He rolls his eyes. “Of course, I’ve heard of it. I think Chris even mentioned that you played it. I’m just surprised to find Mags Carlsen, the scourge of the courtroom and twink’s bedrooms, is actually holed up in his bedroom playing Scrabble.”

“That’s probably because you are not very good at it,” I say in a lordly fashion. I watch the light of battle coming into his eyes with hidden amusement.

He sits up. “I’m actually very good at it,” he snaps.

I start to laugh. “Ah, there it is. The Gentry competitive spirit.” I tuck my tongue into the corner of my mouth and smile at him. “Care to have a game?”

He reaches out and hooks his shorts that have been flung over the lamp. Withdrawing his phone from the pocket, he presses a button. “Let me just get the app,” he says in a tone of grim determination.

I try to stop myself from laughing. “What did you think you’d find me doing?” I suddenly say.

He jerks in a startled fashion. “What?”

“When you arrived, what did you think I’d be doing?”

He looks suddenly awkward. “I don’t know. It could be anything, knowing you.”

“You do know me,” I say distractedly. I hesitate. “Would you have been bothered?” I ask, finally losing control over my tongue.

“Bothered about what?”

“If you’d found me with another man?”

He stares at me, his phone forgotten in his lap. The silence stretches, and I sit back, feeling suddenly disappointed.

“Never mind,” I say. “It was a foolish question.”

“Yes,” he says, the word breaking like a bullet through my words. “Yes. I’d have been bothered.” He holds my gaze for a moment before quickly glancing away, his hand coming up to rub the back of his neck. “And I shouldn’t be,” he says sharply. “It’s foolish.”

“Then I think we are both of us fools,” I say.

The soft words seem to melt his tension. He drops his hand and gives an awkward laugh. “No. Not going there,” he says and waggles his phone at me. “Food and Scrabble, Mags. We’re living the wild life.”

I nod and slide down next to him, but as we eat dinner in the wreck of the bed and trade quips and kisses sweetened by the chocolate cheesecake, something warm comes to rest in my chest. Something warm and worrying. I examine it later while he lies asleep curled into me, the moonlight on his face. Typically, this kind of emotion would send me running a hundred miles in the other direction, but now I just move closer to him and fall asleep.