“Sure. Yeah.” He gestured at the car. “You need anything out of the boot?”
Stefan shook his head. “All my gear’s out here. So I’ll, um, see you tomorrow night? At work?”
Frank nodded and gave a cautious grin. “Don’t forget to save some for the paying clients.”
Stefan chuckled. “Don’t worry.” He winked. “There’s plenty of Stefan for anyone who wants a bite.” And then he walked away.
Chris and Stefan didn’t waste any time. Within five minutes of the conversation with Frank, Chris’s taillights were disappearing down the dirt road.
Geoff put a hand on Frank’s arm. “You okay?”
Frank nodded. “Yeah. Kid hit it off with Chris, so . . .”
Mike appeared at Frank’s other side. “You didn’t get a chance to tell him, did you?”
“Not yet.” Frank shook himself and turned away from the darkened driveway. “I’ll talk to him tomorrow night at the Garden.”
Mike and Geoff exchanged a look, one Frank had seen a hundred times in the past. Though he wasn’t in the mood for much tonight, he was both relieved and receptive when Mike put his arm around his shoulders. “We’re going to pack up here pretty soon. Do you want to come back to our place?”
“Yeah.” Frank took one last glance at the driveway. “Yeah, I think I will. Thanks.”
Mike and Geoff didn’t live that far from Frank—twenty minutes by car further into Kent—and he wasn’t in the mood to face his own empty, too large house. Taking Stefan to the field had been a bad idea, even though it had worked as planned, and he was rattled. More so than he wanted to admit. He didn’t want to be alone with his thoughts tonight, so he followed his old friends’ taillights out of the forest and back to their nice mock Tudor. More bedrooms than they could fill on their own, as Mike had said once.
Frank parked his car next to theirs inside the large garage. He was relieved to be off the road. He wasn’t thinking very clearly about anything except that feisty ex-soldier. Yeah, it was definitely good to not be alone tonight.
“I’ll feed the cats.” Mike headed off to the kitchen, while Frank hung up his jacket.
“Go, have a shower.” Geoff nodded towards the upstairs. “We’ll find a couple beers and start the fireplace. Or do you want to sleep?”
It wasn’t quite ten yet. Way too early. “I’ll have that shower.” Frank went upstairs.
Every room in the house was comfortable and cosy, even a little bit too much so, with frills that nobody really needed, like intricately carved mirror frames and antiques scattered everywhere. The bathroom was the kind of place where the towels matched small elements in the decor, but the walk-in shower was one of the best Frank knew, spewing out a thick wall of water from four angles with enough pressure to revive him.
He didn’t linger, and quickly towelled off and changed into his clean jeans and T-shirt.
When he came back down, Mike had put some nibbles on the table. Cheese cubes, olives, chorizo bites, crackers, and a six-pack of some type of French artisan beer. Mike took being gay very seriously like that.
He settled on the couch while Geoff got the fireplace going, and the natural fire warmed the room in no time at all. Mike joined them a little later, hair still damp, and Geoff managed to peel the three cats off his lap long enough to head upstairs for a shower, too.
Frank held out some fingers to Jackson, the leader of the feline pack, and the Russian blue sniffed at him and then decided to tolerate his existence for the time being.
“So.” Mike ran his fingers through his wet reddish curls. “You are going to tell him, yes?”
Frank sighed and impaled an olive on a toothpick. He popped it into his mouth and then carefully scraped the flesh off the stone. First time he’d stayed over, Mike’s derision for stoned olives had nearly cost him a molar.
“It’s a work thing. It’ll spread.”
Mike slid closer and put a hand on his thigh. “But you want that guy.”
“I do, but . . .” Frank sighed. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter. You’ll see. He and Chris are going to have spectacular sex and pick out the curtains next week. Long as he still works for me . . .”
“You’re kidding yourself, big guy.” Mike touched his head to Frank’s. “That sounded pretty miserable.”
“Oh, fuck off.” But the protest was halfhearted at best. “Can I have one of those beers?”
Mike grabbed a bottle, popped the top, and handed it to him. Without a slim glass with ice or whatever abominable habits he’d picked up from his lifestyle magazines, thank God. Beer needed to be consumed like a goddamned beer, not a cocktail or a wine cooler.