounce an idea off of or just for a break and lots of laughs. I love you ladies hardcore and I’m so thankful that our lives have crossed paths. Melanie Brock: For being the best friend and cousin I could ever ask for! I know each of our lives are crazy busy, but I know we will always be there for one another if needed! I love ya!

  Nation Fixation: You ladies are a fabulous group of supporters and I greatly appreciate all of your constant help and support with trying to get my name and my books out into the world of reading! I love you all!

  My betas: Mary Anne Bailey, Ashley Volk, Delisa Lynn, Tracy Brewer, Marnie Warren, Jessika Harper, Mayas Sanders, Kristen Cecil, Ashley Hampton, Evette Ashby, and Crissy Sutcliffe: Thank you so much for taking the time out to read and review Unconditionally, even if you were unsure of the whole M/M genre, and for all of the suggestions on how to make Toby’s story great! I cannot say enough how much I appreciate your time and your support!

  My cover designer and formatter Rachel Mizer with Shoutlines Design: Your work continues to amaze me. You have an incredible talent and I am always fascinated to watch my cover come to life! And my editor Anna Coy: You are an absolute rock star at what you do! It is always a joy to work with you!

  Enticing Journey Book Promotions - Ena and Jennifer: Thank you for creating and organizing my blog tour! I greatly appreciate all of the hard work you do for us authors!

  My PA, Giana Racine: Thank you! Thank you! You are amazing to us authors and I greatly appreciate everything you do for me!

  And last BUT certainly not least - The Readers, Reviewers, and Bloggers: THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart for taking the time to read my books as well as the constant outpouring of support and encouragement! I appreciate it more than you will ever know! I love each and every single one of you!!!

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  Copyright

  Other Books by Amber Nation

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  OTHER BOOKS BY AMBER NATION

  The Brown County Series

  Not Alone – Grady and Emmalynne’s Story

  Runaway Love– Charlie and Maggie’s Story

  How to Save a Life– Mike and Sheridan’s Story

  Unconditionally– Toby's Story

  Toby

  I knew from a very young age that I was different than the other members of my family. My mother and father were elite socialites and members of the country club who had to constantly compete with the Joneses. My older brother, Bryce, was the captain of the football team and one of the most popular guys in school.

  Being a freshman while Bryce was a senior, teachers were always so excited to have another Morgan in class thinking that I would be just like Bryce and good at everything. But that wasn’t the case once they got to know me.

  I wasn’t a jock or someone who constantly cared what other people thought of me. I was Toby Morgan, the boy who would rather solve math problems than worry about what was the final score on the scoreboard of last Friday’s game. I wasn’t into what was considered ‘in’ the latest fashion, I came up with my own, and rocked it. It didn’t matter to me how off the wall my outfit could’ve been, if I felt comfortable in it and thought it looked good, I went with it.

  Often labeled a freak or some other lame haphazard attempt to get me down, they never faltered my stride. Nope, my parents took the cake on that all on their own. See, I’m a gay man and I’m one hundred and ten percent proud of that. I never once tried to be something that I wasn’t. I’d known for quite a long time that I was attracted to men, so it was never something that I tried to keep under wraps. I didn’t want them, my parents, to understand me, I just wanted them to love me unconditionally like a parent should to their children.

  But that would’ve been putting them up to a higher standard then what they deserved to be. They hated my guts apparently and even after my brother Bryce was killed in a car accident almost eight years ago, they acted as if they had absolutely no children at all. They were the victims of everything.

  Me coming home in the eighth grade with a black eye and bloody lip and being called a faggot, their reputation was tarnished. Never mind the fact that I was bullied, teased, and often beaten on a weekly basis for being true to myself, they were always the victims, it was always about them.

  Why did their oldest son have to die so young and leave a wife and child behind? Never mind the fact that Bryce turned out to be a world class asshole. Why did their youngest son have to commit the biggest sin and become gay? That’s right, according to them I became gay, I choseit. I embrace my sexuality wholeheartedly, but I didn’t ask for the abundance of cold shoulders and people who thought that being gay also meant that I came with a contagious disease that they would catch if they got too close to me.

  It was on the rare occasion when I heard from Constance and Martin Morgan. And normally I would think that hell must have frozen over when I did.

  On the eve of my twenty-sixth birthday, I wondered if tomorrow would be one of those occasions, but wasn’t going to hold my breath.

  Toby

  Waking up like any other normal workday, I didn’t feel the least bit older. I supposed that was a good thing since they say that you are only as old as you feel, well I still felt twenty-five. I peeled back my thousand thread count Egyptian cotton bed sheets and my bronze and cream bedspread that laid wrinkle-free on my king-sized four poster bed and careened my back as I stretched my arms towards the ceiling. A boy had to indulge in himself every once in a while.

  Just then Elizabeth Taylor came strutting into my bedroom and began rubbing herself against my feet that were now placed on my dark stained hardwood floor. I knew any moment… Yup and in sashayed Sasha Fierce. They were Persian cats who were both divas rivaling after their names. I couldn’t tell you where they got their diva status… Oh hell, who was I kidding, I was a diva myself.

  “Good morning, m
y beauties,” I sang as I bent over to give a little scratch to each pussy behind their ears. The only type of pussy I would ever get caught petting.

  I padded down the hallway towards my kitchen so I could feed these insatiable felines. If they didn’t get their breakfast before I started getting myself ready they would give me the proverbial cold shoulder for the rest of the day. They were just like women, bitchy when they didn’t receive attention or get their food.

  Stepping out of my glass enclosed shower, I quickly ran a towel over my head halting the trek of tiny droplets of water before they pelted against my skin. I then stood in front of the sink and wiped away the condensation on the mirror from the billowing steam of my shower, revealing my solemn face with large dark purple circles underneath my eyes.

  I took a deep breath, sucking in air through my nose and then releasing it the same way. The tension of the day was already unsurmountable and it had barely began. At least the tax day cutoff was weeks ago, if I had that to deal with that chaos on top of my ‘birthday celebration’ I might actually break.

  Breaking was something that I never did, never really could. I was the glue that held my friends together. If they had a problem, Toby was there in an instant.

  Besides the one night when Maggie, a dear friend, came to get me at Big Pete’s last year after Gio and I broke up, I always kept it together. One of these days, everything that I had bottled up was going to come exploding out. And I wouldn’t want anyone to be within a five mile radius when that occurred.

  It was crazy to think that Gio and I had been broken up for almost a full year. He was my first ‘real’ love and even with time it never really got any easier. Giovani Vincenzo was Maggie Walker’s best friend, which was how we met; through her. He was a fitness trainer, an Italian fitness trainer. My Italian stallion, as I had often called him, even though he wasn’t mine anymore. We had a whirlwind romance and everything was fabulous, everything behind closed doors that is. If we were out in public, he would place miles between us and would act as if my touch burned his skin if I tried to get to close. He hadn’t really came out to anyone in the public eye about being gay, the least of all his parents. I wasn’t going to be with someone who had an aversion to me, my parents took care of that one.

  I didn’t want anyone to change me or tell me how to live my life, so I wasn’t about to become a hypocrite and tell Gio how to live his.

  He had since came out to his parents and his brother who were entirely accepting of his sexuality, which was how a parent should react. They shouldn’t have to feel as if they were a burden on their family and an outcast.

  He’s recently tried countless times to get me to talk to him and for me to take him back, but in the end I didn’t know if I could do it. I still loved him, regardless he burned me so badly that I didn’t know if my heart could take a beating a second time. That wasn’t a way to go about being in a relationship, not being able to trust or being leery of the trueness of their affection.

  I resumed my daily primping which included styling my jet black hair with mousse and applying cold cream to my face, to try and get rid of those pesky dark circles. After I brushed my teeth and placed my tooth brush back in its holder, I plastered on a fake smile and repeated my daily mantra to my reflection, “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter and those who matter don’t mind.”

  Being a children’s author or not, Dr. Seuss was a genius in his own right and it was hands down my all-time favorite quote.

  I locked my bright neon green front door and turned to look out towards the passerby’s on the street. I lived in a townhouse, so I had neighbors on either side of me, some were pleasant others…not so much. It all came with the territory I supposed.

  I chose the loudest color of Benjamin Moore paint that I could find, ultimately named Margarita, because it suited me perfectly. I was loud and I was proud. You would be able to spot my house from a mile away, the only one like it around and I preferred it that way. It was a statement and it reminded me so much of myself, not being able to hide and being the front and center of attention. But behind that door, away from the public’s eye, it was a whole different world, a side of me that most didn’t ever get to see. Loneliness.

  On the outside, there was absolutely no hiding me, but on the inside, there were so many different nooks and crannies that could easily inhabit my insecurity.

  Sure I had friends in abundance, but what I really wanted in life was that one special someone to devote my time and attention to and maybe one day even love.

  I squared my shoulders back, straightened my posture, and I painted on my Toby bright white smile as I tried my best to put a pep in my step on my way to my Jeep. Most of the time my smile was genuinely true, but not today. No, today I would fake it with the best of them.

  The day progressed extremely too slow and now I found myself sitting amongst my friends at DeNiro’s pizzeria trying to enjoy my birthday dinner.

  The ladies at work tried to make today enjoyable for me by parading around presents and bringing in my favorite…cake. I was a lover of all food, I didn’t discriminate, and could easily eat my weight in it. No matter how much I stuffed my face with cookies and pies I never gained an ounce. Which was what made my best friend Emmalynne and I so compatible, she enjoyed making the most delicious desserts around and I enjoyed indulging in them, and did so quite frequently.

  Even getting presents here from my friends normally would make me feel all giddy and extremely elated, but I just felt…off.

  It wasn’t as if I was depressed about getting older, twenty-six was hardly a mid-life crisis age.

  I was just completely over this entire day. I couldn’t tell you if it was because I was correct in my assumption of not hearing a single word from my parents. Or the fact that I was now twenty-six and still alone.

  Any who, back to my job…I bet you wouldn’t have guessed that I was a certified CPA?

  Most thought that I was just an accountant, but it’s more than just that. Every CPA is an accountant but not all accountants were Certified Public Accountants. Being that I was certified meant that I was badass, and justifiably so, I had to undergo a series of rigorous tests to become that certified professional.

  Oh, I’d heard it all. Why weren’t I a car salesman? An auctioneer? Or even a radio DJ?

  I certainly had been extremely blessed with the gift of gab. Why on earth would I, a lively vibrant man, be involved in such a boring job?

  It’s extremely simple, I loved numbers—they fascinated me. They were cut and dry, black and white. Entirely no room for that elusive ‘gray’ area.

  My entire life was comprised of that gray area. Being homosexual, there wasn’t anything black and white about it like I wished there was. I couldn’t tell you how many times I was picked on as a child and even as an adult because I preferred men over women. In the end, underneath our clothes and our skin, we were each made up of the same structure. If you cut me, wouldn’t I bleed just the same as every human being? We were all the same, so what made people who were heterosexual any better than me?

  Maybe one day we would all be treated the same.

  Finally turning my attention back to all of my friends who took time out from their busy lives to come help me celebrate and here I was acting depressed and what’s worse, ungrateful which wasn’t the case at all.

  Taking a look at all the people that were occupying four of DeNiro’s tables that had to be shoved together because our party was so large, I took in the happy expressions on each of their faces.

  First up was my sister-in-law Emmalynne, even though my brother was no longer with us and she was married to Grady, I would always consider her family. I was so happy that she found her special someone, she deserved so much and more. My nephew Tucker was sitting next to Emmy and their little tot Charlotte was perched on Grady’s lap.

  Mike and Sheridan were even in attendance with her son Ben. They were newly engaged, I could see the sparkles in her
eyes whenever she would admire her ring. She had a lot to deal with before she came to Brown County, rather unexpectedly too.

  And we learned last fall, Mike hadn’t had it easy either. He was extremely brave to open his heart for Ben and had been an amazing father.

  My crazy partner in crime, Tessa and her extremely patient husband Brock and their son Blake was seated on the other end. You could hear Tessa’s loud and boisterous voice above everyone else’s.

  Across from me was Maggie and Charlie and their daughter, Bailee who was busy blowing raspberries to the waiter, that girl was a heartbreaker in the making.

  It was who was seated next to Maggie who genuinely surprised me. Gio sat there chancing glances at me while he dragged around his fork in his half eaten salad. I had been dodging phone calls from him for a while and succeeded, until now.

  I felt as if I had nothing more to say to him. I wasn’t going to be with someone who had doubts about being a gay man even if he had since come out. If I was still in love with him or not, sometimes love just wasn’t enough and you couldn’t overcome the pain in your heart.

  Actually seeing him for the first time in months, it brought back the memory of the very first night I was introduced to Giovanni Vincenzo. As I said I met him through Maggie Walker, a mutual friend, she had just started coming around the gang and was majorly crushing on Charlie, our bass guitarist. She and Gio both showed up at Emmy Lou’s one night and within one look at the man, I was hooked. Being me I never shied away from acknowledging someone if I thought they were cute and voicing my opinion. Once we grasped each other’s palms in a pleasant exchange something zapped right through me and shook me to my core and made it physically incapable for me to speak, I could only rove my eyes up and down his delectable body.