Page 26 of One Last Try (Try for Love #1)

Owen

Turns out, Daisy as bar manager equals everyone—and I mean everyone —getting so shitfaced they can’t function. Of the nine people who turn up to sevens the next morning, only one isn’t hungover as fuck. Daisy herself.

“Dad, we made so much money,” she says, as we’re doing warm-up laps. “A few more of those nights and I reckon that thatched roof is in the bag.”

“What did you even do to get them all in this state?” I cast my eyes around.

Bryn’s running with one hand on his forehead, Tom’s absent—nursing his alcohol poisoning no doubt—and Lando’s doubled over behind a bush.

“ You were supposed to be the responsible landlord. You have a duty not to kill everyone in the neighbourhood.”

“What?” she says, holding out her palms in faux indignation. “They’re all adults. All I did was tell them about the roof and they wanted to help. We ended up having an impromptu talent show. Winner takes all.”

“What’s all?” I demand.

“The grand prize. The trophy. The framed picture of Pedro Pascal in his Met Gala coat and boots.” She looks so proud.

“Sure, sure. So who won?” I ask.

“Mathias.”

“But he wasn’t even there!”

She simply shrugs and jogs away.

This morning I called into Fernbank Cottage, picking Mathias up, and we walked the five fields to the Old Boys’ club.

He didn’t mention the kiss, or the movies, or the failed snuggling, and I sure as shit didn’t want to bring any of it up in case it made the rest of today unbearably awkward.

So I kept my mouth shut, and instead we talked about penning an Easter themed pub quiz for Thursday night.

There’ll be a chocolate round for food and drink, an Easter egg round for film and TV—even though Mathias had to explain the entire concept of Easter eggs to me twice—and the picture round will feature companies who use crosses in their logo.

The fact that he wouldn’t be around next Sunday for lunch was already making me wish it was the following Sunday. I try not to think too much about that, or what happened last night, as I lead everyone in warm-ups.

“I’m not being funny,” Bryn says after our stretches. He sounds extra Welsh this morning. “But if we do any scrumming, I’m gonna chunder.”

Some of the other guys moan in agreement.

Daisy helpfully supplies, “Scrunder.”

“Can we stick to passing drills or something a little less harsh on the stomach?” he pleads.

We split into two groups based on blood alcohol levels. Group A for people who feel semi-sober, and group B for folk who’d fail a breathalyser test. Daisy’s idea. I expect so she doesn’t get held back by the consequences of her own actions.

Lando’s in the other group, but he’s about as useful as a pair of slippers in a knife fight, and spends the entire morning lying on his belly in the sun whining loudly whenever anyone gets too close to him.

After passing drills, we gradually move up to contact, and then for the last thirty minutes of the session, we have a very diluted game.

Daisy refs, and since there are only five guys per side, I get to play.

Bryn insists Mathias and I play on separate teams because “It’s not fair to have two professional players on one team verses a bunch of lads who are barely hanging onto their breakfast.”

It does mean we get to touch each other more often. Because we’re the least inebriated of the bunch, we’re playing all the positions. Forwards and backs.

We have our shoulders locked in a ruck when I decide to whisper sweet nothings in his ear and, well, I call him “spider monkey.”

It pans out exactly as I expected it to. The ruck collapses as Mathias dissolves into laughter. I seize control of the ball.

“I prefer Wild Card,” he admits, before gameplay resumes.

Even though the rest of our teams seem to be running at half speed, the time whizzes by too quickly, and everyone except Lando is a lot perkier by the end of the session.

They depart with cheery waves, but nobody stays to use the club’s shower blocks, all choosing to drive off to the comfort of their own homes to cleanse.

“Don’t forget, no sevens next week,” I say to each person as they go. Guaranteed at least one or two will overlook this and turn up anyway, confused as a fucking lemon in a cottage pie.

Daisy and Orlando brought their separate cars today, though Lando looks like he’s fallen asleep behind the wheel already. His head is tilted up against the headrest, sunnies on, door wide open, one leg outside the Audi and a foot planted on the weed-cracked tarmac.

“Daze, drive that bloody kid home, will you?” I yell as I shove the unused pads and stinking bibs inside the storage shed. I would do it myself, usually do, but I have more pressing matters at hand today. Like taking another shower with Mathias Jones.

Mathias is quiet while we peel off our sweaty, muddy kit. Pensive. He chews on the corner of his lip. There’s something on his mind.

“What’s up?” I ask, because I get the sense he wants to talk about whatever it is but won’t initiate the conversation.

He puffs up his cheeks, holds all the air in them . . . then eases it out, laughs humourlessly, and shakes his head. “I sent my agent a text last night after you left.”

“At half past two in the morning?” I tug my shirt off and bundle it onto the bench. Mathias’s eyes flit down my chest.

“She’s used to it. I’m not great at sleeping, and if I have a thought, sometimes it can’t wait till morning. Besides, she once told me she has a bedtime mode on her phone so any texts or emails after ten won’t come through until she gets up. If there’s an emergency, I need to ring her.”

“Okay . . .” I hold out a hand, encouraging him to hop back to the point. Pretty sure his little ramble about his agent was just to buy himself more time.

“I . . . I uh . . . I told her not to find another house,” he says.

“ Okaay . . .” I say again, drawing out the word. I take my shorts off next.

“Like, for me to live in. I told her to stop looking for houses, because I’m going to stay here. In Mudford-upon-Hooke.”

“Oh! Oh my god.” The words rush out.

“Until the end of the season . . . and then I’ll go back to Wales.”

Mathias is sticking around. The boy I kissed last night is staying for a few months at least. There’s relief, and adrenaline, and excitement, and I’m trying not to smile like a birthday party clown on gas and air.

I take my pants off. I’m naked and slick with sweat, and not in a good way. Mathias trails his eyes down my body and then looks away. He’s still wearing his full kit, sans boots and socks. I grab my towel and head over to the shower block entrance.

“Does this decision have anything to do with last night?” I pause in the doorway, holding my towel in such a way it obscures the goodies .

He whips off his T-shirt and folds it—again, buying himself more time. “Yes,” he says, and my insides feel as though they’re filled with helium. They crash back down a moment later. “But . . .”

I hold my breath while I wait for him to finish his thought. He takes his shorts off, folds them too, then his underpants. He fucking folds his underpants because he doesn’t want to tell me.

I know what he’s going to say, though. We can’t be anything. We can’t continue to snog on my—I mean his—sofa. Perhaps we can be friends who write pub quizzes together, but that’s it.

Mathias still doesn’t finish his sentence. He grabs his towel and joins me in the doorway.

I smash the on button of the third shower. Maybe the crashing water will help to drown out the screaming in my head.

He slides in next to me, switches his tap on.

“Last night, kissing you . . . it was amazing. Honestly, you can’t know how often I’ve imagined that moment.

It was better—” He cuts himself off mid-sentence.

One-eighties his approach to letting me down.

“I’m going to stay in Mudford until the end of the season, but I’m going back to Wales at the beginning of June, and .

. . I can’t get into anything serious. Relationship wise. ”

It doesn’t sting any less when you know it’s coming.

“I figured as much.” I’m trying to keep my voice even, unaffected, grown-up. It’s honesty, and I want nothing else. Except . . .

“There’s no point if I’m leaving. Eventually, one or both of us will get hurt.”

“True,” I say, nodding.

He dips his hair under the water, runs a hand through it. “But . . . what would you say to maybe a bit of . . . no-strings fun?”

Sensible me should have stopped this discussion right here. Shut it straight down. Mathias is right, one of us will end up broken-hearted, and I’m willing to bet the cost of a new thatch on that one person being me.

But Mathias Jones is standing before me, naked, wet, hot as fuck, and oh, did I mention he’s naked and wet? I couldn’t even recite the definition of sensible right now, let alone apply it to myself .

“Friends with benefits?” I ask. I cringe at how old and uncool I sound, but Mathias nods, then runs his tongue along his bottom lip, and I do not need any further convincing. “We’ll still take things at your pace, okay?”

“Perfect,” he says. “You can ‘comfort’ me after the boos.”

I’m already growing hard at the anticipation of what that could mean. I don’t let myself think about it or doubt it. Don’t ask myself any questions. I don’t even celebrate in my head, because I cannot—will not—jinx this.

“So, do you have any preferred position?” His gaze catches on my thickening cock. “Because I’m vers.”

I turn my face under the water, shake it off. “I am too, but . . . there are certain . . . things that make bottoming kind of impossible for me right now.”

He raises a questioning eyebrow.

“Mate, I’m forty-five, and I’ve done a lot of heavy lifting and shit in my life and . . . I’ve got the rhoids. As in haemor not ster.”

“Oh,” he says. Then, “Ohh. Does it hurt?”

Pretty much every older guy I know who’s played rugby has had them at some point. It’s kind of an inevitability. Still doesn’t make it any less embarrassing to admit.