Page 39 of Dropping Like Flies

When I came out of the bathroom, Griffin passed me without a word to take my place, the shower starting up again. Had it occurred to him we could shower together, or had the thought never crossed his mind?

Much as I tried to stay awake until he returned, hoping to establish where we stood with each other, the hour was too late, the bed too soft, and the effects of a good orgasm too soporific, and I was asleep well before the shower turned off and the bathroom door opened.

The train journey back to London was far less spikey than the one on the way here. We weren’t completely relaxed, but sex had definitely lessened the tension between us. It was tempting to just let things be, but we’d let them be for three years and look where that had gotten us. One of us had to suck it up and threaten the fragile peace, and given that Griffin’s attention seemed firmly fixed on the passing scenery, it looked like that someone was going to have to be me. I put it off, watching the comings and goings in the train carriage for close to fifteen minutes before I finally bit the bullet. “What happens now?”

“What do you mean?”

I didn’t buy the ignorance, the stiffening of Griff’s shoulders, and the spike of adrenaline telling me he knew exactly what I was getting at. Perhaps he was hoping I’d back down. Well, he could keep dreaming. “With us.”

Silence. I tried not to take it personally. He needed thinking time; I could give him that.

Griffin let out a sigh. “I still love you.”

I’d had perps confess to a crime and sound happier about it than he did. I laughed. “I liked it far better when you told me that the first time. You actually looked at me when you said it, rather than staring out of a window.”

Griffin turned his head so slowly my way that I wasn’t entirely sure we wouldn’t arrive back in London before he completed the action. Finally, though, I stared into his brown eyes. “What do you want to happen?” he asked.

Right. Push it all my way. I tamped down on emotion and tried to look at things from a purely pragmatic angle. “The way I see it, there are three options.”

“Go on.”

“Option one. We pretend last night never happened.” No reaction. “Option two. We admit we can’t exist within the same space without something happening between us, but while we give in to our base urges…” My body still tingled and my arse still throbbed from how far we’d gone down that road last night. “We keep it all strictly physical.” Nothing except a blink.

“And option three?”

It was my turn to look away. I focused on a well-behaved dog sitting next to its owner, some sort of terrier cross if I had to hazard a guess. “We admit we can’t fight fate and we fix things?”

“Fix things?”

I raised my gaze back to Griffin’s, trying to work out whether he truly didn’t understand what I was saying or he was just being difficult. It was hard to tell, his stare impassive. “We work on getting back what we had before…”

“Before I ruined everything.”

“Before circumstances ruined everything.” I winced. That wasn’t much better. Reducing Whitney’s death to circumstances would never win me any brownie points. I waited for Griffin to blow, but it seemed last night… the part before the sex, where I’d forced him to confront his feelings and talk about them had done some good, and his expression barely changed.

Griffin shifted in his seat. “What option are you hoping for?”

I shook my head. “Don’t lay all of this on me. I never wanted to split.”

“You get a say.”

“Do I?” I leveled him with an accusing stare. “That’ll be a novelty.” Realizing I’d raised my voice and heads had turned our way, I spoke more quietly. “What I want… what I need is clarity, so I can concentrate on what’s important.” Perhaps a train wasn’t the best place for this conversation, but I’d started it, so I was going to see it through.

“Which is?” Griffin queried.

“The case. Catching Satanic Romeo before he claims any more victims.”

“Right.”

“You’ve been a distraction.” I hadn’t phrased that well either, so I tried again. “Our relationship… us being at loggerheads… has been a distraction. So I need to know where we stand. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for.”

During the silence that followed, I had time to contemplate what Griffin’s answer was going to be. If he went for the first option, then there was no way I could go back to the way things were. Either I’d need to step down from the case, or they’d have to find another necromancer. Or failing that, drop the idea altogether. After all, it wasn’t like Griffin’s involvement had borne much fruit so far. The only lead it had given us was to check out the clubs where Rupert’s night out had taken place, and I was still waiting on clearance to do that. If the DCS deemed it a waste of time and manpower, then it simply wouldn’t happen. Not unless I did it in my own time, and there was little enough of that as it was.

If he chose the second option, it would leave us in a different sort of limbo. A limbo where I could touch him, suck him, fuck him, but nothing else. No getting too close. No thinking that things would ever get back to the way they used to be prior to Whitney’s tragic demise. It would essentially keep me at arm's length. Yet, if that’s all he offered, I wasn’t fooling myself I wouldn’t take it. Because there would always be the chance of it leading to more, to Griffin waking up to what it was he’d thrown away. Option three was, of course, preferable. That was a promise of making a fresh start. Maybe to marriage being back on the cards one day.

“Do you still love me?”

I startled as the question bit into my thoughts. There was no need to think about the answer. “You know I do. I never stopped. I’m not sure it’s possible to stop.”

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