Limerence (Famous Young Things #2)

Twenty Eight

Twenty Eight

Nico

I ’d not known what to expect, what his reaction was going to be, whether he’d just slam the door in my face. Because it had been an insane decision. Made almost the moment after he’d sent that last text. I’d made an excuse about the landlord calling me about a flood in the apartment. It wasn’t the greatest lie I’d ever told, and I’m not even sure they bought it—Porzia certainly hadn’t—but they didn’t try to talk me out of it. I’d looked up flights, pulled out my credit card, and booked myself out on an 8:40 flight to Heathrow.

My father had given me a look that could have meant a whole range of things, but it was, at its core, disappointment. It always was. My brothers and their wives had made a show of being disappointed, too, but Por had been the only one who seemed genuinely upset by my early exit. She’d been too tired to make a fuss about it and I’d considered telling her the truth, but I wasn’t sure it was the sort of conversation I wanted to have before leaving the country, especially as I didn’t know when I’d see her again. Then there had been a weird, awkward goodbye and a half-baked plan for Por, Massimo, and Auro to come to London in March for their anniversary.

But I didn’t regret it. I felt surprisingly little guilt about leaving my family on Christmas to fly into Felix’s arms. It’s a choice I’d make over and over again given the opportunity.

Now, I was watching him sleep, passed out from a mixture of overeating, Champagne, and an intense orgasm.

After finishing a bottle of champagne and talking about our other favourite Christmas movies, he’d let me push him back on the couch and kiss him until his cock was rock hard under his adorable pyjamas. I’d sucked him off slowly and leisurely until he begged me to finish him off. Then he’d taken me to bed and returned the favour.

Now, he’s naked beside me, and fucking hell, a naked Felix Taylor-Brooke is a thing of beauty. His eyelashes long and sooty against high cheekbones, his nose long and narrow with a delicate curve on the point, and his full lips pushed out into a pout. His body is like some divine creation; dips and curves of godly muscle and bone, smooth stretches of skin that are close to flawless. Achilles made flesh.

He’d been beautiful as a boy. I’d first seen him as a bounding golden fourteen-year-old, but that cherub-like form had matured into something Raphaelite in its perfection. Ballet dancers are known for their extraordinary bodies, borne from years of conditioning, discipline, and dedication, and shaped for power, grace, and strength. My own is, at a glance at least, also impressive. But Felix’s transcends that. Obviously, I’ve enough presence of mind to contribute a measure of this worship to the fact I’m in love with him.

But still, he is the ideal. In dance, in form, in my deepest desires: he’s the archetype of perfection.

Reaching out, I skim a hand over his forehead, pushing his hair back from it. Almost always, he wears his hair forward in a tumble of playful brown, but when his entire face is exposed he takes on a different kind of beauty: elegant and refined.

Since I know I’m not going to get any more sleep, not with a sleeping, tempting Felix next to me, I slide out of bed. I’m also starting to sicken myself a little with the extent of worship I’m capable of levelling on someone who may or may not still hate me.

His house—if I can call it that—is a strange old building. A converted fire station in the middle of Soho, which has been transformed into some kind of architectural curiosity. Had he bought it like this? Had he developed it with his own money? It’s no secret that Felix has come from and has a lot of money. I’m not sure if it’s the sort of money that would buy him a place like this. I try to imagine talking to him about something as mundane as finances, or interior design, and I get an odd twist of contentment in my chest.

In the kitchen, I pull open the fridge to see what he has and if there’s enough ingredients to make us breakfast. I’m not sure what he likes, and I only know of four things he’s not allergic to. I’ve seen him eat boiled eggs in practice before, so I take out the box and peek inside, then set them on the counter. I also grab a bag of spinach, some tomatoes, and a tub of cottage cheese as well as the rest of the cheese board I saw him tidy away last night. In one of the cupboards, I find some gluten-free bread. The coffee machine I’d worked the last time I’d been here, so I put it on to brew while I begin making the omelette. In a low drawer I find a stack of wooden trays and set his plate, toast on the side, coffee, and a glass of water on it. I’d wolfed my own down straight out the pan.

He’s awake when I get upstairs, turned away from me as he scrolls his phone.

He glances over his shoulder, eyebrows lifting as he takes in me and the tray. He turns onto his back, and I sit down on the bed with the tray on my lap.

“Did you seriously make me breakfast in bed?”

“I was pretty unserious about it, honestly.”

His face breaks into a smile and he sits up. “You didn’t even get laid. Your girlfriend train you?”

I’m not expecting him to mention Sofia, I haven’t actually thought about her recently, so it comes as a bit of a shock to hear her name.

“Uh, no.”

He doesn’t seem to have noticed my reaction; he’s biting down on a piece of toast as he lifts one of the coffee cups. He takes a small sip while still chewing and sets it on his nightstand. I’d taken a guess at how he takes it. There’d been soya milk in the fridge, and I knew Ava didn’t drink coffee.

“Did you guys live together?” he asks conversationally.

“Yeah.”

I take a gulp of my own coffee as he studies me.

“Why’d you break up?” He takes another bite of his toast.

“You really want to do this? Now?”

“I’ve got some time,” he says. “The entire ballet world thinks you broke up because you couldn’t keep your dick in your pants around ballerinas, but I’m starting to think those rumours are hugely missing the mark.”

This isn’t a conversation I’d prepared to have with him, not today at least. But maybe it’s one I need to have with someone. I’m not sure how Sof would feel about my telling him, but I suppose there had to be friends of hers who knew, and okay, Felix isn’t technically my friend, but I don’t have any of those I can name. This might actually be the closest thing to a friendship I’ve had since her.

“Sofia and I were never together.”

His expression pulls into a frown. “Eh, you were together for five years.”

“Is that a question or a statement?”

“It’s a statement. There are a lot of photos of you together, as a couple. It was like, a thing: Nico and Sofia. What are you talking about, you weren’t together ? Am I being gaslit right now?”

I take a deep breath. “We were never a couple. Not like people thought, at least. We made… people believe it; we were friends.”

Felix is blinking, slow and decidedly confused, half frown still etched onto his face. “Are you saying… Like, you mean…” His eyes go wide. “Was Sofia Wynter your beard ?”

“What? No. It wasn’t... No.”

He says, “A woman who pretended to be your girlfriend for FIVE YEARS while you secretly slept with guys. That’s what they call them, Nico. She was your beard.”

“She was my friend.”

“Who pretended to be your girlfriend for the sake of appearances.”

I shake my head. “It was complicated—”

“Yeah, I fucking bet it was.”

“Look, it was. We went on a couple dates, we liked each other, we slept together a few times. But sexually… it just never worked for us.”

“And so you decided to become a fake couple for five years because …?” He gestures with his hand for me to elaborate.

I take a deep breath and consider how to explain this. “She wanted to focus on her career; she didn’t want guys hitting on her. And we both knew we’d be more powerful together, it was a layer of protection for us both. It was a situation that worked for us for a long time. I never slept with guys, I mean, I did, but she didn’t know…” Fuck this was too much information, I shouldn’t have said anything.

“She didn’t know you liked guys?” he asks, suspicious.

“I told you, no one knows.”

“So she thought you were what, celibate?” He laughs a little at this.

“She thought there were some women… I let her think there were. One-night stands. Infrequent, unimportant.”

“And she was okay with people thinking you were screwing around on her?”

“No, that wasn’t….” I drag a hand through my hair. “She wasn’t okay with that.”

“This makes zero fucking sense, you realise that?”

“I’m starting to, yes.”

“So you were ‘fake dating’ one of the most famous ballerinas on the planet for five years, and all the time you were ‘fake fucking’ women so she never found out you were ‘real fucking’ men? Then what? You both just decided it wasn’t working anymore? Did something happen?” Suddenly, his eyes go wide again. There’s a very complicated look on his face; like repulsion or pity, I’m not sure. “Oh, she found out, didn’t she?”

I turn my head away from the look he’s giving me. It’s hard to stare directly at.

“She found out you liked men and she wasn’t happy.”

“She felt betrayed…” I still can’t look at him.

“How’d she find out?”

I turn my head back and give him a look.

“She found you with a guy.”

I nod. I wonder how he’d feel if he knew the reason I’d broken my own rules and brought the guy home to our apartment was because he’d reminded me of him.

This doesn’t change anything, Sof. I’m the same person. We can still do this.

Are you kidding me? No, Nicoló, you’re not! You’re someone else—I don’t know who the hell you are, I never have.

But nothing has to be any different, I’d said, because for me, it wouldn’t be.

But for her, everything was different.

I’d known for years that Sofia was in love with me. I’d known it hurt her thinking I slept with other women, it hurt her even more when we’d fall into bed together every now and then and the next morning I’d act like nothing happened. I let her believe that one day it might work for us. She’d wanted to believe that lie and I’d known that too. She was right to hate me. I used her. Lied to her. Kept parts of myself from her because I knew she’d leave if she knew. And I was so scared to be that lonely ever again.

“Shit,” Felix mutters, stunned.

“Yeah. It was... a mess. She hates me.”

He gives me a different look this time. “Well, she obviously hasn’t told anyone your big gay secret, so I reckon she doesn’t hate you that much. That would have been one way for her to come out of it unscathed. Instead of the bloody doormat everyone thinks she is.”

Guilt slams into me. “She’d never do that.” I’d heard some of the stuff people said about Sofia after, while my reputation had been tarnished in a way that made it look like gold in some lights. “She’s not malicious like that. She’s a good person, and I hurt her. Lied to her.”

“So she just couldn’t get over that? Your lying to her about who you were fucking?” There’s a note there I think I understand.

“It wasn’t like you and Ava, Felix,” I clarify. “Sof cared about me… was in love with me, and I let her think there was a chance for us. It was unforgivable.”

He looks newly stunned. “Fuck.”

I nod and we sit in silence a few moments before he lifts the tray off my lap and sets it on his own. “Well this is gonna be fucking cold now.” He shoves a forkful of omelette into his mouth and mmm’s loudly. “Still good.”

“I’m glad. Do you mind if I use your shower?”

Mouth full, he points the fork in the direction of his en suite.

“Towels in the blue basket.”

“Thanks.”

In the shower, I think about Sofia. I think about calling her when I get home and apologising for everything. I’m thinking about what words I’d use and how to make her believe how much I regret everything when the sound of the shower door sliding open pulls me out of my thoughts. Naked, Felix steps into the double cubicle with me. Without a word, he drops to his knees and presses a kiss to the point where my thigh meets my torso.

Looking up at me through thick, wet lashes, he says, “Thanks for breakfast.”

“You’re welcome… fuck.” He sucks the head of my cock, soft and soaked, into his warm mouth. Suckling the head for a moment before he lets it slip out.

“Maybe after we’re both nice and clean, we can recreate that diagram of yours. If you can get it up again after I drain these, that is.”

I groan as he sucks one of my balls into his mouth, rolling it gently over his tongue.

“I have a short recovery period,” I get out as I grab a handful of his hair. “Don’t worry.”

“Mmm, well, we’ll certainly need that going forward because I’m not about to carry you through these rehearsals, Savini. It’s going to be hard enough as it is.” He lifts my dick and licks the length of the underside with the flat of his pretty pink tongue.

I groan again, louder this time.

He’s entirely right; I’ve no fucking idea how I’m going to get through fourteen-hour days without pinning him down and fucking him raw on the rehearsal room floor.