Folk disappeared.
I turned the heat down on his lunch and wondered how it could be that I missed him so much it hurt. I’d been without him most of my life. It made no sense that he had this effect on me.
“Is that mine?” Ivy poked me in the leg, reaching for her plate.
I passed it over. “Make sure you eat the cucumber.”
“It’s yucky.”
“It’s good for you. Sit at the table. Anddon’tput it in the plant pot again.”
“Where’s Folk?”
“Putting some dry clothes on.”
“Can he stay for tea?”
My heart fractured. “You’re not having tea here. I’m taking you to your mum’s this afternoon.”
“Why?”
She always asked me that. I didn’t know if she asked Lauren too, and I tried not to think about it. Too much thinking made me the man Folk had asked me about before he’d gone upstairs.
You ever think about doing that?
“Hey.”
For the second time in ten minutes, Folk’s gentle touch made me jump. His hair was wet and pushed back again. His chest bare, my sweatpants hanging low on his slimmer hips.
He’s not wearing underwear.
“Is that for me?”
“Hmm?”
Folk opened the sandwich press, catching his lunch seconds before it burned. He flipped it out with deft fingers and placed the next one onto the heat plate.
He shut the press and cut the hot sandwich in half, sliding one piece to me. “What else did you put in it?”
For a hot minute, I couldn’t remember. “Uh. Cheese? Mushrooms, maybe? Sorry, I forgot to ask what you like.”
“You did ask. And it wouldn’t matter anyway. I like everything.”
If we were still talking about sandwiches, my cock hadn’t got the memo. A shot of heat flared inside me, stealing my appetite for anything but him. Only Ivy scowling at her plate kept me from bursting into flames.
Folk knew it too. Most days I was resigned to how I felt about him being a lonely occupation, but he washere, in my kitchen, winking at me before he joined Ivy at the table.
I made the other sandwich and plated it up. By the time I reached the old oak table Cam’s family had left behind, Ivy was eating her cucumber as if it was a regular occurrence without a half-hour discussion on why I demanded such outrageous things.
Should’ve left it, but I had to ask. “You like that, Ives?”
She crunched the last piece. “Course I do. Mermaids eat the rainbow.”
Couldn’t argue with that. “Put your plate in the dishwasher.” I eyed the window. The glorious morning we’d spent in the sun had clouded over, drizzle soaking the parched earth outside, gentle summer rain that never usually kept us indoors unless Ivy was as knackered as she was starting to look. “Then go choose a film we can watch before we go to Mum’s house.”
Ivy slid from her seat and skipped to the dishwasher, opening it andtossingher plate inside.
It clattered into whatever was already in there. I opened my mouth to chastise her, then realised I didn’t give a shit. I’d worry about plates when she was gone.
