Husband Material (London Calling #2)(9)

“I dunno. Sort of…closure-y? Like it might help to be able to stand up and say, ‘Hey, you totally destroyed me that one time, but I’m fine now, so I wish you well.’ Also, I’d really like to show up at his wedding with my gorgeous, successful boyfriend and rub it in his stupid, smug, beardy face.”

Oliver laughed. “Should I feel flattered by that or exploited?”

“Oh, we’re too special for a bit of exploitation now, are we?”

“Depends on the situation.”

It was nice to be able to have this, just sitting with Oliver being very slightly flirty, even while I was having a mini-crisis. But that didn’t make the mini-crisis less crisisey. “I keep going in circles,” I told him. “One moment I’ll be all Why are you even considering this, fuck him, and then I’ll be like But isn’t that giving him more power over you, then I’ll be back to Or maybe that’s what he wants you to think, and—gah.”

“You’re a complicated man, Lucien O’Donnell.”

“Thanks, I try.” I sighed. “I guess the whole let-us-reconcile-even-though-I-shafted-you thing is bringing up a lot of stuff, and I’m not sure where I want to…well…put the stuff it brings up.”

Oliver gave me a reassuring nod. “That makes sense. But for what it’s worth, I don’t believe this is as much like your dad as you might be thinking.”

That’s exactly what I was thinking. Even if I hadn’t put it into quite those words. “Isn’t it, though? Aren’t I just setting myself up to go through life with people shitting on me and then saying, ‘Hey, remember that time I shat on you? It’d be great for me if you could put it all behind you and say we’re cool now’?”

“I think, or rather I hope”—he gave me earnest eyes over the remains of his bowl of non-pie—“that the difference is you’re not invested in Miles. He’s not trying to be a part of your life; he’s only asking you to come to his wedding. And he’s probably asking for selfish reasons. I don’t doubt that it’s about making him and his new husband feel better rather than making you feel better. But he’s not asking you to commit to anything.”

“They’ll expect a gift.”

Oliver smiled. “Then get them a toast rack and put a note in it asking when he’s going to pay back the fifty thousand pounds he owes you.”

I enjoyed seeing Oliver’s mean side. It didn’t come out very often, but when it did, it was usually on point. “I might do that. If I go.

Should I go?”

“You know I can’t make that decision for you.”

“Why not? It would be super convenient. You could just say, ‘Sorry Lucien, I’m wildly jealous, and I refuse to let you go to Miles’s wedding.’”

“Sorry, Lucien,” repeated Oliver obligingly. “I’m wildly jealous, and I refuse to let you go to Miles’s wedding.”

“Oh, that’s rubbish.” I gave him my best sulky face. “You clearly don’t mean it.”

Oliver cast me a look of mock contrition. “I know, I’m an inadequate boyfriend and I don’t know why you put up with me.”

“You must have a preference, though?” I wheedled.

For a moment Oliver thought about it. He was never a man to give a hasty answer to an important question. “Well, I’d be lying if I said that attending the wedding of a total stranger was my idea of a fabulous night out. And you don’t owe Miles anything so neither he nor JoJo should be a factor here.”

“I feel like you’re about to drop a massive ‘but’ on me.”

“I was heading that way, but now I feel you’ve cut my ‘but’ off at the pass.”

This was a very serious conversation about very serious things, and Oliver was taking time out of his evening to boyfriend at me, but there was no way I was letting that go without comment. “Oliver, I would never cut your ‘but’ off.”

“Lucien”—his eyes had gone all soft while his mouth was trying really hard to be severe—“you’re making it very hard for me to finish my sentence.”

“Sorry. Sorry.” I paused. “‘But’ me.”

“But,” said Oliver carefully, “just because Miles is behaving selfishly, that doesn’t mean that going to his wedding wouldn’t be good for you. If going along and drawing a line under the past would make you feel better, you shouldn’t not do it just because it might make him feel better too. Does that make sense?”

It did. Kind of. “But what if knowing it’ll make him feel better makes me feel worse?”

“Then maybe you need to revisit the does-he-have-power-over-you question.”

Oh. Right. My shoulders drooped. I was supposed to be…not like this anymore. “Why do people keep having power over me?”

“Well, one of them was your father, so power is rather a given.

And the other is someone you were in love with who betrayed you.”

“So I have to go to the wedding to prove—”

I had no idea where I was going with that, but thankfully Oliver interrupted me. “You don’t have to do anything to prove anything. To anyone. Not Miles, not me, and not even yourself.”