Angelo woke up in his underwear and covered by Dylan’s clean-scented duvet. The bed was so much more comfortable than the couch he slept on at home, that he allowed himself a moment to pretend he didn’t have to get up and go to work. Then he realised he was alone.

He sat up and instantly regretted it as his head spun, letting him know that he was in for a day of dodgy balance. “Dylan?”

Damn it, his voice was pretty fucked too. Luckily, it didn’t have to travel far. Dylan popped up at the edge of the bed, a pair of black-framed glasses perched adorably on his perfect nose. “Hey.”

Angelo blinked. “Hey. What are you doing down there?”

“Catching up on some emails.”

“Seriously? What time is it?” Angelo swung his legs out of bed, praying that they’d hold him up on the first try. “I have to get to the deli.”

“Easy,” Dylan said. “It’s only five thirty.”

“Oh.” Angelo relaxed and set his feet gently on the hardwood floor. “What are you doing up then? You don’t have to work today⁠—⁠” Angelo broke off with a coughing fit.

Dylan left his laptop on the rug and crawled onto the bed behind Angelo, pressing his warm chest to Angelo’s back until Angelo was done hacking. “I couldn’t sleep and I didn’t want to disturb you.”

“Fat chance of that.” Angelo leaned back into Dylan’s embrace. “I don’t even remember taking my clothes off.”

Dylan chuckled. “You started. I helped you out after you passed out on me.”

Through the ever-present fog, Angelo tried to recall the latter part of the previous night, but all he remembered was wanting to punch Rhys in the face for no reason other than the fact that he had a body that worked. And Dylan having a mid-fuck panic attack in the BDSM chambers.

Angelo turned in Dylan’s arms and regarded him. Despite the insanely hot play session that had followed, he couldn’t shake the sensation of Dylan shaking beneath him for all the wrong reasons, and the dark circles now beneath Dylan’s eyes didn’t help. “Are you okay?”

“Of course.”

“Sure about that? ’Cause you kind of look like I feel.”

“And how do you feel, Angelo?”

“Tired and like I’ve been hit by a bus.”

Dylan’s brow furrowed. “That’s not good.”

“Actually, it’s not that bad. Some mornings I’m still under the bus.”

“I wish I could help you feel better.”

“You do.” Angelo pushed Dylan’s messy hair away from his face. “If I was at home right now, I’d be so fucking miserable that even opening my eyes would hurt.”

“Your state of mind has that much impact on your physical wellbeing?”

Angelo shrugged. “Some days.”

Dylan looked like he wanted to ask more but merely put his hands on Angelo’s bare shoulders and massaged them so soothingly that Angelo was halfway back to sleep before he remembered that he had to get to work.

He stilled Dylan’s magic hands with a groan. “I’ve got to get moving.”

“You don’t have time for a blowjob?”

“Huh?” Angelo’s eyes flew open.

Dylan smirked. “That woke you up.”

“Unfairly, so if you’re taking the piss . . .”

“Would I do such a thing?”

“The fact that you’re not on your knees yet incriminates you.” Angelo grinned and dodged Dylan’s playful swat.

“Please.” Dylan pushed Angelo’s chest until he was lying flat and crawled over him, his face inches from Angelo’s. “We’re not in the club right now, so I’m not getting on my knees for anyone, but I’ll still make you come in three minutes flat.”

“Three minutes, eh?” Angelo’s morning wood solidified, tenting his underwear, and he folded his hands behind his head in the same pose as he’d adopted last night when Dylan had ridden him into oblivion. “Reckon I can make time for that.”

“Game on, then.” Dylan ripped Angelo’s underwear down his thighs and took his dick in his mouth in one smooth motion. Angelo’s tip hit the back of Dylan’s throat and the banter died a fiery death.

“Jesus fucking Christ.” Angelo arched his back, and his muscles screamed with tension, his balls already drawn up tight. “I’m putting money on two minutes.”

Dylan dragged his lips wetly up Angelo’s dick and chuckled but cut himself off by plunging his mouth down again. He sucked Angelo fast and deep, his lips fused tight around Angelo’s shaft, his teeth scraping gently with the perfect amount of pain.

And it was the right kind of pain too. The aches in Angelo’s body faded, replaced by spine-tingling sensation. He’d always been a sucker⁠—ha⁠—for good head, but Dylan’s mouth clamped around his dick was something else, particularly while he was still half asleep, his mind at that meandering point where it was easily distracted. Removed from the real world enough that he didn’t think, only felt.

Angelo’s stomach muscles clenched, drawing his head up from the bed. His neck flexed, and a jolt of discomfort rippled through the tendons, but the throb in his cock outweighed the pain, and a guttural groan tore out of him.

The two-minute deadline passed, and then another minute, and another. Edging was Angelo’s party trick, but it seemed that Dylan had picked up a few tricks of his own. Over and over, he brought Angelo to the brink, only to ease back just enough to drive Angelo insane.

Angelo’s body curled off the bed and he clenched his fists. Dylan slid his hands beneath Angelo’s thighs and lifted him slightly. His fingers splayed out over Angelo’s buttocks, teasing the sensitive flesh behind Angelo’s balls, pressing . . . probing.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck⁠—⁠” Angelo’s hands flew to Dylan’s head, and he locked his fingers in Dylan’s silky hair as he drove his hips up, fucking Dylan’s mouth with rapid, short-fire thrusts. Dylan moaned around Angelo’s cock, and the hummed vibration pushed Angelo over the edge. He released his death grip on Dylan’s head to give Dylan a chance to pull back. “Shit. I’m gonna come.”

But Dylan didn’t pull back. He opened his mouth wider and took Angelo impossibly deeper, swallowing every jet of come as Angelo shot down his throat.

Angelo collapsed, slack and panting, his heated skin sheened with sweat. He clumsily grasped Dylan’s hips as Dylan moved quickly up the bed. Dylan straddled Angelo, jacking himself furiously, his expression caught in the throes of a fast approaching orgasm. His breath came in tortured moans, and then he started to come, his head thrown back, his dick pulsing, and wet warmth painted Angelo’s chest.

“Damn.” Dylan fell forward, his damp hair flopping into his face.

Angelo pushed it back and pulled Dylan down, capturing his lips in a slow, sensual kiss that went on and on until Dylan broke away to breathe.

“Whoa. That went on a bit longer than two minutes.”

Angelo laughed breathlessly, but the phantom clock in his brain sobered him way too fast. “I want to stay here and fuck you, but I’ve really got to go.”

Dylan sighed and slid off him. “I know. I put a clean towel out for you in the bathroom if you want to take a shower.”

Angelo shot a pointed glance at his come-smeared abdomen, then forced himself upright. His limbs felt light and loose as they bathed in the rush of endorphins, and a hot shower would hopefully prolong the sensation, but he didn’t want to leave Dylan.

He stood and held out his hand. “Shower with me?”

* * *

Two hours after the best start to a day that he could remember in recent years, Angelo’s morning was fast descending into the day from hell. He’d arrived at the deli to find his mother already there with his least favourite uncle in tow, faffing around with signage displays that didn’t mean anything when they couldn’t pay for the coffee beans. He’d only just managed to get rid of them when the bailiffs turned up.

“I can’t pay you anything,” Angelo explained for the fifth time. “I don’t own the place.”

“I understand that, mate,” the bailiff said. “But we’re going to need some kind of payment today or we’ll have to remove goods.”

Angelo sighed. Deep down, he’d known this was coming. The financial plan the business advice centre had put together had been sound, but it had depended on selling off equipment, using cheaper suppliers, and raising prices⁠—all things his mother, backed by good old Uncle Gino, had refused to do. “If you remove goods, we won’t be able to trade.”

The bailiff was sympathetic but ultimately unmoved. He listed the contents of the deli and then took a seat at the counter while Angelo placed a dozen unanswered calls to the Giordano family home.

It was midday when the bailiff ran out of patience. Angelo watched with mixed emotions as the deli was packed up and loaded into the back of a transit van. Half a century of his family’s history was winging its way to an auction house, and he’d always figured that when it happened, it would take a part of him with it.

As it was, he felt nothing except a vague sense of panic that his sole remaining source of employment had gone too.

Dazed, he locked the deli and walked home. Under the unseasonal sunshine, he found Theresa in the garden having coffee and biscotti with his uncle, aunt, and three teenage cousins.

“What are you doing here at this hour?” Gino snapped. “Theresa told me that you’ve been closing the deli during the day and it’s got to stop. How do you expect to get out of this mess if you aren’t putting the hours in?”

The unfairness of it was almost funny. Angelo leaned in the back doorway and shook his head. “Enough bullshit. I couldn’t trade if I wanted to. The bailiffs have been and cleaned us out.”

Theresa lamented to God in Italian and clutched her hand to her chest. Aunt Carmella rushed to her side while Gino stood and stepped forward, his large frame towering over Angelo.

“What do you mean they’ve cleaned us out?” Gino said. “You let thieves come in and take your father’s business from under your nose?”

“Not thieves. Bailiffs. Sent by the high court by suppliers we haven’t paid. Some might argue that makes us the fucking thieves⁠—and by ‘us’ I mean me and Mum. It’s got fuck all to do with you.”

Angelo spoke quietly, as exhausted mentally as he was in every other capacity, but Gino’s face reddened like Angelo had called his wife a whore. “Nothing to do with me? My father built that business from a pot of piss and then my brother killed himself keeping the doors open. You run it into the ground and tell me it’s not my concern?”

Angelo glanced at Theresa. They’d never been close, but familial loyalty had kept Angelo in Romford, flogging the dead horse his father had left behind. Or had it? Was he giving himself too much credit? After all, it wasn’t like he’d had any better offers.

Gino shoved at Angelo’s shoulder. “Don’t glare at your mother. I’m talking to you.”

Angelo’s gaze shifted to where Gino had touched him. Was still touching him. “Get your hands off me. Dad ballsed the business up all by himself. And she”⁠—Angelo pointed at Theresa⁠—“has done nothing but bury her head in the sand. I’m the one who’s been stuck behind that counter for the last four months. If I hadn’t been, it would’ve been over a lot sooner.”

“Four months?” Theresa finally looked up. “Four months, Angelo? I needed you home four years ago. Where were you?”

“You know where I was and what I was doing. And Dad took the money I sent home to him. So don’t give me any indifferent, uncaring-brat bullshit.” Angelo fished the keys to the empty deli from his pocket and tossed them past Gino’s head and onto the glass garden table. “All you can do now is sell the place as a going concern and then hide any leftover cash from this money grabbing bastard.” He jerked his head at Gino.

Gino spat on the ground. “I should put you over my knee and teach you some manners.”

“Try it.” Angelo wrenched Gino’s hand from his shoulder and sneered. “And don’t think for a minute that I don’t know why you’re hanging around Mum like a fucking disease. If you weren’t as stupid as you look, you’d have encouraged her to sell the moment she got power of attorney when Dad was ill. That way you could’ve got your hands on the cash long before I came home.”

“You little fucking faggot.”

Angelo laughed. “Right. And you’re not? Me and Paolo found your porn stash when we were kids and it was pretty obvious that you like cock as much as I do.”

Gino’s huge fist connecting with Angelo’s ribs and then his stomach should’ve surprised him⁠—shocked him. But it didn’t, even though it had been more than a decade since Gino had last struck him, and what came next seemed to happen in slow motion. The weight behind Gino’s blow sent Angelo crashing into the doorframe. The back of his head hit the wood with a dizzying thud, but Angelo barely felt it as the punch to his stomach stole his breath.

He doubled over, and an odd calm settled in his veins. For a moment, he thought he would pass out, but then adrenaline kicked in, and his own Giordano temper roared to life.

Angelo lunged at Gino and rained hits on his head and chest, his fists blurring in the sunshine, his speed making up for the weight disadvantage.

Gino grunted, caught off guard, and fell backwards, stumbling into the glass table and knocking it to the floor.

Someone screamed. Gino kicked out and his boot slammed into Angelo’s ribs again. The sickening crack poured petrol on Angelo’s fury, and the long-neglected masochist in him⁠—the one who’d danced on the international ballet circuit through a dozen ME relapses⁠—sprang forward again. Bones crunched against his knuckles and blood flowed. More screams. And then desperate hands yanking him back.

“Angelo! Stop it. You’ll kill him.”

Angelo struggled against the hands that held him, but the fight drained from him as perspective returned. The patio was a wreck, and so was he.

Gino was on his arse by the broken table, blood dripping from his mashed-up nose, his left eye already swollen. Angelo stared at him and felt nothing. And the numbness frightened him. His family had always been dysfunctional, but even on the other side of the world, he never felt so detached.

His cousins released him. Angelo’s arms dropped to his sides, and pain throbbed in his ribs, spreading fast to the renegade nerves in his back. Nausea roared in his gut. He swallowed it down and looked at Theresa⁠—at his mother.

She turned her back on him and crouched at Gino’s side, leaving Angelo to stagger to his garage bedroom alone.

He locked the door behind him and sank to his knees by the tiny basin. His stomach heaved, and he threw up. When he was done and had cleaned himself up, he fell back in a heap, clutching his injured ribs. Past experience told him they weren’t broken, but his weakened muscles didn’t support his body as well as it used to, and he knew he was in for some fuck-awful bruising.

Brilliant. Angelo sucked in painful breaths and crawled to his makeshift bed on the couch. Lying down was worse than sitting up, but Angelo was tired, and the buzz he’d left Dylan’s place with that morning was long gone.

He didn’t remember falling asleep, and the darkness he woke to some time later unnerved the distant part of his brain that was aware that it had been early afternoon when he’d last been awake. The prickling sensation that something had woken him bothered him too. He sat up, wincing as the bruises forming on his ribs made themselves known. The garage was quiet and still, and dark, the only light coming from the strip of light below the shutter door that was rarely opened.

Sometimes it rattled in the wind, treating Angelo to a chilling breeze that he’d never noticed when he’d slept in the garage as a child. He shivered now and the nausea he’d passed out with lingered, and his chest burned too. Perhaps that had woken him. But then the garage door shook again, far harder than any wind had ever shuddered through it.

What the fuck?

Angelo stood and shuffled to the door. There was a tiny rust hole in the top corner. Stretching to peer through it hurt like the devil, and he didn’t relish the prospect of brawling with Gino again. Angelo’s anger had long faded and he simply didn’t care enough to fight anymore.

But it wasn’t Gino shaking the door and calling his name.

Angelo lunged for the handle that raised the door. It seemed to take a lifetime for enough space to appear for him to duck beneath the door, and by the time he stumbled out, Dylan was already walking away.

“Hey!” Angelo limped after him. “Dylan! Wait!”

Dylan stopped walking but didn’t turn round. Angelo caught up with him and grabbed his arm, but Dylan wrenched it away. “So you’re not fucking dead then?”

Angelo flinched, like the fury in Dylan’s voice had hit him. “What?”

“I was worried,” Dylan said. “You didn’t respond to any of my messages, and when I stopped by the deli, it was closed and the shutters were down. I tried calling, but you didn’t answer me that way either.”

Shit. In the shambles Angelo’s day had become, he hadn’t given his phone a second thought. Through the ever-present fog in his brain, he pictured it clearly on the prep counter where he’d left it when the bailiffs had told him to wait outside. When they’d handed him the keys to the empty deli twenty minutes later, he’d forgotten all about it, too intent on getting home and throwing the keys in Theresa’s face.

It hadn’t occurred to him that Dylan would be worried. Guilt burned hard in Angelo’s gut, matching the inexplicable fire in his lungs. He fumbled for Dylan’s hand, the words to explain himself jumbling in his mind as he tried to form them into a coherent sentence, but Dylan evaded Angelo’s touch.

“Look,” he said. “I don’t know what’s going on between us⁠—even though we’ve had a gazillion conversations about it⁠—but I thought we were at least friends.”

“We are⁠—⁠”

“Bullshit!” Dylan snapped. “If we were friends, then you’d have picked up your phone or at least sent me a message to tell me to mind my own business. You wouldn’t have me running across town in my pyjamas to check you weren’t dead.”

Angelo looked at Dylan’s Spiderman clad legs. With his hi-top Pumas, he was so adorable that a smile escaped Angelo before he could stop it, and for the second time that day, he was sent stumbling by someone else’s hand.

Dylan shoved him hard. “Don’t fucking laugh at me.”

“I’m not⁠—⁠”

“You are. And you know what? That makes you a bit of a dick.”

Angelo regained his footing, acid dancing in his chest as pain lanced his ribs. “I’ve never claimed not to be a bit of a dick, but I’m sorry I dragged you out here, okay? I had a shit day, and I left my phone in the deli.”

It was the vaguest explanation in the world and Dylan clearly knew it. He shook his head and stepped back, and when he spoke again, the rage was gone, replaced by flat despondency. “I can’t do this with you. Maybe it’s my fault because I keep falling for blokes who have a million other things to worry about before they get to me, but I just can’t do it anymore.”

Angelo’s heart scraped a dull summersault in the pit of his stomach. “What do you mean?”

“I mean this.” Dylan gestured between them. “I’m tired, Angelo⁠—tired of losing my shit every time someone I care about doesn’t answer the phone or goes dark on me⁠—⁠” Dylan held up his hand to keep Angelo quiet. “The reasons don’t matter anymore, mate. It’s my fault; you never promised me anything. I just⁠—I can’t do this with you again. I feel like I’m stuck on a loop.”

“Dylan⁠—⁠”

“Nah.” Dylan shook his head. “I can’t, okay? I need some space. Maybe I’ll see you at the club some time.”

The thought of only seeing Dylan in the club⁠—of those snatched and wonderfully sordid encounters being their only interaction⁠—nearly sent Angelo to his knees. He reached out for Dylan, but Dylan was already walking away. In his mind, Angelo called out to him⁠—called him back and promised to be a better man, but when he took a breath, there was nothing there.

Because Dylan was right⁠—especially in the things he’d left unsaid. Angelo was a mess, and Dylan deserved so much more.