Page 31 of Wear It Like a Crown

“Clearly,” Leo said lightly, very much a joke, nothing that had ever been even remotely true. At all. “Know thine enemy, right?” To show that he wasn’t serious, he nudged Joshua’s hip with his knee, and Joshua’s grin grew, the darkness not quite enough to conceal the dimple pressing into his left cheek.

“Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. Makes sense.” Joshua nodded.

Nate chose that moment to get to his feet, steadying himself with a hand on the frame of the sofa bed. He’d shared a bottle of wine with Mo, and much to Leo’s amusement, the effect was starting to show; it was the tipsiest Leo had ever seen him. Quite a change for someone who clung to control just as much as Leo himself did.

“Gonna take a piss,” Nate announced. “Anyone need something?”

“How is you pissing and someone needing something connected? Are we talking golden showers?” Leo asked, tipping his head back for a smirk.

“Twat.” Nate flushed, his forehead wrinkling unhappily. “From thekitchen. Like beer, or stuff.”

“Fruit, please? There should be cubed ones in the fridge.” Joshua waved a hand.

Tristan snorted. “Course that’s what you want. ‘nother beer for me, yeah?”

“I’ll come with,” Mo said. He slid off the mattress and headed on inside. For a moment, Nate stood awkwardly suspended, staring at the bright rectangle of the doorway before he followed. He hit his hip on the doorframe and cursed, glancing back over his shoulder with a pained expression.

As soon as he was gone, Joshua propped himself up with his arms behind him, stomach dipping in, his T-shirt straining around the chest. His tone was thoughtful. “Is Nate always that clumsy?”

“Not at all.” Leo paused and selected his next words carefully, studying Joshua’s features for any sign of discomfort. “Is this weird?”

“Why would it be?” Joshua asked, and Leo was about to wonder whether Joshua had somehow missed Nate’s obvious infatuation whenJoshua gave a short laugh and added, “It’s kind of funny, actually. I mean, Mo is supremely oblivious, and Nate is way too subtle for him.”

“This is subtle?” Leo asked.

With a cackle, Tristan rolled off the sofa bed and landed with his head on Joshua’s stomach, making himself comfortable while Joshua made a disgruntled noise, yet didn’t move to push him off. “Subtle for people interested in Mo,” Tristan said. “Joshua, remember that party at George’s place? When Mo got five blowjob offers in less than an hour?”

“That was a good one.” Joshua sounded delighted with the memory, no trace of jealousy. Well, he did keep insisting that he and Mo were friends first and foremost, and while Leo couldn’t quite wrap his head around the concept of friends with benefits… maybe it worked for some people.

“Josh here,” Tristan said, directed at Leo, “had just as many offers, of course. Mildly classier, mind, but the intent was the same.”

“Why am I not surprised?” Leo muttered.

Joshua shifted, taking a deep breath that made his stomach rise, Tristan grumbling at the disturbance: “Bad pillow. Lie still, you fucker.”

Not even blinking at the insult, Joshua patted Tristan’s head and said, “It’s just people who are into the prince thing. Like, girls. Well, and even if it had been boys, it’s not like I could have done anything about it without risking exposure.”

So chances were that Joshua hadn’t been with anyone but Mo. Even factoring in some girls he might have fucked before he’d come to acknowledge his sexuality, it was so… vastly different to Leo’s past. So innocent.

Leo envied him for it.

“Well,” he said out loud. “Don’t worry, little prince. Once we get this show on the road, you’ll have plenty of offers. You’ll be positively drowning in them. Mr Supermodel inside will be jealous of your game.”

“Mo doesn’t do jealousy,” Joshua said evenly, giving Leo a strangely blank look before he dropped back down. His next words were directed at the sky. “How often do I have to tell you we’re friends until you believe it?”

“To be fair,” Tristan put in, “you’re friends plus. It’s like a bottle oftequila that comes with an extra shot glass, like, special offer. You and me, on the other hand, we’re just a standard bottle.”

All right, so Tristan was pretty damn fabulous. Not that Leo hadn’t suspected as much. “I like the way your brain works,” he said, while Joshua gave a low hum before replying.

“But that’d imply that you and me are less. That’s not true.”

Tristan appeared to consider this. “We can be a slightly bigger bottle,” he decided. “A bigger bottle of the really good stuff. To make up for the missing shot glass.”

“Works for me,” Joshua said. “But if we’ve got two bottles and a shot glass between the three of us, what about the lime wedge and the salt?”

“Nate and Leo can battle out who’s who,” Tristan decided, and really, they were both ridiculous. Leo could easily see himself being friends with them; he could see all five of them being friends.

Jesus, he couldn’t be thinking like that. This was temporary. A job, something James had entrusted to Leo, and Leo wasn’t about to fuck it up just because at the moment he couldn’t tell left from right.