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Hayden answers the phone blearily at 4am, not even looking at the name flashing across the screen. There’s a very small number of people who can call him while he’s on Do Not Disturb, and one of them is sleeping beside him.
“Hello?”
“Pike. Where are you?” Ilya Rozanov’s gruff, Russian-accented voice is far too loud for this hour.
“My fucking bed, why?”
Jackie rolls over, shushing him as she steals the comforter.
“Is Shane with you?”
“Why would your fiancé be in my bed?” He whispers.
“Pike. Hayden, is Shane with you at your house?” Oh shit, this must be serious. Hayden’s brain wakes up properly, finally clocking the urgency in Ilya’s voice.
“Why?”
“He said he was going out with you, Rose and some hot male actor friends of hers. Shane never goes out. He was supposed to be back at 1, he won’t answer my calls, and he turned off his location. Is he with you?”
Hayden has a choice here. A moral dilemma of sorts.
- He could cover for his best friend who might be doing something dodgy.
- He could worry about where his best friend is.
- He could also worry about Shane and fuck with Ilya.
“Why’d you call me and not Rose?”
Jackie sits up, clearly having heard enough of his end to become intrigued. She cocks her head at him, mouthing the words, Is Shane okay?
He shrugs back at her.
“Already called Rose, she said he wasn’t with her.” Ilya says, voice tight.
He decides to be a dick. Later, he’ll blame it on being woken up at 4am by bullshit, but for now it’s just spite. “Yeah man, he’s with me. Passed out on the couch, phone died probably.”
Jackie raises an eyebrow.
“Thank god. Send him home at reasonable hour. I was worried-“ Ilya cuts himself off but Hayden can guess the rest of that sentence. Worried about “hot male actors” alone with my fiancé.
“Yeah, I’ll send him home soon.”
Ilya hangs up. Hayden immediately climbs out of bed and heads downstairs to the kitchen. He needs coffee.
Jackie trails behind him and he quickly fills her in.
“Shane’s missing, told Ilya he was with me, turned off his location.”
“You don’t think… you don’t think he’s had a mental breakdown, do you?” Jackie asks. “So stressed out he’s run away like Arthur used to?”
“I hope not.”
While the coffee pot brews he dials Shane. It rings… and rings… and goes to voicemail.
“Shane, buddy, why the fuck is Ilya calling me looking for you? You gave him some shitty excuse that you were with me? Call me.”
He waits approximately four minutes, just enough time to pour a cup and fill it with caramel creamer, and check Shane’s location for himself before trying again.
This time, Shane answers. Hayden puts it on speaker for Jackie.
“Hayd? What’s wrong?”
“Where are you? Why aren’t you answering Ilya’s calls?” He doesn’t even notice the slip up, he always calls him Rozanov to piss Shane off. “Why did you tell him you were with me?”
There’s a long gap of… what sounds like a muffled man’s voice in the background before Shane answers.
“Did you tell him I was with you?”
“Why the fuck is your location off? Where are you? Who are you with?”
“Hayden, chill, it’s fine. Don’t stress.”
He actually checks his phone to be sure he’s called the right person. “Where are you, Shane?”
“Um, Maxwell’s house.” Jackie raises both eyebrows in alarm, mouthing, Holy fuck, repeatedly.
“Who the fuck is Maxwell, and why are you with him and not your very worried fiancé?”
“He’s one of Rose’s friends.”
Hayden is not liking the direction this conversation is taking one bit. Frankly, he’s getting a little pissed at Shane’s clipped answers that create more questions than they answer.
“Look, I knew I’ve always said you could do better than Rozanov but you’re wearing his fucking engagement ring man. At least, you better be wearing his ring. I just lied to him about you being with me, so you better not be doing some dodgy shit behind his back. He’ll kill us both and I am not dying for you if you’ve cheated man.”
There’s another gap, one that makes something sick pool in Hayden’s gut. Jackie whispers, “no way.”
“I’m wearing my ring.” Shane says, almost grumpily, as if he has any right to be put out by this conversation.
“And?” He prompts.
“And Ilya is not going to kill you.”
Hayden grinds his teeth together. “Looking for a confirmation here buddy, did you or did you not sleep with another man?”
“God, Hayden, no!” Shane erupts, absurdly, into laughter. “Did you really think I would?”
“Why are you not answering his calls? Why did you tell him you’re with me? Why are you laughing?” Hayden thinks he’s aging more in this conversation than he did through any of his four children’s births.
“It’s a prank, Hayden! I’m still at the cottage.” Shane continues to laugh. “Ilya saw a TikTok and wanted to know if you’d cover for me if I lied to him.”
Jackie jumps in, suddenly excited. “So you called Hayden at four in the morning?”
“Jackie?” Shane asks incredulously.
“We wanted to catch you off guard, Pike!” Ilya’s cheery voice floats down the line. “If you were awake you’d never believe Shane would do such a thing!”
Hayden takes a very long sip of very hot coffee. Jackie laughs so hard tears spring to the corners of her eyes and she stops making noise altogether.
“Hayden?” Shane asks, an appropriate amount of trepidation seeping into his voice.
“I’m going to kill you. Both of you. Do you know how scared I was that I was going to have to side with Rozanov in the breakup aftermath?”
Jackie grins. “You turned your location off, that’s like Cheating 101!”
“How would you know about cheating, hmm?” Ilya asks. “Finally moving on to better men, Jackie?”
“Ha! You wish.” She retorts. “Now boys, this was very funny and I enjoyed it greatly, but our children will be up with the sun so I’m going back to bed. Please don’t call my husband at 4am again unless one of you is actually missing.”
“Night, sorry Jackie.” Shane says, sounding truly apologetic.
“Sorry.” Ilya mimics. “Give Pike children my love.”
“Will do!” Jackie pats Hayden’s shoulder, then exits the kitchen.
Hayden just stares at his phone screen. Beyond miffed.
“You alright?” Shane asks. “I’m sorry if you worried, Ilya said you wouldn’t be able to lie to him… honestly I’m flattered you’d risk pissing him off for me.”
“I wish you’d actually been missing.” Hayden groans. “I was genuinely worried about you, man!”
“And you’re so cute with how much you care!” Ilya chirps. “Even if I have to kill you for lying. What if Shane had cheated on me?”
He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, sure, that’s a thing that could totally happen. Good night, both of you.” He hangs up.
When he crawls back into bed there’s only 45 minutes before one of the twins will be in to wake them. Jackie’s reading on her Kindle, amusement still sparkling in her eyes.
“You’re a good friend, Hayden.” She says softly, pressing a kiss to his temple.
“I fucking hate Rozanov, have I told you that?”
“Mm, I don’t believe you. You called him ‘Ilya’ on the phone.” She smiles. “It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone.”
“Fucking TikTok.”