“But lasagne was so much easier?” He shook his head at her and took a seat at her breakfast bar, watching her dish up their tea.
“No, but I’d had enough cooking by then.” She shoved a plate in front of him. “Shut up and eat. Then you can tell me all about your week of sex and debauchery.”
Henry choked on his drink for the second time that day.
Of course she waited until he’d taken a sip of water.
Before he could retaliate, his phone buzzed in his pocket with a text message, and he almost knocked his glass over in his haste to read it.
It wasn’t from Dom, and he let out a small huff of disappointment, setting his phone on the worktop next to him.
Ella watched it all with a raised eyebrow.
Henry picked up his cutlery, knowing she was going to be asking all sorts of questions now. “After we’ve eaten,” he muttered.
But eating in silence made him far more uneasy than having Ella grilling him about it all, so ten minutes into their meal, he pulled up his recent message thread with Dom and shoved his phone at her.
“He friend-zoned me and I’m not sure how to get out of it.”
Ella skimmed through their texts, brow getting more furrowed as she read. “Oh,” she said, setting his phone back down.
“Oh? What does that mean?”
“Nothing.” She gestured to his phone. “I mean, at least he’s replying to your messages.”
“But?”
“But considering you just shared a week of torrid sex—”
Henry snorted. “Just say we spent the week together. You’re making it sound ridiculous.”
She smirked at him. “Was the sex not torrid and debauched, Henry? Is that why you’re now his bestie instead of his lover.”
“The sex was fine.”
“Fine?”
He threw his hands in the air. “Oh my god, yes, the sex was hot and awesome and definitely not the reason why he’s sending me Christmas jumper pics instead of—” He clamped his lips together.
“Dick pics?” She ventured, laughing. “Is that what you want him to send you?”
“No, of course not.”
Maybe?Henry shifted on his stool, ignoring the curl of heat in his belly at the thought of Dom’s dick.
“Mm-hmm.” Ella stood and cleared their plates away, waving Henry to sit back down when he went to help her. “How did you leave things between you? Did you talk about meeting up again?”
“Not exactly.” Henry recounted their awkward moment in the car park, cringing at his inability to simply tell Dom what he wanted.
She passed him a beer from the fridge and patted his shoulder. “I don’t know what to say.”
“That’ll be a first.” Henry suspected it was more like she didn’t know what to say without confirming his fear that Dom wasn’t interested in seeing him again. At least not in the way they’d seen each other the week before. “You don’t have to be diplomatic.”
She laughed at him, nudging his shoulder as she took her seat next to him. “Since when have I ever been diplomatic?”
He tipped his beer at her. “Good point.”
“It’s just, you said the week was great, right?”
