One Under

by JL Merrow

  Jory had dutifully got out his phone—and, of course, the first photo to come up was the one of Mal pouting in bed. Everyone laughed, Mal threatened to show his pictures of Jory, and after that, the conversation had flowed far more smoothly.

  It was good. More than good.

  Later, Jory and Mal walked down to the Sea Bell together, because Mal was determined to prove that Jory and Jago would get along fine over a pint. Jory still had his doubts about that, but since the meeting with Dev had gone so well, he was prepared to give it a go.

  The skies were still cloudy, but there was a lighter feel to the air as they looked out to sea. “Think we’ve had the last of the rain?” Jory asked idly.

  “God, I hope so. Had enough the other night to last me a lifetime. Hey, that thing with the seaweed, does that actually work?”

  “Thing with the seaweed?”

  “You know. You hang it up outside your window, and it tells you the weather.”

  “What, if it’s wet it must be raining?”

  Mal stuck up a finger. “Git. But it must’ve been well dodgy being a fisherman in the old days if that’s all you had to rely on when you put out to sea.”

  “Oh, that reminds me: I found out something about Mary Roscarrock for you. Or rather, Bea did, and she told me. Although I’m not sure it’s what you wanted to know. She didn’t really concentrate on the piracy side. More the, er, family side.”

  “Yeah?” Mal’s tone was cautious. Maybe Jory should have left Bea out of the story, but . . . she was still his sister. That wasn’t going to change.

  Jory recounted what Bea had told him of Lady Mary’s tale. Leaving out Bea’s reaction to her discovery because, well. It didn’t exactly show her in a good light and he didn’t think she’d thank him for sharing it.

  Mal grinned. “Hey, so you’re not the first queer in the family.”

  “I’d be amazed if I was.” To be honest, there had been times he’d wondered about Bran. “But anyway, we could try and dig a bit deeper, building on what we know so far. See if there are court records that mention her, that sort of thing. Although if she changed her name, perhaps took a male name, it might be difficult.”

  “Yeah, if you want.” Mal didn’t sound all that bothered.

  “I thought you wanted to.”

  “Nah, it’s just . . . Okay, don’t laugh, but it was just this idea I had, you know? I wanted to find a Roscarrock Dev could, like, relate to or be proud of. Whatever.”

  “And you chose a pirate? Is there something I should know about Dev? Latent criminal tendencies? A fetish for tricorn hats?”

  “See, I knew you’d laugh. But you know what I mean. Someone who didn’t just do what was expected of ’em. Took their own path and sod the head of the family. Uh. Not literally.”

  “I’d hope not. But yes, of course we can still do that.”

  “Nah, don’t need to anymore, do we? He’s met you.”

  Jory’s heart flipped over at the warmth in Mal’s eyes. “Me? I’m not exactly a role model of rebellion. I’ve spent my life doing what my family wanted.”

  “Yeah, and now you ain’t doing it no more.” Mal snaked an arm around Jory’s waist and pulled him close. He leered. “Now you’re just doing me.”

  “That was awful,” Jory protested, laughing as he pushed Mal away in mock disgust.

  “Nah, you love me really,” Mal said—then he froze, uncertainty in his eyes. “Uh . . .”

  Jory pulled Mal in tight again, emotion threatening to overwhelm him. “Yes,” he said, his voice hoarse. “I do.”

  “Jeez, it’s cold round here.” Mal shivered, the thick woolly fisherman’s sweater Mrs. Quick had hand-knitted him out of an actual sheep doing sod all to stop the wind slicing through.

  “I told you you’d need a jacket.” Jory sounded smug, but he also wrapped his arms around Mal in a big, warm hug, so Mal decided to let him live. “It’s almost December, you know.”

  “I was fine back home.” Home was Jory’s cottage on the outskirts of Porthkennack. Well, it was Jory’s for now. After Christmas it was going to be theirs, properly and officially rather than just a case of Mal generally not getting around to leaving at the end of the day. He was going to move his rats in and everything. The thought made Mal feel all warm and fuzzy inside although, sadly, not outside.

  Jory was going to be coming back with Mal to his mum and dad’s for Christmas. Mal hoped there’d be room in his parents’ flat, what with Morgan and her husband bringing the baby over for Christmas dinner. But he couldn’t wait to see his nephew again.

  Even if Morgs had insisted on calling him Calvin and not Mordred or Tristan like he’d suggested.

  Tasha was going to be looking after the rats, seeing as she had her own reasons for staying in Porthkennack for Christmas. And Dev and Kyle were coming down again for New Year, so they’d all be together then.

  “It’s a lot more sheltered back home,” Jory was saying. “Here, there’s nothing but sea between us and Newfoundland.”

  “No wonder King Arthur and the knights were always going on all them quests. They had to do something to keep warm. Where’s a fire-breathing dragon when you need one?”

  “I think they all flew south for the winter. But don’t worry, you’ll warm up in a minute.”

  Jory was probably right. They were standing on the bridge that connected the not-quite-island of Tintagel to the mainland, taking a breather after climbing down about sixty zillion steep stone steps. There were another sixty zillion they’d have to climb up on the other side to get to the castle.

  Mal smiled up at it. “Can’t believe I finally made it here.”

  It’d taken a few months, mostly because Mal’s git of a brain insisted on associating trips to Tintagel with panic attacks. But, yeah, apparently not all counselling was a waste of time, and Mal got on pretty well with the bloke he was seeing now. Although they seemed to spend a lot more time talking about his relationship with his dad than Mal would have expected.

  He’d decided at the end of the summer that he wasn’t going back to work as a driver on the underground. Well, he was going out with a teacher, so the shift work would have been a bit of a bugger anyway, even if him and Jory were both living in London. He could’ve taken longer to make the final decision—his old boss had been really good about it—but it’d seemed daft not to accept the museum job when it fell vacant.

  Mal still couldn’t believe they were letting someone like him look after a museum, but apparently Jory’s recommendation was enough, either cos he was a Roscarrock or cos he was Jory. Or both. And Mal had plans for that place—Jory’s mermaid exhibition at the end of August had gone down a treat, so Mal was going to follow it up with one on women pirates. Starring, of course, a certain Mary Roscarrock, seeing as how it’d struck him that Dev wasn’t the only bloke in town who could do with a relative he could relate to. In the meantime, the downturn in visitors after the summer meant Mal had plenty of time to work on his Open University arts and humanities course.

  Jory had suggested he sign up for the full degree course, but Mal hadn’t had a lot of time to think about it, what with registrations closing, so he’d played safe and gone for just the first-year course in case he hated it.

  He’d already decided he’d be doing the next two years too. Well, he needed something to do while Jory was marking homework or hanging out with his old mate Patrick, didn’t he? Or visiting Gawen at his mum’s cos, yeah, that level of awkward wasn’t going away overnight. Then again, they mostly saw Gawen on his own these days, so that was cool.

  “I always knew you’d make it here eventually,” Jory said in his ear. “Even if we had to hike all the way from Porthkennack.”

  “Yeah, and looking at all them steps, aren’t you glad we didn’t have to do that?”

  Jory grinned. “Race you to the top!”

  He set off at a run, the bastard, so Mal followed, behind at first but gradually catching up cos months of walking everywhere was fucking awesome for im
proving your general fitness. Halfway up the steps, he had to tear off his sweater, now way too hot and itching like a bitch.

  Old grannies in pack-a-macs and families in bright waterproofs scattered out of their path. They were probably glad of an excuse to stop climbing for a mo and watch the madmen go by.

  With a final burst of speed he’d be paying for tomorrow, Mal surged ahead of Jory. When he reached the top, he turned and punched the air. “Oh, yes! The winner!” He swung his sweater around his head in a victory wave.

  There was the sound of clapping, a few cheers, and even a wolf-whistle from the slow-coaches on the steps.

  Mal gazed down at Jory, who smiled up at him from a few steps down, chest heaving.

  He’d won a lot more than a race.

  Explore more of the Porthkennack universe: riptidepublishing.com/titles/universe/porthkennack

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  Dear Reader,

  Thank you for reading JL Merrow’s One Under!

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  The Plumber’s Mate Mysteries

  Pressure Head

  Relief Valve

  Heat Trap

  Blow Down

  Lock Nut (coming May 2018)

  Porthkennack

  Wake Up Call

  The Shamwell Tales

  Caught!

  Played!

  Out!

  Spun!

  The Midwinter Manor Series

  Poacher’s Fall

  Keeper’s Pledge

  Southampton Stories

  Pricks and Pragmatism

  Hard Tail

  Lovers Leap

  It’s All Geek to Me

  Damned If You Do

  Camwolf

  Muscling Through

  Wight Mischief

  Midnight in Berlin

  Slam!

  Fall Hard

  Raising the Rent

  To Love a Traitor

  Trick of Time

  Snared

  A Flirty Dozen

  JL Merrow is that rare beast, an English person who refuses to drink tea. She read Natural Sciences at Cambridge, where she learned many things, chief amongst which was that she never wanted to see the inside of a lab ever again. Her one regret is that she never mastered the ability of punting one-handed whilst holding a glass of champagne.

  She writes across genres, with a preference for contemporary gay romance and mysteries, and is frequently accused of humour. Her novel Slam! won the 2013 Rainbow Award for Best LGBT Romantic Comedy, and her novella Muscling Through and novel Relief Valve were both EPIC Awards finalists.

  JL Merrow is a member of the Romantic Novelists’ Association, International Thriller Writers, Verulam Writers and the UK GLBTQ Fiction Meet organising team.

  Find JL Merrow on Twitter as @jlmerrow, and on Facebook at facebook.com/jl.merrow

  For a full list of books available, see: jlmerrow.com or JL Merrow’s Amazon author page: viewauthor.at/JLMerrow

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