London, not a fucking unicorn.”
“You might as well be a unicorn to me,” he says.
“What?”
He puts his drink down. “Ask me when I packed up the booze.” He pauses. “Ask me when I packed up the random men.”
I swallow hard, panicking. “No.”
“You must know when,” he says loudly. “Come on, Felix, think. It was June the eighteenth at a barbeque.”
I look at him in consternation. “But that was… That was the day Carl and I finished.”
He sits back in his chair, his face harsh with an emotion that looks like disappointment. “You remember him finishing it that well?”
“Not for that reason,” I scoff.
Max’s shoulders become less rigid.
“He threw a hotdog in my face, Max,” I explain. “It’s not something I’d forget. Especially as I got mustard in my eye. That stuff stings.”
I do remember it. Not because of Carl, but because Max had brought some bloke with him. A thin redhead who had hung on his arm and laughed at everything he said. It had been like nails down a blackboard, and I’d almost welcomed Carl’s final temper tantrum which had come when he accused me of only watching Max all day.
He watches me, his dark, clever eyes busy. “I remember,” he says. “And when he finished it, I went home and poured all my booze away and deleted the Grindr app.”
“Why did you do that?” I ask in a small voice.
“I had to stop because I realised one thing that day.”
“What?”
“That I wasn’t getting you back by drowning myself in booze and men.”
“Oh my God, Max.” I push my hands through my hair and hang them on the back of my neck. “You can’t say things like that.”
“I haven’t been able to before, but I have to now.”
“Why? Because I’m your prisoner,” I burst out. My heart is pounding heavily, and I’m almost lightheaded with the desire to go to him, to let him sweep me back into his world.
And that’s the tragedy of us. The sex was incendiary, but it was never anything else to Max. I’m abruptly furious with him for making me think otherwise for even a second.
“I don’t want to talk about this,” I say in a warning voice.
For once he doesn’t force the issue. He watches me with sharp eyes, and maybe he reads the exhaustion that suddenly weighs me down because he inclines his head and says gently, “As you wish.”
I grimace. “And now you’re Princess Bride-ing me. It’s not fair. I can’t concentrate around you, Max. I have never been able to. You make my head dizzy. You always have.” I bite my lip and feel my cheeks burning. Never in a million years had I meant to confess that.
He scrutinizes me and something that looks suspiciously like happiness settles on his face.
“Ugh!” I groan. “Why do you look so happy?”
“Never mind,” he says carelessly. “Let’s get some sleep.”
I eye him. “I need to get undressed.” His eyes kindle, and I shake my head. “Turn around,” I instruct him. “And don’t peep.”
“I’m not fourteen. I don’t peep,” he says in a disgusted voice. I make a spinning gesture with my fingers, and he obeys with a huff.
“Tell me when you’re done,” he says. There’s a long pause. “But tell me immediately and not when you’ve been in bed for a few hours.”
I laugh because he knows me so well. I quickly strip off my suit, pulling on pyjama shorts and a T-shirt and opening the cubicle to get my toothbrush.
“You can look now,” I say with a mouthful of toothpaste.
He turns and directs a heated glance at my body. I shake my head. “I feel like a piece of steak being eyed up by a dog,” I say, turning to spit out the toothpaste.
“You’d be fillet, my darling.”
“Don’t call me that,” I start to say, but the words die away when I see him taking his clothes off. Unlike me, he shows no modesty at all stripping casually until he’s down to his skin. I swallow hard. His sleek tanned skin.
“Alright?” he asks, pulling on a pair of pyjama shorts very slowly.
“Fine,” I say quickly. “Why?”
“You’ve got a bit of something there,” he says, pointing at my chin.
I raise my fingers. “What is it? Toothpaste?”
He winks. “No, it’s drool.”
I shake my head as he laughs. “Twat,” I say with great feeling.
We climb into our bunks, and I smile at his huffing and muttering. “Are you comfortable down there?” I shout.
“Felix, I’m about a foot underneath you. Not two miles away. There’s no