“We broke up because you didn’t accept me for who I am, Josh. Stop pretending. Stop making me feel shit I wasn’t worth your acceptance and he is.”
Josh grappled with the churning frustration, hurt. “That isn’t what this is about, Cassius—”
He turned away. “In front of the professor.”
Josh stared at his dinner plate. He’d barely spoken since dancing lessons. West wasn’t seated next to him tonight, and Josh missed his solid, comforting presence.
He looked across the table at Cassius.
He’d thought he was the only one holding onto pain over not being . . . enough. He hadn’t realised the guy who’d twice checked his image in the silver decanter was hurting too. Was . . . disappointed.
Still. Blackmail.
And the insistence Josh come clean in front of their professor was meant to win Cassius points. Make Josh look crazy, like someone she couldn’t rely on.
Laughter rippled down the table and Josh snapped his attention to the present.
Wally banged his fists on the table. “It’s true. Old folk songs were outrageously naughty. Ask our know-it-all here.” He flicked a hand to Josh.
Josh flushed.
At the other end of the table, West stood abruptly, gloved hands fisted at his sides, scowling toward Wally. An invisible warm blanket curled around Josh, and brushing Wally’s insult off became nothing. He caught West’s eye and smiled. He mouthed “thank you” and pushed back his chair. He had this.
“In fact, he’s quite correct,” Josh said. “Today’s songs have nothing on the lewdness of the past.”
The table called out sing, sing, sing.
“Happy to oblige.”
All eyes suctioned on to him, West’s pulling strongest of all. Cassius’s scowl came a close second.
He looked up at the glittering chandelier like he could draw in its light. “This is called A Lusty Young Smith. It’s about a married woman and a blacksmith, and how often they, well . . .” Josh hauled in a deep breath and sang.
The first verses were met with laughter and gasps, and they kept coming.
Six times did his iron by vigorous heating,
Frow soft in her forge in a minute or so,
And as often was hardened, still beating and beating,
But each time it softened, it hardened more slow.
With a jingle bang, jingle bang, jingle bang, jingle,
With a jingle bang, jingle bang, jingle, hi ho!
He finished with a bow, applause making him giddy as he drained his wineglass.
He could guess what Cassius was thinking. Josh was faking this enthusiasm.
But Cassius was wrong. History, music—his interests could be another’s fun. Certainly, they were his.
That pull at his left had him seeking West. Their gazes clashed, and his heartrate kicked up at West’s soft frown. What was the matter?
When they filed out to the drawing room, Josh pulled West into the study. He shut the door and leaned against it, drumming his fingers nervously on the wood as West slouched against the desk. His eyes met West’s wary ones.
“Not your humour then?” Josh swallowed down the lump in his throat.
West grasped the desk either side of him. “It’s hard to laugh when my mind is going a hundred miles an hour. Trying to work it out.”
“Work what out?”
Those dark eyes flashed to his, then dropped to the books on the desk beside him. “Why you spent most of that performance looking at your ex.”
Josh gaped, flabbergasted. “I did not—”
West pinned him with a don’t-bullshit-me look.
“Okay, I did. But it’s not what you think.”
He crossed his arms, waiting.
“He’s possibly not over me.”
West blinked at him. One beat, two . . . “That’s . . . Not over you?”
“Yes?”
“I see.”
Josh cocked his head, observing West’s flattened lips, the way he stared down the middle distance. Pushing off the door, Josh crossed toward him.
“West?”
West looked out the windows, away from him. “So it all worked out then.” He stood.
Josh. Was. Not. Computing. “What?”
“I’m glad, in some roundabout way, I made you happy.” West’s eyes glanced off him and he made for the door. “I should . . .”
Josh stopped him with a palm to his chest. “This is getting confusing. Let me make this much clear. I never wanted to win back my ex.”
Hazel flecks in those eyes glittered. “It was a song about fucking.”
“I was thinking of you.”
“Strange way of showing it.”
“You told me to practice being proud of what I know. Share with confidence.”
“And you did that . . . to him.”
“I wasn’t looking at him. I was looking at the mirror.” His fingers trembled on West’s lapels, the golden pin a cold bite on his thumb. “I don’t need to prove anything with you, West.” His voice hitched. “You already believe in me.”
West’s frown gentled. “So you don’t—”
“No.”
West dropped his gaze to Josh’s lips. “You really sang with conviction.”
Josh smiled and pushed West back to the lip of the desk.
“What are you—”
Josh hauled in his breath and sang again, eyes locked on West. Soaking in every ounce of delight that crossed his face.
Quoth she, ‘What is this so stiff and warm?’
‘Tis Ball, my Nag, he will do you no harm.’
‘But what is this hangs under his chin?’
‘Tis the bag he puts his Provender in.’
Quoth he, ‘What is this?’ Quoth she, ‘Tis a well
Where Ball, your Nag, can drink his fill.’
‘But what if my Nag should chance to slip in?’
‘Then catch hold of the grass that grows on the brim.’
‘But what if the grass should chance to fail?’
‘Shove him in by the head, pull him out by the tail.’
The desk shook with West’s laughter.
Josh bowed.
A short step had Josh between West’s parted legs. West hauled him closer, ‘til their thighs and more were snug. “Why hello.”
West’s lips quivered. “Would you like to drink your fill, Mr Fairfax?”
Josh chortled into a kiss.
West gripped his nape and his arse, and hot thrills whisked through him. He shivered, and lips smiled against his chin.
“Should we . . . right here?”
Josh pulled back and stared at him, scandalised. “On priceless books? What are you, a Neanderthal?”
He clasped a protective hand around West’s and pulled him to their room.
Soft light flooded through the parted drapes. Josh snuggled against West’s chest and fingered the leaves of his tattoo, eliciting a soft, rumbled hmmm.
“West. Mr West. Mr West.”
Muffled laughter. “What are you on about?”
“You said your name is West without the mister. So I’m wondering, what is your surname? Why don’t you use it?”
West’s smile subsided and he rubbed his eyes. “It’s Churchill. For obvious reasons I don’t like what it reminds me of.”