He blinks. “I’m fine. The limp will go.”

The flat is a mirror image of my flat, but while mine is all clean lines and minimal furnishing, this is… This is chaos. Floor-to-ceiling bookcases spill books onto every available surface. Piles of them adorn the floor. Paintings are stacked up against the wall, and dirty cups are dotted about everywhere.

He must catch my expression because he starts to laugh. “Have you been in here before?”

“Once.” I shake my head, unable to drag my appalled gaze from the table full of dirty cups. One of them has a chocolate bar sticking out of it. “We keep very different hours. We tend to just say hello and goodbye in the corridor.”

“Ah, the scene of some of your most memorable farewells.”

I ignore that. “Your brother is a hoarder,” I announce.

“Luke is definitely that.”

“So, what are you doing here?”

“I’m housesitting for him while he’s in California for work.”

I chuckle. “I thought he was an English professor when I first met him.”

He scratches his scruffy chin. “Why? Because he has books?”

I look around the living area. “He doesn’t just have books. He has many books.”

He skirts a table where a huge tower of books is teetering and heads into the kitchen. “He loves them. Always has done. He can’t throw them away or sell them. He doesn’t even like lending them to people.” I wrinkle my brow in incomprehension, and he grins at me as his long fingers unseal the wax at the top of the bottle. “You don’t understand that?”

“Well, no. I don’t keep books. I don’t like clutter.”

He attempts to look shocked, but his expression is plainly mocking. “You don’t like books?”

“No. I like reading, but I do that on my tablet. That way, the books don’t mess up my living space.”

He gets the bottle open, extracts a couple of tumblers from the kitchen cupboard, and pours a healthy splash into both of them. He hands me one and raises his own glass. “Slainte.”

“Skål,” I say.

“Is that Danish for ‘pass me the bacon’?”

I roll my eyes. “I should apologise for the scene this morning too, yes?”

He throws his head back and breaks into peals of laughter. It’s a rich, warm sound, and I find myself smiling too. Finally, when he’s reduced to chuckling, he wipes his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he says. “But that was so funny.”

I grimace. “It makes me very uncomfortable when my bed partners leave and come back.”

He shakes his head. “Oh dear. That one definitely came back. I’m stunned you’re not moving him in.”

“I’d rather pickle my eyeballs,” I say gloomily.