“Why do you think?”
“I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.” Paolo’s voice rose to a shout by the end of his sentence, and his anger made him impossibly hotter. His cheeks were flushed, and his dark eyes blazed. In any other circumstance, Luis would’ve jumped him, rolled him to the floor, and fucked him right there, but his scrutiny scared Luis more than Dante did.
“He didn’t want anything specific. Just likes winding me up, I’ve told you that before.”
“Have you?”
“Yeah. Maybe you’re the one who needs your fucking hearing checked.”
Luis pushed past Paolo and stormed into the kitchen, trying to remember if hehadtold Paolo that particular snippet of joy about Dante. They talked a lot, sometimes without Luis realising it was happening, and he’d shared so much with Paolo that it had become a blur.You should’ve kept your mouth shut. For all the good it would’ve done him. Paolo hadn’t needed Luis’s confession to know Dante was bad news.
On cue, Paolo barrelled through the kitchen door. “I don’t need my hearing checked to know you’re losing your mind about something. Do you think I’m asleep when you spend all night staring at the ceiling? That I haven’t noticed you’re lost in your own head every night you come home and don’t talk to me for hours on end? What have I ever done to make you think my head is up my arse so far that I don’t give a fuck what’s going on with you?”
Paolo had never done anything to make Luis think he didn’t care, and that was the problem. He cared so much Luis couldn’t hide from him, and that was why this shit had to end. Why he had to get as far away from Paolo as possible before he kicked down Luis’s walls and dragged everything out of him.
Tell him you love him.
Luis shook his head to clear it. Where had that come from? He needed to tell Paolo they couldn’t see each other anymore. That Luis couldn’t work at the cafe and sleep in Paolo’s bed. Not that he was so in love with him that he couldn’t see himself surviving what he had to do next. “I—”
Paolo cut him off with a growl and shoved him hard enough to make him sway on his feet. “Don’t. Whatever deflective rubbish you’re about to come out with, just don’t. Tell me the truth or don’t fucking bother. This is my life too. My business your brother is fucking with to get to you. Why can’t you justtalkto me? Tell me what’s going on in your head?”
Something inside Luis snapped. He moved so fast he had Paolo pinned against the wall before he knew what he was doing. “Why do you want to know what’s going on in my head? Do you think it belongs to you because I suck your dick? Is that where this is going? You think you can fucking control me?”
Paolo’s gaze was wildfire and something else that Luis was too far gone to contemplate. “I don’t want to control you. I want to help you.”
“Why? So you can mould me to fit your world instead of mine? Do you think it’s that easy?”
“None of this is easy, Luis. I just want to understand.”
“You don’t want to understand. You want toknoweverything. That isn’t the same.”
“Isn’t it? Not everyone has an agenda.” Paolo fought Luis’s hold on him. He was strong, but Luis was stronger, and he kicked out in frustration, catching Luis’s shin with his boot.
The pain opened the gate. Every ounce of fear and despair burst through, and Luis clenched his fists. He pulled his arm back and punched the wall behind Paolo’s head. His fist broke through the plasterboard, leaving a hole by Paolo’s ear. His knuckles erupted, blood seeping to the surface of his broken skin. Beige dust from the wall littered Paolo’s hair. It should’ve been enough to bring him back to his senses, but it wasn’t. Rage still flowed through his veins like lava, and he couldn’t think straight.
Luis leaned closer to Paolo, close enough that they could’ve kissed. “Everyone has an agenda, cos every fucker’s out for themself. Sooner you learn that, the sooner you can be done with my shit.”
He backed off, every physical disconnect a bullet to his heart. His feet hit the back door.
Paolo stepped forward. “Luis—”
But Luis was already gone. He ripped the door open and fled, pounding the busy streets in the pouring rain until he found himself on the dilapidated street he called home. Wet through and breathless, he stopped and doubled over, shock and cold slamming into him like a sucker punch.What have I done?Paolo hadn’t flinched at Luis’s flying fists, but the damage to the wall was the same as if Luis had punched him in the face. The cafe was everything to him, to his family, and Luis had brought trouble to their door. Hewasthe fucking trouble. Paolo had been right about him from the start.
Nausea rolled through Luis. He forced himself upright and trudged to the bedsit. The front door of the old house was half hidden by the overgrown trees by the porch. It took him a moment to notice the blood-red spray paint covering the battered wood—another faceless clock, this time with a crude interpretation of the Italian flag blotted into it. A marker or a warning, it didn’t matter. Dante’s message was clear:fuck this up and I’ll kill him.
* * *
Luis didn’t come back. It was becoming such a theme, Paolo was almost bored, but this time felt different. He locked the cafe without wondering if he should wait in case Luis returned, and went home. Shut the door behind him. Bolted it. Only then did the magnitude of what had happened hit him full force.
Trembling, he sank to the floor to sit with his head in his hands, his back to the door.What the hell just happened?He pictured Luis’s face as he’d driven his fist into the wall, the desperation, the fear, all twisted up to make a man Paolo didn’t recognise.
A sob coughed out of his chest, dry and pointless.The fuck are you crying for? You pushed him into it. You laid hands on him first.As if that made it better. Luis had wanted Paolo to be scared of him, as if manhandling him and punching the wall would prove he really was the man Paolo had naïvely feared him to be.
But it didn’t work. Paolowasscared, not of Luis, butforLuis. Something had happened to push him like that, and as guilty as Paolo felt for tipping him over the edge, he knew it wasn’t him. He was a catalyst, not the source. Nah, that was Dante. It had always been Dante.
Paolo lifted his head from his hands and banged it against the door. White powder from the plaster Luis had pulverised drifted down from his hair and landed on his knees. He drew a clock face into it, then scrubbed it out. Anxiety like he’d never felt flared hotly in his chest. He was bone tired, but at the same time buzzing with enough nervous energy to power a space station.
The temptation to chase Luis down was so strong he almost choked on it. He clenched his eyes shut and banged his head again.God, I wish I didn’t love him.
