Page 66 of Crave

So when I finished the job and came back to my car around one in the morning, the last thing I expected was to find him there. Head bowed, shoulders hunched in the rain, leaning on the back door of my Audi as if it was the only thing holding him up. For a second, I thought it was a trick of the dark. Then he lifted his head, and the streetlight caught his face, fine rain drifting down to distort his features. Fuck, he was a handsome bastard. A pretty, beautiful thing sent to test me.

Tristan Hale-Fitzroy.

Did I know what that name meant?

No, course not. I had a feeling I was meant to find out.

And my stomach did a stupid little twist, traitor that it was. It didn’t matter that my hands still smelt of blood and diesel. Or what was in the bag slung over my shoulder. Seeing him there, dripping rain, hair stuck to his forehead, lips parted as if he’d been holding his breath, hit something in me I didn’t want to know was there.

I hated that.

Because I knew what he was. A risk. A weakness. Temptation getting men like me killed. He was everything I couldn’t afford to want. Clean. Golden. Out of reach. Beauty that didn’t belong anywhere near my world. And I’d already spent too long lying to myself that wanting him didn’t matter.

And yeah, okay, Lennon had tried to give me an out earlier. Told me I still had choices. That I could still take the things I’d always wanted. Maybe I could have once. But I was too far gone now. Too deep in the dirt, too soaked in filth that would stain him forever, to even entertain the fantasy of someone like him waiting for me in the rain.

Whether I cared about that… that was a fight for another time.

I approached him. He stirred, head tilting up, eyes glassy under the amber glow of the streetlamp. I took a drag from the half-smoked cigarette bobbing between my lips, then clutched it between my fingers and dropped it to the ground to crush it under my heel. I then opened the car door, shoving the bag inside, all the while his gaze stayed on me. Questioning, maybe. A little scared, too.

I blew out the last curl of smoke, watched it vanish between us.

Tristan gave me a weak smile before dropping his head again, hiding that too-pretty face from me.

So I stepped closer, close enough to smell the rain off his skin, and hooked a finger under his chin, tilting it up. “You’re soaked.”

“The car was locked.”

“You could’ve gone home.”

“Yeah. I could’ve.”

“Probably should’ve.”

“Yeah.”

I let my hand fall, exhaling a slow, heavy breath. Christ, I shouldn’t have cared. Not about him. Not about anyone. But there he was, standing in the rain for me. And the thought of him choosing this cold, wet, filthy gap over the polished sanctuaries where he belonged lit a stupid, ugly heat in my chest.

Hope and self-loathing knotted together.

“Sorry you had to see that.” I meant it.

Because I hadn’t wanted him to. The blood. The rage. Nor to get a real taste of what I was beneath the swagger. I wasn’t some noble avenger cleaning up the streets. I was a thug. White-trash muscle keeping order where I had no real power. Proving, for anyone watching, that I was exactly what the world had decided men like me were from the moment we’re born into the council estate.

“Guess I would’ve seen it eventually.” He sighed, breath fogging in the air. “Should’ve seen it sooner.”

For a beat my chest clenched, because I’d been talking about me. Sorry that he had to be brought face to face into my world. But the truth slid over me cold and sharp: he was talking about the video. The thing mattering to him was the proof of his boyfriend’s betrayal, not the junk I hauled in bags or the cut marks on my knuckles. He didn’t care who I was. I didn’t matter to him. It should have been a relief.

Instead, it hollowed me out.

“What did you do to him?” Tristan’s voice was small, braced.

“What needed doing.” The words were flat, practiced, sounding better in my mouth than the truth.

He nodded, eyes dropping back to the ground. In that small motion he accepted what I’d told him, and I realised I’d given him the reason he should’ve walked away from my car and never looked back. I hadn’t pulled him in. Hadn’t even asked him to stay. But the truth was, I hadn’t finished Ollie. I’d held back. More than I would have for someone who’d crossed me and badmouthed me and thought they could get one over on me. Because of this pretty thing in front of me. Because of this soft, ridiculous pull making me pause when I should’ve finished the job, I’d let the danger live.

“Is the debt paid?” he asked.

“Yes.” In both cash and information.