Husband Material (London Calling #2)(72)

“Yes, it’s just”—for a while he stopped there, leaving me to speculate about all the various justs it could be—“I think in an ideal world, my parents wouldn’t be making such a fuss.”

I shrugged. “Fuck ’em.”

“That’s all very well for you to say.” He half swivelled to look at me. “And I know you’re right on some level, but it doesn’t really make things any easier.”

Yeah, that was the problem. And chances are it would always be the problem. “It’ll be okay,” I tried. “We’re having lunch with them next week, and I promise I’ll do my best to get back in their good graces.”

“Thank you, but…their good graces are not that easy to access.”

And that was the problem too. Actually, it was the same problem.

“I know. But I’ll try. Although if it doesn’t work, I do reserve the right to go back to the fuck ’em strategy.”

“That seems a reasonable compromise.”

He relaxed back against me, and for a while it seemed like we could stay forever in that warm, magical space where all our troubles seemed as insubstantial as foam. Eventually, though, the water cooled and my toes got unattractively wrinkly. And so we climbed up the now-even-slipperier marble steps in search of towels. In some ways, I was sorry to see Oliver shed his still-on, still-transparent, still-clingy shirt but his body underneath, for all his insecurities, more than made up for it. I stroked lightly over his chest, making him shiver, before wrapping him up. Normally, Oliver was a vigorous and efficient dryer, rubbing himself down like he was sanding a bench, but tonight—or I suppose technically this morning—the time, or the bath, or the kissing had clearly got to him because he seemed happy to snuggle dry as per my preferred practice.

Entoweled, we headed back to the bedroom, where what sounded worryingly like the dawn chorus was beginning to filter through the windows.

“What time is it?” asked Oliver, blinking.

I scooped my phone from the table and had a look. “You don’t want to know.”

“Is it try-to-sleep o’clock or pull-an-all-nighter o’clock?”

“It’s quarter to could-go-either-way.”

“Ah.” He pushed his damp hair back from his forehead. “I’ll admit the all-nighter has never been my go-to strategy.”

I wouldn’t say it had been a strategy for me so much as how things tended to work out. “The trick is to push through the one hour when you really, really want to go to bed.”

“Just out of curiosity”—a wave of fatigue washed over Oliver’s face—“is that hour now?”

It wasn’t right now for me, but I suspected it could come on any minute. “Kind of. We need to find a way to distract each other.”

He laughed. “I could run another bath.”

“But think of your water footprint.”

“Is your way to distract yourself teasing me?”

“It’s working.” I grinned.

The other issue with the hour of all-nighter criticality was that it always passed incredibly slowly. I glanced around the room, looking for anything to occupy us. And it couldn’t be the bed because that was a one-way ticket to sleeping through Alex’s wedding.

Unfortunately, while our surroundings were sumptuous in many ways, they were surprisingly short on entertainment. I suppose when you could ring a bell and get a servant to bring you a live peacock and a hand job whenever you felt like it, there wasn’t much need to also keep a Snakes and Ladders set handy.

Finally, my gaze settled on the fireplace, which was still crackling merrily and casting orange shadows over what I suspected was a very expensive Persian rug.

“Oliver?” I said.

He gave a little jolt. “Yes, I’m awake. I’m definitely awake.”

“Oliver,” I said again.

His eyes narrowed warily. “That’s your I’ve-got-an-inappropriate-idea face . ”

I did. I totally did. “You see that offensively posh rug by that offensively pretty fireplace? That’s an actual fireplace with, like, fire in it?”

“I’d do a great many things for you, Lucien, but I draw the line at arson.”

Because Oliver kept relentlessly to a very sensible bedtime, I’d never seen him quite this dazed before. It was, honestly, kind of adorable. I stared at him. “Oh my God. How did you get to arson from ‘We should do something to keep ourselves awake’?”

The slightest pause. “Be gay. Do crimes?”

“I was thinking more…be gay, have sex? You know, on the rug, in front of the fireplace. Because it’s here and I think we’ll regret it if we didn’t.”

Another pause. “You want me,” he asked slowly, “to make love to you in front of the fireplace?”

“Yes.” It came out a little more aggressive than I intended it.

“Tenderly. In soft focus. With violins.”

“Well, I am quite tired, so I suppose that counts as soft focus.

And while I’m sure there’s a string quartet somewhere in the building, I don’t think that would fall within their job description.”

“Fine.” I cast off my towel and arranged myself as seductively as I could on the rug. “Just. You know. Romance me, baby. Romance me hard.”