Page 42 of Wear It Like a Crown

Looking down, Leo ran a finger along the condensation gathered on his glass. “He was quite upset, and his closest friends were out of the country. Plus I encouraged him to do this. I couldn’t exactly tell him to turn around and cry at home. I owe him that much.”

“He gets under your skin,” Nate said. It wasn’t a question, and Leo kept his hands steady and his gaze off Nate’s face.

“Well, Mo gets under your skin. Joshua is bringing him, by the way.”

Nate sucked in a breath, then relaxed again. “Nice try, mate. But I know your little tricks, and you’re not changing the topic just like that.” He raised his glass and frowned over the rim. At the table next to theirs, a group of tourists broke into excited shouts over something on the telly—ah, the Italian national squad—and Nate waited for the excitement to die down before he said, “What I want to know is what makes him different. It’s not just the prince thing, is it? Probably never was.”

Leo stopped to consider it. Back at school, Joshua being a prince had been fodder for Leo’s obsession. Now it was an afterthought. More than that: it was an inconvenience.

Movement by the door drew his attention, a burly bloke entering first to tax the room’s occupants with a narrow-eyed stare. From their background checks, Leo recognised him as another one of Joshua’s bodyguards, Zach—married, paying off a reasonably sized flat, no expensive gambling habits. Behind the man’s bulk, Joshua seemed dwarfed, an unbuttoned shirt in blues and reds hanging off his shoulders. He turned to hold the door forMo.

Leo shot Nate a warning look. “Look, this thing with Joshua, it’s complicated. And they’re here, so let’s just—let’s just not.”

“They’re here?” Nate twisted around in his chair, the motion so abrupt he spilled beer down his front. While Nate cursed and dabbed at his stomach, Leo fought to stifle a laugh.

“Smooth, Nate,” he said. “Do you need me to hold your hand, or do you think you’ll be fine talking to him on your own?”

“Shut up,” Nate hissed just as Mo pulled out a chair and sank into it. He held himself with the kind of effortless coolness that Leo would despise if he hadn’t seen Mo erupt into giggles at the idea of zombies lumbering around a football pitch and groaning, “Gooooooal,” in morbidly strangled voices.

“All right?” Mo asked. His gaze lingered on Nate’s bicep for a beat too long—not that Leo was judging; Nate’s biceps were impressive. As was his eight-pack. Sometimes, he tried to share his disgusting protein concoctions with Leo. They smelled and tasted like mud, and if that was the price for killer abs, Leo wasn’t man enough to pay up.

“All good,” Leo said. He glanced around to find Joshua stuck taking pictures with a bunch of people. “How was Paris?”

“Paris?” Nate tried to subtly dispose of the soaked napkin.

“Oh, yeah.” Mo shrugged. “Just a day trip, pretty much. Never get to see much of the city with those, you know?”

No, Leo did not know. He figured it would be mildly bitchy to point that out, so he didn’t. While Nate asked about the Louvre—as far as Leo was aware, Nate had zero interest in art—Leo watched as Joshua posed for another picture, then one more, his smile wide and practised, empty. Past the flash of a camera, Joshua caught Leo’s eyes. His smile shifted into something more authentic, softer.

Had Leo done that?

Once Joshua had completed his duty, bodyguard looming nearby like a menacing shadow, he excused himself to finally make his way over, arriving in the middle of Nate and Mo discussing an exposition of Marvel concept drawings that Mo had not yet managed to attend. Which—now wait a minute, this was Leo’s jam. How had he missed the shift in topics? And did he want to get into the middle of it, or should he leave Nate to his awkward courtship dance?

Leo decided to leave them to it. Mostly because Joshua finally made it over. Kicking out a chair for him, Leo grinned. “Hello again. So you’re fine chilling with a bunch of homeless kids, but you need a minder for a round of pints. Explain?”

“Hi.” Dropping into the seat, Joshua rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. His smile was sheepish. “Well, just, there hopefully won’t be pictures from earlier, so no one will ever know. But there’ll be pictures of this, and my mum would have my head.”

Joshua’s mum, the motherfuckingQueen. Leo needed a moment to process the reminder because holy shit, yeah, right.

“We could have met at someone’s place,” he said out loud. “If that’d been easier.”

“No, this is nice.” Joshua turned his head to study the blackboard listing beer options, the distant glow from the bar reflecting in his eyes and turning the wispy ends of his curls an electric blue. “And you told me you and Nate do this every Saturday, different pub every time, so I didn’t want to break the habit.”

“How generous.”

Joshua threw Leo a bright look. “I can be. If the situation calls for it.”

Leo was quite,quitecertain he hadn’t imagined the suggestive note to Joshua’s voice. There had been a few moments just like that earlier in the car, when Joshua had seemed to be flirting and Leo had told himself to keep his cool. Although that boat might have sailed already.

Maybe he just needed to get it out of his system. A one-time thing. Closure.

No.Fuckno, that would be a horrible idea—not only because it had been a while since Leo had been with anyone, but also because he had no clue where Joshua stood, whether there was true intent behind his teasing, what he wanted from the world in general and Leo in particular.

It spelled trouble. In capital letters and with several exclamation marks.

Leo drew a deliberate breath and leaned over to bump his shoulder against Joshua’s. “How about you go get us another round, then? That would be highly generous of you.”

“I can do that.” Nudging back, Joshua got to his feet again. Hewiggled his fingers to attract Mo and Nate’s attention, the two of them startling apart where their heads had been bent close together. “Drinks,” Joshua told them. “What do you want?”