Page 15 of Thrown

Robbie definitely remembered John. John was the guy Keith had met at the gym, the one who had his shit together and had just opened his third tacky tourist shop along the beach in Brighton.

“Yeah, I think,” Robbie said as casually as possible.

“I don’t want to leave him waiting,” Keith said, wiggling his eyebrows a bit. “It was nice to see you again. Let’s get together for lunch one of these days.”

“Absolutely,” Robbie said, still managing to smile.

He watched Keith walk away, feeling like part of himself left with him. Granted, it was a part he didn’t particularly like or want, but it was a part of him all the same.

“So you’re into pretty man-whores, are you?” Tillman asked.

It was just the punch Robbie needed to yank him out of his spiraling thoughts, but it would have been nicer if he hadn’t been yanked from one arsehole to another.

“Don’t you have something better to do than bother me?” he asked.

He intended to go back into the workshop to try again at the pottery wheel, but instead, his body shifted into motion. He had too much angry energy swirling in him to concentrate on mugs. He needed to walk.

Tillman followed him, of course.

“My job here is to find ways for your family to make more of a profit off the estate without selling it or altering everything that makes it unique,” he said, walking quickly to catch up to Robbie’s longer stride. “These Renaissance weekends are a big part of that.”

Robbie huffed. “Next, you’re going to tell me that we should expand them and I should dedicate the rest of my life to production pottery while dressed as a peasant.”

Ahead of them and off to one side, Keith stepped out from the side path that ran parallel to the one Robbie and Tillman walked on. John was there, looking at some of the leather goods one of the vendors was selling. The two of them smiled at each other, then Keith stepped in to greet John with a kiss.

It hurt. He didn’t want it to. He resented every moment that he felt bad over Keith. But it was more than that. Keith had moved on and left him behind. His mum and brothers had left him behind. And if Tillman had his way, everything around him would move on. Where would that leave him.

“God, you are a poor little rich boy,” Tillman laughed beside him.

Only then did Robbie realize he’d stopped to watch Keith and John.

Furious with himself, he pushed on, heading in the opposite direction than the outdoor theater, where he assumed Keith and John would head.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he grouched at Tillman. “Things with me and Keith were done a long time ago. I don’t get hung up on exes.”

That made Tillman laugh loud enough to draw glances from the same family who had heard him curse earlier and were now watching a juggler perform in the street. They glared at the two of them even harder than the last time.

“I hate to break it to you, mate, but you’re bleedin’ obvious,” Tillman said.

“Well, of course you find a bit of human emotion to be ridiculous,” Robbie snapped back. “Seeing as you don’t have a heart anywhere in that stunted body of yours.”

Tillman laughed again, but there was a harder edge to it now. “Weak,” he said, shaking his head. “If you’re trying to insult me, you should go for something other than my height. Like my piercings or the fact that I still live at home.”

Robbie jerked to look at him, eyes wide.

“Oh, that’s right,” Tillman went on with a sly grin. “I’m not the only one who still lives at home. I guess the difference is that I’m just past twenty-five, whereas you’re, what, forty?”

“Thirty-four,” Robbie said, seething.

He could tell what Tillman was doing. The argue, the banter. It was all just a defense mechanism to hide other things. Robbie had seen it a million times before. Hell, he’d probably done it himself at some point. It made him wonder what sort of frustrations and failures Tillman was trying to run away from.

Or maybe Tillman was arguing with him to distract him away from everything Keith and John had made him feel. Maybe the bastard was insulting him as a way of beingnice.

A second later, Tillman shook his head and made atsksound before saying, “Imagine that. Thirty-four and still selling mugs and teaching classes at his family’s school instead of going out there and conquering the world.”

“I beg your pardon?” Robbie demanded, heat rising up his neck to his face as he turned onto the path that would take them out to the stretch of the property that was currently set up as ajousting arena. “My family means everything to me. And I’m two weeks away from filming a guest appearance on The Ceramics Challenge.”

“Ooh!” Tillman said, mockingly impressed. “Isn’t that something.”

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