by Ashlyn Kane
In truth, Flip used to do this himself, but he’d been spending so much time in Toronto he’d forgotten he had it. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”
Friday Flip visited the children’s hospital.
“You don’t have to come,” he told Brayden. “This visit… I do it because I love the children and it does cheer them, but it isn’t fun or easy. I don’t expect you to come.”
“I’ve come with you everywhere this week,” Brayden pointed out. “All of a sudden I’m going to bail because it’s not fun? What kind of message does that send to kids? I’ll end up in the gossip blogs as a callous, heartless gold digger.”
Flip rolled his eyes. “Since when do you care what the gossip is?” Other than the bit where he insisted on sappy expressions and hand-holding.
“All right, that’s fair. But I’m still not backing out on the kids. I like kids.”
That was what Flip was afraid of. He just hoped Brayden and his big, soft heart came through the day intact.
Their visitor coordinator showed them how to scrub in for the general wards first—for this part of the visit they could wear their own clothes. Brayden followed directions assiduously, but he was largely silent while Elin went through a list of dos and don’ts. He almost seemed to be bracing himself for something. At least this time he paid no mind to the film crew.
Flip wanted to put a hand on his back for comfort, but he’d been listening to Elin’s directions too, and he was trying not to touch things if he didn’t have to.
The first children they visited weren’t chronically ill, just laid up with tonsillitis, appendicitis, a broken leg, or another relatively minor childhood affliction. Flip chatted with them and posed for selfies while Brayden played video games with them or charmed their parents.
“He seems like a nice young man,” Elin commented as Brayden started a rock-paper-scissors tournament with the twin five-year-old siblings of one of the patients.
People kept saying that like it surprised them, but they approved. “He is,” Flip agreed, and he wondered if it weren’t his own heart he ought to worry about.
As Elin led them down the hall to the next ward, Brayden fell into step next to Flip. “So health care in this country,” he began.
“Single-payer, tax-funded. Sometimes the lines in the waiting rooms do get long.” He glanced over. “We do have astronomically high taxes here, or so the Americans would say.”
Brayden shrugged that off. “You get what you pay for, right? I mean, the security of knowing your medical bills won’t bankrupt you—that’s worth it for your people, so it’s the right thing. And hey, I’m Canadian. I’m used to lines.”
The children in the next ward were very ill, which meant a longer scrubbing-in and actual gowns, masks, and gloves that had to be changed between each room.
“No outside cameras for this part, huh?” Brayden said as he tied the back of Flip’s robe. “I’m kind of relieved. This is not my color.”
“I don’t know that anyone can really pull off this shade of yellow. What would you call it? ‘Pastel vomit’?”
Brayden finished tying and turned around so Flip could do the same for him. “We should ask Bernadette.”
“Mmm,” Flip agreed.
This part of the hospital tended to be pretty bleak. Flip didn’t like to ask people to fake hope they might not feel for the sake of PR.
They started with the children who couldn’t get out of bed. Flip had years of experience putting on a brave face, so he did most of the talking. He even blew up a latex glove into a silly balloon animal, a trick made possible via an amenable nurse who’d seen him do the trick before and a nearly empty oxygen tank. By the third room, though, they found a groove—Flip played Brayden’s straight man, and Brayden made the kids laugh.
Flip didn’t know how people did this every day. Many of the kids were in good spirits, but not all of them.
Finally they finished with the toughest cases and moved down the hall to a common room. The kids there had more energy—they sat playing video or board games, coloring, or building with Lego. Flip took a seat across from a little girl in pajamas with pink unicorns on them and asked if he could help build her castle. He wondered if Brayden might join him, but instead he took a seat next to the kids playing an ancient version of Dance Dance Revolution using the handheld controllers.
“Hey, I remember this game,” he said. “I used to play when I was a kid.”
The children exchanged glances. Then one handed over his controller. “Think you can beat Jess?”
Flip’s companion, whose name was Zoe, turned to look over her shoulder. “No one can beat Jess at this game.”
Having no idea of Brayden’s prowess at video games, Flip only offered, “We’ll see.”
Jess won the first round, but Brayden begged for a rematch. “I haven’t played this in fifteen years. Come on. Give me one song to knock the rust off.” And sure enough, he squeaked out a win in round two.
Jess’s companion whooped, and Jess looked like she was trying to be sour but couldn’t quite manage it. “Beginner’s luck.”
“Old man luck is more like it.” Brayden handed the controller back. “I used to have the dance pad that came with this game—you know, so you could play with your feet.”
Jess narrowed her eyes and scrolled down to another song. “Show me?” She passed the controller to her friend and wobbled once as she slowly stood up.
Brayden cast a quick glance at Flip, then Elin, as though to verify it was allowed, but when no one intervened, he shrugged. “Sure. Okay, so the trick is when you’re just learning, try using one foot for all the up arrows and the other for the back arrows.”
They didn’t have a dance pad, but that didn’t seem to matter—they went through two different songs on Easy before Jess started to visibly fade, and she raised a hand to her face to rub her eyes. “I always wanted to learn to dance for real.”
For a second Brayden looked heartbroken, as though his face were about to crack down the middle. But he composed himself, cleared his throat, and offered, “Well, as it turns out, I used to teach kids how to dance. So if you all want… we can do that.”
Zoe got up to join the lesson as Asher’s partner, but that left the boy who’d been coloring alone as Brayden partnered with Jess. “Do you want to learn too?” Flip asked, holding out his hand. “I can do the girl part.”
The boy considered for a minute and then let Flip help him to his feet. “We can take turns,” he said diplomatically.
Brayden led them through the basic steps of the paso doble—a good dance with big, slow steps that were easy for beginners to learn and easy to count. “Don’t forget that the first count is just to bend your knees,” Brayden reminded them. “And remember, always to the right first, if you’re going forward. That means if you’re following, you’re going back and to the left. Ready? Let’s try one more time before we add the music.”
Not surprisingly, the kids’ energy levels flagged before they really mastered the basics. Flip handed his partner off to an orderly, who put him in a wheelchair to go back to his room. Asher and Zoe were glassy-eyed and pink-cheeked, but Flip didn’t think they would tear themselves away from the visit until he and Brayden left. He made eye contact with Elin, who nodded and gestured at Brayden to wrap it up.
“All right.” Brayden held out his hands to Jess. “We’re going to do this one last time. And because it’s important that you get a feel for it so you can practice when I’m not here, I want you to stand on my feet, okay?”
Jess looked down at the plastic coverings on his shoes. “Really?”
“I won’t let you fall, I promise.”
They got situated, and then Asher hit Play on “Another One Bites the Dust.”
Flip had to look at the ceiling a few times as Brayden carried Jess through the whole song. Jess never stopped smiling.
Later, they stripped off their gowns and waited for Celine to bring the car. Brayden was quiet, and Flip didn’t want to
interrupt whatever was going on in his head, so he kept silent too. But he worried. Uncharacteristically, Brayden had his head down. He was shuffling his feet. And—
Brayden’s voice was very small when he lifted a face writ with grief. “Hey Flip?”
Flip didn’t have words either. He opened his arms and Brayden fell into them, clung tight, and pressed his face into Flip’s shoulder. Flip took a deep breath and wrapped him up, trying desperately not to memorize the scent of him, the way his body fit with Flip’s, and failing miserably.
Eventually Brayden took a deep, shuddery breath, pulled away, and wiped discreetly at his eyes. “Thanks for taking me with you.”
Flip swallowed hard. “Thank you for coming. It meant a lot to the children… and to me.”
“You know, I enjoyed it.” He huffed at himself a little disbelievingly. “Even though it’s not easy. You normally do this alone?”
For the nth time that day, Flip found something fascinating about a light fixture. Fortunate that hospitals had so many of them. Kept things nice and cheerful. Lighting-wise, at least. “Yes.”
Brayden let out a breath and shook his head. “Not while I’m here, okay? I want to come too.”
It was definitely his own heart Flip should have been worried for.
“All right,” he agreed. “Now come on. I think we deserve hot alcoholic beverages in front of a toasty fire.”
“That sounds like a pastime I can get behind. Or in front of.”
And get in front of it they did. Flip ordered them a light supper, and then they both changed into lounging clothes. Brayden lay in front of the fireplace, absently eating a plate of vegetables and hummus while he scrolled through something on his phone. For the first time since he could remember, Flip sat on the floor with his back to the couch, his legs outstretched with his feet toward the fire, and worked his way through a crossword on actual paper.
“This princeing thing is more difficult than people give you credit for,” Brayden said around a yawn. He tossed his phone away and rolled over, presumably to heat his other side. The motion made his high school T-shirt ride up almost to his rib cage. With Brayden’s face turned toward the flames, Flip stared at that stretch of skin with impunity, imagining what it might feel like under his hands.
Or his mouth.
After a moment Flip remembered to respond. “Thank you. You’re keeping up admirably.”
But he didn’t drag his eyes away from Brayden’s stomach until Brayden turned his head toward him. “Thanks for taking me with you to everything. You didn’t have to do that.”
Flip shrugged, the muscles between his shoulders tightening. “You didn’t have to be my escort to the Night of a Thousand Lights. But you did, and that put the kibosh on your solo sightseeing trip. This is the least I could do.”
For some reason that made Brayden’s mouth tighten in a false smile. “Yes, true. You owe me.”
Damn it. Flip rewound the conversation and backtracked. “And it’s nice,” he said, “having someone around to do things with. I’ve never…. I was mostly in Canada, and I didn’t have a lot of princeing to do, as you put it, the last time I was with someone.” And before that, he’d never really been serious enough about someone to trust them to come along. Which he should have noticed earlier, and he realized now that they would have been awful at it. “Clara’s too young to come along, and my parents have their own appearances to make.” He briefly glanced away from Brayden’s face and into the fire. “It’ll be difficult to go back to doing it alone.”
Brayden let out a slow breath. “Yeah.” Then he half sat up and looked at the forgotten newspaper lying near Flip’s knee. “Okay, enough being maudlin. What’re you working on?”
Flip picked up the paper. “My mother’s crossword.” He shook his head. “Before I moved into my own apartments, we used to squabble over who would get to it first. I could get my own newspaper subscription, but it wouldn’t be the same as sneaking hers. Sort of a running joke.”
Brayden grinned. “Yeah, it’s the same in my parents’ house if I ever visit in the morning. My mom’s an English teacher, so she’s got an edge, but I speak more languages and I’m better at the travel stuff. And Dad gets up earlier and he’s pretty good at them too. It can get cutthroat.”
Flip could easily imagine Brayden partaking in a morning of shared coffee and newspaper subterfuge. The mental picture made him smile. “Competitive crossword-stealing. A pastime for arseholes.”
With a sly look, Brayden tilted his head to indicate the paper. “Sure. But what about cooperative crossword-solving? You look like you’re having trouble.”
Flip looked down at the puzzle. “Got stuck,” he admitted. “It’s been a long day and I guess my brain’s had enough.”
Brayden lifted his head a fraction of an inch, a partial smile on his face.
“What?” Flip asked.
“Just… you do this thing, you know? When you’re not comfortable, you get very formal. And then, all of a sudden, you start dropping words and saying ‘arsehole’ and I know you’re happy.” His cheeks went rosy as though he were embarrassed at having made the observation.
Flip felt himself go red too, because he was aware he did it but hadn’t known it was so noticeable. And he hadn’t considered what it might tell Brayden about him.
“Anyway.” Brayden crawled over to look and leaned his head against Flip’s shoulder. “Gimme a clue.”
“Fifteen across,” Flip said, tapping his pen. “Renovator, eight letters.”
“Mmm. Restorer.”
Flip filled it in and Brayden pointed to the fourth-last letter. “There, starts with o. What’s the clue?”
He scanned over the Down list and… stopped. He needed a moment to silently curse the world.
Brayden nudged him. “Well?”
Nothing for it. “Lubricate.” Why hadn’t he filled that one in? Three letters—it was obviously oil, only now he wasn’t thinking about squeaky wheels.
“Seriously?” Brayden craned his neck, giggling. It made Flip want to laugh too. “Is this the naughty crossword or something?”
“Perhaps if you’ve a fetish for home repair,” Flip said dryly, writing in oil.
“I do like a man who’s good with his hands.” Flip didn’t have to look to know Brayden was wagging his eyebrows. “What about this one? Thirty-seven across. You don’t even have any hints for that one.” He’d pulled Flip’s hand with the paper close enough that he could read it himself. “Bottom’s master.”
For God’s sake. “I think I might have to throw this paper in the fire when we’re done so the press don’t get hold of it.”
Brayden shook against his side. “Bottom’s master. God, what do you think, does ‘power top’ fit in there?”
Flip couldn’t hold in the laugh any longer. “If he puts his back into it.”
Thirty-seven across turned out to be a reference to A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but they were still laughing as they got ready for bed. Flip came in with his Magic Bag heated up to find Brayden snickering, and that set him off again.
And then Brayden snorted. Flip really wished he could stop finding that so endearing—and also so hilarious.
When they finally calmed down, Brayden asked, “God, did we have too much to drink?”
Flip smiled at the ceiling. “I’d say we had just the right amount.”
Sleep came swiftly, each of them on his own side of the bed. But even though it had never happened before, Flip couldn’t say he was surprised when he woke up in the middle of the night to find they had gravitated together, Brayden’s head, hair fragrant with Flip’s mint shampoo, tucked under his chin.
Flip decided to worry about it in the morning and went back to sleep.
Chapter Eight
BRAYDEN had to stop waking up like this.
Ever since Friday night, when it seemed like some kind of dam had broken between them, he and Flip had been behaving like heat-seeking missiles. They went to bed firmly on their own si
des, and then Brayden woke up clinging to Flip like an octopus, or, for a fun twist this morning, with Flip plastered against his back.
Brayden hadn’t ever spent a real morning after with a boyfriend—largely because he didn’t have boyfriends. But that wouldn’t have been like this anyway—it wouldn’t have carried this sort of illicit thrill, seasoned with equal parts shame and self-indulgence and a liberal sprinkling of what do you think you’re doing.
What Brayden was doing was holding very still, hoping Flip didn’t realize he’d woken up.
What he wanted to do was wiggle around a little to see if he could get a better idea of what Flip was packing under those pajamas—though with the way Flip was pressed against him, his hips flush with Brayden’s ass, it wasn’t like he didn’t have some idea.
And it was a good idea.
Even if Brayden had wanted to go anywhere, he probably couldn’t have managed it without waking Flip, whose breath he could feel on the back of his neck and who had slung his arm around Brayden’s stomach to boot. Brayden was so hard that if Flip moved his hand a half inch lower, he could steal third. I guess I’ll just stay here, then. And think about… all the things he’d been avoiding.
About how easy it was to be around Flip, even though his life wasn’t easy. About how welcome Brayden felt in the palace, with Flip’s family. About how he fit into their lives just as seamlessly as he fit in Flip’s arms.
About how good it felt to be there.
You’ve been doing so well until now. Don’t fuck it up by falling in love, for the first time in ten years, with the prince you’re fake dating, you absolute idiot.
On the other hand, wasn’t it good penance? If Brayden fell in love with Flip and had to leave when his vacation was over and go back to his life, wouldn’t that heartache cancel out the one he’d caused when Thomas died?
The idea was stupid. Brayden knew there were no cosmic balances. Nothing he ever did would make up for Thomas being gone, and if he were honest with himself, he knew that it wasn’t his fault and that he had nothing to make up for. But knowing those things intellectually didn’t make a difference.