It felt like he knew the answer—not the easily assumed “a lot” but the actual, visceral raw-meat pain of it. He didn’t remember when he’d been scalded, but maybe his nerves did.
“That’s enough,” he said, his voice dry and sticky in his throat.
Edward studied him with narrowed, ice blue eyes for a second as he seemed to weigh the impact his words had. After a moment he gave a briskdip of his chin.
“Maybe it is,” he said. “Finally. If anything happens, call me. Anything at all. Trust me, after an hour I’ll want a graceful excuse to leave. Something like this goes from ‘catching up with old friends’ to ‘bunch of old codgers complaining about how it used to be done back in the day’ very quickly.”
Joe nodded his agreement, and Edward turned to leave. He got a few steps andthen turned around to look at Joe.
“I know I’m not your dad, Joey” he said. “I never tried to be. But you’re still the closest thing I have to family, and everything I do is with your best interests at heart. Even if you don’t see it at the time. I hope you know that.”
Joe knew that Edward believed that, and he was tired of arguments, so he nodded. “I know you mean well, Edward.”
There wasenough room left between the words of that statement for everything else, from the fact that Edward had been the one to sit with Joe when they thought Harry was going to die to the fact that he thought only he knew best. Both of them knew that. After a second, Edward nodded and left, his hands shoved into the pockets of his coat.
Which left Joe with a decision to make. The plan had been to comedown, cut through to King’s Cross, grab a coffee from Starbucks, and then go back to run an eye over the redundancy paperwork for their local employees. It needed done, and it really wasn’t his business what Cal did. Or who he ate with.
He still headed for the hotel restaurant. By the time he got there, he was sure he’d have come up with an excuse for why he picked tonight to eat at the hotel.
Or not. If Cal didn’t owe him anything, he didn’t owe Cal an explanation.
The restaurant was all dark wood and crystal lights. It was full of murmured conversation and the busy click of cutlery on good china. The host, her hair up in a bouncy blonde ponytail, a tailored gray vest buttoned snug over her stomach, smiled politely at him.
“Do you need to be seated, sir?” she asked.
Joe glancedover her head. He tracked across the tables until he found Cal’s profile, half-lit by the candle on the table. The man opposite was short but solid across the shoulders. His blond hair was styled back from his face, and his mouth was open as he held forth about something.
It could be hard to tell what Cal was thinking, except for the times he cracked that goofy grin, but Joe thought he had theknack of it. The smile that tugged one corner of his mouth up didn’t have the sly turn that his humor usually took. He didn’t look at the other man—the doctor—the way he looked at Joe. If he had, Joe supposed that Dr. Lawrence would have already rented a room for them.
He smiled at the host and pointed across the room.
“In that booth over there,” he said. “By the window.”
“Ahh….” The hostessturned and ran her pen down the reservations book. “That should be fine. Follow me.”
She led the way to the booth, handed him a menu, and assured him that the waiter would be with him soon. As she left, Dr. Lawrence chuckled at something as he sliced into his fish, and Cal watched him and drank his soda.
Joe waited until he’d put his order in. Salad and a glass of sparkling water. After theday he’d had, whiskey made sense, but this was already a bad idea. No point in more fuel for it. While he waited for the waiter, he typed out a brusque message to Cal.
The deal was 24/7 after all.
He hit Send and waited. Across the room Cal shifted in his chair and said something to Lawrence as he reached into his pocket. He studied the screen for a second and then slowly looked around to scowlat Joe.
“Fuck off,” he mouthed.
Joe texted him backNoand smirked.
