Page 80 of Companion Required

After they’d cleared most of the table and set the dishwasher going, Jefferson and Bernie had offered to make coffee or tea for everyone. Soft Christmas tunes played in the living room as everyone made themselves comfortable. During a lull in the various conversations, Steph, sitting the other side of the room, addressed Claire.

“So come on, Claire, I think we’re all intrigued. How did you and Jefferson meet?”

“Oh, shush. Nobody wants to know.”

After a few encouraging noises, Claire relented.

“Oh, well. If you insist. I know Kennedy’s heard this story before, but I met his father at an embassy ball. Dragged along by my mother and father, I didn’t want to be there, even though the embassy were supposed to put on something of a spectacle for their guests. I think some lower-ranking member of royalty had arrived for one reason or another. Of course, Jeff’s family were well-known, his father being head of the consulate, but I’d never met any of them. So when this nice young man approached me, asked me if I could waltz—which of course, I could—we took a spin around the floor. Well, by the third dance, I knew. Jefferson was the one for me.”

Everyone made pleasant noises at the end of the story, and Kieran gazed over at his own mother, who caught his eye, smiled sadly and shrugged. Not everyone got to have their happy ending.

Once again, small conversations hummed around the room.

“When did you know?” asked Kieran, snuggled into Kennedy.

“Know what?”

“That you wanted me. I mean, when did you really know?”

Kennedy appeared to consider this.

“You know, I think it was on my stroll up the lane in Okinawa, when you were waiting for me. I saw you standing there, grinning at me as I approached and, I don’t know, something inside me just clicked. And then, when I got to you, and you gave me a hug outside that Buddha bar—”

“Outside the what?” asked Kieran, turning to face Kennedy.

“That bar. The Giant Buddha lounge, or something like that. The one you were standing beneath when you hugged the life out of me. I only remember because the bar light popped on just as we hugged. What about you?”

But Kieran’s mind went back to that evening and later to the night in the hotel, the one branded in Kieran’s brain forever, the first time they’d made love. And all this time, he hadn’t realised he’d been standing beneath the giant Buddha bar in Okinawa waiting for Kennedy to arrive—waiting for his destiny?

“Hey, Kieran. Are you okay?”

“More than,” said Kieran, turning and kissing him on the cheek. “I love you, Kennedy Grey.”

“Love you, too. But for the record, I said it first.”

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