My bedroom door opened before my subconscious sniped back at itself. I blinked in the darkness, half-convinced the shadow cast from the doorway was a figment of my overactive imagination, before Billy staggered over the threshold.
Alarmed, I sat up again. “What’s the matter?”
He shook his head wildly. “Can’t sleep. Need you.”
I begged to differ as I was pretty sure he’d sleepwalked across the landing, and the relief in my chest that he was suffering without me was criminal. Don’t do it. You’ll only have to go through all of this again tomorrow. But I held the covers up all the same. “Come on then. Get in.”
Chapter Seventeen
Billy
I was a massive dickhead. Luke was being zen as fuck, and all I could think about was Gus.
He drove the van into town and parked illegally by the green. I jumped out and came round the back to where he was already opening the door and unloading all the crap Mia wanted us to display at the fair. “You sure you want to break the rules with me in the van? You’ll get a ticket for sure if the coppers see me, or they’ll think you’re robbing the copper piping from the church.”
“That was you?”
“No. I’m just saying the police don’t like my face.”
Luke shrugged. “Let them not like it. We’re not doing anything the other traders won’t be doing when they get here.”
And of course, they weren’t here yet. Terminally early as always, Luke had picked me up at the crack of dawn, forcing me to leave Gus in bed, which was every bit as messed-up as I thought it would be. How was it that sharing his bed, as platonically as it was possible to be when we were both naked, messed with my head more than sucking his dick? Was it me? Was I biologically wired to not understand how shit like this worked?
Maybe that was why I’d never had a real relationship, but then, if Gus was to be believed, neither had he, unless I counted him being some married cockhead’s piece of arse. I mean, Gus had a nice arse and all that, but fuck, he deserved better than to be some duplicitous cunt’s bit on the side.
“What are you glaring for? Have I fucked this up already?”
I came back to reality to find Luke frowning, worry and concern marring the chill vibe he’d rocked up with at the arse crack of dawn. It was all wrong, and guilt overtook my introspection. “Sorry. Just tired. Gus wanted to watch the last episode of Vikings last night.”
It was the truth. Luke didn’t need to know I’d been obsessing over Gus’s thick thighs at the same time.
And I got my reward in the form of Luke’s slackening shoulders and the return of the grin I remembered from my childhood. “We watch that show. Do you think Mia looks like Lagertha?”
“Yeah, actually, I do. And she acts like her too, so you’d better be careful if you don’t want her to cut your balls off in your sleep.”
“Better than being awake. But I get your point. She’s wild, man. I thought growing up would tame her, but she’s more... I don’t know, more Mia than ever.”
“That’s cos we don’t change, bro. Life just moves on.”
“When did you get so wise?”
I felt like it was a question he’d asked me before, but I couldn’t remember when, or if I’d given him a coherent answer. And I didn’t have an answer now. I settled for a shrug and got to work unloading the van.
It was packed with dusky-coloured roses and weird-shaped lilies, and beneath them were the vintage wooden boxes and flagstone slabs Luke had picked up last night. It was...a lot, and I had zero clue what we were supposed to do with them, despite the fact Mia had told me in great detail the night before. It hadn’t occurred to me that she’d only told me. “What do you mean you don’t know?” I waved a bunch of green foliage in Luke’s general direction. “Didn’t she give you, like, a list or something? A plan?”
Luke shook his head. “Nope. She said you knew all about it.”
“She lied. I wasn’t listening.”
“You looked like you were listening. You had that frown going on that you used to have when you were obsessed with LEGO.”
Brilliant. So my perving over Gus’s face made me look ten years old and angry. No wonder he’d dodged me last night. He didn’t dodge you. He went to his own room, while you knocked out in yours. What do you want from him? A grand goodbye on the stairs every night?
I knew what I wanted from him: everything. But in the absence of truly understanding what that meant, I’d have settled for a goodnight kiss.
Probably.
Definitely.
Maybe.
As if. You lusted after kissing him for years. How long do you think it will take you to forget him finger-banging you into oblivion?
“Billy?”
“What?”
Luke sighed. “I don’t know. I s’pose we’re just gonna have to guess and hope she doesn’t kill us.”
“Kill you. You’re the one who has to go home with her.”
“And you’re the one who didn’t listen to her instructions. Trust me, we’re all in trouble.”
“Not Gus.”
“Right.” Luke rolled his eyes and hefted a slab onto his shoulder. “Because none of this is his fault.”
He strode away before I could answer, but I was absolutely not taking that hit-and-run shit from him. I picked up my own slab and followed him to the stand that was Mia’s for the day. “What’s Gus got to do with anything?”
“You’re the one who brought him up.”
Luke wasn’t looking at me. I set my slab down and got up in his face. “Why wouldn’t I bring him up? I live with him, he’s Mia’s brother, and he’s your best friend.”
“Is he? I’ve hardly seen him since you moved in with him.”
“Because you asked him to make sure I didn’t tear the town
