“Theulcer?”
“And the rest. Even without it, I was a mess. It got so bad that I couldn’t roll over in bed. I slept for, like, a month before I got evicted from my apartment, and by then my contract at the ballet company had beenterminated.”
“They sackedyou?”
“Of course they did. They were never going to pay me forhibernating.”
“Don’t make light of it. They should’ve looked afteryou.”
Angelo sighed. “I had a benefits package with my contract, but ME was excluded. Like I said, if I’d had MS or something else, it might’ve beendifferent.”
“That’s awful.” Dylan felt sick. “And then you had to come home to your family’smess?”
“Uh huh. I was here for a few months before my dad died. And you know therest.”
“They don’t, though, dothey?”
“What?”
“Your family. They can’t know or they wouldn’t let you work yourself into the ground.” Dylan didn’t need Angelo’s silence to confirm it. He reached for the tea he’d brought for Angelo. “Sit up a bit. You need to drinksomething.”
Angelo didn’t protest as he propped himself up on his elbow, and Dylan held the mug to his lips until most of the tea was gone. “I never told anyone except my bosses at the company. I never got round to making many friends over there, and there was other shit to worry about when I camehome.”
“I get that,” Dylan said. “But you can’t live like this. That deli is going to kill you if you keep working the way you are. What does your doctor over herethink?”
“Dunno. I haven’tbeen.”
“You haven’t seen a doctor in theUK?”
“What’s the point? Doctors can’t helpme.”
“You don’t knowthat.”
“Don’t I? My bank balance saysdifferent.”
Dylan let it go?—for now. The bitterness had gone from Angelo’s voice, and he’d revealed more in the last ten minutes than he had in the whole time they’d known each other. Besides, he was fading fast, his face so weary that Dylan’s soul wept for him. An invisible magnet drew him close to Angelo?—so close that their noses touched, and then before he could comprehend the bloom of warmth in his belly, his lips found Angelo’s in a sweetkiss.
It wasn’t the kind of kiss he’d imagined when he’d thought of seeing Angelo again after their club encounters. The heat was there, but it was tempered by worry and exhaustion and a flurry of other emotions that Dylan couldn’t quite decipher. Angelo kissed him back, moving his lips like a softly whispered dream, and it seemed like a lifetime had passed before the need to breathe forced Dylan to pullaway.
His hands found Angelo’s face like they had so many times since he’d brought him home, and Angelo stared at him with watery eyes. “Sleep,” Dylan said quietly. “I’ll be here when you wake up, Ipromise.”
Chapter Eight
Angelo acceptedDylan’s outstretched hand and stepped carefully out of the shower. “Thankyou.”
Dylan scowled, only the thin layer of scruff on his jaw stopping him looking like a stroppy teenager. “I still think you should call insick.”
“Callwho?”
“I don’t know... yourmum?”
“My mum is sixty-eight and can barely see the labels on the milk bottles. Closing the place is better than leaving her to open up byherself.”
“So close theplace.”
Angelo didn’t answer. If Dylan didn’t know by now why he couldn’t close the deli, then the last month meant nothing. Losing a day’s takings would mean he couldn’t pay his suppliers, and then he’d have to live with pushing them into a financial hole too.Fuck that. His own mess wasenough.
Dylan wrapped a towel around Angelo. “I know you can’t stay home. I’m just worried aboutyou.”
