Page 50 of Merry & Bright
“Arun-in?” Eilidh repeated. “Wait—is that why you didn’t want to meet here?”
Cam nodded. “This is the first time I’ve come in here since Rob and I argued.”
“Youargued? Like raising your voice arguing?”
“Ssssh!”Cam frowned, adding more quietly, “Yes, like shouting at each other in this very café arguing.”
Eilidh let out a strangled laugh. “What got you so riled you were actually—oh wait,no way!” She covered her mouth with her hand to smother her giggles and glanced over at the counter. Cam followed her gaze—Rob was there but his back was to them as he busied himself doing something at the coffee machine.
“Did you and Rob havea thing?” Eilidh murmured, brown eyes twinkling.
“What?No!No, we didn’t! Jesus, just because I’m gay doesn’t mean I try it on with every halfway attractive man I meet!”
“Aha! So you admit he’s attractive!”
“Well yes, obviously he’sattractive—” Cam had liked the look of Rob from the first. He had those west coast looks—pale skin married with very black hair and those light, almost silvery blue eyes. More than that, though, he seemed—strong. Unflappable somehow. It was difficult to imagine him being fazed by anything.
Eilidh laughed softly. “Well then, ask him out. When he was standing here, he kept sneaking these little glances at you all the time, like he couldn’t keep his eyes off you. I bet he’s gay—is he?”
Cam shrugged. “Apparently. I was told he moved here with his boyfriend but I gather the boyfriend died a few years ago.”
According to Mrs. MacIver in the village shop, that was.
“Oh, that’s so sad!” Eilidh said. Then she gave a little smile. “But you couldcomforthim. Does he know you’re gay too?”
Cam felt heat steal over his cheeks. “Christ, I don’t know! It’s not like I wear a T-shirt announcing the fact!”
Eilidh gave a soft hoot of laughter.
Before the argument, Cam and Rob had been on pretty friendly terms. Enough that they’d chatted over their pints in The Stag on a Friday evening, or when Cam came into the café. It’d felt to Cam as though, maybe, they were on the way to becoming friends. And yes, there had been a few—shared looks. Cam had even, from time to time, toyed with the idea of asking Rob out, though he hadn’t, in the end.
He still wasn’t sure whether he was glad of that, or if he regretted not asking when he’d had the chance.
“Anyway,” he said to his sister, making his tone brisk, “there’s no way anything would ever happen between us, so just forget it, okay?”
“How can you say that if you’ve never been out with him? Just ask him out on a date!”
“Stopit! Seriously Eilidh, I couldn’t ask him out even if I wanted to—which I don’t by the way—not after what happened.”
Eilidh regarded him curiously. “Why? What did you argue about?”
Cam rubbed the back of his neck uncomfortably. “Rob was pissed off because I started selling coffee down at the boatshed—”
“What?” Eilidh frowned. “Why on earth were you sellingcoffee?”
“Jesus, Eilidh,” Cam hissed. “Will you keep it down?” He shot a nervous glance at the counter but thankfully Rob was still turned away, apparently focused on his task.
“Sorry,” Eilidh murmured. “Go on, I’m listening.”
“Well, it happened back in the summer, when the tourists were around. I was getting quite a lot of people dropping in, just wanting to hire kayaks or bikes for a couple of hours but half of them were wandering off ’cause I was busy talking to someone else. So I figured, if I stuck a few chairs out front and sold some drinks and snacks, they wouldn’t mind waiting so much. It wasn’t a proper café like this place—with fancy espresso coffee and steamed milk and stuff—I just got one of those filter coffee makers and a hot water urn for tea and kept them topped up so people could serve themselves.”
“So what happened with Rob? Do I take it he was annoyed about this?”
“Yeah. He didn’t say anything to me though. The first I knew about it was when a council official turned up at the boatshed and served a notice on me saying I was in breach of planning rules ’cause I didn’t have permission to use the boatshed as a café. And then he starts asking me about food safety and disabled toilets and pretty much every rule and regulation you can imagine—”
“Shit, you must’ve freaked!”
“I did. I told the council guy I’d stop straightaway—which was a pisser ’cause I’d just spent eighty quid on the equipment and stock and I reallyfuckingneeded the extra income. I was so apologetic I think he felt sorry for me. That was when he let slip that it was the owner of the café in the village who’d reported me, and I just—snapped. As soon as he left, I came marching up here to give Rob a piece of my mind and it kind of...got out of hand.”