Page 52 of The Unlikely Spare

“Call again soon,” Callum says. “I mean it, Nicholas. If you ever want to talk, we’re here.”

“Of course. Talk soon.”

The screen goes dark, and I’m left staring at my own reflection.

Outside the window, the desert sunset is spectacular, but my thoughts are pinging between what Callum disclosed about colonial atrocities and the intimacy I witnessed between Oliver and Callum. They’ve found purpose—in each other, in their child-to-be, in their respective roles. While I…

I play the part assigned to me. I charm and deflect and smile until my face aches, unwittingly participating in trying to gloss over centuries of systematic theft and the blood-soaked foundations of our wealth with a well-timed joke and platitudes about “shared heritage.”

And at the end of the day, I return home alone.

I sprawl on the sofa, loosening my tie even further.

Dammit.

Why on earth do I have a pressing need to talk to Officer O’Connell about my thoughts right now?

Eoin.

Is it because I know he’ll give me an honest opinion without any sugarcoating whatsoever? He’s Irish after all, and I’m quite certain they learn800 Years of English Oppression: A Comprehensive Listbefore their times tables in school.

I think of what he said to me at the coral reef when I talked about how all the environmental issues feel so overwhelming.

“You start where you are. With whatever piece is in front of you. You can’t fix everything, but that doesn’t mean you fix nothing.”

The problem is, it’s hard to feel like being on this tour, giving palace-sanctioned speeches at palace-sanctioned events, is fixing anything.

And now that my mind has let thoughts of O’Connell in, they arrive in a deluge, overtaking everything else.

His rare, almost-smile this afternoon when I compared him to that disgruntled camel. The unexpected revelation about his brother. The way his eyes lingered on mine for a heartbeat too long before I climbed into the car.

I’ve always prided myself on maintaining control in every situation, but something about that stubborn, principled Irishman keeps throwing me off balance.

This ridiculous…whatever it is…needs to stop. O’Connell is my security detail, nothing more. Even if he is attracted to men—and that’s still a significant if based on one fleeting look when I was in a wetsuit—he definitely doesn’t appear to be my biggest fan.

And pursuing anything with a member of my protection team would be catastrophically stupid, even by my occasionally questionable standards.

I get to my feet. I’ll have a shower, try to rinse off the day, and distract myself.

The marble bathroom is unnecessarily enormous. I turn the water to scalding and step under the spray, letting it pound against my shoulders.

I try to focus on thinking through the schedule for tomorrow, but my traitorous mind immediately conjures the image of O’Connell’s forearms as he rolled up his sleeves in the heat today. The way his muscles flexed beneath tanned skin, the light dusting of auburn hair. The broad expanse of his shoulders straining against that fitted shirt.

“Christ,” I groan, turning the water temperature down with a vicious twist. Cold. I need cold.

It doesn’t help.

Now I’m just shivering while thinking about how his voice deepened when he told me about his brother. How, for one unguarded moment, those gray eyes held something other than disapproval when they looked at me.

This is beyond ridiculous. I’m behaving like a teenager with a crush on the school rugby captain.

And one part of my body is particularly engaged.

I shut off the water and step out, dripping onto the tiles. The shower clearly can’t be trusted.

Neither can I, apparently.

I dry myself off and wrap my towel around my waist. I’m just wiping condensation from the mirror when I spot something dark moving across the pristine white marble floor.