Page 50 of Home Grown Talent
“It’s not posh,” Mason objected. The place was a favourite with celebrities and the media crowd, which was exactly why Mason had chosen it, but it wasn’t posh. Although he supposed the clientele might look rather glitzy to Owen’s eyes. Mason was used to the place, but perhaps he should have prepared Owen. Was that what a friend would have done?
“Look, if you don’t fancy it, we can go somewhere else, but there’s no dress code or anything. And you look scrumptious.” He stepped closer and ran a hand over Owen’s chest, his sweater as soft and cosy as he’d imagined and perfectly outlining Owen’s firm pecs. “Mmm,” he said, teasing, “Insta-ready.”
Owen smiled. God, he had a lovely smile. It started in his eyes and then nudged his lips up on one side of his mouth, then the other. “Well,” Owen said, “I trust you. If you think I look okay, let’s head inside.”
“You look more than okay,” Mason assured him, sliding his fingers down Owen’s arm to take his hand. “Come on, let’s get a drink. They make amazing cocktails.”
Owen’s fingers threaded with his, squeezing. “Do they do beer?”
“Oh, I expect so, but you have to try a cocktail first.” Mason led him inside, pausing for a moment at the entrance, both to scan the bar and to ensure he’d been noticed. He recognised a couple of faces, people Jay had introduced him to, and saw several pairs of eyes turn in his direction. Good. As a reasonably successful model, Mason just about scraped into the minor celebrity category these days. People often recognised him but usually weren’t sure why.
Since it was relatively early in the evening, one of the tables in the window was still open, and Mason led Owen over. There was a loveseat on one side, a deep armchair on the other. He toyed with the idea of snuggling up next to Owen in the loveseat, but wasn’t sure how comfortable Owen would be with that kind of public exhibition. Besides, he was meant to be teasing their relationship, not confirming it, so he dropped—elegantly—into the armchair instead. Owen, glancing around with interest, took the loveseat.
“This is nice,” he said. “Not my usual sort of place, but nice.”
“What’s your usual sort of place?”
“Well.” Owen laughed, picking up the cocktail menu and starting to read. “Just a normal pub, really.” His eyebrows shot up. “Bloody hell.”
Mason felt his face heat. The prices were steep, even by London standards, and he should have considered that Owen’s budget might be different to his own. “My round,” he said breezily. “I recommend the Aviation. That’s what I’m having. Gin, Maraschino, Creme de Violette and lemon. Fragrant, aromatic, a little sour.”
“Sounds good,” Owen said, closing the menu with a slight frown. “But I’ll get them.”
“Owen—”
“My treat. You did all the organising for tonight.”
And there was something about the mulish set of his mouth, a harder expression than Mason was used to seeing on his face, that warned him to accept the offer graciously. Perhaps money was a sensitive subject for Owen. Mason could see how it might be; Lewis was loaded, and, as Mason well knew, that kind of wealth disparity within a family could cause all sorts of stresses and strains. So instead of arguing, he simply smiled and said, “Thank you.”
It was the right call because Owen visibly relaxed, setting the menu back on the table, and gesturing for a waitress who glided over from the bar to take their order. As Mason watched her, he glimpsed a couple of women sitting at the bar eyeing him and Owen. He didn’t recognise them, but he did recognise their giggling interest and the way one of them was subtly holding her phone like a camera. It was exactly the situation Misty had told him to create and why he’d chosen Cosmos in the first place, so he made a little show of shucking off his jacket to reveal the slim-fitting Claudio Lugli shirt—an outrageous print of pink and blue feathers—and leaned across the table to take Owen’s hand.
“So,” he said, smiling into Owen’s eyes, “all set for next week’s production meeting?”
Owen threaded their fingers together, looking pleased and a little flushed. “Yes—if by ‘all set’, you mean I saw that Misty sent some kind of feedback email that I haven’t opened yet…”
Mason laughed, exaggerating it for their audience, not letting go of Owen’s hand. “Yeah, I read it. Basically, you won’t be surprised to know that she loved all the flirting we did and wants us to ramp it up even more next time. She thinks you should bring me some sweet peas from your garden, by the way. Like, as a gift?”
“Next time we film?”
“Yeah. You know, because you said you’d give them to someone on a date…”
Owen shook his head, looking both bemused and amused. “Okay, first off, I said nobody gives people flowers on dates. And second, I won’t have any sweet peas in my garden by then. And third—”
“There’s a third?”
“Yeah, there’s a third. Third, I thought this was meant to be a slot about gardening, not flirting.”
Mason patted his cheek, grinning. “Sweetie, it’s about both, of course. Viewers love shipping people.”
“Shipping people…? Please don’t say in crates.”
Mason laughed, shaking his head. “Oh my God,” he said, lifting Owen’s hand to his lips, pressing a swift kiss to his knuckles. “You’re unbelievable.”
And Owen laughed too, although his eyes widened deliciously, darkening as his fingers tightened around Mason’s hand. “Yeah, yeah, I know what shipping means. Aaron’s always banging on about people ‘shipping’ the characters in Leeches.” His smile faded. “But that’s different from us. They’re fictional characters. It’s just a story. This is real.”
Mason shrugged, throwing a casual glance at the two women at the bar, who both looked away quickly. “The thing is,” he said, turning back to Owen, “when you’re on TV, or in the public eye in any way, you sort of become a fictional character, you know?”
“That’s not true.”