Chapter 5
FIVE
“I could do this, you know,” Jake said as part of his never-ending stream of noise as Rafe drove them out of London and into Surrey. “I could drive a British car.”
“I thought you didn’t like being on the wrong side of the car,” Rafe said, sending him a flat look. “You like trains.”
“Oh, I do like trains,” Jake corrected himself in a rush, leaning his elbow on the bottom edge of the car window. “I’m just saying that I could drive if you needed me to. I spent an entire summer driving around the English countryside a few years ago.”
Rafe frowned as he made a turn that would take them the final few miles to Box Hill. “When was this?” he asked, sending Jake another look.
“A few years ago,” Jake said with dismissive speed and a tight shrug. “It was before we met.”
Rafe hummed.
“This area is really pretty,” Jake went on, as jumpy and wiggly as Rafe’s four-year-old nephew, Jordan, was on a long drive. “It gives me ideas for an exhibition. Can you imagine recreating all these greens and browns and summertime colors in glass?”
“I can,” Rafe said. He’d often been inspired to create a line of glassware that reflected the gardens and woods around Hawthorne House. He’d lain awake at night imagining ways to recreate the effect of grass and tree branches and flowers inside of glass plates, bowls, and goblets.
That was his problem, really. His imagination only went as far as tableware. Jake was probably dreaming of a gallery installation when he lay awake at night. That is, if he wasn’t rubbing one out so he could get back to sleep. That was exactly the sort of thing Jake would do in the middle of the night.
Why did contemplating that raise the temperature in his car by ten degrees?
“Here we are,” Rafe said a few minutes later as he pulled into the parking lot.
“You have a parking lot for a hill?” Jake asked with a smirk.
“It’s a National Trust site,” Rafe explained as he found a spot and pulled in. “There’s a café and an ice cream shop.”
“Ooh! Ice cream! Yes, please.”
Rafe shook his head as he cut his car’s engine. Jake wasn’t just American, he was a little boy in adult clothing. Or else he was acting the part of a little boy for some reason. Maybe he was acting the role of an adult. With Jake, anything was possible.
“I can’t imagine that British ice cream is better than what I used to make at home,” Jake rattled on as they got out of the car and headed for the kiosk to pay for parking and get a ticket for the windshield.
“You used to make your own ice cream?” Rafe asked as he swiped his card over the kiosk.
“Yeah, all the time,” Jake said with a huge smile. “I started out with one of those homemade ice cream makers, but I got so good at it that I bought an industrial ice cream maker.”
“Wouldn’t that take up a lot of space?” Rafe asked, taking the ticket and walking back to the car.
“I had it in the garage.” Jake shrugged. “Anyhow, I experimented with unique flavors, like raspberry cheesecake and mochi. I used to sell it at the local café. They always wanted more, and I could have gone into business making ice cream, but that wasn’t my true calling, you know?”
Rafe eyed Jake sideways. If his energy was any higher, he’d bounce right out of his shoes.
At the same time, something wasn’t right. Jake was as pink and dewy as if they were working hard in the hot shop. Or doing something else that would overheat them. Rafe wanted to throw his arms around him, but not necessarily to hug him. He felt like he needed to pull Jake together before he launched.
“Where is this boxy hill anyhow?” Jake asked, glancing around as Rafe started walking back through the parking lot to the hill. “What kind of boxes did they make it out of?”
Rafe couldn’t help but chuckle and shake his head. He didn’t answer the question. Jake would see for himself in a few seconds.
They left the parking lot, crossed the road, and there it was, the most astoundingly beautiful view in England, as far as Rafe was concerned. Jake must have thought so, too. He caught his breath and pushed a hand through his hair, eyes wide as he stared out at the vista.
“Whoa!” Jake said. “This is amazing!”
Rafe grinned in pride, glancing from Jake to the magnificent view as they walked down the discreet stairs to the path that ran along the crest of the hill.
“You can literally see for miles from here,” Rafe said, taking Jake off the path to where clusters of people were sat on blankets or just in the grass, some with picnics, some just staring. “There’s a guide back there that will tell you what you’re seeing. You can see Gatwick if you look hard enough that way.” He pointed off to one side.
“It’s beautiful,” Jake said.
Rafe turned to stare at him. His tone of voice had changed completely, and his puppy dog energy was gone. In its place was an expression as rich with emotion as it was with anxiety. Jake drew in a shaky breath as he glanced out over green vales, trees, and a few houses and hamlets here and there. They were lucky to have a deep blue sky with artfully puffy clouds meandering through the sky.
“This is England,” Rafe said, admiring the view again. “Forget London and its congestion and wall-to-wall tourists. This is what it’s truly about. People have stood on this hill for centuries, looking out over the verdant countryside and the blue sky. There’s a peace here that you’ll never find inside the M25. You can feel the calm here, you can fill your lungs with the same air that has been here for a thousand years.”
Jake drew in a deep breath, though whether that was because Rafe told him to or because he was so moved, it was hard to tell. Rafe watched him, puzzled by the change that had come over him. Suddenly, Jake was lost and emotional instead of being a loud, happy-go-lucky American. His blue eyes were tired, and Rafe could practically see the weight pressing down on him. The armor Jake wore was gone, and what lay underneath was deeply vulnerable.
It was hot as hell. He was probably wrong to think that, but introspective Jake was exactly the kind of man that Rafe wanted to wrap himself around, kiss and pet, then pound into the mattress until they broke the bed.
A heartbeat later, Introspective Jake was gone and the puppy returned. He glanced at Rafe, flashing an American smile, and said, “Can we roll down the hill?”
All the heated, sexy feelings that had started to draw Rafe to Jake like a magnet flattened again.
“No, you cannot roll down the hill,” he said, shaking his head. “It’s fine up here, but it gets steep quickly. You wouldn’t be able to stop yourself and it would be a disaster.”
“I know what that feels like,” Jake muttered, so low Rafe almost didn’t hear it.
Rafe looked at him for a moment, wondering if Introspective Jake would return, but that ship had sailed. “Come on,” he said instead, gesturing for Jake to walk with him.
A short way along the path, there were a few sets of benches. They were probably for pensioners who needed a sit-down and not able-bodied men in their thirties, but since one of them under a spreading tree was free, Rafe and Jake helped themselves to the seat.
“Mum and Dad used to bring us here for picnics when we were kids,” Rafe said, crossing one ankle over his leg and stretching his arm along the back of the bench, touching Jake’s shoulder lightly. “I have so many good memories of the entire, mad lot of us, both branches of the Hawthorne family together, chattering away, running around, and generally disturbing the peace.”
“Both branches?” Jake asked, screwing his face up in distaste.
Rafe noticed the gesture and frowned. “Yes, Mum and Dad had seven kids, and my dad’s brother had seven, too. We all grew up together for a while when Hawthorne House was being renovated after the school closed.”
“God,” Jake said, crossing his arms tightly. “That must have been an absolute nightmare.”
Rafe fought the urge to stroke Jake’s shoulder, since his hand rested so close, but stopped himself. “What do you have against my family?” he asked.
Jake’s expression pinched through several emotions as he stared out over Surrey. Rafe didn’t think he would answer, but he finally glanced his way and said, “Families have always been bad news for me. My own family was about as dysfunctional as you could get. I don’t talk to them anymore. I’m sort of in touch with my sister, Beth, but she’s been refusing to answer my calls since I told her I’d flown over here.” Clearly, there was more to that relationship and it was hurting Jake.
“I’m sorry,” Rafe said. “I know I’m extremely lucky to have been raised in the family I have.”
“Yeah, I guess you are, although the jury is still out on whether it’s possible for any family to truly be good,” Jake said.
A burst of sadness and disappointment hit Rafe right in the chest. “That’s not true,” he said. “I might have mixed feelings about being back at Hawthorne House instead of setting the world on fire with my glass, but my family is wonderful.”
Jake hummed. The odd, kinetic look that sometimes came over him was suddenly there.
“I do have some good memories of my family,” he said. “There was this one time my dad took me fishing on Lake Michigan. We sat out in the boat all day, waiting to catch something. Dad was really good about teaching me how to put a worm on the hook and how to cast. But then it started to rain and we had to quickly paddle back to shore. Dad did the paddling while I had to bail water out of the boat with our bait bucket. I threw all the worms into the water, and when I looked, a whole bunch of fish were following us. So many that Dad just took the net we had, scooped it into the water, and came out with half a dozen fish.”
Rafe had no idea what to say. Nothing about the story seemed plausible. And Jake stared out at the countryside instead of looking him in the eye as he told it.
“Mom was pissed when we got home,” Jake went on. “She had to gut all those fish and then cut them up so they could be stored in the big freezer we had in the garage. Fortunately, that thing was big enough to store twice as many fish as we brought home.”
Jake stopped talking abruptly, still not looking at Rafe.
Rafe shifted uncomfortably on the bench, checking to see if anyone passing was listening to them. Then he said, “Is this the same garage where you had your industrial ice cream machine?”
Jake snapped to stare at Rafe with wide eyes. Color splashed his face, and desperation shone brightly from him. “Yeah, that’s the one,” he said, adding a nervous laugh.
He was lying. The fish story was a complete fabrication. That wasn’t a red flag in and of itself. Plenty of people might have made something like that up, only to laugh when the person they were telling the tale to took it seriously.
That wasn’t what was going on with Jake.
“Why are you here?” Rafe asked in a quiet voice, anxious for the answer.
“Because you brought me here,” Jake said, his puppy-dog smile back. “I never could have found my way here on my own,” he went on, talking too fast. “The roads in England are so narrow and winding compared to the US. And you don’t have enough highways to get anywhere. It’s like your entire transportation system is designed for you all to stay home all the time. It confuses me, really. I don’t know how you live like this. I can’t even drive your cars. I’d be terrified of swerving into the other side of the road. I’ll never get used to it.”
Rafe tensed. “I thought you said you spent a summer driving around the English countryside a few years ago.”
Jake froze. He didn’t even breathe for a second. The silence that fell over him was so noticeable that it was like the breeze had stopped blowing. Rafe was still, too, but inwardly, he was screaming and tearing his hair out, desperate to know what was going on.
Surprisingly, he didn’t have to wait long to find out.
Jake turned just his head to look at him, deep shame and sadness in his eyes. Before he could say a word, Rafe shifted his hand to rest on Jake’s shoulder, knowing he needed that contact to ground him.
“I have a problem,” Jake murmured after a silence that lasted a hundred years.
Rafe nodded for him to go on instead of interjecting something.
Jake swallowed. “I…I tell stories,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I’ve told a lot of stories. They…get in the way.”
Rafe frowned. “How so?”
Jake shrugged slightly, gloom starting to settle in on top of the shame that dripped from him. “I’ve lied about how much money I have and skipped out on landlords when I couldn’t pay the rent. I’ve lied to my family about where I am and what I’m doing. That started at an early age, what with figuring out I’m gay and all. I had to lie about that for a long time to keep myself safe.” He sucked in a quick breath before going on with, “I’ve lied on my resume to get jobs.”
“Did you lie to get the residency at Corning?” Rafe asked.
“A little,” Jake admitted.
Rafe shook his head and sat a little straighter. “But you’re genuinely talented. I’ve seen your work. You pissed me the fuck off by stealing attention away from everyone else, but your work is damn good. You can’t lie about talent like that.”
“Glass is the only thing I’ve ever been good at,” Jake said, hunching in on himself a little. “I suck at everything else in life.”
Rafe started to say that couldn’t be true, but he was beginning to get the feeling it was. “Is that why you want to move to the UK? To leave behind a pack of lies you’ve told and start over?”
Jake nodded, but he also sat straighter and faced Rafe more fully. “It’s not just that, though. I really do love England. I’ve felt like this is where I belong since the first time I heard about England.”
“And when you told your teacher you’d taken a summer holiday over here?” Rafe suggested.
“Yes,” Jake said. “I really did pretend I’d been over here that summer. I’m not lying about the lie.”
“I’m sure you’re not,” Rafe said.
He didn’t know what to do with the situation in front of him. He’d been so angry with Jake for so long. He’d blamed Jake for his residency in Corning failing to lead to something bigger. He’d been certain Jake had sabotaged him on purpose. Now he was beginning to see that the only person Jake sabotaged was himself.
“What is your financial situation like?” he asked, trying to figure out what the biggest problem Jake currently had was.
Jake shrugged. “I’m broke. I maxed out my credit card buying a one-way plane ticket over here.”
Rafe sighed and rubbed a hand over his face. “Is that your only debt? The credit card?”
“Weirdly enough, yes,” Jake said. “It could be so much worse, I know, but somehow, I’m not quite enough of a screw-up to have torpedoed my finances beyond repair. I don’t have any savings, though, and I’ve no idea how I’m going to pay off that credit card.”
Rafe knew. He knew what his own savings was about to go to.
“At least you have a marketable skill,” he said with a smirk. “And a place to live rent-free for the moment.”
Those last few words sent a visible spike of fear through Jake. “I’m fucked if your family throws me out,” he said.
Dammit, but Jake’s vulnerability tugged hard on Rafe’s heartstrings. It settled in his balls, too, which was disturbing. Rhys was the closet Dom in their family, not him. Although watching Jake fall apart and needing to do something about it was challenging that notion.
“I just want to start over,” Jake said in a whisper, stopping Rafe’s thoughts from rolling off down the hill. “This is my last chance for that. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me if I can’t start over. I just want to be here, with you.”
Heat raced through Rafe, but it wasn’t just for the implied compliment Jake tagged on the end of his speech of desperation. In fact, Rafe had the awful feeling that Jake could be telling him what he thought he wanted to hear to get what he wanted and needed. That was what all the lies were, essentially.
“You think that marrying me and securing a visa that will put you on the path to becoming a British citizen will solve your problems,” Rafe said. He didn’t even need to phrase it as a question. Jake’s motivations were obvious to him now.
“Yeah,” Jake said, his puppy-dog look turning sad instead of peppy. “I need you, Rafe. You’re the last hope I have of not completely messing up my life. It only takes five years of residency under a spousal visa before I can apply for citizenship. Once those five years are up, I’ll let you go do whatever you want with your life.”
Rafe made a grumbling noise and rubbed a hand over his face. He was going to do it. It was an absolutely mad thing to do, but he couldn’t resist Jake when the man looked at him like that. He was weak, and he would end up with a ring on his finger because of it.
“Alright,” he said quietly.
“Come again?” Jake asked, blinking.
“Alright, I’ll marry you so you can make a new life,” Rafe said with a shrug.
Jake burst into a smile, his eyes going glassy with tears of relief. “Fuck, Rafe, thank you! I won’t let you down.”
He leaned in and threw his arms around Rafe, hugging him tight in gratitude.
Rafe didn’t know what possessed him to do it, but as Jake started to pull away, he cupped the side of his face and quickly slanted his lips over Jake’s.
It was instantly hot. Rafe should have pulled back, but instead he leaned into the kiss, parting his lips. Jake was either too stunned to resist or else he wanted it, too. He moaned quietly and opened, touching his tongue to Rafe’s. Rafe pressed his fingertips into Jake’s stubbly cheek, wanting so much more.
A dog barked somewhere nearby, bringing Rafe back to reality. He pulled away from Jake, glancing anxiously around to make certain no one else out enjoying the afternoon was offended by the kiss. As far as he could tell, no one else had even noticed.
He cleared his throat. “We should be getting back,” he said, his voice gravelly. “We could get a lot of work done in the hot shop this afternoon if we leg it.” He stood and stepped away from the bench.
“Yeah, that sounds great,” Jake said, following him, a glazed look in his eyes. “Thanks.”
Rafe grunted in return and walked on. This marriage was for visa purposes only. He couldn’t let himself fall into a trap of thinking it could be anything more as much as he might want to.