“Wise move. I’m sure your family’s name is flagged at every news agency. As soon as it appears, they’re on the quest for a story. In your case, they’d probably bring the boy band with them.”

  “I expect so.” Another small laugh. “Your humour….”

  “What about it?”

  “Nothing. Just… I miss it.”

  The brief silence this time was quite companionable. Then I got scared he’d ring off and I started gabbling again. “Are you seeing anyone, then?” How crass, I groaned to myself. How moronic, how pathetically clinging—

  “No, I’m not.” There was a pause. His tone had sounded strangely flat.

  “Seve? Are you still there?” No, please, please don’t go….

  “Yes, I’m here. What about you, Max?”

  “Who, me? Seeing anyone?”

  “Yes.” The tone was dry now. “Is there a better choice on the honest side of the street?”

  “Maybe,” I snapped. The arrogant smartarse—

  “Don’t!” The phone vibrated against my ear with the exclamation. “I didn’t mean….” Another sigh, more like a groan. “I am still not very good at saying the right thing, Max.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Perhaps that’s what I miss from you, Seve.” More silence, while I forgave him everything but couldn’t tell him. My fingers were numb from gripping the phone so tight. “Seve?”

  “What is it?”

  “I’m thinking of retraining for the future. Youth counselling.”

  Pause. “That’s good.”

  I was rambling on. “If it works out for me, I’ll go looking for an apprenticeship somewhere.”

  “You might move away from Brighton?” What did that sharpness in his voice mean?

  I took a deep breath. My chest felt constricted. Ideas were springing to mind whether I wanted them to or not—whether I thought any of them were any good. “I don’t know. It depends where the jobs are and what I want to do with my life in the longer term. I mean, I like it here, and the guys are still okay with me at their flat. And it’s not worth moving lock, stock, and barrel until I know where to go… even what country,” I added rashly. “But I wouldn’t rule it out.” This was the first time we’d talked at length about the mundane things of life—about work, money, somewhere to live. This was weird. “Seve?”

  “Yes?”

  “What’s the job situation like in Spain?” My heart was hammering so hard I couldn’t hear my words clearly.

  “It’s… it’s not good.” Maybe he heard disappointment in my silence. “But that’s the same everywhere. You could find something, I’m sure.”

  “I could learn the language. It has a lovely sound. Of course, at the moment I only know two beers, please, and that’s because Pedro in the site office taught me for a laugh—” Fuck. Talk some more crap, why don’t you. My hand was shaking around the phone.

  Seve’s voice broke in. “Don’t move without telling me.”

  “I’m on weekly check-in for a few more months, Seve. I can’t go anywhere without letting everyone and their dog know, and overseas travel is definitely out of the question.” I sounded just a little too sharp. “Why, are you thinking of calling again?”

  There was a hissed breath on the other end of the phone. “If that’s a brush-off, I know I—”

  “No!” I yelped. “Call me, Seve. I mean it!” God, did I mean it. God, was I scared of fucking things up!

  More silence. I was terrified I’d lost the connection. But it seemed that neither of us was putting the phone down just yet.

  “Max….”

  “Yeah?”

  “It’s no good. This is not working for me.”

  “Sorry? What isn’t?”

  “Everything. I miss you.”

  “Seve.” I didn’t know what to say. His accent had thickened while he’d been away, his words were more stilted.

  “I understood that you wanted to be alone—that you had things to do. That maybe it had come to an end for us. That it was just….”

  “Just what?” A casual fuck, like I’d once said?

  He didn’t rise to my bait. “I have tried to move on. I have tried to keep away.”

  “Seve….”

  “It’s no good. Like I said,” he continued doggedly, “I don’t want any other.”

  And look at me, I thought. I dragged my way through the days like I really was in jail. I did my work and I paid my dues, and I ached throughout it all. I brooded, I obsessed on the pain inside me, and I wallowed in the loss of one of the few things I ever truly wanted. Some days I never contributed more to a conversation than a couple of sentences. I reckoned I was a better wooden spoon than I was a friend to Jack and Louis.

  I wanted to say it all aloud, but my throat felt dammed. I couldn’t date anyone else—I couldn’t forget Seve’s skin, fragrant with its unique musky smell; his soft dark hair; his tongue tangling with mine. His delight in touching me, in running hands through my hair, his strong fingers gripping my arse. I couldn’t forget the feel of his strong arms around me—his legs pushing between mine—the incredible, anguished ecstasy of being fucked by him. My nights were a mess of frustrated tears and aching balls. I wanted all those things I told him about—the company, the argument, the teasing, the sharing. And I wanted them with him. Yeah… it was pretty obvious I felt the same.

  I took a deep breath. “So… how often do the flights go to Spain?”

  “What?” He sounded startled.

  “I’ll come to you as soon as I can. If you still want me.”

  There was another sharp intake of breath. “Of course I do. But you said you could not travel—”

  “Tell me where you are,” I said urgently. I was wondering where my toothbrush was and if Jack would lend me the money for the airfare. “Listen to me, okay? I’ll find some way to come to you. I’ll talk to Hayley, my support officer, I’ll… fuck it, I don’t know, but I’ll find a way. I want to see you—no, it’s more than that. I want to be with you, whatever. Wherever.” I sucked in a last breath before I lost my nerve. “But the thing is, Seve, I don’t want to wait for you to call again on the off chance. I want to see you now! The only way you’ll keep me away is to tell me you don’t want the same.”

  The door to the living room was opening, and I cursed whoever was interrupting me. But it was Jack, holding a travel backpack out to me and pointing to his watch. “Cab arriving in ten,” he said in a stage-whisper. “To the station. There’s a train every twenty minutes to the airport!” He backed out quickly.

  “Jack?” I gaped at his retreating back.

  Seve’s voice spoke at my ear, laced with tentative amusement. “He told me I could ring you. I called him first—I didn’t know what else to do.”

  “You called Jack?”

  “Yes. I remembered his name from when he booked the club. I still had his number. I didn’t know how you would react if I contacted you, after all this time. I thought you wouldn’t want to hear from me, not when I had fucked up so badly. But I thought he might know how I’d be received. You said he was a good friend.”

  Yeah, I thought wildly. The best! “Um… look, I know I said I’d get there somehow, but first, I’ll have to call Hayley at home. Then I’ll have to arrange things with work, and the guys. I can’t get to Spain as quick as I’d like.” I was silently screaming, wishing I had some way of transporter-beaming my molecules to bypass all these bloody obstacles. Why was everything out to get me?

  Seve made a tutting noise. “Of course you can’t. And you don’t have to. I am already in England, at Gatwick Airport. I have just arrived from Spain. I can stay for a week this time, maybe longer after things settle further….”

  I was already pulling my jacket off the back of the couch and shrugging into it. “I’m on my way!”

  “Max, I must tell you, I only have a little money. I’m in a cheap hotel. It’s not like the flat.”

  I smiled to myself. What an arrogant prick he really was. My arrogant prick. “You reckon you fucked up badly, right?”

  He made a growling sound. “I try to understand you, Max—”

  I interrupted quickly. I was sure he’d hear the happiness in my voice. “If I cared about furnishings, Seve, I’d fuck a cushion, okay? I have almost a week until I have to check in again, and I’m owed some holiday at the site. I’ll meet you anywhere. Hotel room, airport coffee shop, car, park bench….” Just meet me, I prayed. Then—sudden panic. “You want to spend that time with me?”

  “Yes,” he whispered. “Yes… please.”

  My heart shrieked its joy. Thank God they never gave a cock a voice. “We’ll talk about it then, okay?” My heart was hammering again, but this time it was with excitement. “I said I’ll meet you anywhere, Seve, and I meant it. We’ll work something out on the logistics.”

  “Work something out,” he echoed. He didn’t say the “yes, please” again, but it was there in his tone. That’d do for me.

  I could hear the cab beeping its horn outside the house and a squeal of excitement from Louis in the hallway. “Anywhere, you hear me? Just….”

  “What?”

  “Just make sure it’s somewhere out of the rain!”

  I cut the call off even as I heard his low laugh.

  Then I ran for the door.

  EPILOGUE

  Six months later

  1 – Max

  “You know, I’m pretty sure this look isn’t working for me,” I said.

  The mirror didn’t respond, which was not a surprise. Instead, it glared back at me from over the sink in the small bathroom of my flat. There was a crack creeping across the bottom right-hand corner that always caught my chin and created a false cleft. A crooked cleft. Some mornings I found myself lifting a hand to rub it away.

  I chuckled to myself. Stupid arse.

  With a huff of impatience, I loosened my necktie, then undid the top three buttons of my brand-new shirt. I backed out of the bathroom, easing off the also-new shoes that wanted to cramp my toes into the shape of a dunce’s hat—some message there, right?—and shrugged out of the suit trousers I’d been trying on. I dropped them onto the sofa, on top of their crinkly plastic wrapping from the dry cleaners. Then I paused, picked up the trousers and hung them more carefully on the top of the bathroom door.

  Stupid and selfish arse. I might feel weird in a suit, but that didn’t mean I shouldn’t wear one for my best friends’ special occasion. But now my trying-on duties were complete, I could change into something more casual for the rest of the morning, and I tugged on my worn but comfy jeans with a sigh of relief.

  My living-cum-bedroom was relatively tidy at the moment because I’d been working long hours at the building site for the extra money, and all I’d had time for at home each night was a wash, a cuppa or two with a toasted sandwich, and to crash out on my bed. I paused at the screen that partitioned off the far end of the room and peered around it at my bed. It was squashed into a space barely big enough for a double, the undersheet half-creased on my side, and one set of pillows with a head-shaped dent. I guessed the whole bed could be my side, really, because no one else had ever shared it with me. There was no other fragrance left on the bedding, no unfamiliar laundry left on the small dresser beside it, and only my own scattering of spare change in the tacky ceramic ‘Souvenir of Brighton’ dish on the top.

  It had been like that since I moved in. Some days, the loneliness was crippling. But… it was what it was, right?

  I’d moved out of Jack and Louis’ place two months ago, having secured a bedsit I could afford, up by Preston Park. I was just out of my supervision, and Hayley, my support worker, had helped me with the lease. The drugs business had been the only criminal blot in my life, and my community resolution better than I could have hoped for, but even though it wasn’t on my record, I was still a poor risk to some landlords. So, she’d helped me with my references, and a lot of the liaison with letting agents. I didn’t earn a lot, and my choices were still limited, but here I was at last.

  The flat was small, but I was kind of proud of my own space, once I’d settled all my meagre stuff around me. The house was right at the top of a hill, but I was used to that from living at the guys’ place. There was nothing much going for my room in the way of a sea view or luxury amenities—it was too small for a bath, just a narrow shower cubicle, and no space in the kitchen under the sloping roof for any extras like a washing machine—but the main living area was large and airy. Plus, my live-in landlady, Mrs Burton, was a dear who had seemed less interested in my sordid past than in giving me a second chance. She allowed me full use of her washing and drying machines in the utility room downstairs, brought me a whole carrot cake every time she baked, and let me use the house phone when I ran out of credit on my mobile. Even better, she didn’t mind if I was a couple of days late with the rent. At least, she never complained, which just made me strive harder not to put her on the spot too often. Instead, I made sure I helped her with any household repair jobs, and she knew she could call on me if she needed any strong-arm support, ever since I’d chased off a bullying doorstep tradesman or two for her.

  The whole house was quiet this Friday morning. Most people in this area of Brighton, including Mrs B’s other tenants, were at work, and even the traffic passing outside seemed muted. It had been raining since late last night and the morning sky outside was that weird, brooding shade of grey that looked almost luminous. The pavements would be slick with standing water, and I’d have to be careful in case I slid down the bloody hill to the bus stop. I hoped the rain held off until after the ceremony. Sunshine always looked best in photos of a wedding, didn’t it? I smiled to myself. Maybe it didn’t really matter, if you were happy and having a good time. I rummaged in my drawer for a clean polo to change into, instead of this posh shirt, because there was no point in peaking too early. The ceremony wasn’t for hours yet.

  “Max?”

  The call was distant, but I was used to my landlady’s voice. I wasn’t going to ask her to climb three flights of stairs every time she wanted to talk to me, and she had a strong voice when she needed. So, a yell up the stairs suited both of us as a starting point.

  I padded out in my socked feet onto the landing and leaned over. There was a direct view down to the lobby, and Mrs B stood there, wiping her hands on a tea towel, clad in a flour-streaked apron, and grinning up at me.

  “There’s a young man to see you,” she called up brightly.

  My first thought was panic. Had something gone wrong with today’s arrangements? Were the guys okay? Dammit, I should have gone straight over to their place instead of loitering around here, indulging in a rare, lazy morning off. If there was some critical thing they needed help with—

  “It’s not your police friend or the dancer.” She made Jack and Louis sound like members of the Village People come to call. “It’s your other friend. The one who calls you sometimes on the house phone. I know his voice very well. I mean, I wouldn’t let just anyone in, would I?” She smiled back over her shoulder at someone standing under the bend of the staircase so I couldn’t see them. There was the deep murmur of a few words in reply, and Mrs B simpered, her cheeks pinking. Seventy-six years old, and she still responded well to charm.

  I was in no position to criticise anyone for that. My heart beat had already started to race painfully.

  “Shall I send him up, Max? I wasn’t expecting anyone to arrive here today. I know you are required to attend an important engagement this afternoon.”

  Bless her kind discretion. Some days it was like living in a Jane Austen novel. “Sure. I’m not leaving for the Register Office yet.”

  Mrs B laughed softly, though not at anything I said. Then, as I watched helplessly from the top bannister, Seve Nuñez rounded the first flight and looked up at me.

  I stood frozen to the spot like a bloody lamppost while he climbed the rest of the way, until he stood beside me on the top landing. Fit and gorgeous, barely out of breath, a discreet three feet away from me, dressed in a suit that was creased from travelling yet still stylish, and with a leather overnight bag in his hand. Then I noticed a random trickle of water running from his black hair down his cheek.

  “You got caught in the rain,” I said stupidly.

  He looked me up and down, and nodded slowly. His usual forcefulness seemed muted today. “And you’re getting ready for Louis and Jack’s special day. You are the head groomsman, I remember. I’m sorry to interrupt.”

  “No, it’s fine.” Of course, it bloody was! “I’m not exactly kitted out in my finery yet, as you can see.” I gestured in a flailing way at my halfway dressing: my frayed jeans topped by the wincingly expensive shirt, with the twisted silk tie still hanging unevenly from the collar.

  Seve’s cheeks were flushed, the olive-toned skin around his eyes crinkling as he frowned. “You look hot,” he said, his voice sharp.

  Jesus. And with just that, he did what he always did, made my every nerve come alive, and my whole body flush with want and need.

  “Only you can make a compliment sound like an accusation,” I half-joked.

  He gave a smile, but it was also muted. Surprised he hadn’t snapped back, I blathered on. “I wasn’t expecting you today. And definitely not here. You didn’t let me know you were arriving, or I’d have met you at the station.”

  “Then you would have got wet, too,” he said simply. He shook his head like an impatient dog, spattering a few raindrops on my face. “It’s no problem. Just water.”

  We were chatting about the fucking weather, for God’s sake.

  I heard Mrs B drop a pan in the kitchen downstairs and an angry murmur through several walls that was probably one of her imaginative trying-not-to-be-remotely-offensive curses.

  “Come on in.” I gestured for Seve to go ahead of me into my room, shaking my head. “Jesus, I don’t know what I’m waiting for.”