adore the nuanced dynamic

this author is tooo good at sketching out personality and character through dialogue. love subverted expectations (everyone expects hayden to get jealous and "protect" brett) but brett takes care of things himself, hayden might be jealous but says "you're acting as if i have the right to get jealous" very calmly. i wonder if it's implied that maybe brett KNEW that the dude would follow him and kiss him and if he wanted hayden to see.
safe word dialogue is chefs kiss, esp the implications of "honey" being the safe word. you can tell hayden is definitely developing feelings but he's guarded bc he's been warned about what brett is like/he has an impression of brett as well so he's not letting himself fall. meanwhile, brett is still mysterious - what is he thinking exactly? he still seems so flippant about everything