“Maybe next week.”
Luis let it go. Paolo was a moody fucker, and despite falling asleep on Luis at ten o’clock the previous night, he seemed tired. Luis made it his mission to give him as little as possible to do, an easy task with the slow custom.
But still, Paolo flagged.
An hour before closing, he came into the kitchen, pale and rubbing his temples. “Man, I feel rough.”
Luis ran a tray through the dishwasher. “You look like shit.”
“Thanks.”
“You want me to lie to you?”
“Keeping your observations to yourself would be better.”
Paolo grinned a little, but it looked like a struggle. Luis abandoned the dirty plates and crossed the kitchen to where Paolo was slumped over the counter. He rubbed his back, absorbing the excessive heat beneath Paolo’s clothes. “You’re hot.”
“That’s more like it,” Paolo said.
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“No? Fuck. This shit ain’t working.”
Behind the obvious signs of fatigue, Paolo looked the same as he always did. A wet dream of olive skin, floppy hair, and perfect bone structure. But he sounded off. Loopy, almost. Unless Luis’s hearing had worsened in the last two hours.
He tugged Paolo upright and pulled him into a hug.
Paolo resisted a moment, then sagged against him, moaning softly as Luis massaged the back of his neck. “That’s nice.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I could fall asleep right here.”
Luis would hold him up, but it seemed an uncomfortable place to rest when his flat was a short walk away. “Go home. I’ll finish up here.”
Paolo shook his head. “I can’t ask you to do that again.”
“You didn’t ask me last time.”
“Don’t talk circles at me. I can’t keep up.”
“Then go home. I can do this for you.”
Paolo stayed where he was, and for a strung-out moment, Luis feared he’d refuse. Then he let out a sigh that seemed to sap even more of his equilibrium and drew back so Luis could see his face. “You’ll be okay? Really?”
Luis pushed Paolo’s hair back. “Of course. I’ll lock up and bring the cash over when I’m done.”
“You’re a better man than you think you are.”
“You have no idea what I think.”
Paolo started to frown, then seemed to change his mind. He kissed Luis’s cheek with dry lips and left. Luis watched him meander across the road, then got to work serving the last few plates of pasta and cleaning down.
It was after five when he left, Paolo’s takings tucked into his sock. He was still wearing Paolo’s hoodie, but it was beginning to smell more like himself, so he’d have to return it soon. Didn’t stop him burying his face in it, though, chasing down what remained of Paolo’s scent.
Scent? Fucking wolf now, are you?
For once, the devil on Luis’s shoulder made him laugh. He crossed the high street and ducked down the alley that took him to the road behind. Mind on Paolo, he kept his gaze down, paying little attention to the faces he passed. If they weren’t Paolo, he didn’t give a shit. And despite worrying about him, it felt good to empty his brain of all else. Freeing. As if the soul-deep warmth he felt for Paolo was all he’d ever been meant to feel. That he’d been waiting for him and never known it. Luis wore cynicism like a second skin, but with Paolo, sometimes, he forgot.
I need to be with him.
Two hundred yards, and Luis would get his wish, but as he passed the corner shop, a car pulled up alongside him, rumbling along the kerb until it drew level with Luis, and the window slid open. “Brother.”
Luis kept walking. The car followed, then lurched ahead and mounted the pavement. Growling, Luis evaded, but Dante opened the passenger door, blocking his way.
“Brother,” he repeated, lower this time. Dante never shouted. “Stop being a pussyhole and look at me.”
Luis had nowhere to go, unless he wanted to take his chances in a kerbside brawl. He stopped short of Dante’s personal space but kept his gaze fixed on the brick wall behind him. “What do you want?”
“Same thing I wanted the last three times. I want to talk business with you.”
“I ain’t got no business.”
“Course you have. You’re my brother.”
Not by choice. I’m not your fucking road boy. Luis steeled himself and forced himself to meet Dante’s dead-eyed stare.
It swallowed him whole, but not like Paolo’s molten gaze. Dante’s eyes held no warmth, no humour. Just cold-hearted appraisal as he harvested whatever reaction he’d come looking for. “Look,” he tried again. “At least let me give you a ride. Where are you going?”
“Home.”
“I know where that is.”
“Of course you do. Don’t suppose you’re gonna tell me how you got my phone number, are you?”
Dante smirked. “I will if you get in the car.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll follow you all the way back to that piece-of-shit bedsit.”
Hot fury lanced Luis’s gut. In prison, he’d often pictured moments like these, when Dante got up in his face and twisted shit around until Luis didn’t know which way was up. In fits of rare optimism, he’d imagined himself driving his knuckles into Dante’s smug face, dropping him to the floor, stepping over him, and walking away for good. But reality had always haunted him. He was getting in that car, and Dante knew it.
Conversations with Dante had always been a dance across a minefield of unknown width. Every time, Luis trod softly, but still it blew up in his face. And he was out of practice, his senses dulled to Dante’s tricks.
“So, you like your job then? Playing straight suits you?”
Luis glowered past the muscle driving for Dante but saw nothing but a hole where his life once was. “I’ve never played straight.”
“Oh, I know. That why you’re busting hours in that greasy spoon? For the Italian man candy?”
Luis clenched his fists. Don’t say his fucking name, or I’ll kill you, I swear to god. “It’s a job. I need it to pay my rent.”
“Crawley Road? Jesus, man. Why do you want to make that skankhole your yard?”
Because it’s mine, not yours. Luis shrugged. “I need to stay out of trouble. Prison ain’t no joke.”
The scar on his head throbbed, but between this meeting, and their first a few weeks back, Dante didn’t seem to notice it. He fished a cigarette box from the car door and pulled out a half-smoked joint. “Want some of this?”
Luis rolled his eyes. “You know I don’t smoke that shit.”
“Maybe you should. Chill you out a bit. You seem tense.”
As if Dante knew Luis was wound so tight, every nerve felt as if it would surely snap. As if he cared. He lit the joint and blew fragrant smoke into Luis’s face.
Luis waved it away. “What are you smoking in the car for anyway? You want a stop and search?”
Dante sneered. “For what? A couple of weed buds? Brother, you’ve been away too long. Police don’t care about that shit anymore. They only pull you for the good stuff, and we save that for the fiends.”