Patrick's face fell and for a moment Simon thought he might cry.Jesus.
"I know,” Patrick finally said. “I know there’s nothing to worry about. I trust you, I do." Patrick looked at their joined hands. "I've just been so on edge lately. I guess the pressure finally got to me. But you've got to admit, Darren does have a thing for you, so you can't blame me for jumping to conclusions."
Simon squeezed Patrick's hands and couldn't help the smile in his voice. "You're jealous. I kind of like it."
Patrick's brows shot to his hairline. "Jealous?" He let out a small laugh, then frowned. "You may be right."
"I know I'm right."
"So what was it all about then? Why did he want to meet with you, and why didn't you say anything about it before?" Patrick looked at him with wide gray eyes. "Not that you need to tell me everything you do," he hurried to add.
Simon squeezed Patrick’s fingers again. "I don't mind you wanting to know where I am, especially when I don't come home as expected. I should have told you I had something on."
"So, why didn't you?"
"I wanted to understand a bit more about it before talking to you. When I spoke with Darren on Saturday he asked me to do him a favor, but asked for it to be kept on the down low."
Patrick drew his brows together. "The down low?"
"Okay, he specifically asked me not to say anything to anyone."
"Including me?"
Simon nodded, not liking the expression on Patrick’s face. "Yeah, including you."
"I can respect that then."
That shocked Simon, given Patrick’s jealous outburst only moments before. "Well, I can't, and you shouldn’t have to. I told Darren I wouldn’t keep any secrets from you and if he was going to insist then I wouldn't be able to help him. But I wanted to get some more info from him first before talking to you. So I’d know what I was dealing with, I guess. That's what the coffee was about—me finding out why he wanted to have boxing lessons and why he wanted to keep it all hush-hush. I mean, heaps of people take up boxing, it's not anything unusual, not the sort of thing you’d ordinarily keep secret."
"So that's all he wanted? Boxing lessons?"
Simon nodded, but could picture Darren’s fear when Simon had asked why. "Uh-huh. Well, more like self-defense lessons. But jeez, Patrick, there's something bad going on there. I think he's in real trouble."
"What kind of trouble?"
"I think someone's hurting him."
"Fuck!"
"I know, right? Just the thought of it makes my blood boil. But Andrew's never said anything or even hinted that there might be something going on with Darren."
"Maybe Andrew doesn't know. Not that I've met Darren that many times, but I've never seen any sign of physical abuse. Maybe the odd scrape, but he's a mechanic so you'd expect that, right? A few bumps and scratches, and skinned knuckles from working with tools and engines."
"Possibly. I always thought he was just a shy kid, but it seems like his timid nature could be driven by something more than plain shyness."
"So what are you going to do?" Patrick asked. Now he was the one squeezing Simon's hand.
"I'm going to teach him to box, of course."
"I gathered that." Patrick's smile was gentle. "But what about the other stuff, the trouble he's in?”
"I'm not sure what I can do. To be honest, other than saying he wanted to be able to protect himself, he didn't tell me anything else. He told me he'd said too much already and asked me not to push it. He definitely looked scared. I want to help, but I don't want to make things worse."
"And we don't really know how serious things are. Maybe we’re jumping to conclusions."
"No, that's true,” Simon agreed. “So I'm going to meet with him a couple of times a week."
Patrick nodded. "And we can invite him around to hang out. Maybe he'll relax when he gets to know us better. Build some trust, you know? And once he trusts us he might open up a bit more."
