Page 17 of After Felix (Close Proximity #3)

CHAPTER NINE

FELIX - TWO AND A HALF YEARS LATER

I lower the paperwork to my desk and look at the young man sitting on the chair in front of me.

“So let me get this straight, Aaron. The customer requested that you deal with his shed. He intended for you to strip the paint off and paint it in the lovely yellow colour he’d chosen so painstakingly.

” Aaron squirms, and I narrow my eyes. “And you did what?” He mumbles something, and I put a hand behind my ear. “Come again?”

“I set fire to it,” he mutters.

I grimace. “Yes, and that’s what Mr Harkin told me, but I said to him, ‘Mr Harkin, I cannot believe that a member of our staff needs so badly to clean his ears out. I will have to question the young man myself because he’s a model of integrity.

’” Aaron stares at me, and I shake my head. “I was, of course, lying.”

He perks up. “You don’t need to cross-question me?”

“Of course, I do.” He instantly deflates. “You are the anti-model of rectitude. You set fire to a shed which then set fire to the poor man’s fence and entailed the fire engine making a little trip. It was quite a chain reaction, as Diana Ross would say. ”

“Does she work for the fire service?”

I look at him for a long second and then give up. “Why did you burn the shed down?” I say, pinching the top of my nose.

“He said to take care of it. That means to destroy it.”

“Only in Guy Ritchie films.” He looks winsomely at me, and I shake my head.

“Aaron, you need to learn to listen properly to the customer. Not just pay attention to the first two seconds and then make the rest up yourself. Now, you’re going to trip along to Mr Harkin’s house, and you are going to drive him to the garden centre and buy him a new shed and a fence.

You are then going to put both things together.

And you are not going to return to the office until that is done, because I cannot answer for the sharpness of my tongue if Mr Harkin is still unhappy. ”

“The sharpest,” he says in an awed voice. He bites his lip and gets up but then hovers. “I presume this will have to come out of my pay, Felix?”

Internally, I give a huge sigh because I know when I’m beaten. “It should do,” I say, eyeing him and the subsequent droop of his shoulders. “But you can use the company card to pay for it this time.”

He brightens. “ Really . Oh, thank you so much, Felix. I know I should pay, but I’m helping my brother out with his rent after the accident and?—”

“I know,” I say. “But you need to listen now. I can’t do this again, and I might be soft, but I’m not stupid. I’m definitely not paying your wages on this. That was already covered during your arsonist phase.”

“You’re the best,” he cries, grabbing his jacket from the back of the chair and hightailing it out of the office before I can change my mind.

“I’m so glad Zeb made you the manager of the agency.

I’d have shit myself if I’d had to answer to him.

Mr Crossy McCrosspatch would have …” There’s a stuttered pause, and his voice, when he speaks next, is hushed.

“Oh, Mr Evans, I didn’t see you there. How are you? ”

“Well, Aaron, I have to say that I’m doing very well for a Crossy McCrosspatch,” Zeb’s voice drawls, and I can’t repress my smile.

There’s the hurried sound of footsteps and the slam of the outside door, and then my old boss appears in my doorway.

I blink at the sight of him. Once upon a time, my day would have started with eyeing whichever designer suit he’d chosen to wear.

Now, he’s dressed in disreputable jeans, a T-shirt, and a liberal coating of brick dust from his latest property renovation.

“You’d better not get any of that shit in my office,” I warn him.

He grins. It’s a lazy, happy grin. The sort he’s worn ever since he ditched Patrick and got involved with the lovely and irrepressible Jesse.

“Wasn’t this my office, Felix?”

“Yes, and it was full of repressed yearning and angst. Then you got involved with a younger man and left to knock walls down in old houses or whatever you do now, and I inherited it along with half of this very up-and-coming firm.”

He leans against the door, folding his arms over his chest. His eyes are bright and knowing. “Can you still say that with a straight face after the little firebug just left with the company credit card clutched in his arsonist hands?”

I shake my head. “Let’s not discuss it, Zeb. I have a wrinkle forming over my left eye that is solely down to him, and I’m far too young and single to cope with that.”

“Thought you had a fancy new man,” he says lightly. He sneaks a look at me that he thinks I don’t see.

“Andrew?”

He nods.

I laugh. “He’ll probably just be a variation on all of his predecessors.

Promising, yet ultimately useless.” A frown of concern crosses Zeb’s face, and I wave my hand at him.

“At least I’ll get a dirty weekend in the Cotswolds for my trouble.

It’s better than a shag in the bathroom of the Lyceum. I’ll even get breakfast.”

“Ah, yes, the Cotswolds. Hmm.” He shifts against the door, a slightly apprehensive look on his face.

“Is there a problem with the Cotswolds that I’m not aware of, Zeb? Have the tectonic plates shifted and swallowed them whole along with all the sheep and antique shops?”

“Oh, ha-ha, yes. No, it’s just that I wondered if you’d do me a huge favour?”

“Does this favour involve me shagging Andrew in a four-poster bed and then eating room service in one of those lovely dressing gowns that I fully intend to nick afterwards? Because I can manage that with a great deal of enjoyment.”

“Not exactly. It’s just that you’ll be near Max, and I wondered?—”

“Oh my God.” I throw my hands in the air. “I knew it. Are you aware, Zeb, that most people don’t see their actual current partners as much as I’m landed with seeing my ex?”

“I know,” he protests. “But it would help me out so much. We went in on a house together, and I’ve got some papers that need to be signed and witnessed. I waited for him to come up to London, but he’s ensconced himself at his house lately and won’t budge. He’s also not answering his phone.”

“I did notice a lovely, quiet, Max-sized gap in my life. I might have known it was too late to relish the sensation,” I snipe, but there’s no real heat in my voice.

He smiles, looking relieved. “He’s writing,” he says as if that explains everything.

And it sort of does with Max. “If you could stop in, I’d be so grateful.

He lives in Chipping Camden, which is just up the road from where you’re staying.

You and Andrew could witness the papers, and then I can get on with?—”

“ How grateful will you be?” I say abruptly, stopping his flood of words dead.

“Oh well, erm.” He looks slightly nervous.

I eye him and run my finger over the desk surface. “You know a favour like this is of a huge magnitude. I mean, introducing your current lover to the old one is really awkward.”

“What do you want?” he says in a resigned voice.

“I need the cabinets in my kitchen painted, and then some new tiles put up. Oh, and I’ve got a work surface that needs fitting too.”

“So, in fact, you practically need a new kitchen fitted?” I offer him a limpid gaze, and he rolls his eyes. “They should employ you in Brexit trade negotiations.”

“I’m much too important for that.”

“Okay.” He sighs. “You strike a fucking hard bargain. I’ll just go up to the flat and get the papers.”

When he’s gone, I scrub my hands through my hair and sigh.

This sort of thing has happened a lot in the two and a half years since Max and I split up.

Most men, when they leave their lover because he’s in love with another man, would expect never to see him again.

When I left him passed out on that bed, I really thought that would be the last I saw of him.

And for a whole month that was the case. Complete radio silence. Then he turned up again. My mind tries to shy away from the memory of that meeting. It was painful in a way I don’t like to remember, but I can’t help it.

I see him as I walk along the towpath to the boat. At first, he’s just a dark shadow, and I jerk back in caution, but then the light falls on his face, and I stiffen.

“What are you doing here?” I ask, proud of my cold, even tone. I’m less proud of the way my eyes must be visibly eating him up, but one out of two isn’t bad.

He’s dressed in jeans and a grey jumper, the outfit looking as expensive as ever, but something seems off about him. He’s thinner, the hollows in his cheeks visible, and his eyes have dark circles under them.

Must be terrible to know the love of your life is happily married to someone else, I think savagely.

I try to feel sympathy, but I can’t manage it because I’m still angry.

I’m so mad at him, and it’s intensified because I know I shouldn’t really be.

Yes, he didn’t tell me the truth about Ivo, but why should he?

We were only shagging, and he was very careful never to give me anything else.

He never led me on. It was his natural kindness and charm that snuck under my walls, and it isn’t his fault that I mistook it for something else.

My mental pep talk doesn’t do any good because I’m utterly embarrassed at the way I misinterpreted everything. Embarrassment mixed with the anger creates bad results. All I want to do is punch him.

“I wanted to see you,” he says, coming closer.

I inhale the sweet, warm scent of sandalwood and close my eyes involuntarily. When I open them, he’s staring hungrily at me. If he were anyone else, I’d say he looks desperately glad to see me. However, it’s Max, so my body language antennae are probably on the blink .

“Why?” I ask bluntly.

He winces. “Do I need a reason?” He’s trying for lightness, but I’m not in the mood.

“Yes,” I say coldly. “You do. What do you want, Max?”