Husband Material (London Calling #2)(46)

“Fine. You’re a better gay than me.”

“It’s not a competition, Lucien,” he said loftily. “But. Yes. Yes I am.”

I kissed him again. “I think you’re a better most things than me.”

“You know that’s not true at all.”

“Name…” I was about to say three, but then I remembered the way Bridge had outmanoeuvred me. “Five.”

“Only five?” he asked. “Very well. You can eat a dessert without feeling unnecessarily guilty about it.”

“Wait.” In my head, Oliver had just laughed it off. But in reality he’d gone for it. Of course he’d gone for it. “You don’t have—”

“You have a good relationship with your mother. You don’t blurt out insulting things at people you like.”

“Have you met me? That one doesn’t count.”

“Fair enough. You don’t need a live-in boyfriend to remind you what work-life balance is.”

“I think,” I said, “you’ll find I do. It’s just the other way round.”

“You were always good at your job, Lucien. You sometimes pretended not to be, but you were.”

I grinned. “Are we counting that as one or two?”

“Neither, that was justifying the previous assertion.”

“M’lud,” I added for him.

“Shush,” he told me, getting all stern and exciting. “That’s three so far. You’re more willing to do things that frighten you. And, as we’ve established, you can dance.”

“Okay.” I narrowed my eyes. “Name seven.”

He didn’t miss a beat. “You’re slightly taller and more annoying.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” I muttered. “I completely love you. And thank you for coming today. I know it’s, like, the opposite of your scene.”

“It’s fine.” He gazed at me in that sincere, silver-eyed Olivery way. “I’d say I’d do anything for you but, as a lawyer, I’d never use such imprecise language. I am, however, happy to accompany you to an ostentatious wedding for an unpleasant person. Did you get what you needed?”

I sighed. “Honestly, I’m not sure what that would even have been. Unless you count Miles pooing himself on the way to the altar.”

“Would that not just have been quite unpleasant for everybody?”

“Well, yes, but then years from now I could look back and say, ‘Sure, he fucked me over and turned our whole life into a jagged, broken lie, but he still took a massive dump in his pants at his own wedding.’”

“I suppose that’s why there’s a popular saying: The best revenge is living well, or watching somebody soil their underwear.”

“I mean,” I admitted, “I probably don’t actually need to see him poo himself.”

Oliver glanced speculatively towards the happy couple. “Are you sure? It could be arranged.”

“How?”

“Laxatives in the champagne. There’s a twenty-four-hour chemist up the road.”

I’d heard people say the key to a good relationship was still being able to surprise each other. But I think, maybe, it was an unexpected willingness to arrange public defecation. “We…we shouldn’t. And, anyway, I’m over Miles. Not, like, in the romantic sense. I mean, definitely in the romantic sense. But also in the what-he-did-no-longer-has-power-over-me sense. And I’m not a therapist but I think trying to make him shit his keks isn’t the best way to signal I’ve moved on and I’m now a more complete human being.”

Oliver offered a conspiratorial smile. “What if I did it so we had an excuse to leave?”

“How about,” I suggested, “we just leave. Because I’m done with this, and you’re clearly hating every minute of it, and I’d rather spend time with, y’know, you than a bunch of people I’ve not spoken to in a decade.”

“I see no flaws in this plan. Although we should give our congratulations to Miles and JoJo before we go.”

“Oh my God. You can’t even bail on a party impolitely.”

“Eight,” said Oliver. “You bail on parties better than me too.”

Ideally, I would not have given our congratulations to Miles and JoJo. Except no. Fuck it. I’d made the choice to come here, and I was—if I said so myself—fucking nailing it. Okay, maybe not nailing it. Perhaps pinning it? Or putting it up with some of those little adhesive Velcro things? Either way, I was being mature and evolved and above it all, and if I was now hurtling towards a space in which tradition demanded that I kiss Miles on his smug, beardy cheeks and tell him that he and JoJo looked amazing and had thrown an amazing party, I could do it. I could do it with a smile on my face.

Because none of this mattered anymore.

“Miles,” I said as we entered handshaking, cheek-kissing range, “JoJo. Congratulations. ”

“I’m so glad you could make it.” Miles gave me an awkward half embrace.

JoJo nodded. “Yeah, it meant a lot to the both of us.”

“Wouldn’t have missed it,” I lied. “This is my boyfriend, Oliver Blackwood.”

Oliver shook both their hands with the disarming formality of a man who was professionally formal and disarming. “Delighted.”