Fox
How I had let myself go along with all this was madness. Him booking a hotel? The Kilmartin Hotel? Had I really expected that I would willingly let him fuck me in there? Next door to Angus and Eileen?
I’d been too deep in this haze of everything happening at once to actually think clearly, because absolutely not. He wasn’t staying in some hotel. Not when I was right here, and I wanted him in my bed.
Which in itself was a massive mistake.
“I’m going to regret this,” I said, walking up the lane. Him carrying his bag. Me? Dragging him along by the hand. It was coldbut at least not raining, and the walk was doing its intended job: clearing my head. One gin and tonic and I went all fuzzy, so this helped. This was good.
“Why?” he huffed behind me. I was used to this, the brisk walks, the fresh air and the constant movement. There were no fancy gyms up here; instead, we had hills and dips and mountainsides and ravines. Lakes. Puddles. And one mother-fucker of a gravelly lane known as Cardiac Hill. Noah was obviously an office guy, and he was huffing and puffing behind me.
“Almost there.” I was still holding his hand, dragging him upwards.
“You trying to kill me? I had two pints. Didn’t dare say no to that Angus.”
“Nope. You’ll get used to this, and you’ll have to learn that…no. You don’t say no to Angus. If you can’t finish your drink? Those big plant pots in the pub get a good watering. Don’t say no. You want to be in Angus’s good books.”
“He’ll get mad anyway; I have a car, and I left it parked outside the hotel.”
I had to laugh because this was very much me.
“We’ll pick it up tomorrow. No worries.”
“Fox.”
“Noah.”
I stopped him right there, on the incline. Held on to him as I leant in and kissed him. Because he was there, because I could and mostly because I couldn’t imagine not doing it. This ridiculously normal man, who was just here. Late at night, standing on the lane with his bag, and all I wanted to do was get him naked and in my bed.
Not necessarily for sex, which, by the way, I was hoping would happen, but right now? I just needed to find my way back to what we’d been.
“Sorry about the hotel. It was rude and inconsiderate, making you book that. I don’t know what I was thinking.”
“Well, we got to have a drink?”
“I made you leave half that pint.”
“Don’t mind. As long as I get to be with you.”
“You will. Just up the top here, and we’re there.”
“I drove past here earlier.”
“Well, welcome to Kilmartin School. In the daytime, we have security on the gate. At night, it’s locked with code entry only. We change the code every week because the boys keep figuring it out and going off on adventures in the middle of the night.”
“Sounds like boys.”
“They’re an interesting bunch. Start of term, lots of new starters who need to learn the ropes and the rules.”
“How did it go with that new little boy?”
“Bailey?”
“Yes.”
“He’s settling in. Slowly. Won’t wear the clothes he was given. I still haven’t had a chance to take him shopping, but the major issue is that he hates his room. The housemistress keeps finding him sleeping downstairs on the sofa with the dog.”
“Sounds difficult.”
