Chapter 8
Mark
Philip settles back against me again, easier now, not holding himself quite so tightly, and my arm stays where it is, his weight fitting into me with a familiarity that should feel impossible after a few hours.
It doesn’t.
Instead it feels as though my body made up its mind about him long before the rest of me caught up.
I lower my head and press a kiss to his shoulder.
Slow enough that he can move if he wants to.
He doesn’t.
So I do it again, a little higher this time, against the warm line where neck meets skin, then ease him gently round until he is facing me.
His mouth is right there.
I stop thinking before that can become a problem and kiss him.
Not like earlier.
Not hungry.
Just quiet. A soft confirmation that whatever this is, we are both still choosing to stay in it.
When I draw back, I stay close enough to feel his breath.
“Why are you single?” I ask.
He blinks, then lets out a laugh.
“That’s quite personal for a first date.”
I huff a quiet breath, the corner of my mouth lifting. “We left first-date behaviour behind when your hamster blessed my kitchen with diarrhea.”
He groans. “Please don’t phrase it like that.”
“Accurate, though.”
“Unnecessarily so.”
I watch him for a second, the way the humour sits over something else. The way he uses it to keep things level.
“You don’t have to answer,” I say.
His gaze settles on me.
“I know,” he says.
There’s a pause.
Not uncomfortable. Just… deliberate.
“I date,” he adds after a moment. “I’m not completely hopeless.”
“Didn’t think you were.”
“Short-term, mostly,” he says. “Nothing that sticks.”
“By choice?”
He hesitates.
That’s enough of an answer on its own.
“Partly,” he says eventually. “It’s easier. Clear. No expectations.”
“And the rest of it.”
He looks away for a second, then back.
“I’m good at keeping things… manageable,” he says. “For everyone involved.”
I take that in.
It lines up with everything I’ve seen so far.
“You don’t seem like someone people would get bored of,” I say.
He huffs a quiet laugh. “That’s kind.”
“It’s not a line.”
“I didn’t think it was.”
I shift slightly closer, hand settling at his side again, steady.
“So it’s not that no one wants you,” I say.
“No,” he agrees.
“It’s that you don’t let it get that far.”
He doesn’t answer straight away.
“Something like that.”
There it is.
I don’t push it further.
Not now.
Instead, I let my thumb move once against his side, grounding, the same way I’ve been doing without thinking.
“Seems like a waste,” I say.
He looks at me, something flickering there. Not quite a challenge. Not quite agreement.
“Does it,” he says.
“Yeah.”
I hold his gaze for a second longer.
Because I mean it.
And because I don’t say things like that unless I do.
He studies me for a second, then something shifts in his expression. Lighter. Curious.
“Right,” he says. “Your turn.”
“My turn.”
“All these dates your brothers apparently lined up for you,” he says. “Why didn’t any of them turn into a grand, sweeping love story?”
I huff out a quiet breath. “Top secret.”
“Oh, come on.”
“Classified.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It is,” I say. “You just don’t like it.”
He leans in slightly, narrowing his eyes at me like that’s going to help.
“I think,” he says, “given everything we’ve already covered tonight, I’ve earned a slightly better answer than that.”
“Have you?”
“Yes.”
I shake my head. “No.”
He exhales, somewhere between a laugh and frustration. “You’re impossible.”
“Occasionally.”
He shifts then, turning more fully towards me.
“That’s not fair,” he says.
“It is.”
“It’s not.”
“You’re not getting classified information just because you asked nicely.”
“I didn’t ask nicely.”
“No,” I agree. “You really didn’t.”
There’s a pause.
Then he swings his leg over mine, settling into my lap in one smooth movement, like he’s decided this is happening and that’s the end of it.
I go still for a second.
Not because I don’t want it.
Because I very much do.
“Philip,” I say, low.
“Yes,” he replies, entirely too calm for someone who has just climbed onto me.
“That’s not going to help your case.”
“Feels like it might.”
His hands come to rest lightly on my cock, not gripping, just there, and I can feel the shift in his weight, the warmth of him, the way he hasn’t hesitated at all.
“Tell me,” he says.
“Still no.”
He leans in a fraction closer.
“Mark.”
There’s something in the way he says my name that makes it land differently.
“Persistent,” I say.
“Very.”
I watch him for a second.
The way he’s looking at me now.
“Fine,” I say.
His eyebrows lift slightly. “That was easier than expected.”
“I didn’t say I’d give you a good answer.”
“I’ll take what I can get.”
I let out a quiet breath.
“They weren’t right,” I say.
He watches me, still settled in my lap, not moving away, not letting it go that easily.
“None of them?” he asks. “In… what, twenty years?”
“Something like that.”
He tilts his head slightly. “That seems statistically unlikely.”
I huff out a quiet breath. “Probably.”
“So there wasn’t even one,” he presses, softer now, less teasing, “that came close?”
I hold his gaze for a second.
“There were people I liked,” I say. “People I got on with. People that could’ve worked, maybe.”
“But,” he says.
“But,” I agree.
He waits.
Doesn’t interrupt. Doesn’t try to fill it.
I shift slightly under him, my hands still resting at his waist, feeling the steady weight of him there.
“I grew up with a very specific version of how this is supposed to go,” I say.
“How?”
“My parents,” I explain. “They met once, and that was it. My dad always says he knew straight away. That she was it for him.”
Philip’s expression shifts, just slightly. Something quieter settling in.
“Love at first sight,” he says.
“Yeah.”
“And you believe that.”
I shrug a little. “I don’t know if I believe it like that. But I grew up watching it. Hearing about it. It sticks.”
He studies me, closer now than before, but not pushing.
“And that’s what you’re waiting for,” he says.
“Something like that.”
“That’s a high bar.”
“Yeah.”
There’s a beat.
“Maybe an unrealistic one,” he adds.
“Probably.”
I don’t dress it up.
Because there’s no point.
I’ve thought that myself more than once.
He shifts slightly, still not moving off my lap, but adjusting just enough that his weight shifts slightly.
“And what if it doesn’t look like that?” he asks.
I meet his gaze.
“Then it’s not it.”
The words come out steady.
Simple.
But even as I say them, something about them feels… less certain than it used to.
Philip holds my gaze for a second longer.
He moves, sliding off my lap, not abruptly, just… choosing distance. He settles beside me instead, back against the pillows again, a small gap between us now where there hadn’t been one before.
“That’s kind of romantic,” he says.
I watch him.
“Even if I’m not entirely convinced it actually works like that.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Most people aren’t.”
He glances at me, one corner of his mouth lifting slightly. “And you still are.”
“I believe in it,” I reply. “Or something close enough.”
“Close enough?”
“Soulmates,” I say.
The word hangs there for a second.
He doesn’t laugh.
Doesn’t dismiss it.
Just lets it sit.
Then he yawns.
It catches him mid-breath, sudden enough that he tries to stifle it and fails.
“Sorry,” he says immediately, dragging a hand over his face. “That’s not— it’s not you. I’ve been up since five this morning and it’s…” he glances vaguely towards the window, like the time might be written somewhere out there in the dark, “ridiculous o’clock.”
“Two,” I say.
There’s a faint flush to his expression now, like he’s worried it’s come across wrong.
“I’m not bored,” he adds. “Just… exhausted.”
“I didn’t think you were,” I say.
He studies me for a second, like he’s checking that.
Then nods, once, small.
“Okay.”
The room settles again.
I reach for the remote, the fire dimming with a soft click until the flame disappears completely. The last of the warmth lingers as I switch off the lamp beside the bed, the room slipping into darkness, broken only by the faint light from outside.
I let it sit for a second.
“Can I hold you?” I whisper into the darkness.
There’s a pause.
Not long.
Just enough that I feel it.
“Yeah,” he says.
Simple.
I shift closer, sliding an arm around him, careful not to crowd him, giving him space to move away if he wants to.
He doesn’t.
If anything, he moves back into me, settling like it’s something he’s decided on.
That does something to my soul I don’t examine too closely.
I adjust the pillows slightly, then still, my hand resting at his side, feeling the slow rise and fall of his breathing as it begins to even out.
For a while, neither of us says anything.
The quiet is different now.
Softer.
Held.
His hand shifts briefly, brushing against mine before settling again.
“Glad we met,” he murmurs, already sounding half-asleep.
“Yeah.” Fate is a cruel bitch.