His teeth scraped over his lower lip, leaving it ruddy. “It’s a work in progress. What we believe and what we live, they don’t always match up.”
Alle shuffled closer and clasped his bicep. She leaned her head against his shoulder. The fact that he not only accepted her there but folded his arm around her sent a thrill through her tensed frame. That acceptance meant more than dozens of words. It gave her hope. Suggested maybe there was a way forward. That they would be able to figure things out.
“Xane tell you to go easy on me?” he asked after another few washes of the tide over his toes.
“Yeah. How’d you know?”
His smile crinkled the corners of his eyes. “You’re being very contained. It’s not like you. Normally, you arrive like a hurricane and knock me flat.”
“You know at least half of the times we’ve had one of these reunions, you’ve been the one who initiated the kissy stuff,” she said in her defence.
“The kissy stuff?” he echoed.
“The London awards ceremony, you definitely kissed me first. I’m not saying I wasn’t chasing, but you started it.”
“You started it the very first time we met. I mean where did that kiss even come from? We were talking tats and troll crosses, and thensmack, you’re all over me.” He clapped his hands together to demonstrate the impact.
“Spook, you know exactly where it came from. It’s why you kissed me back. Same in Monte Carlo. You try to deny it, but we can both feel it. Look me in the eyes and tell me you don’t feel it now.”
He looked her in the eyes, but his lips failed to form any words.
Yeah, that’s what she thought. Maybe he wanted to deny their chemistry, but he couldn’t. Because he wasn’t a liar. She wasn’t certain where that left them, probably in the same stalemate they’d been stuck in forever.
Alle gathered her jacket more tightly around her. Even snuggled up to his warmth, the sea air carried a chill, and now that twilight was stretching its fingers over the horizon, it was perfectly apparent spring hadn’t arrived yet.
“Cold?” he enquired.
“Yeah, a bit.” Then again, it was a good reason to snuggle closer.
“Should we head somewhere warmer?”
“That depends on where you had in mind.” If he meant them to head to the recording studio or the cottages, or anywhere else they’d be surrounded by other people, then she’d rather shiver. They’d lost too much time for her to relinquish sole possession of his company so swiftly.
“I could show you where I’ve been staying.”
“Is it far?”
He shook his head, already moving to stand. Alle followed him onto her feet. Spook tied his shoelaces together and slung them over his shoulder. Then, he clasped her hand. “It’s just a little way along the shore.”
***
After struggling along the pebbled shore for several minutes without sight of a habitable building, or hell, any building, Alle concluded that his and her definitions of ‘a little way’ varied wildly. This side of the island consisted entirely of cliffs and shingle, and driftwood slowly rotting on the shore. It was wild and rugged, quite unlike the civilised, sandy shore that rolled out from the cottages Black Halo were occupying, down to the foaming sea.
Spook began to lead her towards the cliff face at a sharper incline, taking them past fronds of washed up seaweed crawling with crabs and entire families of limpets and barnacles.
“Almost there,” he encouraged, when she stumbled.
Tempting as it was to contradict him, for they clearly weren’t even halfway to anywhere, Alle held her tongue and maintained her grip on his hand. That was the important part. The connection they’d forge anew en route, not the destination. They were right at the door of his place before she even understood what she was looking at—a house of sorts, with rough sea-carved walls, and lopsided windows cut straight through the rock face. It wore a thatch of seagrass as a roof and sported a handsome beard of moss and barnacles.
“This is where you’re living?”
The door stood tucked into a natural alcove of the cliff face, next to a row of weathered iron rings, the sort you tied boats to, making her suspect that on occasion, the tide came right up to the door. Spook produced a key, of the old-fashioned iron variety, six inches long and suitably weighty. The door opened onto a flagged stone floor, and a space that could best be described as a cave. A comfortable, admittedly well-appointed cave, but a cave, nonetheless.
There were no overhead lights she could see, only an assortment of lanterns, and a single large open fireplace.
“What the hell is this place?”
“Home for the minute.” He pointed to the throw on the sofa, suggesting she use it to warm up. Instead, Alle remained by him as he lit a couple of the gas lanterns. They painted a warm orange glow on their otherwise grey surroundings.
