Chapter 10

Chapter Ten

Liam

L iam awoke to the sound of rain on the tin roof, and the feel of a warm body pressed against his.

When they'd climbed into bed last night it hadn't escaped Liam's notice that Ambrose had scootched over to the farthest edge of the bed and kept his back turned to him, and he hadn't been sure if he should be insulted or not at Ambrose's apparent reluctance to get within touching distance.

Asleep Ambrose apparently didn't have the same reservations as awake Ambrose. Sometime in the night he'd rolled over, and now he was pressed against Liam's back. He had one arm flung possessively over Liam, and his breath was warm on Liam's neck. Liam lay there quietly and debated whether it made him a bad person if he didn't wake Ambrose up right away.

It had been a long time—fourteen months and six days, not that he was counting—since Liam had woken up in anyone's arms, and it felt good . Just because he wasn't looking for a relationship didn't mean he didn't miss someone touching him and holding him. Was it creepy if he let himself enjoy being held for a bit more? At what point did this become weird?

Ambrose let out a snuffle-snort and pressed in closer, and that was when it did become weird, because now there was something pressing against Liam's arse, and he was one hundred percent certain it was Ambrose's dick.

Okay, so morning wood was a thing, and Liam knew it had nothing to do with him personally, but it was still as awkward as fuck—especially now that, having woken up slightly more, he was aware of his own erection. Getting out of bed and away from Ambrose immediately went from optional to imperative.

Careful not to wake Ambrose, he lifted his arm up, shuffled forward out of his hold and eased himself out of bed. Ambrose mumbled something about Bert Newton (Liam made a note to tease him about it later), and rolled forward into the space Liam had left and buried his face in the pillow.

Liam scurried to the bathroom, embarrassed at his arousal even though there was nobody here to see it. Surely if he ignored it, it'd go away, just like it did every other day. He turned on the shower and stood under the stream of hot water while he pointedly thought unarousing thoughts—about Balian's nappy, about that time his mum had gotten a frizzy perm that made her look like a Brillo pad, about the uni assignments he had due—anything except the warmth of the arms that he'd woken up in, the press of Ambrose's body against his and how nice it had felt to have someone caring for him again.

Not that Ambrose cared. Ambrose was here for Ambrose. He was selfish and shallow and generally rude, and Liam didn't need to waste his time thinking about him.

Except, that wasn't quite true, was it? Arsehole-for-hire Ambrose was rude and shallow and selfish. Regular Ambrose Newman was, well, he was a decent guy, at least as far as Liam could tell from the glimpses he'd had. He'd been willing to sleep in a chair last night, and he'd apologised repeatedly over the Orhan thing.

And Grandad Billy liked him, which was more puzzling than anything, because Grandad's radar for bullshit was legendary. More than once he'd met someone who seemed perfectly normal only to state, "I don't like him. He's a bastard, mark my words." And inevitably, days or weeks or months later, he'd be proven right. It was uncanny. But he wasn't saying anything about Ambrose, who was patently here under false pretences and absolutely acting like a bastard, and what was that about?

Liam turned off the water and was relieved to see that his dick had once again decided to behave respectably. He dried himself and brushed his teeth before realising he'd left his clothes in the bedroom. Ambrose was still asleep, he reasoned. He'd just go out in a towel and grab them, then duck back in here to get changed.

He wasn't sure why he was so shy about Ambrose seeing him undressed, but he suspected that it was because next to Ambrose, he wasn't much to look at. Ambrose had actual muscle definition and a chest like you'd find on a Staffy, whereas Liam was more of a whippet. He wrapped the towel around his waist and went back into the bedroom, hoping Ambrose was still asleep.

He wasn't. He was sitting up in bed, rubbing the heel of one hand against his eyes and talking on his phone. "It's half past six in the morning, Mum. I wasn't ignoring you. I was asleep. I didn't hear the phone, that's all."

Liam busied himself getting a clean shirt and underwear out of his bag and pretending not to listen.

"I'll call you when I can, but I can't answer my phone during rehearsals, you know that," Ambrose said, which made Liam wonder again why Ambrose was lying to her and exactly what was going on with Ambrose's mum—Bella Newman, actress, he remembered.

Not my business , he reminded himself, and ducked back into the bathroom. He took his time dressing and when he came out again, Ambrose was off the phone and bent over the fridge in the kitchen peering inside, which had the unfortunate effect of highlighting the curves of his pert arse in ways that Liam did his best to ignore.

"There's a cheese platter and all sorts of good shit in here," Ambrose said, closing the fridge and turning with a dimpled grin that was somehow even more distracting than the view of his arse had been. "Your mum went all out."

"Yeah, she's a feeder," Liam said. "Expressing her love one cheese wheel at a time."

"Aw, she likes me," Ambrose said. His smile faltered just for a second, but then it was back. "For now, anyway. What do you say, I keep up the current level of inappropriateness for today and tomorrow, and then when they have the big family engagement dinner on Sunday night, I drink too much and ramp it up, do something truly outrageous? Oooh, maybe I'll make a move on Neve's fiancé? That'd be heart-breaking enough for you, right?"

Liam pulled a face. "Nobody would believe it. And besides, if you overdo it, Bridget won't let you in her car, and you'll end up having to take the train back to Sydney. Trust me, you don't want to do that."

"Fine, no cracking on to the brother-in-law. I'll figure something out." Ambrose stretched, his shirt riding up so an enticing strip of belly skin was on display, and said, "I'm going for a shower. I hope you left some hot water. You were in there forever." And with that he wandered into the bathroom, leaving Liam doing his best not to wonder what Ambrose would look like wet and naked.

When they got to the main house for breakfast, Grandad Billy was rubbing his hands together in anticipation. "Eat up, boys," he said, "and put a good lining on your stomachs. We've got the wine tour today."

"Now, Dad. You can't take the boys drinking at the crack of dawn," Fi scolded mildly as she presented them with plates loaded with scrambled eggs and toast. "You can wait till Neve and her fellow get here."

"Fine," Grandad grumbled. "The pair of them can help me fix some of the reticulation in the meantime. And then we'll drink." He stabbed at his toast mulishly, and Liam smiled to himself. Grandad pretended to hate it when he didn't get his own way, but it was mainly front and bluster for the look of the thing. In reality, Liam's dad did most of the day-to-day running of the winery. Grandad mainly took care of the tour groups. And he was good at it, too, his larger-than-life persona and Irish accent making the whole thing an unforgettable experience.

Liam knew that he could never run a wine tour like Grandad did—he didn't have the personality for it. He knew that if he explained the oenology process it would come off like he was reading from a textbook. Oenology. He winced internally—that right there was a prime example. Other people would just call it wine-making, but not Liam. Whereas he'd heard Grandad refer to it more than once as, " Bashing the hell out of the grapes to get the good stuff ."

People liked that sort of thing. They liked their information packaged as entertainment, with style and flair and a little bit of flirting for them to giggle over as they sipped their shiraz and pretended they could taste the difference between that and the other shiraz they'd just tried, or the one before that.

Ambrose would be great at wine tours. Liam wasn't sure where the thought came from, but he could see it in his mind's eye. Ambrose had all the qualities needed to deal with groups of tourists in spades. If they really were together, Ambrose would fit right in.

"Eat your breakfast and stop wool-gathering, Liam," Mum said, and prodded his shoulder. "You're away with the fairies."

He looked up to see Grandad beaming at him. "Leave the boy alone, Fi," he said, a wicked glint in his eye. "He's just spent the night in the honeymoon cottage, after all. Of course he's distracted."

"Oooh, how was the cottage?" Mum asked. "Did you have everything you needed? How was the gift basket?" She leaned forward eagerly, elbows on the table, and Liam felt himself flushing beet red.

Not Ambrose, though. He leaned back in his chair and made those fucking finger guns at her. "It was aces, Mrs C. Great stuff in there. Bed was excellent, too. Nice solid frame." He winked. "Sturdy."

"Christ on a cracker," his father muttered under his breath, and Mum swatted at him.

"Don't blaspheme over breakfast, William." She turned her attention back to Ambrose. "So did you find the cheese board? Should there be a little sign telling people there's a cheese board? We don't want the guests to miss it."

"We found it this morning," Ambrose said with a wicked grin. "We got sort of, um, distracted by the gift basket last night." Dad choked on a forkful of eggs as Ambrose continued blithely, "Have you thought of adding anchor bolts and restraints to the bed, Fi? Maybe a few more sex toys, a nice paddle perhaps? I'll bet people on their honeymoon would like something a bit spicy like that. I know I would."

"Do you think so?" Mum asked while Liam debated whether he could fit under the table with John Phillip and stay there till this conversation was over.

"Sure," Ambrose agreed easily. "If you want, I'll show you some good websites to order what you need, and the ones to avoid."

"You seem to be quite the expert," Mum said, looking uncertainly from Liam to Ambrose and back again.

Ambrose gave another grin. "Nah, just an enthusiastic amateur."

Dad's chair scraped against the floor as he pushed it hastily backwards. "Perhaps we could discuss it when we're not having breakfast," he said gruffly. Liam had never seen his dad so red in the face, apart from during the talk he'd given Liam at fifteen that had mainly consisted of him impressing on Liam the importance of using contraception if he ever met a nice girl and things went that far. That particular talk had turned out to be unnecessary, but in fairness to his dad, neither of them had known that at the time.

"Righto," Grandad Billy said, rubbing his hands together. His eyes sparkled. "Reticulation. Let's go, boys."

"What's reticulation?" Ambrose asked.

"Oh, for when you want things to reticulate," Grandad Billy said. "Are you wearing comfortable shoes? We've got a bit of a hike. Bring a brolly!"

Ambrose snagged another piece of bacon before leaving the kitchen.

"Good," Grandad Billy said. "You'll need that. Bit of lining on the stomach, right?"

Ambrose's eyes grew wide as he and Liam followed Grandad Billy out of the house. "We're not doing reticulation, are we?"

"I very much doubt it," Liam agreed.

Riley joined them and walked with them as far as the side of the house, then she headed around the back to feed the chickens. John Phillip followed her halfway down the long driveway, before he changed his mind and loped back to follow Grandad and Liam and Ambrose as they headed for the vineyard.

"Now then," Grandad said as they reached the first of the vines. "What do you know about dirt?"

"Absolutely nothing," Ambrose said cheerfully, his nose wrinkling as it started to rain again.

Liam opened his umbrella and stepped closer so they could share.

"It's good soil here," Grandad said, squatting down to dig his fingers into the first. "Red clay."

"That's what Liam said last night," Ambrose said, and Liam felt a tiny thrill that Ambrose had remembered.

"The soil's good," Grandad said, his eyes twinkling. "But the proof's in the finished product!" He leapt to his feet again and pointed in the direction of the sheds. "To the wine!"

He headed off down the slope of the hill, his coat flapping wildly behind him.

Ambrose was drunk, and he seemed surprised about it. He kept peering at the glass in his hand and muttering, "I'm hammered?" like it was a question, and not the inevitable result of Grandad pouring glass after glass of red down his throat.

The tasting room in the shed was large and airy, and mercifully free of customers. On holidays and for corporate events, the place could be transformed with decorators and caterers, but mostly wine tastings were small affairs for whoever dropped by. One of the Connellys talked people through it and maybe offered a charcuterie board as well. Grandad hadn't bothered with any of the trappings. He'd just lined up a bunch of bottles and glasses, popped the cork off the first one, and now, forty-five minutes later, Ambrose was wrecked. They had tasting glasses, dainty little things that held barely a mouthful, but Grandad Billy tended to ignore those. And because of course Ambrose was the one who'd joked about ‘spitters are quitters', he'd emptied every full-sized glass Grandad had set in front of him.

Liam, who was still sitting on his first glass of shiraz and managing to dodge Grandad's continued attempts to refill it, wondered if he'd have to wheel the pair of them back to the house in a barrow. Ambrose, very possibly, but Grandad wasn't yet at the sea-shanty stage of things, so he could probably still walk.

"Nonsense," Grandad said, sloshing more wine into Ambrose's glass. "You've barely a shine on. Try some of this one."

"Who…?" Ambrose blinked dozily. "Who comes up with the words?"

"What?" Grandad asked. "The names?"

"No, the words ." Ambrose attempted to swirl the contents of his glass and slopped it all down his hand. He licked it off. "This wine is heavy and verdant and has hints of…of tin, and scaffolding and cow. Words like that. But not that, because nobody has cow wine." He wrinkled his nose. "Does anyone have cow wine?" His eyes widened. "Ooh. You know how people make hard lemonade? Could you make hard milk?"

"I'm gonna get you some water," Liam said, and headed for the fridge out the back. Hopefully he'd get back in time to prevent Grandad from pouring more wine down Ambrose's throat and also agreeing to make hard milk. That honestly seemed like something Grandad would attempt. "Also, hard milk is already a thing! It's called Baileys!"

Ambrose lifted his glass in agreement. "To Baileys! Even though it doesn't have subtle notes of cow."

"Would that not just be cow shit though?" Grandad asked. "The notes of cow? Or would it taste of steak?"

Liam missed Ambrose's reply, too busy retrieving a water bottle and some crackers and dip from the fridge. Something to soak up the wine could only be good at this stage. Maybe he should have warned Ambrose about Grandad and his tastings. Although now he thought about it, they'd tried in the car on the way up. Maybe Ambrose just hadn't believed them because Grandad seemed so harmless, all charm and blarney, right until he was breaking out the special reserve port, the one that could fell a grown man.

Shit, the port. Liam hoped he wasn't too late.

He was.

He got back to the tasting room just in time to hear, "—aged for seven years in an oak barrel to give it some depth. You can taste the heart of the grape. Go on now, no sipping, take a decent mouthful!"

Ambrose was staring wide-eyed at the glass of port Grandad had plopped on the table in front of him. "Do grapes even have hearts? Do they get heartbroken when you make the wine? Do they miss the rest of their bunch?" He giggled and swayed on his stool, then picked up the glass carefully with both hands and slurped noisily. He set the glass down, licked his lips, and belched. "I like that one," he declared, right before he slid sideways off his stool.

Liam dropped the crackers and darted forward in an attempt to catch him while Grandad cackled. "Your boy's a lightweight, Liam!"

Ambrose lay on the floor, blinking up at Liam and smiling dozily. "I like green grapes."

"Yeah," Liam said. "From Woolworths. You said."

Ambrose's smile widened. "And you remember !" Then his smile wavered, and he exhaled heavily. "Why am I on the ground?"

"Because you drank the wine," Liam reminded him, and tried not to be charmed by Ambrose's helpless confusion.

"You're not on the floor though," Ambrose pointed out. "Why aren't you on the floor? Don't you wanna drink with me? Drink with meeeee," he wailed, and Liam wasn't sure if he was asking or if he was just singing lines from Les Mis incredibly badly. John Phillip gave a querulous howl in agreement from his position under the table and licked Ambrose's face.

"I am drinking," Liam said, and pointed to his half-full glass on the table.

Ambrose scrambled into a sitting position then, taking Liam's arm, hauled himself to his feet, frowning at the glass. "It's full," he accused. "You didn't swallow."

Grandad, still perched on a stool, chuckled. "He's got you there, lad."

Ambrose's bottom lip quivered. "I wanna drinking buddy like in the movies," he declared. "And now you've pulled out."

Grandad cackled into his glass. "Drink with your boy, Liam. A good boyfriend swallows and doesn't pull out."

Ambrose cackled, and Liam sighed. He should have known Grandad wouldn't let him get away with just one glass. Saying no to Grandad was like fighting off a hurricane with a paper fan. Pointless, and a waste of energy. And truth be told, Liam didn't really mind having a few glasses with the old man. They'd had some of their best conversations halfway into a bottle of red. Liam even remembered some of them.

He helped Ambrose back onto his stool. "You drink your water, and I'll drink my wine, okay?"

"Okay," Ambrose agreed happily. "And we'll meet in the middle!"

"What?" Liam asked.

"What?" Ambrose echoed, his brow wrinkled.

"Drink your water," Liam said, hiding his grin behind the rim of his wineglass. Ambrose was a messy drunk, but he was cute as hell, and the last thing Liam needed to do was confuse pretending to care for him with actually caring for him. At least as more than a friend. God. Were they even friends? Probably not. He didn't know a thing about Ambrose, not really.

Ambrose returned the smile and drank his water.