“Settle down, Leo.” Heston lowered himself into the vacant chair at the head of the table and crossed his legs.
He was decked out in that carefree, suave and masculine way that Fletcher had come to expect of him. So Heston could be a tad overdramatic, and was considered past his prime at fifty-two, but he was still a handsome man who dominated any room with ease and humility. His casual white shirt was unbuttoned a few notches, revealing olive-tanned skin courtesy of his salon visits to acquire the youthful complexion his role demanded. Despite being less firm than he might have been in his youth, he was still toned and kept in tip-top shape, thanks to all the dancing he had to do on stage. And his beige khaki trousers and red-rimmed reading glasses finished off a well-presented and effortless look perfect for a distinguished gentleman. A kind of Colin Firth, with the floppy mess of ashen-blond hair grown out for the part of Jay Gatsby.
Fletcher was a sucker for an intellectual man with a history of lavish experience.
And, boy, did Heston have experience.
Get the feck over it.
“You’ll break out in a sweat.” Heston waved over at the younger man opposite him, where his black ensemble suggested maybe he worked the technical side of the theatre. “Told you, darling, those slacks will cause a stir.” He peered over the top of his specs. “Leo, here, is playing a straight man in the play so he’s only acting out of desperate need. Pay him no attention and sit down.”
Discarding his satchel on the floor, Fletcher obeyed. He scooted past the ladies to his right and sat beside his boyfriend. Heston slid a hand onto his knee, up to his thigh and settled it there as the chatter continued between the ensemble cast and, if the inflections and tones were anything to go by, there had been quite a boisterous difference of opinion before his arrival.
“He’s a new director. A new vision. And that’s what the theatre needs. An injection of new ideas!” That was Katy. She’d been in as many productions with Heston as Fletcher had had pints of the black stuff.
A feisty petite brunette with a soprano voice, she was a hurricane who was typecast as the wallflower. Her girlfriend, Natalie, however, was the exact opposite. Not a thespian, not a creative in any sense. She was a firefighter with the lightest voice and timid nature that contrasted her solid frame and taller-than-average height. She, too, remained in the background at these things, trailing to a corner where Fletcher would seek her out to while away the evening in solidarity.
“I still believe a classic is a classic,” Heston argued, his hand on Fletcher’s thigh in danger of gripping a tad too much. “No one should mess with it. Imagine a generation growing up believing Juliet was the ultimate feminist.”
“Oi!” Katy prodded a finger through the air. “She wasn’t a berated wife either. She held her own.”
“Oh, darling, she killed herself at the first sign of life without a man.” Heston chuckled into his glass of bubbly, clearly proud of himself for goading Katy once again.
Shaking his head, Fletcher caught onto Natalie’s gaze and offered a gentle smile. She held up her bottle of lager and toasted their camaraderie.
“Enough of the shop talk!” Leo waved a white napkin in the air, then slammed it back on the table to grab a few olives from the bowl. “I want to hear from Fletcher.” Leaning forward, he rested on his elbows and crunched through the green olive, spitting the pip into the napkin. “I hear you write celebrity gossip. Come on, give us the latest scandal, won’t you?”
“Oh, no, nothing of interest.” Fletcher downed the wine, willing the conversation to go elsewhere.
“Give over, now!” Katy nudged his elbow. “We heard who’s back in town!”
Fingertips pinned into his leg, Heston’s jawline clenching.
“Oooo, do tell!” Leo jumped out of his seat in excitement, rubbing his hands together in glee. He was an avid subscriber to the online columns, then.
“Jackson Young,” Katy replied, curling a lock of hair behind her ear. “You must have written about that one?” She turned her expressive dark oval-eyes on Fletcher. “Especially after—”
“Enough of that!” Heston ripped his hand from Fletcher’s thigh and held it up to cut her off. “We’re not speaking of the event, nor the villainous wretch himself. This is a party!”
Fletcher caught onto Heston’s harried glare and mouthed a reassuring, ‘it’s okay’.
“What is this?” Leo waved a hand between the two of them, clearly not up to speed on the connections.
“Oh, didn’t you know?” Katy tried with the innocent face, but even after her years of acting she couldn’t mask the look of amusement that spread. “Fletcher and Jackson go way back. They had a…what would you call it, sweetie? A tussle?”
Fletcher made sure to give her the stink eye for both his and his boyfriend’s benefit.
“Not a tussle exactly. And we don’t go way back.” He sighed, taking a swig of wine to calm his nerves. He wasn’t sure why he was worried. Maybe it was just that he hadn’t had time to fill anyone, mainly Heston, in on that afternoon’s escapades. It felt a little like cheating. Not that he knew what that would be like. Faithful to the bone was old Fletcher.
Didn’t Heston know it.
“I was outside a club. For work,” he explained. “I was there to write up a piece on the Z-listers invited to whatever event it even was, I forget now. Awards ceremony thing. Jackson came out of the club, took one look at me, my credentials hanging around my neck, and recognised me.”
“Stalker,” Leo snickered.
“I wrote a bad review of his West End debut,” Fletcher corrected. Why? He wasn’t sure.
“The man could not sing,” Heston chipped in. “I had to endure that Godawful production with him.” He nodded toward Fletcher who offered back an apologetic smile. “Last time I let him convince me to be his plus one for a work event. Fletcher’s review was spot on in my opinion. Not one person in that audience would argue.”
“Yea, well, it made the fella a wee bitter.” Fletcher winced. “He took a swing at me, but tripped on his own feet and landed arse-down in the gutter.”
Leo roared with laughter, slapping the table, and the others all offered their own subtle snorts of amusement.
“That would have been the image in London Lights the following day, except…”
“He went home and murdered his girlfriend.” Heston’s bluntness caused a rapid inhalation of all the air from the already unventilated conservatory.
“Allegedly.” Fletcher had to add that. Maybe he wouldn’t have done twenty-four hours ago. But, all that flashed through his mind at that particular moment weren’t the reams and reams of articles he’d read citing the same, nor the repeated images of Jackson’s arrest from his home, shielding his face and declaring he had no recollection of the previous evening, nor the continued statements of, not guilty, I’m innocent, I’m being framed that had been plastered as headlines for the days, months after.
No, it was sad, blue eyes pleading with him across a table in a greasy spoon café and begging for help to clear his name.
How was he ever going to tell Heston?
“Who else would it have been, darling?”