Calum let his gaze drop back to the damp concrete he’d been staring at since he’d discovered that Rob had cleared out their joint bank accounts, rendering his debit card—his only card—totally fucking useless. With no phone and no money, and nowhere to run, Calum was stranded. And drunk.
Very drunk.
“Calum.”
Brix’s ghost spoke again. Calum ignored it as a phantom hand, darkly inked with familiar pirate tattoos, closed around his, squeezing, shaking, and punctuating every utterance of his name.
“Calum. Dude. Anyone home?”
Nope. Even if Brix had been real, Calum definitely wasn’t home, because home was where Rob was fucking someone else in his bed. Bastard.
The ghost stood and disappeared. Calum mourned the loss of its warming touch, but was mostly relieved that his sanity had only been briefly questionable. Then the world tilted and the phantom hand returned, grasping Calum’s arm and hoisting it over a set of slim shoulders that were far too bony to be a dream. “Is it really you?”
“Depends who you think I am,” Brix said. “If you call me Cunty-Bastard-Rob again, I’m gonna bloody deck you.”
Cunty-Bastard-Rob. Calum let out a strangled giggle as the half litre of rum he’d drunk on the train threatened to make an abrupt reappearance. “Rob is a cunty bastard.”
“I’m sure he is. Don’t explain why you’re all banged up and trashed on a rusty bench, though, does it?”
Calum touched the slight swelling on his face and supposed it didn’t, but though Brix had pointed the wound out, he didn’t appear to be asking for an explanation. “What are you doing here? Thought you were dead or some shit.”
“Close, mate, close. Been a long time, eh?”
“Yes.” Calum thought hard, searching his rum-riddled mind for any clue as to exactly how long it had been since he’d last seen Brix Lusmoore, but as he stared at the blue-grey eyes he’d often pictured in his dreams, he honestly had no idea. All he remembered was waking up in London one morning to the news that Brix had packed his stuff from the flat he’d shared with a mutual friend and disappeared into thin air. “Brix?”
“It’s me, Cal.”
Cal. Brix was the only soul on earth who’d ever been able to shorten Calum’s name without making his teeth itch. “Where’ve you been?”
“I’ve been right here.”
Brix’s textured gaze was off. Calum was missing something—years of something—but his brain and mouth didn’t feel connected, and his only response was a nonsensical grunt.
Brix didn’t seem to notice, apparently too preoccupied with keeping Calum upright. The absurdity of the scene almost made Calum laugh again, but he didn’t. He stared at Brix, and as he absorbed that Brix wasn’t a hallucination born of too much rum and not enough sleep, his equilibrium deserted him. He lurched sideways, despite Brix’s hold on him, and for a terrifying moment believed he would fall.
He braced himself for impact, perversely craving it, like the pain of his bones slamming into the concrete would erase the sting of Rob’s betrayal. But he didn’t fall. Brix held firm, and as he guided Calum away from the bench to a nearby van, Calum realised that this was what he remembered most about Brix—not his shaggy, dirty-blond hair, awesome ink, or hypnotic gaze, but the subtle strength in his lanky arms. Strength that had made Calum feel safe from the moment they’d met in London all those years ago.
Brix deposited Calum in the passenger seat of the battered van. “Where’s your stuff?”
“What stuff?”
“Your things. You gotta bag?”
Calum shook his head. “Nope.”
“Okay. Are you with anyone? Someone you want me to call?”
Calum couldn’t contain a humourless bark of laughter. “I ain’t gotta phone, Brixie, and even if I had, no fucker would care if you called.”
“I don’t believe that.” Brix’s frown was troubled. “Listen, I can’t leave you by the side of the road in this state. How about you come back to mine for a shower and a kip?”
The only place Calum could remember Brix living was the Camden flat he’d abandoned. He shook his head, reeling at the dizziness that came next. “I’m not going back to London. Fuck that. I’ll walk to my mum’s.”
“In Reading?”
“Sure. Why not?”
Calum started to get out of the van, but Brix pushed him back with strong hands. “Don’t be a dick. Man, I’d forgotten what an arse you are when you’ve been on the juice. Just come back to mine for a bit, yeah? It’s half an hour away. I’ll make you some coffee, some grub, and we’ll figure out whatever’s got you in this mess.”