Page 64 of Just Like in the Movies

His dad must have been bisexual, but why had he never had a long-term relationship with any woman, including his mom? His old man had hidden his true self behind a string of casual, careless, indiscriminate booty calls. But it wasn’t his father’s sexuality that Luke was ashamed of.

‘No, it’s not the fact he fell in love with another man that bothers me, it’s all the lies,’ he said at last, in answer to Ruby’s question. Because all he felt now was sad and disappointed that Falcone had never been honest about anything.

‘I’m glad.’ The relief on Ruby’s face was palpable. ‘It’s so important to know that the quality of your relationship with your father doesn’t have anything to do with him being bisexual,’ she said, sounding so earnest he had the weird urge to hug her. If only it were as simple as that. ‘My father was heterosexual,’ she added. ‘Or at least I assume he was, because I never met him. He disappeared faster than Harry Potter in his invisibility cloak when my mum told him she was pregnant with me.’

‘That’s tough. He sounds like a dick,’ Luke said, and felt the pointless anger scouring his throat again. This time on Ruby’s behalf instead of his own.

‘Yes, I suppose he was,’ she said. ‘But I didn’t need him in the end. Matty was the dad of my heart, and he made a much better dad than that guy could ever have made, so I consider myself lucky,’ she said.

So, Ruby had lost her father a month ago. No wonder she was still struggling with her grief.

‘But I don’t want to talk about my deadbeat dad right now,’ she said. ‘We were talking about yours,’ she added, neatly changing the subject again. ‘Why did you think he was a selfish arsehole?’

He jerked his shoulder. Shit, he really didn’t want to have this conversation. He hated talking about his father at the best of times, complaining about him now though – in the light of Ruby’s crap dad story – made that even tougher. But as she stared at him, somehow he felt he owed her this conversation.

‘My mom wanted me to form a relationship with him. But I don’t think he was ever that interested,’ he said. ‘I lost count of the times as a kid when he’d be due to take me out for the day, and he didn’t show. Or I’d get dropped off to spend the day with him in Montecito and he was too hung-over to do much of anything. Eventually I started to resent it and him. But maybe if I had known why he didn’t want to see me. Because I was a reminder of what he’d lost. A symbol of the night he’d fucked up what sounds like the one genuine relationship in his life …’ He sighed, and the weight in his stomach from the day before dropped back into his guts. ‘I guess I never thought of my father as someone who could be hurt, who deserved my sympathy. He was always so arrogant, so careless. Or so I thought. But to have that secret inside him that he could never acknowledge. It’s like Heath Ledger in that movie we watched. It must have destroyed him. I’ve disliked my father for a large part of my life, because I always thought he was a fraud. Pretending to be cool when he wasn’t, but now to discover he was kind of forced to be a fraud … and he must have been suffering.’

Ruby pressed a hand over his on the table, and the weight in his stomach rose up his torso. He blinked. Jesus, he was not going to cry. But the only wa

y to stop the sting from becoming a flood seemed to be to keep talking.

‘When I found him that morning, I always figured the overdose was a mistake,’ he said, the words tumbling out. ‘I figured he didn’t really mean to commit suicide, he was just monumentally careless. Or maybe he was looking for attention. A headline. His career was on the skids by then thanks to his addictions. I was sure he had forgotten I’d agreed to come by, because he always forgot details. But now I’m not so sure. What if he meant it? What if he meant for me to find him? What if it was a cry for help? I’ve been angry with him for so long about the consequences of that day.’ The panic attacks, the nightmares that had plagued him for years, and the anxiety which he’d never quite been able to tame completely a result of the emotional fallout from that day. ‘But I’m not angry with him anymore,’ he continued. ‘Because I realise he was never to blame. I guess there’s not much point being angry with my mom, either, for taking so long to tell me the truth.’

He sunk into the kitchen chair. Drained. Exhausted. He hadn’t meant to say any of that, hadn’t even known it was inside him.

But when Ruby knelt down in front of him, put trembling hands on his bare knees he was forced to meet her gaze and saw the emerald green, misty with compassion.

He shifted, supremely uncomfortable at how much he wanted to bask in it. Even knowing he didn’t deserve it.

‘Luke.’ She pressed her cheek to his knees, the sheen in her eyes crucifying him. She looked as if she were on the verge of tears. Who was she crying for? ‘I’m so, so sorry. I didn’t know it was you who found him.’

Shit! why had he let that slip out? He was seriously losing the plot and it wasn’t even noon.

***

Ruby felt Luke pull away and forced herself to hold in the tears that were making her eyes burn and get off her knees.

Displays of emotion were not the way to go here. He looked uncomfortable, wary, because he had shared much more than she suspected he had meant to share. She mustn’t read too much into it.

Just as she had suspected, last night hadn’t ever been about her, about them.

She lifted their used plates from the table. ‘Do you want to take a shower?’

His eyebrows lifted a fraction. Then he rubbed his hand over his jaw. ‘I should probably head back to my place, before anyone arrives. I don’t want you to be accused of sleeping with the enemy’

No one would think that – not anymore – not even Jacie. But she could see how keen he was to leave, so she nodded and forced a smile to her lips.

‘Good thinking, Batman. Do you want to head down the fire escape once you’re dressed, just in case?’

‘Yeah,’ he said. ‘You sure you don’t want me to help out with the dishes?’

She shook her head.

As much as she would have loved to take him up on his offer, and have him pressed against her hip while they washed the breakfast dishes together in her tiny kitchen, she would just be prolonging the inevitable. And she needed to get her own shaky emotions under control.

‘Maybe next time,’ she said, then winced.

There won’t be a next time.

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