by Max Hudson
Adrian was just staring at him. Simon felt his neck prickle slightly, not quite sure what to do under the intensity of that gaze.
“What?” he mumbled, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
To his surprise, Adrian suddenly beamed. “Dove, I know I’m gonna regret saying this, but you’re a genius.”
Simon felt his jaw go slack. Quickly snapping it closed again, he felt that tiny flush creep up his neck to take up residence in his cheeks. “Uh…thanks?” he managed to sort of stammer out.
Adrian didn’t seem to be really listening, shoving his phone to the side so he could start spreading out the papers from the manila folder over the table. “Okay. So the note was just for her, just something she needed to see written out. Which means it is important, we just don’t know how yet.” Looking up at Simon again, he abruptly split the files in half and shoved one of the stacks in his direction across the table. “Look through those and find out how many she worked on with Mina.”
“Okay.” Simon took the stack of papers on reflex more than anything else. Quite without realizing it, he had been caught up in the sudden burst of nearly manic energy that was radiating out from Adrian at this point.
“Fine.” Adrian shot him a quick grin and he felt his stomach lurch again. Though this time it wasn’t entirely unpleasant. “Let’s get to work.”
Chapter Four
Adrian Crow
Getting to work lasted until roughly three in the morning. Honestly, Adrian would have gone longer, but by that point Simon’s near constant yawning was more a distraction than anything else. When he had told Simon to go to bed, he had stubbornly refused to do so unless Adrian did as well. Point blank. Just said, “Not if you’re still up doing this.”
Mother hen, Adrian thought to himself as he all but stumbled out of the bathroom and made for his bedroom door. He had thought the quick shower might wake him up a bit and he could maybe stealthily keep looking through the files while Simon got some sleep, but it seemed he had had no such luck. All the hot water did was lull him even closer to sleep.
So close that he nearly tripped over the outstretched leg on his way to the bedroom. His toe fetched up on something solid and at first he blearily assumed it was the leg of the coffee table. Then it moved and mumbled an apology, and he realized it was in fact the leg of Simon Dove.
“Wha…?” He followed the line of the leg up to the couch, where Simon was sort of half-curled onto his side. He had somehow managed to find that awful throw that Adrian’s brother had given him two years ago and had draped it a little awkwardly over himself.
Awkwardly, because there was no way all six-foot-something of him was going to fit on that tiny couch. No wonder his leg had been sticking out.
Adrian stared at him for a long moment. “What the hell are you doing?”
Simon stared back. “I’m sleeping?”
Adrian snorted. “No. Not like that you’re not.”
As much as he enjoyed needling Simon, he didn’t want to make him actually uncomfortable. And given how much the other man seemed to dislike him, he had a feeling offering to share a bed would land him solidly in the territory of “uncomfortable.” Even if there was a part of him that really, really wanted to.
Still. He could not just leave him on the couch like that. And there wasn’t anywhere else to go.
He could take the couch for a night. He had done it before, when he ended up working on a story late enough into the night that he fell asleep at the coffee table.
With a deep breath in and then a long, slow exhale, Adrian propped one hand on his hip and gestured vaguely to the bedroom door with the other. “Look, I know the apartment is pretty small, but I do actually have a decent bed. Just use that.”
Simon blinked up at him as though he had suddenly started speaking in tongues. “You want me to use your bed?”
Adrian rolled his eyes. “What, do I have to draw you a diagram? Yeah, just take the damn bed.”
The second the words were out of his mouth, he winced internally. Great. Nice going. Tact and grace, may we all hope to emulate thee. He had even less of a filter when he was tired than he did fully awake, and he knew his tone was bordering on downright “crotchety.” The really annoying part of it was that he was actually trying to be nice this time.
Simon frowned up at him slightly and he felt his jaw set. “I’m not taking your bed, Adrian.”
“Huh?” he responded intelligently. Then, before Simon could reply, he processed what he had actually said and rebutted, “You’re not taking it. I’m giving it to you. I can fit on that couch a lot easier than you can.”
Simon’s lips twitched up in a small smile and Adrian thought his heart might have actually stopped. The big brown puppy eyes and the smile? How is that even legal?
“Look, I’ll admit you could fit on this thing better than me, but—and I’m saying this as delicately as possible. This couch is a piece of shit.”
That earned a burst of startled laughter, Adrian raising his eyebrows just a bit. “I mean…yeah, it is. Which is why I’m giving you the bed.”
Simon’s frown deepened. “That doesn’t make any sense.”
Adrian quirked his eyebrows up further. “Which part of that doesn’t make sense?”
“Why do you want to sleep on the shitty couch?”
“I never said I wanted to,” he huffed, exasperated. “I just don’t want you to.”
“Oh.” Simon’s voice had gone surprisingly quiet, his eyes a little wide as he blinked up at him. “That, uh…thanks? But I’m really okay?”
Neither of them was buying that, and Adrian could see it on his face. He let out a long, slow exhale and pinched the bridge of his nose as his shoulders slumped. “All right, look can we just not argue, for five minutes?” he muttered. “I’m tired, you’re tired, we’re both stressed as hell and worried about Minnie, let’s just…”
He glanced toward the bedroom. There was an obvious solution. If Simon didn’t like the idea, he could keep the couch. At least he would have tried. “Look. It’s a big bed. For the sake of nipping this in the bud, let’s just share.”
Simon opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He seemed to have been taken pretty soundly by surprise. Adrian tried not to feel pleased about that.
He expected irritation at the suggestion, or even outright indignation. Which was fine, because what else could he really expect? He was under no illusions about how Simon would feel about sharing that kind of space with him.
“Okay. Fine.”
He stared. “Uh, what?” he voiced intelligently. Then his brain caught up with his mouth and he felt the barest hint of warmth creep into his cheeks. “Oh, okay. Cool. Just in there.”
He gestured awkwardly over his shoulder toward the bedroom before turning quickly on his heel to make his way in himself.
He thought it was. Really, he had just been too tired to stand there arguing over the stupid fucking couch until five in the morning, which made this the best solution. A solution that, though he had offered it, he hadn’t really expected Simon to take.
Silently, he crossed to the bed and all but collapsed into it, rolling onto his stomach so he could turn his face into the pillow. He heard Simon’s shuffling footsteps enter the room, then cross to the other side of the bed. There was a long, elastic moment of hesitation, and Adrian actually felt his stomach clench nervously—which made absolutely no sense, so he decided to ignore it.
Then the mattress gave on the other side and he almost felt as much as heard Simon’s soft sigh. He could sympathize with that. After spending the last few hours hunched over the coffee table and then trying to squeeze onto that crappy couch, he was sure a real bed felt like heaven.
“Hey, ah… Thanks, Crow.”
Adrian rolled onto his side just enough to free one arm and wave a hand at him lazily. “Yeah, no problem. Now go to sleep, I’m beat.” He started to turn back onto his stomach, then changed his mind and rolled to face Simon, narrowing his eyes dramatically.
“And you better not snore, or I will personally haul your ass back to the couch myself.”
Simon glared at him. Of course, but for a moment, just a moment, he thought he saw a flicker of amusement pass through his eyes. It may have been the sleep deprivation, but hell. He’d take that as a win.
“Just go to sleep,” Simon huffed, turning onto his side. Adrian smirked a bit to himself and rolled again to put his back to him.
Simon must have been well and truly exhausted, because it was only a few minutes later when Adrian heard his breathing deepen, evening out into the measure of the unconscious. He wished he could fall asleep that quickly.
His own brain refused to quit, no matter how wiped he was. Adrian kept turning over what little information they had, again and again, until finally he had to put a conscious effort into actually blocking his own thoughts.
I refuse to count sheep. Instead, he found himself counting Simon’s breaths. It had been longer than he really cared to admit since he had actually shared a bed, and he had forgotten how soothing the rhythm of sleep beside him could be. One…out…two…out…three…out…
It wasn’t until he was nearly asleep himself that the thought occurred to him, I never even thought to ask him to leave.
***
Adrian was the first up the next morning, and for a few fuzzy moments he entirely forgot everything that had happened the day before. It was just another Thursday, and his alarm was about to go off.
Groaning quietly, he rolled over and stretched his arm across the bed, reaching for where he always left his phone on the bedside table.
Instead of empty sheets and then the edge of the bed, his hand found a shoulder, then a neck.
Adrian shot up, jerking his hand back and looking around blearily to see that—blessedly—he hadn’t woken Simon up. That was all he would have needed. Wincing to himself, he glanced around the bedroom. Despite everything that had happened yesterday, it was still just an ordinary Thursday, according to the rest of the world, and he knew his alarm was about to go off, which meant he was going to need to call his editor.
Moving carefully, doing his best not to wake Simon, he scooted to the edge of the mattress and lightly placed his feet on the floor. Then, he started tiptoeing his way to the door and back out into the living room. If he could just manage to get the door open without it creaking.
An offensively loud bass riff suddenly blared through the apartment. Adrian actually tripped over his own feet in a mad scramble for the door as Simon jerked upright on the bed behind him, looking around wildly. “What the fuck—?!"
Staggering to the coffee table, Adrian managed to shut off the alarm before the song went any further. He heard a low, drawn-out groan behind him and turned to see that Simon had stumbled into the doorway, leaning heavily on it to keep upright.
“What the fuck?” Simon repeated, deadpan.
Adrian shrugged and offered up what he hoped was a semi-apologetic smile, but he was honestly still too wiped to really know if he succeeded. “Yeah, I know, sorry. Forgot to shut it off last night. I’ve got this call scheduled with my editor—”
“And you decided the best reminder for that was to blast music at…” Simon cast his gaze around, landed on the clock on the far wall, and finished with a groan, “Six thirty in the morning?”
“Hey, don’t knock it.”
“It’s not the choice of music that I take issue with,” Simon replied dryly, glowering. “Why the fuck do you need to call your editor at the crack of dawn?”
Noting with some amusement that Simon seemed to have much less issue with his use of “strong language” first thing in the morning, Adrian replied, “Because she’s in London this week, so she’s five hours ahead. Just, give me two minutes, I’ll let her know something came up and I have to reschedule.”
Simon grumbled something that may have been a vague affirmative and shuffled his way sleepily out into the living room. Adrian tried to duck passed him back into the bedroom. They both had to turn sideways and sort of twist awkwardly to manage it. Despite their best efforts they still wound up pressed together for a moment in the doorway.
They both froze. Adrian felt himself starting to smirk without making the conscious decision to do so. He saw the hint of red creeping up Simon’s neck and into his cheeks. “Morning,” he chuckled, genuinely unable to help himself.
Simon’s blush flared and he looked away, growling, “Oh, shut up.”
Adrian raised his hands, swallowing another chuckle. Simon hurried passed him out into the living room. Nudging the door closed behind him with his toe, Adrian quickly pulled up his editor’s number and hit “call.”
“Hey, Bex. Yeah, I know I’m a little early, but I had this thing come up…”
If there was one thing Adrian could do really well, it was bullshit. He managed to answer Bex’s questions about his current piece with a few deft, intentionally vague comments, assuring her that they could reschedule their call for the weekend.
It honestly took longer just to try to get off the phone. He liked working with Bex, he really did, but she was caffeinated.
Better fix that, he thought to himself as he finally managed to extricate himself from the conversation and hung up. He glanced down at his phone before the screen went dark. He had spent almost twenty minutes on that call.
So much for “give me two minutes,” he lamented silently, but shrugged it off. It wasn’t like Simon was going anywhere.
Nudging the door open and stepping back out into the living room, he found himself suddenly drawn up short by an absolutely heavenly scent.
“Is that bacon?”
Simon stuck his head out of the kitchen nook, looking much more alert than he had twenty minutes ago. “Uh, yeah. I figured it was okay, the use-by date is tomorrow, so…”
Adrian grinned at him. “Okay? Dove, I think I love you.”
Simon’s eyes widened. Once again, Adrian found his brain trailing behind his mouth.
“So, just the bacon, or do I get the works?” he breezed on, walking over to peer around Simon at the kitchen counter.
Simon snorted, and gave himself a little shake. Adrian saw his shoulders relax slightly and felt a bit of tension he hadn’t realized he had been holding himself bleed from his body. “You get whatever I bother making. You do know you have like three eggs and a bottle of wine in this fridge, right?”
Adrian laughed, leaning back on his heels and tipping his head up so he could grin into his face. “Yeah, well, I mostly eat out. Don’t really have time to cook often. Plus, I suck at it. So, even when I do have the time I’d really rather not.”
Simon’s lips quirked up on one side and he turned back to the stove. “Yeah, I kind of gathered. Well, like I said, three eggs, some bacon, and I’m pretty sure I saw half a loaf of bread in there if you wanna throw some in the toaster.”
Adrian blinked at him. “I have a toaster?”
Simon snorted and glanced back over his shoulder at him. “Yes. In that cabinet there,” he said, pointing with his elbow as he pushed the bacon around in the pan with a small spatula—another cooking implement Adrian had no idea he even owned.
What the hell else is in here? Shrugging mentally, Adrian crossed to the cabinet Simon had indicated and opened it. Sure enough, shoved back behind two half-open carboard boxes—gifts from his sister-in-law, he was pretty sure—was a small toaster.
“Huh. Who knew?”
“So.” Adrian pulled the toaster from the cabinet and twisted so he could set it on the corner furthest from the stove, trying to give Simon room so they weren’t tripping over each other in the small space. “Sleep well?”
It was a little stilted and awkward, but he was sort of scrambling for something to say at that point. It occurred to him, more than a little belatedly, that he hadn’t actually had breakfast with someone in a long time. At least, breakfast that wasn’t also some sort of meeting or interview.
Simon gave a soft noise of affirmative and shrugged one shoulder i
n response. “Yeah. It was fine. You?”
Simon seemed just as awkward as Adrian felt. That was sort of comforting, in a way. “Oh yeah, fine, fine…”
They lapsed into silence. Adrian located the half loaf of bread that Simon had said was in the fridge, relieved to find that it still seemed edible. Normally he didn’t get through a whole loaf before he had to throw the thing out.
“How many you want?” Adrian asked as he untwisted the plastic tag from around the bread.
“Four, if there’s enough,” Simon said.
Adrian quirked an eyebrow as he began pulling out slices. “Guess the size really does come with a bigger appetite, huh?” he mumbled, mostly to himself.
Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Simon sort of hunch his shoulders forward and shrink down a little closer to the floor. He had noticed him do things like that before, but he realized that he had always assumed that was just how Simon held himself. He hadn’t even realized Simon wasn’t slouching until he started doing it again.
He winced guiltily and turned to start feeding bread into the toaster. “You don’t have to do that, you know,” he mumbled after another moment or two of silence.
He almost felt more than saw Simon start slightly in the small space. “Do what?”
“That.” He gestured vaguely toward Simon’s entire body. “That like hunching thing. I didn’t mean to—I was just kidding about the appetite thing, you know, it’s not like…”
“Oh.” Simon sort of shifted from foot to foot and Adrian chanced another glance over at his face. He saw that his expression had been set into a slight frown, lips pursed as he pushed bacon around in the pan almost absently. “It’s fine. Really. Guess I didn’t realize I was doing it.”
Simon still didn’t straighten up. Adrian sucked his bottom lip between his teeth and chewed at it absently as he leaned back against the table and waited for the first round of toast.
They probably didn’t have time for this. They really should be talking about what to do next, but he didn’t exactly have any new ideas on that front since last night. He also wasn’t sure either of them was fully awake enough to come up with one. Which probably meant they weren’t awake enough to really talk about this either, but fuck it.