Page 5 of Let Me Love You (Excess All Areas 5)

She sighed and relaxed against him. “Don’t make me have to worry about you, lad. After all this time worrying about Matt and Jase making up. And Luke getting through his addictions. And people not accepting Alex. You’ve always been the steady one.”

“Yeah, well. It is what it is. Can we get inside? The sun’s too bright and my head’s banging.”

Nan stepped back inside, and Ben followed her lead. Her house smelled of cinnamon and sugar. A sure sign she’d been baking, likely for all of them now they were home.

“You smell like alcohol,” Nan observed, a wrinkle across the bridge of her nose.

“We walked straight off the stage last night to the airport via an X-ray on my ribs that cost someone a few grand. Painkillers did fuck all, but partnered with a solid single malt, I was able to pass out.”

Nan walked into the kitchen of her small two-up, two-down Manchester home. “Well, that’s a sure-fire way to win the Darwin award for idiocy. You fell off the stage. Concussion is a thing.”

Ben placed the toolbox on the floor, trying to ignore the way his stomach suddenly lurched as pain fired through his ribs. “No concussion,” he hissed, leaning on the small table he’d sat at ever since he was small. “Just bruised ribs.”

“Then what are you doing out of bed?”

“Because you messaged about your goddamn tap, Nan.”

Nan put her hand to her chest, and he took a deep breath.

“I’m sorry, Nan. It’s just…” His eyes caught sight of the root cause of everything.

Nan followed his gaze. “Oh, Ben. I’m sorry, lad.”

She wrapped her hands around him, but his eyes stayed focused on the save the date card for Chaya’s wedding. A gold Star of David over a splash of blue watercolour. The names Chaya and Asher. Words and details blurred.

He didn’t know how it had gotten to this point, that she was three months away from marrying someone else.

He didn’t know how to fix it.

Beyond getting drunk and blanking it all out again, he couldn’t.

“Strip,” Nan said. “I’ll wash what you’re wearing while you go get in bed.”

“I’m not getting naked in your kitchen, Nan.”

“You forget, I used to wipe that bum of yours. You smell. You’re hungover. You need sleep. Go get in the shower. Take a towel. Then get into the bed in the spare room. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”

“But your tap…”

“I’ve coped with the tap for four days. Another four hours won’t matter. Plus, I want it done right.”

“Fine. I’ll leave my clothes outside the bathroom.”

Half an hour later, Ben hauled his now clean and decidedly bare arse into Nan’s spare room. His laundry was gone, and she’d turned the bedding down for him. It squeezed his heart.

Within minutes of hitting the sheets, he was asleep.

What felt like five minutes later, a loud alarm shocked him from sleep. A look at his watch told him he’d been out for nearly three hours.

“Nan,” he shouted as the smoke alarm continued to screech.

Nothing.

His heart raced. The shock of his wake-up. Why wasn’t the alarm turning off? Nan was a pro at fanning her tea towel just below it when it went off, to stop it. He listened for the back door opening, another of her tactics, wafting in cold air.

Ben climbed out of bed and remembered he was naked. Tugging the sheet off the bed, he wrapped it around his waist.

“Nan? Is everything okay?” He jogged down the stairs holding the sheet around him.

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