37
Reading Between the Lines
Jude
I’ve never been one to think I have a gift when it comes to acting. Mainly because it’s a craft, and like all crafts, it takes work, time, and practice.
But there’s one gift I might very well possess—reading between the lines of TJ Ashford-slash-Hardman. I’ve been able to do this since I met him seven years ago outside a discount shop in London.
I knew he was writing a book before he told me.
And I figured out the first night that he kept pieces of himself to, well, himself. I learned to be patient since eventually, he’d share some of those details with me.
Tonight, his damn shirt is so easy to read, and it gives me the balls to take the next step. Something I’m ready to do when a knock on the dressing room door stops me. “Hello, Mister Fox. We’re going to lock up for the night,” the stage manager calls out.
“Great. Thanks,” I say as TJ and I spring to our feet, comically tugging up jeans, tucking in shirts, and smoothing our hair in seconds.
“Just checking to see if you need anything,” she adds.
“Thanks, Maggie. All good. Cheers.”
“Cheers to you,” she says.
As TJ buttons his duck shirt—could there be a better sign, universe?—I mouth this is all your fault.
With a cocky smile, he just shrugs. “Sure is, Mister Fox.”
“Shut it, Mister Hardman. Just shut it,” I say with a laugh.
Five minutes later, he helps me carry vases of flowers from my agents, the show’s producers, and my parents and friends.
Once we’re outside the theater, his brow knits. “Do you want to take these to . . .”
“My Airbnb.” I stayed near the theater for the first few weeks but switched to a cute little cottage on Venice Beach on Friday. “And I want to take you too. For more than tonight,” I say, since why beat around the bush?
There’s that twinkle in his eyes, that grin he tries to mask. Why does he hide his feelings? Or hide them badly, I should say. Doesn’t he know I can eventually see through him?
As we walk, he clears his throat. “A few minutes ago, you asked Do I really have to leave tomorrow?”
“I did.”
The twinkle multiplies as we walk past the fountains, glittering in the dark. “To answer your question, Jude . . . I bought a one-way ticket.”
This is officially the best night ever. “Someone was hopeful,” I say, as he’s proved my point—eventually, he says what’s in his heart.
“I was,” he says, and it’s the admission I wanted last night at the bar, but I suppose it’s an admission I had to earn. Maybe one we both had to earn over the last twenty-four hours.
As we head toward the Lyft I ordered, he tells me he has to return to New York on Thursday for a book signing the day after.
“Good. Stay till then,” I tell him. “I got this place on the beach since I figured I’d rather be there for these meetings and whatnot. I have a commercial shoot in Malibu on Wednesday, but it’s only half the day.”
“No problem. I’ll write then. I can write anywhere, while you’re in your meetings and whatnot,” he says, always practical.
And I like that practical side. I want him to write while I handle business. I want our lives to mesh somehow. This week feels like the start, even though I know there are so many more hurdles—New York, London, the fucking ocean.
But one thing at a time.
An hour later, after we’ve stopped at his hotel to grab his things, we’re in my one-bedroom Airbnb cottage on the beach. It’s all white wood, with a wraparound deck and a view of the Pacific. In short—heaven. We set the flowers on the kitchen island, surf crashing softly in the distance. TJ leans against the counter, tipping his forehead to the daisies. “I guess you do like flowers.”
“Yes, because I’m not a monster who hates flowers and musicals.”
“Musicals suck, but I like flowers too, you dick.” TJ grabs both my hands, yanks me flush against him, then rumbles something soft and sweet against my throat, a long, low mmm. He rubs his beard against my neck, whispering in my ear, “Are we doing this, finally?”
That fizzy sensation I had when I learned Pillow Talk was going to the US? It pales in comparison to what I feel now. “We are.”
If I ever need to play a character who’s falling in love, this moment is what I will draw from, and I will fucking nail it.
On Monday morning, I get out of bed and follow the smell of coffee. TJ’s drinking a cup on the beach house deck, staring at the surf from the white wooden railing.
Or wait. Is he staring at a Top Gun scene?
I stride out onto the deck. “You fucking pervert. Are you watching those shirtless guys play beach volleyball?”
He shoots me the kind of deadpan stare only he can deliver. “Yes, Jude. I’m staring at other men when I’m with you.” He nods to the phone in his hand and the notes app on the screen. “I was thinking about a scene on the beach for my next book. I was trying to figure out a volleyball meet-cute.”
“Ah, so you came here to work,” I tease. It’s so fun to poke him.
“You figured me out. I flew to Los Angeles for work. I finagled this invite so I could stand on the deck of a beach house and brood over a clever way to start the book I’m dangerously close to falling behind on.”
That’s surprising. TJ always seems to have his shit together. Moving behind him, I run a hand through his hair. “Just write about a fetching Englishman who charms the pants off a hot, broody, bearded volleyball player.”
“You’re so helpful. I even know who to suggest to star in it when it’s made into a flick.”
“Problem solved,” I say.
I tell him I need tea before I solve any bigger dilemmas and go inside the house to put on the kettle. While I wait for it to boil, I grab my phone, touching base with Holly and Kenta about our meetings, then I click to my texts. Olivia tells me to get a job in New York before she dies from missing me, my brother teases that he liberated all my books from my flat, and William shares details of his show with both TJ and me.
Hmm. Do I want to go? William is a big fucking deal too, just like TJ, and I’m the guy who’s trying to catch up to their level of success. But as TJ said, comparison is the thief of joy. So what if they’re both a little further along in their careers than I am?
TJ always did like William’s music, so I suspect he’ll enjoy going. After I pour the tea, I head back to the deck, calling, “What’s the verdict, stud—”
But he holds up a hand then points to his phone as he speaks into it. “Yes, of course. I love Amsterdam. If they want me there for the book show, I’ll go.” There’s a long pause. “I’ll believe that when it happens.” Another beat. “Just like you taught me, Mason.”
When he hangs up, the wildly curious center of my soul is dying to ask what that’s all about. But it’s not my business.
“That was my agent,” he explains. “A lot’s been happening.”
No one in the whole world can downplay like TJ Hardman. “Sounds like it. Is your publisher sending you to Amsterdam?”
“Potentially. There’s a book expo in a month. A big trade thing. My Dutch publisher is talking about me doing a meet and greet.”
You should stop by London, I want to say. But more than that, I want it to be his idea. Or to ask me to join him for the weekend. I’d go. In a heartbeat. So, I wait for him to connect the dots. Let him be the impulsive one for once.
Instead, he glances at the phone screen. “You were asking me about this text, I think?”
I shift back to that topic. “Do you want to go? You always liked his music.”
“I did. I still do.” Then he scratches his jaw like he’s about to say something, but maybe he thinks better of it. “But do you want to go? I know he’s a good friend,” he says carefully, maybe a little unsure of William’s role in my life.
“We should. I think he’ll appreciate it. He seems a little different than when I lived with him in London. Lately, I get the sense he’s struggling with something.”
TJ blinks. “You. Lived. With. Him?”
Oh, fuck me. “You didn’t know that?”
“Um, you and I weren’t in touch for seven years, dude.” His tone hints he’s about to cross his arms and shut down.
I step closer. “But you talked to him, so I figured it came up at some point.”
“We texted now and then. That was all.”
“He lived with Olivia and me for a bit, but that was a couple of years ago,” I explain quickly. “Does that bother you?”
He hesitates. “It shouldn’t,” he says, but it’s clear it does and he sounds as frustrated as he did that rainy night at Wiseman.
“Why though? Why does it bother you?”
“He lived with you. He got to see you.” TJ sighs heavily, then does it once more as if he’s trying to get a handle on his emotions. “He got to see you over the last seven years. I didn’t get to see you at all.”
I set my mug on the railing then close the distance between us, grabbing a fistful of his shirt. “He’s not you. Just know that.”
TJ exhales in obvious relief as he jerks me up against him. “And I get to see you now.”
“Yes, you do.”
“We’ll go, then. It’s important. We’ll show him our support.”
It’s settled.
More importantly, we’ve navigated that little speed bump. I take that as a good sign for us.
TJ tells me he wants to teach me pinball, so that night, he takes me to an arcade a mile away.
This will be thoroughly entertaining—because I am absolutely savage with the flippers.
His jaw hangs open after my tenth win in a row. “What the hell, babe? You didn’t tell me you were the pinball wizard.”
I smile for many reasons, but partly because I’m babe now. A nickname for when we’re in the real world and one for when he’s drunk on sex. I like having both.
We continue like that the next day. I head to meetings, and he disappears into his meet-cute world in coffee shops. On Tuesday night, we go to The Holy Cow to see Lettuce Pray. It’s a packed house, and the crowd goes wild for the lead singer. When the show ends, William texts and asks us to meet him at a dive bar around the corner, someplace he won’t be recognized. Once he’s there, he slams back shots so fast he’s unsteady on his feet after a mere twenty minutes.
That’s what I was worried about.
“C’mon, buddy,” TJ says gently. “Share a Lyft with us. Let’s get you home.”
“Awww, I thought you blokes would never ask,” William says with a dopey grin.
When we’re in the back seat, he’s between us, wrapping an arm around me, then TJ. “You’re both so fucking hot,” he says. He kisses my cheek, then TJ’s. “If you ever want to have a threesome . . .”
TJ shoots me a seriously deadly stare as he answers, “No, William. I’m not sharing Jude. With anyone. Ever,” he says, firm and clear.
William laughs, shaking a finger at TJ. “I fucking knew you were here in LA for him, not business like you said.”
“Of course I’m here for Jude,” TJ says, his tone underlining my name and what I mean to him.
I get hot all over. I needed that—a little possession from my . . . obsession.
We deliver William safely into his home, where he flops onto his couch, humming a tune. TJ pours a glass of water and sets it on the coffee table, and I find some aspirin.
“My mates are the best,” William says, and I tell him I’ll check on him in the morning.
We return to our waiting car, and as the driver peels away from the curb and into the hazy night, TJ points back toward William’s house. “I guess that’s what he’s struggling with.”
“I think the fame is hard for him,” I say.
“Good call on going to see him,” TJ says, then he’s clearly done talking about William since he pounces on me, pouring all that possessiveness into a kiss that doesn’t stop when we get home. His ownership continues in bed for a good, long time.
The next morning, I take off early for Malibu, ruffling TJ’s hair as he lies in bed. He mutters something about seeing me tonight—that he’ll be in a coffee shop all day writing.
“Of course you will,” I say, then I’m gone. Maybe tonight, I’ll ask what happens after Los Angeles.
No, I won’t ask.
I’ll tell him I want him to see me in London when he goes to Amsterdam. Or ask if he wants company while he’s there. I’ll tell him I want an After Los Angeles.