But Jevon had scars too, and if Rhys could heal them just a little, with the swipe of his tongue and a gentle graze of his teeth, he’d suck Jevon’s cock all night long.
“Oh god,” Jevon whispered. “I’m gonna come.”
The soft plea hit Rhys harder than if Jevon had screamed at the top of his lungs. He flattened his own body, grinding his dick against the mattress, and took Jevon as deep down as he could. Jevon’s cock scraped the back of his throat, and he unravelled, his body curling in on itself as he clutched Rhys tight against him. He erupted with a ragged yell, shooting hot come down Rhys’s throat, and Rhys drank it all down, absorbing the spasms in Jevon’s abdomen, revelling in them, believing them. Believing in himself if just for a moment. This is what you’re good at.
Rhys’s stomach rolled, but the bleak thought was fast eclipsed by his own pleasure. When he’d swallowed every drop of Jevon’s release, he rose up on his knees, his hand a blur on his cock, and came quickly—and hard—on Jevon’s chest, a guttered shout tearing from his lungs.
Exhausted, he fell forwards, his palms landing either side of Jevon’s head, gasping, and for a long moment, the only sounds in the room were laboured breaths and pounding hearts.
Jevon gripped Rhys’s chin and gently forced him to meet his gaze. He smiled, and Rhys blinked down at him, awed. Fell into his languid kiss like a warm summer lake and wondered how the fuck life had given him this.
Given him Jevon.
He pulled back, still staring, until a shiver racked Jevon, and Rhys remembered that he’d covered him in come. “I’ll clean up.”
Rhys stumbled from the bed and to the bathroom where he found a fresh washcloth. He dampened it with warm water and returned to the bed to clean them both up.
When he was done, he sat back on his heels. Jevon gazed at him drowsily. “Don’t go.”
“Go where?”
“Anywhere.”
“No?”
“No.” Jevon wriggled up the bed and drew the covers back. “Stay, Rhys. Stay with me.”
As if Rhys could refuse. He crawled into bed as Jevon muttered something else and rolled over, his long arm stretched over his head, his fingers tangled loosely in Rhys’s hair. His eyes closed, and the absolute peace radiating from him seeped into Rhys like a drug.
He slid his arm around Jevon and breathed him in. “I’m not going anywhere, mate.”
Six
Rhys was definitely not a morning person. Jevon steered clear as he stumbled around, gathering his clothes, and slipped downstairs to get the coffee on, trying to temper his amusement. Rhys’s grumbling was kind of cute, but also scary. Jevon didn’t stick his head above the parapet until the coffee was ready.
The bleary-eyed smile he got in return was well worth the wait.
“Thanks,” Rhys said. “Sorry for getting you up this early.”
“It’s okay. I’m going to the children’s home later to work with those Syrian kids some more.”
“Damn. What are you going to do with them?”
“Play.” Jevon peered out of the kitchen window. “Outside, hopefully, if the weather holds. I’ve never found a language that doesn’t translate duck, duck, goose, so I’d imagine there’ll be a lot of that.”
Rhys took a thoughtful sip of his coffee. “Do you ever find they just don’t want to play?”
“Sometimes. And it’s a constant worry when you go somewhere new—that it’s not the right place for us, that we’re insulting them by invading the worst time in their lives with drums and feather boas—but at the end of the day, kids need to be kids, man.”
“And I guess in situations like this, it’s all you can do for them?”
“Exactly.” Jevon slid off the kitchen counter. “I spend a lot of time paying outrageous compliments to pretty average artwork, and that’s just for the adults.”
Rhys’s smile widened a touch. He was close enough to slip effortlessly into Jevon’s personal space, and he did, his stubbled cheek scratching Jevon’s jaw as he nuzzled his face. For a fleeting moment, it was like he’d always been here, that they both had, but too soon, he pulled away. “I’d better go.”
“Okay.” Jevon chewed on his lip and trailed Rhys to the hallway, tracking him as he shrugged into his coat. “Are you working all day?”
Rhys stamped moodily into his shoes. “Yeah. Seven to five on paper, but I reckon I won’t get out till six. Never do.”
“What happens if you get a call that goes over your time?”
“We keep going till it’s done.” Rhys straightened up, and flicker by flicker, the lightness Jevon had seen in him last night fluttered away, like the skin he wore to work was slotting into place. “Um . . .”
He stopped and scratched the back of his head. Jevon raised an eyebrow and waited, but nothing happened. Rhys shifted his weight from one foot to the other, and whatever he’d wanted to say seemed to desert him.
Jevon took a deep breath and opened the kitchen drawer where he’d stashed his new set of business cards. He plucked one free of the wrapping and offered it to Rhys. “The email address goes to the office before it gets to me, but the phone number is mine. Maybe, uh, you could give me a call sometime . . . if you want?”
Rhys said nothing. Just stared.
Jevon’s heart skipped a beat and his fingers tightened around the shiny card. Last night—all of it, not just the mind-blowing orgasm—had been incredible, like fate had stepped in and brought them back together, but what if that was it? What if last night had been nothing more than a convenient coincidence? After all, it wasn’t like Jevon had shown Rhys a good time in the bedroom. You didn’t even make him come—
Rhys took the card, and with it, Jevon’s hand. He pulled Jevon into his arms and kissed him so soundly that the doubts cartwheeling through Jevon’s mind evaporated like they’d never been there at all. They’d be back, but in that moment, there was nothing but lips bruising lips, grasping hands, and snatched breath. For Jevon, there was nothing but Rhys.
They stumbled against the fridge. Magnets fell to the floor, breaking the spell. Jevon, who’d fallen slack in Rhys’s searching embrace, reluctantly pulled away. “You’ll call me?”
Rhys took a deep breath and squeezed Jevon’s hands. “Yes.”
Rhys didn’t call. For a week, Jevon stalked his phone like a teenage girl, but nothing happened, not even a text. One week stretched into two, and by the third, he’d given up hope.
“Why don’t you call him,” Efe said when Jevon called her up to bend her ear.
Jevon rolled his eyes. He loved his cousin dearly, but listening to his actual words wasn’t her strong point. “I already told you—I don’t have his number. I gave him my card before he left and he said he’d call.”
“You can’t track him down on Facebook or something?”
“I don’t know his full name.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah, oh.” Jevon made a note on the paperwork he was wading through for his assessment of the surviving children from the detention centre fire. “All I know about him is his first name, his occupation, and that he doesn’t eat chicken.”
“Whoa, brother. Hold the bus. Man’dem don’t eat chicken? What kind of monster is that?”
“Shut up.”
Efe laughed. “Don’t blow up my phone if you don’t want to hear my chat.”
Jevon grumbled under his breath, but in truth, just hearing Efe’s voice had lightened his mood. He’d spent twelve hours with the fire children that day—his last session with them—and letting them go had hurt his heart.
Efe understood. She always did. “Come and see me,” she said when she was done ribbing Jevon’s forlorn love life. “I’m making patties tonight—sweet potato, beef, salt cod. All your favourites. I’ll give you a box for the freezer.”
It was a kind offer, but Efe’s Vauxhall bakery was a mission on the train from Bedford. As amazing as her food was, Jevon didn’t have the energy. “Nah, blood. Thanks, though. I’ll come see you soon.”
“You’ve been saying that since you got back.”
“I know, and I mean it, I swear. I’ve just been busy with work.”
“I thought you only did a few kiddie parties when you were over here?”
“I do, but something came up.” Jevon’s attention drifted back to his laptop screen as Efe said something else. “Sorry, what?”
She sighed. “There’s a type of man who don’t stop working, and it don’t do him no good. There’s a few of them round here, and it hurts me to see what becomes of them. Don’t let life suck you down, cuz. Put your work aside and get out there living.”
She hung up before Jevon could reply, and he absently set his phone aside. Haya—the little girl who’d attached herself to Rhys in the hospital—was next on his list. Last on his list, in fact, by design, rather than fate.
He spread his notes out on the coffee table. Social services hadn’t asked his opinion or even paid for his services beyond the interpreter fees, but he’d offered his assessments anyway in the hope that someone might read them. Haya’s most of all.
Jevon collated his notes into a document that made his chest tight and his eyes sting. Most of the children he’d seen over the last few days had, despite their grief and trauma, made progress, but Haya was different. The brother who’d died in Rhys’s helicopter had been her only living relative. She was alone in the world now, and the risk of her being deported was at an all-time high.
When his work was done, Jevon retreated to the kitchen to nurse the rum bottle. He was on his second shot when Efe called him back.
“Come over,” she said. “I can’t concentrate knowing that you’re so down, and I like having you around my kitchen. Please, Jevon? Gloria’s helping me out tonight, and she’d love to see you too.”
Jevon sighed. The prospect of facing two Jamaican women who wanted to be all up in his business was daunting, but he couldn’t deny the prospect of another lonely night was far, far worse. “All right,” he said eventually. “But you’d better have somewhere decent for me to kip when you’re done with me.”
Efe giggled gleefully. “Only the best flour-covered couch for you. Hurry yourself up, son.”
Seven
Rhys jumped off the helicopter as soon as it was declared safe to do so and charged across the roof to the second helipad. Another chopper was parked there, fixed and good to go when the next call came in, but he wasn’t waiting for the next call. Couldn’t because he’d been waiting for this chopper three long weeks already.
He hopped inside and scrambled immediately to where he’d been sitting when the chopper had returned to London from the Bedford job. It had gone out of service for essential maintenance half an hour before Rhys had realised he’d left something precious on board.
“Come on, come on, come on . . .” He rummaged between the seats and down the backs, praying that whoever had cleaned the chopper had done a piss-poor job. For long, terrifying moments, it seemed the maintenance crew had let him down, but then his groping fingers touched thin cardboard, and his heart threw itself against his ribcage.
He pried the creased card free and turned it over. Jevon’s contact number jumped out at him, and his phone was out of his pocket with little conscious thought.
Rhys jumped down from the helicopter and tapped the digits into his phone as he walked back to the base rest quarters. He felt sick. Three weeks. Three fucking weeks. Would Jevon answer? Would he tell Rhys to do one even if he did?
Jevon didn’t answer. The call went to an automated voicemail, and the nausea in Rhys’s gut turned to despair. The email address on Jevon’s card was the same as the one on the FFP’s website. The one that had bounced back when Rhys had sent a benign message asking Jevon to contact him. Fuck. He crumpled Jevon’s card in his hand, then instantly panicked and flattened it out again, shoving it into his flight suit pocket for safekeeping, at least until his shift was over. He’d known it was taking the piss to expect Jevon to wait around the best part of a month for him to call, but he was sorely unprepared for how much that one unanswered call hurt.
His phone buzzed in his hand. Rhys’s heart briefly leapt again but sank just as fast when he saw his brother’s name on the screen.
H: Where are you?
R: Work
H: Can you talk?
R: No
In the past, Harry would’ve let that slide, but he’d become more persistent since he’d jumped ship to Cornwall. Like seventy-five thousand texts a week made up for the fact that he wasn’t there. Like it perpetuated the myth that he was the older brother, distracting them both from the fact that Rhys couldn’t be bothered to check in on himself, let alone anyone else.
H: Stop ignoring me
R: I’m not. I’m at work
H: You’re not on a run or you wouldn’t be responding at all
R: Fuck off
H: No. What’s wrong?
R: Nothing
H: Liar
R: Fine. I think I’m in love with a real-life clown who’s blown me once. Happy now?
Harry called instantly, but Rhys silenced him and turned his phone off. He justified his childishness when the base alarm went off a few seconds later, but by the time his shift ended in the early hours of the morning, he’d accepted that he was a moody prick.
He rescued Jevon’s card from his flight suit and tucked it into his wallet, then he turned his phone on and sent Harry a GIF acknowledging his wanker status.
Harry didn’t reply, but why would he at this time? And no one else had tried to contact Rhys either.
With a heavy heart, Rhys pocketed his phone and headed out to catch the night bus home. Staying awake on route was a struggle, but when he got home, he found himself irritatingly restless again. A packet of fags called his name, but a year-old promise to Harry kept him indoors, and eventually, he crawled into bed.
The TV droned in the background while he stared at the ceiling, willing himself to pass the fuck out already. He had twenty-four hours off work, but it came on the back of seven days straight, and he was so tired his eyeballs hurt. Sleep, dickhead. But the gods were against him. Under his pillow, his phone buzzed with a message. Assuming it to be Harry’s response to his half-arsed apology, Rhys ignored it until it vibrated a second time, and a third.
“Fuck’s sake.” He shoved his hand beneath the pillow, prepared to turn the phone off again, but when he looked at the screen, the three new WhatsApp messages weren’t from Harry.
And the sender was still online.
Rhys leaned on the wall outside the pizza bar, eyes closed, his face turned to the fading afternoon sun. Inside, his heart was thumping, his mind racing, but like this, with the warmth of the late autumn seeping into his bones, his nauseating nerves gave him a break.
“Rhys?”
Or not. Rhys jumped and opened his eyes to find Jevon right in front of him, dressed in Timberlands, grungy black jeans, and a white tee, his hair held back by a tribal-patterned scarf. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Jevon’s smile was cautious, and Rhys knew why. He hadn’t got round to telling his tale of woe in the handful of WhatsApp messages they’d exchanged over the last couple of days. Lord knew what Jevon was thinking.
“Listen—”
“So—” Jevon said at the same time.
They both stopped, then Rhys threw caution to the wind and pulled Jevon in for a tight hug. God, I’ve missed him. “Let’s go inside. I know I’ve got some explaining to do.”
Jevon didn’t argue. He led Rhys inside and to a booth at the back of the restaurant. Rhys sensed eyes on them as they manoeuvred around the tables, and his stomach flipped a little when Jevon waved at a member of staff working in the open kitchen. The woman was tall, statuesque, and utterly gorgeous. If she wasn’t related to Jevon, Rhys would eat his damn shoe.
“My cousin,” Jevon offered when he caught Rhys’s questioning frown. “She’s the master baker next door. That’s why I’m in the city. I’ve been staying with her for a few days.”
“Right.” Rhys processed the information. Discovering that Jevon was in London and free to meet had made his day when they’d finally made contact, but the notion that he’d been there all along hurt. So much wasted time. “I think I’ve been here before.”
“This place? Or—” Jevon cut himself off with a wave of his hand. “Sorry. Carry on.”
Okaaay. Rhys took a deep breath. “Yeah. This place. I think I came here when it opened, and I’ve been back for work since. Someone passed out in the kitchen.”
There’d been a little more to it if Rhys remembered correctly, but the details escaped him. All he could truly recall was feeling incredibly lonely as he’d watched the dude’s mates take care of him like brothers. I miss Harry too.
“Rhys?”
Rhys blinked. “Sorry, what?”
Jevon smiled a little wider. “You look knackered.”
“I am. It’s been a long week.”
“Is that why you didn’t call?”
“Nah. I didn’t call because I left your card on the broken chopper. It only came back into service yesterday.”
“Oh.”
A rush of something Rhys couldn’t quite decipher seemed to leave Jevon all at once. He held his tongue while a server brought water and menus, then reached across the table to take Jevon’s hand. “I was losing my fucking mind these last few weeks. I even googled that bloody circus place you work for, but the email address on their website is wrong too. It bounced back.”
Jevon’s eyes widened. “Seriously? They were supposed to have fixed that before I left on my last trip.”
“Well, they haven’t,” Rhys said. “Trust me, mate. Short of sending up smoke signals, I did everything I could to find you, but even the landline number didn’t do me any good. I kept sleeping through its opening hours, or it was engaged, and I—”
Believe: A Skins Novel Page 6