Stripped Bare Read Free

leaned back in his chair. He stretched his six foot two frame, raising his arms above his head and yawning. His body was tired, his muscles cramped from sitting reading legal documents all afternoon.
    Time to go to bed.
    He straightened all the papers on his desk into neat, square piles and smiled. Sam had always said Matthew’s tidiness had driven him crazy, as well as his constant need to have everything under control. But they’d managed to compromise. Matthew would ignore the piles of clothing on the floor at the side of Sam’s bed each night. Sam would in turn appreciate the fact that the bathroom towels had to be rightly aligned on the rails and would do his best to keep them that way.
    Matthew looked at his watch. Ten p.m. The time piece was his pride and joy, an Emporia Armani that Sam had bought Matthew for his twenty-eighth birthday two years ago just weeks before Sam had—no, best not go there.
    Matthew had been trying to shut the thoughts out all day. Today would have been Sam’s thirty-second birthday. It was the reason he’d been closeted in his study upstairs, ignoring the world outside and throwing himself into the dry tomes of the family affairs of his employer, Walter Debussy.
    Matthew switched off the goose head light, plunging the room into darkness. He moved away from his desk, picking up his mobile, and walked out onto the landing, dimly lit by wall sconces.
    Thank God the day was nearly over.
    He dreaded the eighteenth of August. It was a mix of sweet and sour emotions. The sweet remembrance of Sam’s face when he blew out his birthday candles and the feel of his warm mouth when he kissed Matthew a thank you for his present. It was the warmth of his knowing smile and his strong arms when they celebrated his birthday by making love in the ornate four-poster bed in their bedroom. The same bedroom Matthew was headed to now. The sour was the simple fact that Sam was no longer around to enjoy the evening as they used to. He gazed unseeingly out into the quiet Chelsea street below. The neighbourhood was still. No dog walkers or late-night revellers walked past. It was one of the reasons he and Sam had bought the three-bedroom, two-storey brownstone. It was in a cul de sac in a quiet residential neighbourhood, not far from the Fulham Broadway tube station.
    His phone rang and he smiled. He knew who it was before he glanced at the caller ID. A look of tenderness crossed his face as he answered it.
    “Rach? Hi, big sister. How are things in Tokyo?”
    Rachel Langer was a fashion model who travelled all over the world on fashion shoots. Matthew knew she was in Tokyo at the moment for a hectic swimwear shoot.
    “Matt? How are you, little brother?” Rachel’s slightly Americanised voice echoed down the phone. She spent a lot of time in the States and had a tendency to pick up the accent. She was also the only one in the family to call him Matt, preferring the more American version of his name.
    “I’m doing okay, thanks, sweetie.” Matthew knew why she was calling. She’d rung him on Sam’s birthday for the last two years.
    “Bullshit. I bet you buried yourself with work. I know you so well.”
    “So I was working. You know it takes my mind off things.”
    Rachel’s voice was sympathetic. “I know, Matt. It’s a bad day for you. It’s why I like to call you before you go to bed and cry yourself to sleep.”
    Matthew flushed. “Rachel, come on. You don’t know that’s what happens.”
    Her sigh was audible. “Oh no? So you don’t do that then?”
    Matthew scowled at his mobile.
    His sister sighed again. “Matt, honey, how’s the love life doing?”
    Matthew rolled his eyes. This was the question she asked him every time she spoke to him. “How’s the love life, have you found a man, are you having regular sex so you don’t explode?” He’d cringed the last time his older sister had asked him that question and he hoped like hell she wasn’t going to ask him again tonight.
    “I’m