Page 64 of After Felix
“You don’t smoke,” Max says urgently. He grabs my arm as I stand up. “Felix, please let me?—”
“You must have things to discuss,” I say, smiling at him and Xavier. “I can’t contribute much unless it’s a discussion about how you like to stick your finger in along with your cock.”
“Oh my God,” Xavier says. “Has healwaysdone that?”
I shrug. “He’s a creature of habit. Old dogs never learn new tricks.”
Then I leave them to it, making my way out of the shop, aware of a slight disturbance behind me. When I get outside, I exhale a long, deliberate breath. “Shit,” I mutter. “That was so stupid, Felix.”
After seeing Xavier, and then Max’s reaction to Xavier, my mind was swamped with images of them in bed together, and I’d felt sick. And it had been impossible not to notice that Xavier looks a little bit like Ivo. My reaction to walk out had been stupid, and now everyone likely assumes I’m jealous.
But the worst bit is that I’d abruptly realised how much I’d been enjoying the flirty banter with Max over the last few weeks. When he’d watched me with that old look of intense fascination, I’d felt special somehow. Meeting Xavier reminded me that I am not at all special. Nothing like the presence of a pretty blond man to remind me of the fact.
I stare at the street with unseeing eyes. Maybe this is just ahangover. The blond hair threw me. But it’s not like I didn’t know Max had fucked lots of men since we’d split. And I’ve had men of my own. Neither of us took vows of celibacy.
“So, you’re Felix?”
I spin around to find Xavier leaning against the shop door and watching me, his bag swinging from his arm.
“I’m sorry. I don’t think we’ve met,” I say politely. It isn’t this man’s fault that I’d behaved stupidly.
“No, we’ve never met, but I do feel like I know you.” He lights a cigarette as he moves away from the door and offers me the packet.
I shake my head. “I don’t smoke.”
“You said you were going for a smoke break?”
“After knowing Max for so long, I’m afraid I only smoke crack,” I say smoothly.
He laughs, his eyes glinting in the sunlight. “He said you were clever.”
“Who said that?”
He shrugs. “Max, of course.”
“When did he say that?” I ask, bewildered.
“Oh, about five hundred times during the weekend I spent in bed with him.”
“Well, that must have been very lovely for you,” I say in a thankfully steady voice.
He watches me with those pellucid eyes. Clever eyes. “Well, itwasnice,” he says in a lazy voice. “He’s a terrific shag as you’d know.”
“Hard to remember,” I say dismissively. “It was such a long time ago. Water under a thousand bridges.”
He chuckles, and I can’t even get angry because he has a lazy charm about him that’s very appealing. “Not really. Not for Max.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, suddenly uneasy.
He scans my face. “I mean that Max is still in love with you. It’s quite sweet, really, that level of devotion. He’s like a slightly untamed puppy.”
“What?” If he’d hit me in the face with a kipper, I’d be less surprised.
He smiles calmly. “Didn’t you know? Youmustknow.”
“I mustn’t because it’s just not true.”
“But it is. He spent most of the weekend when he wasn’t dick deep in me talking about you. On and on and on, he went. And then on and on some more. I heard your name mentioned more in bed than God’s, which is not the usual situation for me when I’m shagging someone.” He pauses as if to consider that. “Come to think of it, he even mentioned you once while he was actually fucking me.”
