Page 154 of Pansies

“I call it the end of days.” Shelley gave a theatrical shudder.

“Is he here?” asked Fen.

Which earned him one of Shelley’s best “who is this stupid arse I see before me” looks. “Course. He’s in the office.”

He made his way upstairs. Someday, probably, he would take the changes for granted. His mother had used this area mainly for storage, he’d lived in it when he didn’t really feel like living at all, and now it was something else. Something Alfie Bell had made and filled with light and his own strangely irresistible sense of order.

A couple of the internal dividing walls had been taken down, opening up the space, although Fen could see down the corridor to what had been his bedroom, and the bathroom where Alfie had once knelt patiently on the tiles and vanquished Fen utterly with his strength and his vulnerability and a little bit of looking quite extraordinarily good with his shirt off. Those muscles. That tattoo. The memory still gave him shivers. And he was suddenly so very glad that Pansies was partly Alfie’s now. For he’d gathered it up, just as he had Fen, cared for it, and reminded it how to flourish.

Except now he was nervous—or not nervous, really, so muchas fluttery with longing and excitement. In his head, he swept into the office gloriously, accompanied by a brass band, ready to reclaim his lover after too long away from him. What he actually did was peep hesitantly around the corner. And there he was, Alfie Bell, leaning forward as he sat at his desk, staring intently at not one but two computer screens, his long, knotty-knuckled fingers curled lightly over the mouse.

God. His focus. So steady and sure, as though he could change the world simply because he thought it was worth trying. A study in contradictions, this man—his blunt hands and his thoughtful gaze, the ridiculously gym-honed body he had yielded to Fen’s taking—a rough-backed cockle shell, all tender and shining on the other side.

“Alfie. Oh, Alfie.” Another thing that was definitely not a glorious sweep. It was, in fact, more of a desperate scamper. But it got him into Alfie’s ever-welcoming arms, which was all that mattered.

“Uh. Wow. Fen.” This was when Fen finally stopped hugging him. “Wasn’t expecting you for a while.”

“I left David and his snotty new boyfriend2 to finalise mortgage things with the bank. Because I missed you and I wanted to be with you. We need to celebrate…everything properly, and I’m sick to death of phone calls.”

“I knew you’d get the job.”

“I knew you’d save Pansies.”

“Well”—Alfie squirmed a little goofily—“I’m working on it. And, honestly, it’s good you’re back. I could really do with someone who’ll just make bouquets, y’know? Not expressions of artistic blah blah blah.”

Fen laughed, suddenly self-conscious in the purity and simplicity of his happiness.

“You’ve cut your hair,” Alfie said.

“I felt like another change.”

“I like it.” He reached out and traced Fen’s jaw, the ridge of one cheekbone. “No hiding your hotness.”

Fen felt the heat gathering under his skin, drawn there by words and a touch and Alfie Bell. He shivered a little, exposed, flayed by this gentleness. And, strangely, made fierce by it. He slithered between Alfie and the desk, and perched on the edge, catching Alfie by the collar of the T-shirt and dragged him close.

In this regard, at least, and honestly in a lot of others, Alfie could always be counted on to take a hint. He bossed his way between Fen’s thighs, spreading them wide, and forced him onto his back, right across some papers. Which hopefully weren’t important.

“Fuck me,” was what Fen meant to say, because he was very much in favour of that happening. But what came out was, “Love me.”

Alfie made this deep, rough sound, dropping his head into the curve of Fen’s shoulder. “I do. I do. So much.”

Fen didn’t need to reply because there were kisses, all the kisses, and Alfie’s hands were everywhere, hard and certain, pulling Fen tight against his body, branding him with promises, today, and tomorrow, and every day that followed. And Fen came to him at last like a shipwrecked sailor finding himself safely beached on beloved, familiar shores.

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