If you could save someone's life, would you? Anyone's? Ali's older brother has a swastika tattooed on his knuckles, a prison ID number for nearly beating an immigrant to death, and spent his teenage years ruthlessly persecuting Ali for being gay. Blood may be thicker than water, but Ali has spent most of his life desperate to prove he is nothing like Tony. A committed vegetarian, charity-supporter, and blood donor, Ali would do anything for anyone. Ali may share parentage with Tony, but he’s determined not to share anything else if he can help it. So when Tony contracts leukaemia, and Ali is the only match for the urgently-needed bone marrow transplant, Ali is caught between two equally awful choices: to refuse and condemn a man to death, or to donate. And in donating, save the life of the man who nearly murdered Ali's Iraqi boyfriend?

Thicker Than Bone

“Are your neighbours ever quiet?” He stage-whispered. Yazid rolled his eyes as he jiggled the keys in the lock.


“Not that one,” he said, and the door popped open. “Voilà!”


“You cleaned,” Ali said in a suitably impressed tone, reeling Yazid in by the jacket. “I hope you made the bed,” he whispered against Yazid’s mouth. The man tasted like filthy, dirty promises. The best kind of promises, in Yazid’s opinion.


“You’ll have to find out, won’t you?”


Chapter 4