Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Sadie
“ S hit, this heat ,” I grumble as I walk back into the parlour with a multipack of ice lollies, our second of the day. Em would have gone, but the phone was ringing off the hook.
Click staggers over to me, wagging his tail, and I put the box down so I can smoosh his sweet little face. “Poor little guy,” I coo, “how are you coping in your fur coat, my little squishybutt?” He snuffles around my ear, letting me know it’s never too hot for puppy kisses if I want them, and then heads back through the corridor to his papa.
It must be the hottest day of the year so far. Our air conditioning is struggling and temperamental, because it’s just sod’s law that it would need fixing when it’s almost forty celsius. It’s like being in an oven out there. The last time I was outside I could feel how hot the pavement was through my sandals, and the air is still stiflingly warm and muggy. I hate weather like this, both as a human and as a ginger human. No matter how much sunscreen I slather on, I’ll burn, and then I’ll peel, and it’s going to itch horribly. I’m not one of those people who looks forward to summer.
Em is still on the phone, her hair up in the highest bun she can manage to keep her neck clear. So I open the box and offer it to her. “Lifesaver,” she mouths silently, and takes one. I got pineapple flavour this time, mostly because they were one of the only types that were left. It’s a busy Saturday in peak tourist season, so not only is it sweltering, it’s packed . People are buying medicinal ice creams in droves, and the local supermarket is almost cleared out.
I head through to Dean’s studio, and he gratefully accepts a lolly, too, as does his client. Eli just finished his last tattoo appointment of the day and is just waiting for his consultation to arrive, so I give him an ice pop as well so he can cool off in the meantime. The NOLA boys are a little more accustomed to the heat than me, but even Eli, who finds the UK cold all year round, looks a bit worn out by this heatwave.
And then I head through to Leo’s room.
“Hey,” I say, “here you go.” There are two left in the box, one each. Perfect.
“Angel,” he says, turning away from his laptop and what looks like a very complex colour coded spreadsheet, “you read my mind.”
Is it weird that I’m oddly disappointed when our fingers don’t touch when I hand it to him?
Not wanting to leave just yet, especially because we’ve both had a busy week since our date, I unwrap mine and perch on the arm of his dentist chair. “No more clients today?”
“Nah, just trying to find an air con maintenance company that isn’t booked up solid. And getting some of the month end stuff sorted. Boring as shit, but has to be done.”
I suck the end of my lolly, and moan softly in relief. It’s so blissfully refreshing.
He groans. “Don’t do that…”
Oh.
Oh.
I find myself grinning wickedly at him. “Don’t do what?” I ask playfully, before giving it another long, deep suck, swirling my tongue at the tip like a porn star.
He takes my wrist, and his eyes are smouldering, deadly serious. “Don’t,” he says quietly.
Something about his tone makes me quiver in anticipation. “Or what,” I whisper, aware that I’m taunting him now but unable to stop.
“Or I’m grabbing you, pinning you to the wall behind you, and showing you what happens when you tease me like this.” His voice is low and growly, and my pussy twitches with approval.
“Don’t threaten me with a good time, Mills.”
“Don’t start something you aren’t ready to finish, Stewart ,” he bites out. My eyes widen. I’m pushing him to his very, very last limit. The air between us crackles with electricity, with fizzing chemistry, and with his frustration.
It’s decision time. Am I going to start it, and cut his restraints loose? Or am I going to back off and leave him wanting yet again?
“Leo, someone called Ariana is on the phone for you,” Em calls along the corridor, making us both jump.
“Ariana who?” he asks irritably.
“Says she spoke to you at the Great British Tattoo Show a while back, wonders if you have any vacancies? Gotta say, she’s sounding pretty desperate.”
“No idea who she is. Take a message, I’ll call her back.” He hasn’t looked away from me the entire time.
“No worries!”
We stay staring at each other for long moments, before he shakes his head and opens his own lolly. “Thanks for this.”
“No worries. I’ll…I’ve got some…tidying to do.” I don’t. My studio is already all in order, with Gary in situ in his cage while he gets used to the place.
But being close to Leo right now, having so thoughtlessly teased him, is making me feel guilty.
I can’t sleep.
Gary can, apparently, silent in his cage, but I can’t.
I’ve done all my usual tricks, tossed and turned this way and that, put my eye mask on for total darkness, and done deep breathing exercises until my head spun, but nothing is stopping my brain from whirring in overdrive.
It doesn’t help that the heat is still suffocating, and my fan is just blowing warm air at me. This is a horribly sticky night, and it’s maddening.
But it’s not the real reason I have insomnia tonight.
Leo fucking Mills is.
I know I need to shoot or put down the gun, as they say. We kiss. We share glances. My skin prickles with awareness whenever we touch now, even if our fingers brush when he hands me a mug of coffee. So I know this isn’t an awkward one sided crush. If you’d told me a few months ago that I’d have the red hots for Leo, I’d have laughed, dismissed it out of hand, and asked you what you’d been smoking.
“That was something special, and I think, in your heart of hearts, you know that, too…”
He wasn’t wrong when he said that. It is there between him and me. Maybe it always was, in some form or another.
So why am I still hesitating?
Because, I acknowledge to myself, if this doesn’t work out, I lose pretty much everything that means anything to me, from my livelihood and independence to the most important friendships in my life – not just Leo, but all of them. Eli and Dean are Leo’s family; Emily has married into it, and I’d bet good money Liaden will follow suit, too. When they’re his family by either blood or choice, their loyalties can’t be axed in half like they would be if everything went sideways, so staying in touch with them would be problematic at best. How can anything be worth risking that?
But then, how am I meant to resist when someone who might just be the perfect man for me so openly and unapologetically wants me?
I have so much, so much, that I could potentially gain if I take that final leap and hold on to him tight. But I also have an unbearable amount to potentially lose if that leap doesn’t go well, and it would make Peter’s betrayal and the impact it had on my life look like nothing .
I growl. Lying in bed isn’t getting me any closer to sleep. I may as well not bother.
A few minutes later, I’m in a black sundress and some flip flops, grabbing my keys to head out for a late night stroll to clear my head. At times like this, being alone next to something as vast and powerful as the ocean is the only thing that recalibrates me by reminding me how small I am in the grand scheme of things. How insignificant.
Certainly not the centre of anyone’s world, and their heart’s biggest wish.
Foxton-on-Sea is a tourist trap for a reason. Vast, clean beaches, gorgeous and colourful architecture, one of the largest conservation aquariums in the country, and an unrivalled pier with arcades and rollercoasters aplenty. But it’s easy to forget that, under the glitz and the tourism friendly holiday lets and shops, it’s home to so many. My family moved here when I was seven, and I can’t remember living anywhere else because nowhere else compares. As I walk across the front, listening to the roar of the waves and smelling the still, salty air, I know in my bones that I will never live anywhere else. I will spend all my days here, and when I die my remains will be scattered off the pier like so many others. And I’m happy with that.
This nighttime stroll in my comfortable home town is my only chance to be able to think clearly again so I can make a sensible and smart decision instead of one guided entirely by the contents of my knickers. My vag seems perfectly content to throw all our years of friendship into the sea so she can get on…what did I call it that time when I was drunk as a skunk? ‘The Leo Mills Wonderdick’, or something stupid like that. But he means too much to me to let her just do that without thinking it through.
My brain has a one track mind, because I’m walking to Angus and Lucinda’s bench before I’m aware I’m heading there. It’s an uphill journey, and that, with the stone steps, has me winded and sweating in the balmy night air.
But when I get there, someone’s already sitting in our seat.
Rats.
It’s a man, lean and angular, with hawk-like features and messy auburn hair. He has what would be called ‘resting bitch face’ on a woman as he stares out at the sea like it slapped his mother. I take a step backwards, wondering where to go instead, when he turns and looks at me. His expression lightens, and he stands. “Sorry. Didn’t expect anyone to come here at this time of night.” He has a wonderful Scottish burr.
“It’s fine,” I say quickly, “it’s…well, it’s everyone’s seat.”
He offers me a tentative smile. “True, and that being the case…feel free to join me on it?”
He seems pleasant enough, and if he ends up being a creep, I feel confident I have enough krav maga training to be able to deal with him.
“OK.” We sit at opposite ends of the bench, both of us gazing out at the waves crashing against the barriers, both of us with folded arms as an awkward silence dances between us.
“Is this your ‘place to think’, too?” he murmurs finally.
One corner of my mouth pulls up. “It’s certainly becoming it.”
“Mine too. Something about that plaque just speaks to me. ‘Lucinda and Angus’. I wonder who they were, and what they were like?”
I smile to myself. I’m going to keep their secret.
“I bet you anything they’d get a kick out of this,” I observe. “People using their bench to think about life and get their heads on straight.”
He turns to me. “Want to talk about it?”
I think for a long moment. Talking to a stranger, someone who doesn’t know me or Leo and so doesn’t have a vested interest in the outcome, is irresistible. And yet… “I hardly know where to begin.”
“That’s alright. I’ve got nowhere else to be.” His face, so sharp when I first saw him, is now warmer. Kinder.
I narrow my eyes. “Nor have I, so feel free to spill your guts, as well.”
He considers it, and then nods. “Deal.”
I gently laugh. “Guess we could both use a stranger’s perspective.”
“Which reminds me,” he says, holding out his hand for me to shake, “where are my manners. David.”
I take it. “Sadie.”
“OK, Sadie, do you want to go first, or shall I?”
I study his face. He has this strange mix of stoicism and a sense of being…lost. Adrift. His eyes are tired, and his mouth is tight. This is a man who needs to offload. “You go.”
“I was afraid you’d say that,” he says, a wry twist to his mouth as he looks out over the sea again. There’s the faintest breeze, and it feels wonderful against my still clammy face. He thinks a bit, and then sighs. “Her name is Hannah.”
“Ah.” We’re both kindred spirits, then. Both preoccupied with specific people.
“She recently came back into my life, and it’s been… Christ, it’s been wonderful. She’s got me all twisted up, but I don’t even mind it. I haven’t felt this way in…ever. She’s fascinating and changing my life in so many ways and I can’t stop thinking about her. But…” He wipes his hand over his face. “It couldn’t be more complicated.”
“OK, start at the beginning,” I invite.
“At the very beginning?” I nod. “I first met her when she was sixteen.” He pinches the bridge of his nose, and seems uncomfortable, almost embarrassed. “I was her teacher.”
“Oh.” I look at him, and guess he’s in his mid to late thirties, or thereabouts. “And you said she came back into your life recently…how old is she now?” Please let her be older than teenaged…
“Twenty five.”
“Oh, well, that’s alright then,” I say, waving my hand.
He looks at me, smiling and frowning at the same time. “You what?”
“She’s an adult. You’re an adult. I’m guessing your age gap is, what, ten years? Fifteen, max? And I’m imagining you didn’t get up to anything…you know…sick and inappropriate that I should punch you for when she was still your student?”
“Absolutely not,” he says firmly. “It’s enough of a moral transgression that I love her now . Just that is eating me alive. I would never, ever have done this back then.”
“Then I don’t see any insurmountable problem. You just said you love her. That’s what matters.”
He is silent for ages while he mulls over my words, looking taken aback at everything that’s passed between his lips as well as my own. “Your turn,” he says suddenly in his Scots staccato, clearly in need of a subject change.
And he listens patiently as a priest as I let it all come tumbling out, with the intense relief of a primal scream, leaving nothing unsaid. All the times I’ve remembered Leo being wonderful to me over the years that now have me screaming at myself for not noticing that he did it for love. My dead horse of a relationship with Peter. The wedding. My spontaneous kiss that snowballed into a hungover confession from Leo the next morning, and how mixed up I’ve felt ever since. How I’m torn between my heart, which wants to take a chance with the person I trust most in the whole world, and my head, who is terrified of what life would be like if I lost that same person.
“Can I just get you to revisit something you said a moment ago?” He gestures a little as he talks. “You have a twin , I think you said, right?”
“Yes.” I mentioned Tim’s thoughts and advice while I spoke.
“And from what I understand, twin relationships are generally unbreakable and strong as iron, true?”
“Very true. Tim is like another part of myself,” I confirm.
“And you just called Leo the person you trust most in the whole world.” He gives me a meaningful look. “Not your twin. Leo .”
“That…I didn’t…” Oh, fuck, he’s right. I did say that. And, what’s more, I wasn’t lying. I meant it.
I meant it.
“I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” he says kindly. “Don’t create problems where there are none. It’d be such a tragic waste. He loves you. And the way you’ve described him…if you don’t already love him back, you’re well on your way to it. And sometimes, things work out. I’ve got a gut feeling this is one of those times. Or will be, if you stop overthinking and getting in your own way.”
Well, shit.
Suddenly, it’s like a fever breaks, and I can breathe freely again. Maybe I am overcomplicating things. Maybe it really is as simple as David-the-usefully-astute-stranger makes it sound.
Maybe Leo deserves someone who isn’t just dipping her toe in, someone who will look at his heart, which he offered me freely with no conditions, and grab it with both hands. And hand him her own in return so his chest doesn’t remain empty.
“Physician heal thyself,” I mutter, my innate defensiveness kicking in.
“You reckon?” He doesn’t take my tone to heart. It’s as though he gets it, and moreover, is genuinely considering what I’m saying.
“Definitely. Don’t let how you first met get in the way of what could be the right thing for you both. That would also be a criminal waste.”
He chuckles. “God, we’re a right pair.”
Impulsively, I reach over and hug him hard. He’s startled, but recovers quickly, gently patting my arm at first, and then hugging me back.
“You’re not doing anything wrong. Go be happy with your Hannah,” I whisper, before stepping back. “Thanks so much for your perspective.”
“You too.” He nods towards the staircase. “Are you off?”
“Yep.”
“To go and be happy with your Leo?”
“Yep.”
“Then stop wasting time speaking to me and bugger off,” he smiles.
And I do. I run almost all the way home, oppressive heat be damned, so I can grab my car keys and go do what I should have done fucking ages ago.