Dirty Games

by Barbara Elsborg

  “Go and see for yourself. Second room on the left at the top of the stairs.”

  The sooner he spoke to Owen, the sooner he could go home, the sooner he could look for a place for Dirk, the sooner he could go to sleep. He took the stairs two at a time and knocked on the door. “Owen? It’s Linton.”

  “Fuck off.” The response was muffled but clear enough.

  “I’ve just driven for ninety minutes to see you. I’m not leaving until I have.”

  When there was no reply, Linton turned the handle and the door opened. The room was dark and muggy and it took a moment before Linton could make out the shadowy lump in the bed. The room looked similar to his before he’d cleaned it. Cans had been tossed everywhere, there were empty glasses and plates on the floor along with a sea of wrappers from bars of chocolate and packets of biscuits. Christ. How much chocolate had he eaten?

  Linton picked his way over to the bed and sat on the end of the mattress. “What’s the matter?”

  “Go away. Just go away. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to see anyone.”

  “Has someone hurt you?” Linton whispered.

  Memories of what had happened when they were teenagers surged back into Linton’s head. He wondered if Owen was having some sort of flashback.

  “Owen, tell me what’s wrong. Whatever it is can be sorted.” Probably.

  “Linton’s driven all the way here,” Max snapped from the door. “Fucking talk to him.”

  The light clicked on and Linton flinched when he took in the full extent of the state of the room.

  “Turn the light off,” Owen screamed.

  “Talk to him,” Max barked.

  Owen heaved himself upright and glared at his brother. “Fuck off, Max.”

  Linton steeled himself not to react. It wasn’t just the blotchy, bloated, bearded face that shocked him but the identical dirty bandages on Owen’s wrists. He heard the door close and Owen slumped back with tears rolling down his face. Owen was one of the best looking guys Linton knew. He had the face of an angel, beautiful silky blond hair and a dazzling smile. The guy in the bed looked like a stranger.

  “Yes, I tried to kill myself. Fucked that up too because I’m stupid. Apparently I needed to cut down my arms not across my wrists. I’ll know for next time.”

  Linton caught Owen’s hands in his. “Did you fail your driving test again?”

  Oh God, why had he said that? This wasn’t the time for jokes.

  But Owen laughed through his snuffling sobs.

  “Thorne Morrisey?” Linton whispered, because it was the only thing he could think of that would have rendered Owen a blubbering mess.

  Fingernails dug into his wrists. “Dumped me. Eviscerated me. Bloody destroyed me.”

  Linton mentally groaned.

  “You were right. You always said life was so much simpler if you kept things casual,” Owen hiccupped. “Except I don’t want to have to choose between loneliness and a broken heart.”

  “What happened?” Linton asked. He didn’t really want to know. He had enough on his plate, but knowing Owen had tried to kill himself had shocked him.

  “I don’t want to tell you.”

  “I didn’t want to come.”

  “I didn’t want you to come,” Owen snapped.

  “I don’t find it easy to say no to Max. You know what he’s like. Just tell me what’s happened.”

  Owen seemed to shrink. “I thought Thorne was the one. I thought he could save me.”

  Linton bit his lip. God, Owen. No one can do that. Clichéd as it was, Owen needed to save himself.

  “We’d just fucked and it was really good, really hot,” Owen whispered. “Thorne made me feel as if I was the most important person in the world. He always did. Not just in bed, out of bed too. Shit, he’s just… We were both into it. I know we were.”

  He sucked in a breath. “There was no sign anything was wrong. We’d been all over each other. Maybe he was a bit more frantic than usual but it turned me on. We showered, got dressed, went down into the hotel dining room where we were supposed to be having a pre-wedding meal to meet more of my family, and in front of everyone and a load of eavesdropping strangers, he turned to me with this blank expression on his face and told me I bored him, that I was a crap fuck, and that he doubted I’d ever excited anyone.”

  Linton chewed his lip. Shit.

  “He said a lot of cruel stuff and every word that came out of his mouth felt like he was stabbing me with a fucking dagger.”

  “Why did he do it?”

  “I don’t know. I thought he loved me. He said he did and all that time he’d hated me. Okay? So now you know. Go away.”

  “Owen—”

  “Just go.”

  “Did you do something?”

  “I did nothing to make him be that cruel.” Owen slumped down in the bed and pulled the pillow over his head.

  When Linton reached the bottom of the stairs Max was waiting. He ushered Linton into the lounge where his wife, Cindy, sat on a white leather couch. Linton had never taken to Cindy. Whenever he met her she acted as though she’d just smelled something rancid.

  “Drink?” Max asked.

  “A coffee would be good.”

  Cindy pushed to her feet. She was model thin with long black hair and boobs that looked too perky to be real. Not that Linton was an expert.

  “Did he tell you why Thorne dumped him?” Max asked.

  “He said he didn’t know. That he hadn’t done anything to deserve Thorne being so cruel.”

  “Shit. I hoped he’d tell you. Do you believe that he doesn’t know?”

  Linton hesitated. “I’m not sure.”

  “I thought maybe Owen had been an idiot and cheated but he swears blind he didn’t. I think this was all a game to Thorne. He never intended to marry Owen. He was just playing with him. He strung him along and then humiliated him. He’s done it before apparently. To Emily Jones, the film star.”

  “He’s bisexual?” Linton asked, his stomach moving into a death roll. “He was going to marry her?”

  “I don’t know about that, but he publically humiliated her.”

  “Owen said Thorne tore him to pieces in the hotel.”

  “We all sat there as Thorne told him he was boring, selfish, pathetic, stupid, and a whole lot more. It was vicious. Before I could shut him up, he’d called Owen a tart, said Owen had pulled down his trousers and shoved his arse at him the night they met. That he was his own pet limpet and Owen had as much self-respect as a piece of seafood.”

  After what had happened when they were teenagers, Owen had been held together with the slenderest of threads. He was always excited and hyper but Linton had seen through that to the frightened kid underneath. Linton had been the one at uni to pick up the pieces each time Owen had been dumped and he guessed that might be why he was here now, but he and Owen had grown apart over the last few years so what did Max want?

  “Thorne said Owen was only interested in him because he wanted to be famous.” Max paced across the room. “That Owen saw Thorne as his path to doing PR work for a whole host of celebrities.”

  Uncharitable as it sounded, Linton thought that was possible. Owen had always been too keen to make connections.

  “Thorne said Owen was an idiot for thinking he’d ever marry him and that his family were frauds. Apparently, I was a jumped up, talentless twat whose buildings looked like prisons and anyone with any sense could see that.”

  Linton gulped.

  “He went on and on,” Max snarled. “It was like a speech he’d practised and as he delivered it, he had no expression on his face. As though he didn’t give a fuck that he was destroying my brother’s dreams, my reputation. I’d designed his new home and he’d approved the plans, said how much he loved it. He stood there and tore it apart. Tore me apart. The fucking bastard.” Max dropped onto a chair.

  Was that the real reason for Max’s ire?

  “I’d already forked out deposits for the wedding venue,
the caterer, flowers, fireworks, Christ knows what else. I was stunned when Thorne exploded like that, but not as shocked as Owen. He ran out of the hotel and we couldn’t find him. A week later he turned up here, plastered out of his skull, a complete mess, begging me to let him stay. He’d been living with Thorne and had nowhere to go.”

  “Thorne sent all his stuff here and now we can’t get Owen to leave,” Cindy said as she walked in with the coffee.

  “I want him better,” Max snapped at her. “He’s on the verge of a breakdown.”

  “He’s already had one,” she snapped back.

  “When did he—er…?” Linton rubbed his wrist.

  “Try to kill himself?” Max gave a heavy sigh. “Ten days ago. Cindy found him in the garage.”

  “At least he had the decency not to mess up the bedroom carpet,” she said.

  You bitch. Even Max glared at her for that.

  “How long since they split up?” Linton asked.

  “Six weeks,” Max said. “I thought time would help him get over it but he’s getting worse not better. I suspect he still thinks he can get Thorne back. He’s delusional. He’s not going to get over this until Thorne is destroyed.”

  Christ. The venom in Max’s voice sent chills down Linton’s spine.

  “Owen wrote him letters, sent texts, emails and got nowhere,” Cindy said. “Thorne blocked his calls. He refuses to speak to him. Owen still jumps like a startled rabbit every time his phone rings, desperate that it’s him.”

  Sounded like the Owen Linton knew from school. He fell hard, both into relationships and out of them. Well, he had until that day in June when he and Linton were fifteen years old, and a geography field trip had gone very wrong.

  “He gets up in the night, sneaks downstairs and helps himself to the kids’ sweets,” Cindy said. “He’s eaten his way through entire packets of biscuits. And cakes.” She gritted her teeth. “We can’t have anyone round for a dinner party because he’s like a spectre at the feast. He lies in his bed and cries and wails. He won’t wash. He’s snuck down, taken Max’s best wine back to his room and drunk the lot. I can’t even let the kids have their friends round. I’ve cancelled—”

  Max patted her knee, squeezed until she shut up, then pinned his gaze on Linton. “We need your help.”

  “To do what?”

  “He wants revenge,” Owen said from the door.

  In the full light of the room he looked even worse. His hair was lank and greasy, his face spotty under a straggly beard. His T-shirt and sleep pants were creased and dirty. He had the beginnings of a belly and Owen had always been rake thin.

  “I told you Owen’s not the first person he’s treated like this,” Max said. “Thorne enjoys fucking up lives. It’s a game to him, going out with a guy or woman for a while, making them his world, then dumping them from a great height.”

  “Did he leave you for a woman?” Linton immediately wanted the words back. He could feel Max staring at him.

  “He didn’t leave me for anyone,” Owen whispered. “He’s not in a relationship.”

  “How do you know? Are you having him watched?” Linton was having difficulty believing this.

  Max shrugged. “Off and on.”

  Christ. Linton faced Owen. “Do you really think you can get him back?”

  “He knows he can’t. He needs revenge,” Max said. “He needs Thorne to see what an arsehole he’s been. The bastard can’t be allowed to get away with treating people like shit.”

  “The little prick needs teaching a lesson,” Cindy added.

  Owen said nothing.

  “Isn’t the best way to get even to stop letting it get to you?” Linton said to him. “Sort yourself out. Clean yourself up. Show you don’t care. Find another guy.”

  He was frantically trying to figure out what the three were up to. Did they want him to go out with Owen? To pretend to go out with him? They’d never really been interested in each other like that. Well, maybe Owen had been interested in him, but Linton found him too needy, too insecure. He preferred stronger, more confident guys.

  “The man needs a taste of his own medicine,” Max said. “Owen almost died. I don’t want to see anyone else brought so low by such a fucking egotistical wanker.”

  Linton saw the irony. Max was a fucking egotistical wanker who regularly tore apart designs of the younger architects and left them shell-shocked, feeling like failures.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Max said to Linton.

  Oh I fucking hope not.

  “I’m a tough boss.” Max gave him a rare smile.

  Linton pressed his lips together.

  “I’ve seen the way you step in after I’ve been on the rampage. You smooth ruffled feathers and reassure.”

  More like give almost dead birds CPR. Linton had seen both men and women burst into tears after they’d left Max’s office.

  “You’re good with people,” Max said.

  Linton had a horrible suspicion he now knew where this was going.

  “You know how to make them see things in a particular way. Yes, you’re manipulative yet you make it seem like a good thing.”

  Please don’t let this be what I think it is.

  “Go out with Thorne,” Max said.

  Ah shit.

  “You’re not involved with anyone.” Max pinned him with his gaze.

  “How would you know?” Linton retorted.

  Max laughed. “I checked. At least you didn’t make the same mistake in the States that you did here. You made the most of what New York had to offer but never went out with anyone long enough to break a heart.”

  Fuck you, you fucking fucktard fucker.

  “You know what it’s like to be betrayed,” Max said. “Dump Thorne publicly just like he did Owen. Make him look a fool. Say he has a small dick.”

  “He doesn’t,” Owen whispered.

  “I don’t give a fuck!” Max yelled. “Mud sticks. We want you to throw it.”

  How old were they? Because they were acting like school kids.

  “Why would you think this guy would even be interested in me?” Linton asked.

  Max snorted.

  “He would,” Owen whispered. “Especially if you play hard to get.”

  Linton shook his head. “I’m sorry, I won’t do it.” There was no way he’d ever get involved with another bisexual guy, and no way he’d deliberately hurt someone.

  There was a long pause before Max spoke. The air in the room seemed to crackle. “Look at Owen. Look what he did. You owe it to my brother to do this. You let him down at a time when he most needed you. This will make up for that. It’s not asking much.”

  Yes it is. Bile surged into Linton’s throat. “What happened to Owen wasn’t my fault.”

  No one spoke. Everyone knew he wasn’t talking about this thing with Thorne. Linton had the feeling they were waiting for him to capitulate. He wouldn’t. Though in a way he did owe Owen, he knew that.

  “Fine,” Max snapped. “You like working for me?”

  Oh shit.

  “You like being an architect? You show a lot of promise. I can give you the world but I can also make sure you never work as an architect again. Your relationship with Pascal can be twisted into any direction I wish, certainly enough to give me grounds for dismissal. Pascal won’t be able to save you. I’m the one in charge.”

  Linton’s mouth had lost all moisture. This was now officially the worst day of his life. He wanted to ask if Pascal knew about this but those words would never fall from his lips. Max was undoubtedly still smarting from the fact that for months he’d not seen what was happening under his nose between his junior partner and Linton.

  “You know I’m not bluffing,” Max said. “I never bluff. On the other hand, if you hook Thorne, then destroy his reputation, his credibility, I’ll pay you fifty thousand pounds.”

  Linton was pretty sure his jaw hit the floor.

  “I’ll do it through the company. Call it a bonus. Fifty thousand after
tax. I’ll ensure you stay on track to become a senior associate. Pascal will support it. I’ll make it happen next year.”

  “Shit,” Linton whispered.

  “I don’t—” Owen began.

  “Shut up!” Max barked.

  “That makes me a very highly paid rent boy.” Linton was part appalled, part tempted. No, he was totally appalled and totally tempted. Max was crazy, but Linton wasn’t sure he was actually being given much option.

  There was always an option.

  Say no, walk out and lose his job, say goodbye to any chance of helping Dirk.

  Say yes, keep his job, sell his soul, but get Dirk exactly the help he needed.

  Fuck, fuck, fuck.

  “Thorne is a shit,” Max said. “He deserves it. Be honest, if you had the chance to get even with Pascal, wouldn’t you take it?”

  Oh God. No, I wouldn’t.

  “Thorne’s going to be at a charity dinner for a cycling event five weeks from now,” Max said. “It’s one we both happen to sponsor. That should give you plenty of time to become part of his world.”

  “Is this what you want?” Linton asked Owen.

  “I want him to see how much he hurt me.”

  Christ.

  “Don’t throw yourself at him,” Owen said. “You have to let him come to you.”

  Maybe he could sit back and do nothing. Would they even know? Maybe he could play the game but make his own rules.

  “His brother River plays chess,” Max said. “So do you. He’s a member of the Abacus Club in Canary Wharf. Join it. Play him. Get him to invite you home. He lives with Thorne. He’s autistic. Or you could hang around Thorne’s house in Holland Park. Which café is it he goes to?”

  “Printemps,” Owen muttered.

  “Don’t you think you’re overreacting?” Linton said. “No one’s going to take any notice of what he said about your—”

  “It was blogged about. Reported in Architectural World’s journal.” Max practically growled. “He made me a laughing stock.”

  Linton spotted the look that Owen gave his brother and was certain Max had hijacked this situation.

  “Thorne would find out where I worked. He’d guess what you were up to.” Linton clutched at anything to avoid doing this.