“Keeping secrets from him hasn’t worked out that well for us so far,” I said.
Freddie picked up his cue and chalked the tip thoughtfully. “You’re assuming all secrets are morally equivalent,” he said.
“I’m just trying to think like your brother.”
“Think like yourself,” he said. “If you need to tell him, tell him. But no one got hurt. You needed to feel normal for one second. He understands how that feels. I know I do.”
I rubbed the felt on the table. It was pilling. “Everyone else has real responsibilities right now and I’m spinning my wheels. I feel really fucking useless.”
He scratched his chin. “Frankly I’m a bit cross I didn’t think of doing your trick here myself. Or at least sneaking in a strange blonde or three that way.”
“Oh, please, all your strange blondes come in the front,” I said.
He smirked.
“Ew, that is not what I meant,” I said, but I was laughing.
He gave me a more complete once-over. “Speaking of, is this what passes for role play in your house, Killer? You look like Mrs. Doubtfire’s niece.”
We laughed even harder, and I was overcome with the sensation of having something returned to me, or finding the last missing piece of a jigsaw I’d been doing for weeks.
“I miss you,” I blurted out.
Freddie didn’t react; he just handed me his snooker cue. “Break?”
“I don’t know how to play.”
“Easily fixed.” Freddie began lining up the red balls in the triangular rack. “Knickers might not like this, either, you know.”
“He ought to be past that by now. We all should,” I announced boldly. “I want my friend back. And I want to meet your girlfriend.”
Freddie pulled a pink ball out of the corner pocket and spun it in his palm before gently setting it on a dot on the felt. “About that,” he said. “She’s not in the picture anymore.” He scooped up other balls and laid them out in their designated spots. “It would seem that dating the third in line to the throne, or the second, or whatever I am right now, is not very appealing to a person who’s trying a case against ISIS at the UN next week.”
“She broke up with you?”
He nodded ruefully. “Didn’t want the publicity,” he said. “She told me she’d worked too hard for this job to gamble it on me. Said nobody at work would respect her anymore.”
I whistled low and long. “Damn. She didn’t exactly let you down easy.”
“It seems I am drawn to women who don’t pull their punches,” Freddie said.
I took the cube of chalk and rubbed it on the tip of my cue. “I’m sorry, Freddie. You seemed to like her.”
“I did,” he said. “She kept me on my toes. She was brilliant. I liked the idea that maybe, in the view of a person like that, I was worth being with.”
“You are,” I said. “Of course you are.”
“Not to her, apparently,” he said, and the sadness gnawing at the edges of his tone also ate away at me.
“Well, she’s just one person,” I said. “We are not giving up.”
“We?” he laughed. “Thanks for the support, Killer, but I’d better sort out my sex life on my own this time.” He paused. “I suppose it’s too soon to make jokes like that.”
“Probably,” I said. “But you can have that one for free.”
He grinned, and straightened. “Right,” he said. “As long as we’re in the cone of silence, let me confess that I haven’t ever properly learnt how to play this bloody game and I don’t understand why they show so much of it on the telly. I was only coming in here earlier because there is a stash of excellent brandy in the bar that Father forgot he left here, and I like to save it for special occasions. Like being dumped.”
A bolt of tension passed through us as I wondered, without wanting to, whether he’d come in here on another night, looking for that same brandy.
“I suppose I have you to thank in a way,” he added, aiming for lightness. “I never took women or dating particularly seriously before, but I’ve realized that I want to, and I can.” He gave me a tentative smile. “Can we drink to that?”
I glanced at my watch. “It’s happy hour somewhere, as they say.”
“I’ll pour the hooch if you’ll Google the snooker rules.”
As he turned toward the liquor cabinet, I wrestled my conscience. Deep down I knew that Nick wouldn’t love this. But Freddie