We’d had sex in more than one place at this club. It looked like neither of us would ever forget it.

  “It’s quiet here,” Max said, closing the door behind us, shutting us in the small closet. His breath was shallow, his eyes fevered. “We can sit and talk, and we’re unlikely to be disturbed. If anyone wants their coat, they can bloody well knock on the counter.”

  I didn’t know whether his irritation was aimed at me or any potential interruption, but his confrontational attitude never ceased to excite me. My heart instinctively kicked up an extra beat. “Whatever you say, Max,” I growled.

  Max’s pupils dilated. For that moment, I was swamped with the memory of hard, fast, near-public sex with him—the times it had been uncomfortable, unexpected, uncontrollable, yet beyond exciting. When we had barely spoken, when it was a perilously thin line between love and anger, but when we’d been so hungry that only each other’s cock could fill us. The early days of our connection.

  It seemed like another world, now. When he reached out and cupped my face, his palm caressing the bristles of my beard, I sucked in a breath and reached for him, too. I slid my hand into his hair at the nape of his neck, tightened my fist, and tugged. Hard.

  Max gasped, and his head went back, his throat taut and exposed to me. The room was lit by a high window, but at this time of the evening the illumination was fading from the darkening streets. I could smell the leather of people’s jackets and bags, the tang of damp wool from coats and scarves. Max had tensed, waiting for my mouth, or my arms to make their move. But, instead, I held us there, connected by nothing but our one-handed touches. I could hear the celebrations in the background; someone had turned up the annoying pop music. There was a shriek of laughter. A siren as a fire engine passed on the road outside.

  “Kiss me,” Max hissed.

  But although it was at the forefront of my mind to do that very thing, I shook my head. “No. I don’t want you passive, Max. I don’t want you to give way to me all the time.”

  He was confused, I could see. If he felt like me, if the blazing desire that had sprung to life inside me was matched by his own—it was in no way passive. But he didn’t challenge me. His gaze searched my face, instead, as if trying to guess what was going on, then he pulled away and dropped onto the bench underneath the coat hooks. He was quiet, waiting for me to settle beside him. When I took his hand, his skin was slightly clammy.

  He frowned, his eyes glinting in the dim light. “Seve, you’re different today. You have been, ever since you arrived.”

  “You mean, more sentimental? Kinder to you?”

  “Yeah, maybe, but you’re always—”

  “No, I’m not kind. I rarely have been,” I interrupted harshly.

  His breath hitched. “Ah. Yeah. Well, maybe I let you be like that.”

  He had always been self-deprecating and, yes, it had suited me at one time. But how long was I going to accept that? Encourage it? My answering laugh was short and sad. “Yes, maybe you are partly to blame. I want you so much, I have always accepted you however you are, whatever you do.”

  “You make that sound like it’s a bad thing. But I guess it hasn’t always been a healthy way to live. Or a healthy basis for a relationship.” He sighed quietly. “Okay. So, I don’t indulge in this soul-searching very often, but I reckon you deserve nothing less than my full honesty. It’s been a hell of a year for me, Seve. Things have knocked me back. I was nearly killed. I’ve been under police investigation. And I remember I told you once, I don’t want drama like that in my life anymore.”

  “Fuck, yes, I know all of that, because I faced a lot of it with you. And I have also struggled since, to find my way. Our way. But it’s hard. Sometimes the only way I know to communicate is to argue. To fight. To fuck.”

  Max huffed. “That thing I said, about sounding like it’s a bad thing? Yeah. But… me, too. Right?” He buried his hand deeper into my grasp as we both inched forward verbally on the thin ice of explaining ourselves.

  The whole back and forth of our relationship was so fucking stressful, and always had been. Yet I could not do without him, and I was pretty sure he felt the same. But we were both men who had been used to being alone, to making our own decisions. We had dodged around each other for so long, letting the desire take charge, not acknowledging the daily routine, not allowing the emotional intimacy to grow—until it ambushed us both. And now we were trying to balance separation, and uncertainty, and loneliness. It would take its toll on anyone, this push and pull.

  And that loneliness? I did not know exactly how Max coped, but for me, it was deep and aching and like a constantly heavy chain around my neck. Whenever we took the chance to meet, we didn’t always mesh easily—there was often frustration, and anger, and disturbance, because our lives were not entirely our own to control. If we fought, the make-up fuck was all the sweeter. But, for our emotional health, it could be all the more painful.

  The room was dark and warm from the clothes around us, and I had tuned out the sounds from the rest of the club. I was only aware of his tense, lean body; the smell of cologne and sweat; his sharp, glimmering eyes, showing how aware he was of me. I knew I always had his full attention, and that was both thrilling and unnerving. This small room was our own, musty, claustrophobic little bubble.

  Max bit his lip. “Seve, I understand you have… limitations on what you can give me. You have a commitment to your mother and to rebuilding your family’s standing and fortunes. A commitment to rebuilding your own reputation.”

  A strange, painful growl escaped from the back of my throat.

  “If we want to keep seeing each other,” he continued, and I hated to hear the shake in his voice, “we need to work these things out. I know it’s not easy…”

  “Especially when I’m hardly ever here,” I added. I took a moment just to savour him; the timbre of his voice, the soft but firm curl of his fingers, the unutterably gorgeous sensuality of his long limbs and graceful form clothed in formal dress. Never had I seen such a luscious creature and, even more than my usual desperate response to him, I wanted to take him in my arms, push him down, and ravish the hell out of him. That was always how I had behaved, wasn’t it? Desiring, and taking, and always on my terms.

  But things had to change. Like Max’s constant bending to my ways, I needed to break my cycle—to find a new way forward for us both. It was time to take that deep breath; to begin to explain myself in a whole new way.

  “You see, I do not want to argue all the time, Max. Not anymore. That’s what you have taught me over these last few months. To be patient, to make allowances. To enjoy the good things that money does not buy. That other people take for granted. I’ve learned to appreciate what I have, however little it is, however infrequently I can enjoy it. The passion is spectacular, my needs overpowering. But that intensity cannot be sustained. And I don’t want to hurt you or myself any longer.”

  Max’s eyes blinked hard. He must have been wondering where the hell I was going with this. I felt as if that thin ice were cracking, and I was at risk of a ducking into shocking, freezing water.

  “Yeah. I mean, what a fucked-up pair we are,” he said, his voice brittle. “With an even more fucked-up relationship. Right?”

  I just slowly shook my head, cradled his fisted hand between both of mine, and held him tight. “I don’t want to suffer these stupid, lonely, bitter times away from you anymore. I don’t want to see the way you bite back your protests when I have to go, or to see you upset your friends, your job, your career plans, just because I am arriving and want to meet you. It’s become gradually and painfully clear to me that I have been holding you back all this time.”

  Max stared at me, a growing panic in his eyes. “We put up with it. I put up with it. Because I need to see you, just as much.”

  I cupped his face in my hands, very gently, and kissed him. I made the most of it, slipping my tongue in against his, relishing the soft, plump lips. “Max. It’s not right for either of us.”

  “Oh, fuck.” His face twisted with pain and anger. “So, is that it? What you wanted to talk about? It’s over?”

  “What…?”

  He stood abruptly, dislodging a pile of bags, knocking a hat off its hook above us. “Yeah, it’s shit, the way we have to live, but it won’t always be like that, will it? Weren’t we agreed on putting up with all the crap, for… for… us?” He gestured furiously between us, his words fast, his breath stuttering. “You think I don’t imagine how you can just vanish if you want, go into hiding somewhere on the continent, cut me adrift, blank me? You think I don’t wait on tenterhooks sometimes, that I don’t despise myself for hanging around, torture myself waiting for the other shoe to drop? Well, fuck you! If that’s the way you want it, if you haven’t had the balls to tell me already you’ve had enough, that you don’t want to be around me anymore, then maybe it’s gonna be a huge fucking relief to face it and get on with the rest of my life—”

  I kissed him. I stood up, too, got right up in his face, grabbed him by the shoulders, and kissed him. He struggled for a second, then kissed back, just as fiercely. As we moaned and devoured each other, I ground my hips against him, so he could feel how hard I was, how much he turned me on. How much I wanted him.

  But I needed to speak it, too.

  “I never, ever said that, Max. I never even thought it. Because it is not true! I want you all the time, whether I’m with you or not. I, also, live in fear of you moving on, of realising I am a poor lover, an even worse boyfriend, and a fucking disastrous future bet.”

  He was panting from our kiss, his eyes wild. “Then… what?”

  I held him at arms’ length, if only to resist the way he scrambled my thoughts and words for a few more precious moments. “Didn’t you ask why I came to your flat today?”

  “Huh?” He blinked. His eyes darted to my mouth, then away.

  I sighed. “No, not just for sex. It was because I have nowhere else to go.”

  Now he looked both angry and bemused. “What the fuck?”

  “I know it’s your place, your sanctuary for your new life, and I don’t have the right to burst in like this. I will happily go and find a hotel room, and call you from there. We can talk further—”

  “But when are you going back to Spain?” he interrupted.

  I winced. “I’m not.”

  He gripped my wrists where I was braced against him. We were a strange pair, all but wrestling in a closet.

  “Don’t joke about this,” he whispered raggedly.

  “I’m not. I have told Mama I cannot live in Spain any longer. I must be here, with you.”

  He was frowning at me, like he did when I sometimes broke into Spanish, when he didn’t understand all the words. “What about the family business?”

  “Mama has a good team around her now. She’s established well enough, with allies and advisors. She does not need me continually at her side.” She had been both voluble and emotional when I first told her of my plans. But she was my mama, and she loved me as much as I loved her. She also understood matters of the heart, and their importance. She had given her blessing, eventually.

  I would have come back here regardless.

  “But… do you have a job here?” Max asked, bewildered.

  Another wince. “The pharmaceutical company is opening a small subsidiary, based here in the UK. Mama has offered to give me full control. Unfortunately, the initial salary is less than I earn now in Spain…”

  “But it’s here!” His outburst was a statement, not a question. His eyes were wide with what looked like hope and excitement.

  “Yes. You do not mind my lower status…? I will have less money than before. I have travelled today with only a few changes of clothes, and a small amount of savings. When I get settled here, I can call on whatever I still have in Spain, at Mama’s house, but it’s not much.”

  His smile was rueful. “I told you a long time ago, I fuck you, not your furnishings.”

  I let out a bark of laughter. His delight was contagious, but I still wasn’t sure I’d made my position clear enough to reassure him. I had so little experience of this. “For my sanity, I had to take this step. I cannot be without you, Max.”

  He pulled away from me again, shaking his head. My hands remained open, uplifted, chilled at the loss of his closeness. What had I said wrong? But then his smile grew broader.

  “It’s hard to take in, Seve. It’s a shock! But it would mean… us. At last. We can just spend time together. Ordinary, uninterrupted, casual time. Watch TV, plan meals, fix Mrs B’s curtain rail, have a beer.” He gave a weird, though happy, little moan.

  I nodded, although I didn’t understand why he was stating the blatantly obvious. “Without you wondering how soon I have to go, or me desperately calculating how long until I can be back.”

  He met my eyes, something raw shining out. “You do that?”

  I nodded again. “Every time. Though…”

  He raised his eyebrows, momentarily wary.

  “I am not sure I’m any good at repairs around the home. I have never had experience of domesticity like that.”

  He started to laugh, bit it off, then allowed it to flow. “Home. Your word,” he said simply. “You and me. Right?”

  “If you’ll have me here. If you are not tired of waiting.”

  He moved close but when I expected a kiss, he thumped me on the shoulder. Then, before I could even protest, he drew me in, so near I could feel the vibration of his heart beating against my chest, and the bulge thickening inside his smart trousers. We laughed and gasped, and kissed some more. A lot more.

  5 – Max

  Seve and I sat in the cloakroom for what felt like a long time, though it was probably only a half hour.

  It was enough time to finish our talk, at least for now. I chatted about mundane stuff, simple stuff, like my construction job and the guys I worked with; about recent trips to the pub with our friends; about where I ate out around here when I could afford it; and how good Mrs B was to me.

  Oh, we’d shared our news plenty of times before, but this time I wasn’t worrying how to keep my updates short and entertaining, or how we should be checking the train times for him to leave, or whether we had time to have sex again, to store the memory up for later retrospective sexy-times in the shower… Well, yeah. It was never a trial to think of that. But tonight, he sat beside me, kissed me, smiled. And listened.

  His bag still lay in the middle of my living room floor, I remembered. It had staked its place ahead of time.

  I was especially eager to share my plans for retraining as a care worker. It was a plan for the future, a future I hadn’t been sure of before now. A new start that was some way off, but it was a ray of bright, exciting hope.

  And Seve would be part of that hopeful future now.

  “What?” I pouted, at a low chuckle from him.

  “You glow,” he said bluntly. “I know how you look in sex, how debauched, how glorious. But this is a different thing. When we are just…” He looked a little dazed, though content. “Being together.”

  “We’ll still have all the sex, though.” I felt it was important to stress those most important terms and conditions. “Just… even more of it. And maybe we can ditch the condoms at last. Right?”

  He laughed, nbodding, his eyes darkening, his lips curling. Cue for some more groping. I could hear passing footfall outside the cloakroom which made me think some people were starting to leave. I should be out there, fulfilling my groomsman duties. But first… I slung a leg over Seve’s lap and arched myself against him. The bench was very narrow, but we’d managed before, in even smaller places. Then I remembered he was coming home with me tonight, with his fierce passion and his hard body, and he wasn’t dashing away in the morning.

  I relaxed, and settled for just the groping.

  We finally sat apart and tidied ourselves but, as he was about to stand, I caught his hand. He turned, gaze fully on me. That was something he’d always given freely, his intensity.

  “You always allowed me to be myself,” I said quietly. “Yet at the same time, you challenged me, made me think about where my life was going. You helped me gain that confidence, to be a better man. To grow up.”

  His cheeks flushed. “I wish I could take credit for that, but you were already a grown, good man.”

  “But I was running, all the time. You helped me to stop, if only to follow you.”

  We stood together, still touching, like we couldn’t get enough. Like we didn’t want to be apart for too long.

  Seve sighed. “You’ve made all the compromises, Max. I am ashamed it took me so long to gain that perspective.”

  I made a not very graceful snorting sound. “We’re gonna talk some more about that, because I’m not some patient Methuselah. I’m not as tolerant or easy-going as some people think. I’ve got plenty angry with you, and probably still will.”

  “But it’s different now,” Seve said.

  “Hey. There’s still a lot to sort out—”

  “I mean,” he broke in, his lips seeking mine. “Now we have the time.”

  And didn’t that sound astonishingly good?

  “Let’s get through the end of this event, then go back to mine,” I said. Ours. “We’ll arrange to get your stuff sent here.”

  “At least until, maybe, we can find a larger place? Together.” He sounded adorably nervous. I could get to like this side of Seve as much as I liked the assertive one.

  “Too bloody right,” I said. “Because I’m not sure I wanna be sharing Mrs B’s carrot cake with you for ever!”

  We emerged from the cloakroom without anyone making a fuss, and wandered back to the reception. The evening had worn on, and so had the guests. Several of them were taking their leave, hugging the grooms, trying to find handbags under the chairs, finishing off drinks, laughing and making plans to meet up again soon. Others were limbering up for the rest of the night, ready to go dancing in the main club.