Page 47 of Daddy's Christmas Elf
“Crispin, not Crispy.” Peter frowned. “He’s a circus skills trainer, very well known in—”
Grey gawped before he burst into laughter. It was the last thing he’d expected to hear.
“Circus skills? What did he do to reel you in? Throw a custard tart in your face, or squirt water at you from a big plastic flower on his lapel?”
Peter glared at him. “I should have known you’d laugh. I’m sorry his profession isn’t serious or buttoned up enough for you. Crispin’s got his own well regarded academy, and he’s been asked to help set up a school in Mexico, in the New Year. He’s going to be away for three months, and I’m going with him.”
“I’m sorry, but — circus skills? Can somebody really make a living out of that?”
“I think—” Peter fell silent.
Grey swallowed the rest of his laughter. “You think what?”
Peter lowered his head. “All right, so it’s not banking but that doesn’t make it any less of a career choice, and for me that’s a good thing. The world that comes with it, it’s more me.”
“More you than the stultifying, suffocating corporate world I was chained to — and by extension, you were too — is that what you’re saying?”
The words were glass, tearing Grey’s mouth to shreds. The bitterness, the pain, the anguish of who and what they’d been together tumbled down around him, as it all came flooding back. He didn’t want to go back, not now, not ever, but it didn’t stop Peter’s words feeling like a scab had been pulled from a wet and weeping wound.
Grey jumped up from the sofa and turned away from Peter. He closed his eyes and drew in a long breath. All of that was gone, in the past, the signatures on the divorce papers confining it all to history.
A hand rested on his shoulder. Taking another deep breath, Grey turned around.
“Just be happy for me. Please?” Peter looked up at him with beseeching eyes.
Grey nodded. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have bit like that. I am happy for you, if it’s what you want. If Crispin is who you want.”
“It is, and yes, he is. Tell me about Eli.”
Grey jumped, Peter’s words taking him aback.
Peter laughed. “Ohhh, have I made a dent in that cool, deadpan façade of yours? You’re blushing, Grey, and you never blush.”
“What do you want to know?” Grey asked, his voice gruff. But Peter was wrong. He hadn’t made a dent in his cool, he’d kicked it out of sight.
“Everything, but I know you’ll tell me sod all.”
Correct…
“He’s gorgeous. And those two-coloured eyes, simply stunning. But it was something else, really, that struck me. Despite his obvious shock at meeting me, he somehow looked very at home here, as though he fitted right in. And the goofy smile on your face when you walked into the living room — which was then ruined when you saw me — well, that told its own story.”
Grey looked down, unable to hold Peter’s assessing gaze.
“Well, I’ve never seen you lost for words. Or squirm. Must be love.” Peter laughed softly, as he rubbed Grey’s shoulder.
Love…
Was it? Grey didn’t know what word to pin to what he was feeling for Eli. His cautious, logical brain told him it was too soon to be surrendering himself to all the stratospheric, soaring emotions that were wrapped up in that one little word, but… Wasn’t that what he felt when he looked at Eli, when he wrapped his arms around him and held him tight? When he touched him, when he kissed him, when he made love to him?
“I… It’s too soon to be thinking like that,” Grey mumbled.
Peter shook his head, an indulgent smile on his lips.
“Love comes when it comes.” He snorted. “That sounds a little smutty, but,” he said, his voice and expression losing all levity, “there’s no timetable. What you feel, and who you feel it for, can’t be regulated and codified. Love doesn’t confine itself to rules and regulations, Grey.”
“I’ve only known him for—”
“Seconds, months, or years, it doesn’t matter. When you know somebody is—”
