Chapter 1 #2
He moves out of my way. I start the van, cringing at the noise from a diesel engine that sounds how I feel—like it needs stripping out and rebuilding with new parts before it rattles itself to death.
Tam opens his mouth to point out the fucking obvious.
That I need to pay Raff, our mechanic pal on Bell Street, a visit, sooner rather than later, but I drive away before he can speak again, guilt eating me up.
It doesn’t feel good to leave my brother hanging.
He’s my best friend. My ride or die. But for whatever reason, this…
thing in my heart, I can’t talk about it.
Not with him. Not yet. Maybe not ever, and I don’t know how many moody Christmases it’s going to take to change that.
So I go home.
I don’t live far from Tam. Not anymore. I leave Stardust Lane behind and drive through town to the run-down street where the only house I can afford nestles somewhere between Esme’s nursery and a boulangerie that sells the best croissants in England, a phenomenon that excites me far more than the vampy girl who serves them.
Sorry, Bhodi.
Though, I’ve heard the baker who makes them is all kinds of hot. The male baker.
Fucking hell.
I turn onto Cosmic Avenue, sunk into my thoughts enough that I don’t notice the blue lights in the distance, or the giant red trucks blocking the road. I’m up the arse of the car in front before my wits return to me.
Slowing, I crane my neck to see what’s happened, but Cosmic Avenue isn’t like Stardust Lane.
Despite the whimsical name, there are no early festive lights, the street lamps barely work, and it’s as foggy as a Parisian jazz bar.
Beyond the front of the van, I can’t see much past a mad long queue of idling vehicles, and as an acrid scent filters into the van, I realise the air is heavy with smoke.
Something’s burning.
It’s not my shitty house, I can see on the doorbell camera it’s right as rain.
But worrying it could be the bakery has me craning my neck to get a better look at the urgent hum of activity at the end of the road.
I slide the window down and stick my head out.
Realise it’s the chip shop and the relief that floods me is fucking scandalous.
And real. Some days those croissants are the only thing that get me through once breakfast is over and I’ve dropped Esme at nursery for the day.
I pull my head back into the van and settle in to wait, fingers tapping the steering wheel, my mind picking up speed again now it has nothing to occupy it beyond the sablé biscuits stashed behind the protein powder I haven’t touched in months.
You’re getting skinny.
I’m not. I still have ten kilos on Tam. But single dad life has eaten into my muscle mass, and I’m not all that sad about it. How can I be when the last time I set foot in a gym I caught my missus noshing off Roidy Dwayne?
That’s what Tam calls him, and it’s as funny now as when my glorious brother thumped that prick four Christmases forward in his miserable life. But the gym thing…it’s a bad memory, one that fucking haunts me, and I’m not in the mood to revisit it.
Not today, not ever.
Merde, I need a distraction. Before anger and humiliation start a new war for dominance.
Emotions I’ve put to bed a hundred times.
And of course my brain defaults to the obsession only my love for my baby girl outshines.
To sex, though it’s not as simple as that.
It can’t be. If all I needed was good dick, I wouldn’t be dreaming of big man arms around me all the time.
Hands far rougher than Tam’s on my face.
A deep voice at my ear, whispering shit as pure as it is absolute filth.
Nothing is ever that simple for me and I’m over it. Is it too much to ask the universe to give me a fucking break?
Apparently so. I reach for my phone and swipe the screen, searching out the app Tam almost caught me poking about in this afternoon.
A swingers app, fuck my life. I don’t have the balls for Grindr. And I still like women, right?
My sexuality has expanded, not shrunk, and maybe it’ll be easier to find a bloke to teach me a few things while he lets me bang his missus.
It’s a good thought.
A logical one.
But it squeezes my chest instead of lightening the load, and I swipe through chats and raunchy pics with a fucking anvil on my heart. I’ve never been good at casual sex, and even the prospect of a dude sucking my dick isn’t enough to make me want it.
Put the phone down.
I want to. I need to, for what sanity a full-time coke addiction didn’t pickle.
But I find myself staring at the screen—at the photo an “adventurous” MF couple have sent my bland as hell anonymous profile.
They’re fucking, obviously. And she’s gorgeous, all curves and lacy underwear.
But it’s not her body that has me shifting in my seat.
It’s him, and the way he’s laying his hands on her.
The way he gazes down at her with that masculine stare, and—
Rap!
A sharp knock to the open window startles the crap out of me. I jump like I’ve been tasered and my phone springs out of my hand.
It lands face up on the dashboard, the screen a bright and incriminating display of sweat, skin, and the dick I’ve zoomed in on.
Merde.
I lurch to flip it, knocking over the coffee I didn’t get round to drinking at work. Grab the bastard and look up expecting a nosy neighbour.
But no, it’s a firefighter. A tall, brawny one, minus his helmet, which leaves his auburn hair a coppery halo beneath the flickering streetlight, the offbeat glow illuminating a sharp jaw and cheekbones so chiselled they belong in a painting.
The rest of him isn’t bad either.
It’s a cold night, but his jacket’s open enough to reveal the muscular physicality underneath, and I just about expire even before his twinkly and kind green eyes meet mine through the open window.
The window he gestures for me to lower a little more.
I press the switch, heart thudding and a face full of heat that isn’t entirely mortification that he’s caught me scrolling filth.
It’s the way he props a shoulder against my van and folds his arms like we’re old mates having a chat.
It’s the smirk flickering at the corner of his hot mouth, as if he’s in on a joke he hasn’t shared with me yet.
“Chippie’s on fire.” His gaze slides between my face and my phone. “Gonna be backed up here for a while. Where are you trying to get to?”
I incline my head to the front windscreen. “Number six. Can I get there if I park somewhere else?”
“Not right now. But there’s no danger to property if you live that far down.”
“Thanks,” I manage, dry-mouthed and raspy, as the firefighter’s gaze slips to my phone again. As that smile amps up enough to dazzle me, and apart from Esme’s birth, it’s the best split second of my life.
Until he straightens, and his arms fall to his sides, taking my heart with them. Which is fucking ridiculous. What am I expecting? Avoir le coup de foudre? No. That love-at-first-sight shit happened to Tam and I’m happier for his Christmas miracle than I can ever say.
But lightning doesn’t strike twice. Not for me. I’m the idiot who gets toxic ash instead of a spark, and this dude is hotter than a mince pie left in the oven too long.
This dude is temporary, and I brace myself for him to walk away. Back to the chip shop. Back to something real.
He doesn’t.
Instead, he reaches through the open window in one smooth, unhurried motion and plucks my phone from my hand like it’s the most natural thing in the world. His fingers brush mine—no gloves—and a jolt rattles my bones.
A brand new sensation.
A wild one.
And it stuns me into a startled and horny statue.
I’m struck dumb as he closes out the swingers app and opens the Google Play store instead, typing something I can’t see, hitting download with that bright grin still on his lovely face.
“This one’s better,” he says, already turning away. “Happy hunting, you handsome fecker.”