Page 86 of Vigilante Twink and the Cop

“They’re winning,” I say, nodding at the tomatoes.

“Only if you let them.” He takes a sip of his own drink, surveying the plants with the mock seriousness of a man who has never once grown anything in his life and has no intention of starting. “It’s very charming, though. Very rustic. Retired detective, defeated by nature.”

“I’ll have you know I saved a whole row of these from slug damage last week.”

“You’re a hero.” He says it warmly, and leans into my side for a moment, smelling of garlic and whatever he’s had simmering since I came out here, and we stand like that for a minute, not talking, looking at a garden that I never knew I wanted.

“Have you thought any more about us having a dog?” he says, apropos of nothing, watching a wood pigeon do something aimless over by the wall rather than looking at me.

“A little,” I say, which is not remotely the same thing as no, and we both know it.

He doesn’t push. He just grins into his glass, quick and satisfied, the grin of a man who’s already picked out three names and is simply waiting for me to catch up to a decision we both know I’ve already made.

“The plumber’s coming Thursday about the outbuilding,” he says instead, looking at the tomatoes rather than at me. “For the second sink.”

“You renovated that room three months ago.”

“And I’m already outgrowing it. That’s a good sign, actually.” He grins, entirely without shame about it. “Speaking of, a parcel came for you this morning. Don’t ask what it cost, I already regret telling you the last time.”

“What is it?”

“A very specific kind of hose attachment that you will use exactly twice and then forget about.” He shrugs, unbothered, the way he’s unbothered about most things that would have made either of us gawp when we were kids, the ease of just deciding to want something and having it arrive. “I ordered myself something too, before you ask.”

“I wasn’t going to ask.”

“You were absolutely going to ask.” He bumps his shoulder against mine.

I was, but now I’m not. My guess is something for his next OnlyFans shoot. But if I think about that too hard, I’m going to end up scooping him into my arms and carrying him to bed, and dinner is going to be burned. Again.

So I’m going to think about other things, and I’m not going to ask to watch, because OnlyFans is his thing and the tomatoes are mine, and why mess up something that works perfectly.

I like knowing there’s a version of him that thousands of strangers adore, because I get the version underneath that, the one that burns garlic if he’s not watching it and hums off key and still can’t quite believe some mornings that he gets to stay.

“Dinner’s nearly ready,” he says eventually, against my shoulder. “Go wash up. You look like you’ve been wrestling something.”

“I have been wrestling something. They’re called tomato plants.”

“Go,” he says, laughing, and doesn’t move yet, tipping his head back to look up at the sky instead, that particular shade of late gold it goes out here that London never quite managed. “God, I love this time of day.”

“You say that every evening.”

“It’s true every evening.” He looks over at me, easy and unguarded in a way I still notice, still catalogue, even now. “Do you ever miss it? London, I mean. Not the job. Just the city.”

I think about it properly before I answer, because he’s asked before and deserves a real answer rather than the quick one. “Sometimes. Not enough to want to go back.”

“Good answer.” He knocks his glass gently against mine, no ceremony to it, just a small private toast of his own before the real one. “Because I’m never living somewhere with that much traffic again.”

“You lived in a loft with a view of half the city.”

“Exactly. I’ve done my time.” He grins, unrepentant, and finally pushes off my shoulder properly, heading back toward the house. “Come on. Before this burns and I have to hear about it for a week.”

I stand there a moment longer, glass in hand, watching him go, the light catching the back of him as he crosses the grass, and then I follow him in.

I wash the soil off my hands and arms, and by the time I come through to the kitchen the smell hits me before I’m properly in the room, garlic and butter and something with wine in it, and Micah’s back at the stove, sleeves pushed up, moving around the pan with the easy, unhurried competence he brings to everything he cares about. He’s got music on low, something I don’t recognize and he’d tease me for not recognizing, swaying very slightly to it without seeming to notice he’s doing it, humming under his breath in a key that isn’t quite the song’s.

There’s a row of tomatoes ripening along the windowsill above the sink, my doing, brought in before the birds could get to them, sitting next to a chipped mug he keeps meaning to throw out and won’t.

I don’t say anything for a moment. I just watch him.