Page 217 of Off the Pitch

“Jordan, do you have a Daddy?” Christian asked, and Liam choked on an invisible drink. I threw my head back and laughed, my whole body shaking. I was totally telling Félix about this later.

“Definitely not,” I said. “And he’s only thirty-eight. He’d probably have a heart attack if you said he was forty.”

“Where’d you meet him?” Christian asked, suddenly changing tactic.

“A bar,” I said. “Ahotelbar.”

“When?”

“A while ago.”

Christian hummed suspiciously, and Liam raised an eyebrow. I didn’t think I could get away with hiding the truth from them for much longer, as funny as it was. Christian was bound to figure it out as soon as he took one look at Félix. His memory was far too good.

“Okay, fine. I’ll tell you, but you can’t say a word.”

“Is he famous?” Liam asked. “Like from TV or something?” Honestly, they were worse than Dani had been. It was like I was being interrogated by the world’s worst detectives.

“No.” I shuffled down in my seat and took a deep breath, silently wishing I had a time machine so I could fast forward their reactions to when they’d be sensible again. “Félix is Félix Trossero. He’s Trossero’s brother. Which I didn’t know when we first hooked up. I just thought he was hot as fuck and that was it. And I met him in the hotel bar at Liam’s wedding. I went to get a drink, and he was there… and then we might have gone and fucked before I went back to the wedding.” I said the last part very quickly, confessing my sins while staring at my trainers and trying my best to ignore the two men who sat on either side of me.

There was a moment of silence which stretched out into eternity, while my life flashed before my eyes. Then Liam exploded, very loudly and very quickly.

“Oh my God! I knew he looked familiar!” Liam said, waving his hand at Christian as he began to fire questions at me at a thousand miles an hour. “He came to the club in February! Oh my God, were you with him then? And when did you sneak out of the wedding? ’Cos I never noticed you were gone. Wait, how long were you gone for? Was it just a quickie? You weren’t the ones fucking in the men’s toilets, were you? Please tell me that wasn’t you!”

“No! We went back to his room, you wanker. And of course you didn’t bloody notice, you had better things to do than wonder where I was.” I shoved him, grinning. “And no, we weren’t together when he came to the club. I hadn’t seen him since your wedding. I’d kinda thought it was a one-time only thing. I didn’t think this was gonna happen!” I paused, looking at both of them. Liam was grinning, and Christian was giving me that wry, knowing smile he wore occasionally when he’d figured something out. It was the smile I saw most on the football pitch, when he’d seen through the defences of our opposition. He knew something I didn’t. I just didn’t know what that something was. There was just one question niggling at me though.

“Wait, who was fucking in the toilets then?”

“I don’t know, I just had to knock politely on the door and ask them to stop. I didn’t see who it was.” Liam shrugged, looking slightly embarrassed. I turned and looked at Christian, raising my eyebrow.

“What? Why are you looking at me?”

“Because everyone in this room knows that you and your boyfriend can’t keep your hands off each other for more than two minutes.”

“I’m not stupid,” Christian said indignantly. “Or tasteless. I’d never have sex in a toilet.”

“Hey! Don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. A quickie in a club bathroom can be amazing.”

Christian looked vaguely horrified, and I laughed. “Don’t look at me like that. I bet you and David have fucked in every room of this house, including all your bathrooms.” Christian went decidedly pink, mumbling something about that being different, while Liam looked down uncomfortably at the sofa we were sat on. “See. Now stop picking on me and tell us what you’ve got planned.”

“So you can change it?” Christian asked with a grin. “I still remember the flower debacle.”

“Don’t remind me,” Liam groaned.

“Yeah, well it wouldn’t have been so bad if you had taste,” I said. “I can’t help it that I’m the only one with any sense of style.”

“Are you sure you want his help?” Liam asked, poking me in the ribs. I shoved him back.

Christian laughed. “I’ll tell you the plan, then I’ll decide if I want your help.”

“Your loss,” I said. I settled back into the sofa, affection spreading through my chest as Christian began. I felt so much lighter, free and weightless, like nothing could hold me back. I’d told two of the people I cared for most about my secret and Félix, and neither had batted an eyelid. I don’t know why I’d expected anything less.

Chapter Nineteen

#revelations #thepastcanhurt

Félix

I was starting to wonder what the point was in paying for a hotel.

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