Screwing the System (25 page)

“I like your nan,” Alasdair offered, hoping it might go some way towards lifting Cosmo’s mood. “And I’m not just saying that.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. I could see. And I know you must be dying to find out about my mum too.”

“I can wait.”

“I want to tell you.”

That was good. “Okay. I’m listening.”

“When we get back, yeah? I think I’m going to need a drink. And a smoke.”

Alasdair put his foot to the accelerator and ate tarmac.

Chapter Nineteen

Cosmo turned it over and over in his head. What he should tell, what he shouldn’t. During the drive, he watched Alasdair out of the corner of his eye. The man was solid, unperturbed. He wasn’t going to judge Cosmo harshly, was he? After all, only some of it was his own fault.

Screw it. He’d tell him the whole lot and let Alasdair decide whether he still wanted him around. Better to get it all out. It had festered inside him for so long he could taste it, bitter at the back of his tongue.

Christ, he needed a smoke. Cosmo’s leg twitched like crazy, and he doubted drumming his fingers on his knee would fool anyone that he was simply grooving to an inner beat. As they drew into Knotty Hill, Cosmo pulled out his baccy and started filling a paper with threads of tobacco.

“Did your nan always smoke?” Alasdair asked, surprising Cosmo enough that he jogged the paper, scattering tobacco everywhere.

“Shit, sorry. I’ll clean that up when we get back.”

“Don’t worry about it. But your nan, did she smoke around you while you were growing up?”

“All the time. She used to get me to light them for her sometimes too, if she was busy cooking or something.”

“You didn’t have much choice, then, with getting addicted.” Alasdair sounded like he was trying to convince himself.

Cosmo shrugged. “I guess not, but I dunno. I think we always have some kind of choice, don’t we?”

Alasdair didn’t reply, but there was a thoughtful quality to his silence and none of that silent judgment that usually hardened his features when Cosmo rolled a cigarette in front of him.

When they pulled up in front of the house, Cosmo got out into the rain. An icy drop insinuated itself down the back of his collar. He shivered, feeling the damp soak through the cheap fabric of his hoodie. Alasdair opened the front door and stepped inside, but Cosmo hung back. “I’ll just smoke this under the trees and meet you in the kitchen, all right?”

“Don’t be silly, it’s tipping it down.”

“Yeah, well, I need my nicotine fix.” That wasn’t strictly true after the one he’d had at his nan’s, but it sounded better than admitting he needed it to calm his nerves.

“That’s not what I meant. You’re getting drenched out here. You can smoke in the kitchen.”

Cosmo stared at him through the curtain of falling rain. Had aliens come down and replaced his toppy boyfriend with a marshmallow doppelganger?

“What?” Alasdair squinted at him. “Do I have something stuck between my teeth?”

“Are you feeling okay? I think you just gave me permission to smoke in the house.”

Alasdair’s mouth twitched in what looked suspiciously like a smile. “I did, didn’t I? Don’t get any grand ideas, though. This is just in the kitchen, nowhere else. And you’ll have to keep the windows open while you do it. I still want you to think about cutting down, though. If not for my sake, then for your health.”

Cosmo followed him into the house, still stunned.

“I’m going to need an ashtray,” he said when he sat down at the kitchen table.

Alasdair put down a saucer in front of him before opening the windows looking out over the garden. The gentle patter of the raindrops filled the room, drowning out the click of Cosmo’s lighter. He held it an inch from the end of his rollie and looked up to find Alasdair watching him, eyes crinkled affectionately.

“You sure this is okay?”

“I’m sure.”

Cosmo maintained eye contact as he lit his cigarette, a small part of him still worried he’d get a hiding for it later. But no, it was all right. It appeared that Alasdair could sometimes make concessions for others’ weaknesses after all. Maybe he’d do the same when hearing Cosmo’s story. He took a deep drag on his rollie and felt the nicotine race through his system, calming his twitching legs. He might as well dive straight in and see what happened.

“The woman in the photos at Nan’s, that’s my mum.”

“The photos?”

“You know the ones. I saw you wondering about them.”

“Ah. The ones of the model.”

“Yep. She does a fair bit of modelling, but most of her pictures are X-rated.” Cosmo watched for a reaction, but Alasdair’s expression remained impassive. Fuck it, he might as well spill the beans. He’d spent so long not telling anyone, it would be a relief. “She’s not just a glamour model, though. She’s an actress, or so she says. If you can call it acting, when it’s a budget skin flick.”

“I don’t know, I imagine it takes a fair bit of pretence to fake it. She probably has more talent than you think.”

Cosmo gaped. “You don’t sound shocked.”

“Very little shocks me these days.”

“So you don’t think that makes me common as muck, having a mum who makes a living out of taking it up the arse and eating minge?”

Alasdair curled his lip. “Only when you put it in such crude terms. But no, I don’t think any of us should be judged by the actions of our parents. That’s something entirely beyond our control.”

“Is it, though? I don’t know. Marilyn—that’s her name, I don’t call her Mum—she gave me to Nan to look after when I was five. Told me I was an ungrateful little shit.”

“And you believed her?”

Cosmo wasn’t going to answer that. “She left the country not long after. Moved to LA and married one of those perverts who watch her films.”

“Sounds like you got the best deal. Sylvia adores you.”

“I’ve no idea why. I’ve been nothing but trouble.” Cosmo ground his cigarette out in the saucer, extinguishing the smouldering tip savagely. “I’m not good enough for you, and you know it. I screwed up my family, I screwed up at school, and I just screwed up my band. It’s only a matter of time before I ruin this relationship too.” He was proud of the way his voice didn’t wobble. The way it came out as a flat statement of fact. He flicked a glance at Alasdair to see if he was as impressed by his show of stoicism. Uh-oh. The man did not look happy.

“That’s utter bollocks.” Alasdair stalked around the table, knocking a chair to one side on his way. “I don’t want to hear any crap like that from you ever again, you hear me?”

Cosmo stared up at the tower of pissed-off man glaring down at him. Who the fuck did Alasdair think he was, ordering him around like that. “Or what? Will you punish me? Smack the crap out of me until I’m a good boy? The one you’re after, who stands up straight and works out and doesn’t smoke and does everything you say and doesn’t talk back?”

Alasdair’s nostrils flared. “Do you really think that’s what I want? Haven’t I made it clear enough to you? I want you, just the way you are.” He slammed his fist down on the table in time with the last few words, which only provoked Cosmo’s inner rebel. He slouched back in the chair in a way he knew Alasdair would hate.

“Really?” Cosmo channelled Rizzo and poured every last bit of sarcasm he could muster into that one word.

“Really!” Alasdair roared, and Cosmo flinched. Shit, had he pushed him too far? But Alasdair made a visible effort to restrain his temper, even if he did still look like a charging bull. “Yes, really, because I fucking well love you, much as I sometimes wish I didn’t. For fuck’s sake.”

Cosmo’s mind whirled. Alasdair loved him? For real? “You really love me?” he asked, but softly, not as a challenge.

“Yes. Really.” Alasdair cupped Cosmo’s jaw. “I didn’t mean it to come out like that.” He gave a wry laugh. “I’d actually planned a more romantic occasion. Keep meaning to say it after a great scene, but you’re always so blissed out, and I stop myself. Tell myself you’ll either think it’s a dream or the endorphins talking.”

Cosmo started to deny it, but then considered what Alasdair was telling him. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. But…how do you know it’s love, what you’re feeling?”

“Because I can’t stop thinking about you. Even at work. I get this stupid smile on my face in the middle of meetings when you pop into my head. And I feel like my insides are being ripped out whenever I think about you moving on and leaving me.” Alasdair’s face was grave and his voice was certain. Like he didn’t have a single doubt in his mind. It wasn’t the ardent, heartfelt declaration of eternal, until-the-end-of-time, suicide-pact-style love the younger Cosmo had occasionally indulged in fantasies of, but it was honest, and it was probably about as passionate as he could hope for from a man like Alasdair.

“Is that what love is?” It didn’t seem like enough, somehow. Didn’t even begin to cover the confusion of Cosmo’s own thoughts about Alasdair. “Is that how you knew for sure? That the thought of me leaving hurts you?”

“I’ve felt it before. I recognise the feeling.”

Oh. Before. “Then it doesn’t last forever. What made you fall out of love?”

“I didn’t.” Alasdair’s flat, empty tone was far worse than the anger. “He died.”

Who’d died? Cosmo itched to find out more about this tragic dead lover, but the warning in Alasdair’s eyes made him stamp down on the urge. And besides, he hadn’t returned Alasdair’s declaration yet, had he?

“So, bearing in mind I’ve never felt this before, if the thought of you kicking me out is painful, does that mean—”

“Don’t.”

“Don’t what? I hadn’t fin—” The arrogant bastard cut him off with a thumb to his lips.

“You don’t need to say it back. Not yet. Wait until it feels right. You’ll know.”

“I wish I had your faith in me.”

“I wish you did too.” Alasdair smiled suddenly, and despite the patter of the rain outside, it felt like the clouds had parted.

Cosmo smiled back, and Alasdair leant down, filling the space between them with a collision of lips and tongue. He kissed like he was trying to devour him whole, and Cosmo met him halfway.

The feelings circling through him might be confusing, but this was simplicity itself. His body knew exactly what to do when Alasdair was around.

“Come on,” he said, breaking the kiss and nuzzling into Alasdair’s crotch. “I want to show you just how happy you’ve made me.”

Alasdair grinned as he began flipping the buttons on his jeans.

But even beneath that lascivious grin, Cosmo could see the love Alasdair had professed. How long was it going to be before he expected Cosmo to say it back? And how the hell was he going to figure out what his feelings were?
One thing was for sure, lying to Alasdair was certain to get his arse in trouble, and not in the good kind of trouble either.

Chapter Twenty

Alasdair had expected things to somehow be easier between the two of them after he enlightened Cosmo as to his true feelings for him, but it appeared that life refused to follow the script. Mind you, things rarely did when Cosmo was involved.

It wasn’t that Cosmo had done anything more rebellious than usual—unless you counted smoking in the kitchen the next morning—but Alasdair had decided to let that go and sacrifice the air in his kitchen to the God of Tobacco. After all, he hadn’t exactly made it clear the permission to smoke inside had been a one-off, and it had still been raining.

No, Cosmo had been his usual self in pretty much all ways, but there was an indefinable something different. Like he’d withdrawn behind his surface expressions, warily watching Alasdair for clues as to how he was supposed to act now.

Or perhaps he’d always been doing that and Alasdair had only just noticed. Perhaps that was what made him such a good sub, looking to his Top for guidance.

But no. Cosmo had been genuine before, Alasdair was sure of it. And it wasn’t that he was being any less genuine now, but he was definitely more watchful. Perhaps he was waiting to find out whether Alasdair really had meant it when he’d said he loved him just how he was. Must be hard to believe when you’d had both parents walk out on you early in life.

He’d prove it, however, even though it meant hiding his dismay when after getting home on Tuesday, Cosmo announced he’d made it back up with his bandmates and was still on for the Friday-night gig at the White Horse.

“That’s good,” Alasdair had said. “I was looking forward to it.” The getting-to-see-Cosmo-play part, anyway. He could do without the rest of the band.

Cosmo snorted.

“Don’t believe me?”

“Well, come on, we hardly play your kind of music. There’s no folk rock or blues in our set. A bit of classic punk and metal, maybe, but it’s mainly that—and I’m quoting you here—miserable, dirgy, slit-your-wrists stuff.”

“What’s wrong, Cosmo?”

He caught a brief moment of fear in Cosmo’s eyes, before the insouciant attitude masked it. “Dunno what you mean. Nothing’s wrong. I just don’t want you there if you’re gonna hate it.”

“I’m not talking about the bloody gig. You’ve been acting strangely for the last couple of days. Are you worried by what I said on Sunday? That I love you?”