by JA Huss
Holy shit. Drifty, flighty, light-headed butterflies in my stomach.
“I hope you got some sleep. I did. Couple hours, at least. I’m taking this no-pick-up as a sign that you enjoyed yours more than I did, but you could also be ignoring me. I’d say there’s a sixty-forty chance that you’re ignoring me. But I’ll take those odds. You might also be asking yourself, Hey, did I ever give this asshole my number? The answer is no. I called myself from your phone while you weren’t looking. Always one step ahead. Really, almost never one step ahead, if I’m being honest. But. I give it a go every once in a while. So… wanna know what I dreamed about?”
Oh, man. I just fell all over again. So hard.
“We swam with the dolphins but then we turned into mer-people.”
I laugh.
“And Johnny and Alonzo were like… warring mer-kings? Or some shit. I’m not totally clear on the mer-people political hierarchy, but Joey and your middle bro, Tony, traded sides, I guess? So Tony was working for Johnny and Joey was working for Alonzo. And then Johnny threw this sissy-girl fit about family loyalty and then your mom called everyone to Saturday-night dinner and made us leave our spearguns and tridents at the door. And then the dog said—I didn’t see a dog at your dive shop, so I don’t know where he came from—but he said, ‘No dogs allowed,’ when the dolphins tried to join us.”
I can’t stop laughing.
“It was a pretty cool dream. I think it means I miss the beach. And sailing. And I had fun yesterday. And you totally won our little bossy game. Which is now over, by the way. And I might want to marry you and your crazy family because how many families could keep up with the Bostons, ya know? Not many. And… yeah. It all makes so much sense in that context.” He takes a deep breath and says, “So. Don’t bail on me, Emma. Don’t pull a Jesse. Call me when you get this. I would like to take you out on a date tonight. I’ll even let you drive.”
I want to listen to it all again. Maybe even memorize every word, but I want to call him back more.
“Ms. Dumas,” he says, picking up my call. “Did you have an excellent rest?”
“I did,” I say. “And I listened to your message.”
“Shit, what did I say? I can’t remember.”
“Seriously?” I huff.
“No. I wrote it down and recited it word for word before I called.”
I laugh but I can’t tell if he’s kidding.
“I’m kidding,” he says. “I winged it. Was it OK?”
“It was… pretty damn adorable, actually.”
“Pretty. Damn. Adorable. I’ll take it. So would you like to date me tonight?”
“As opposed to tomorrow night?”
“Tomorrow night we could be married.”
“Oh, man. You’re a funny guy.”
“I’m a fucking joy. But really. Can I pick you up? Or,” he says, “you can pick me up. How ‘bout that?” I swear, I can hear his eyebrows waggling at me.
“Your innuendo is showing.” I giggle.
“I try,” he says. “I do my best.”
“Yeah. I’ll pick you up. Should I… I don’t know, buzz your butler when I arrive? Or how does one pick up a Boston Brother from that monstrous building you live in?”
“His name is Zach and he’s my cousin, remember? He’ll meet you downstairs and bring you up. That way I can maintain my image as mystery man, you know?”
“Sure,” I say. “I get it. One must not give up on their mysterious persona too quickly.”
“What time?” he says.
“Give me two hours.”
“I’m counting the seconds, Ms. Dumas.”
“I might be early.”
“I wouldn’t object to you coming now. That was not innuendo. Unless you want it to be.”
“I have to shower and change. I’m still in my pigtails.”
“Awwwwwww. Is it too much to ask that you wear those again?”
“Yes.”
We both laugh.
“Two hours.”
“I’m holding my breath. Don’t be late or I’ll die.”
I hang up because I cannot stand how adorable he is.
And then waste ten whole minutes replaying his voicemail until I have the entire thing memorized.
I choose a short, loose-fitting, summer dress with revealing cold-shoulder sleeves. It’s yellow, and has a flirty skirt, and says casual summer evening. Yellow looks fantastic with my dark, wavy hair and the sun I got yesterday really makes my skin glow. I accent it with a pair of strappy silver wedges and a little silver bag for lipstick and phone.
When I look in the mirror everything about me says beach.
That’s what I’m going for. I want Jesse to think of our day together yesterday. I’m kinda proud of myself for planning that whole experience. Yes, I did it out of spite, and revenge, and maybe a little bit of hate.
But it kinda backfired on me. Because by anyone’s standards it was pretty damn perfect. Even my family. That was a move meant to put him in his place and make him uncomfortable. Let him know I’m protected by these big Dumas men and he should never fuck with me or hurt me again.
And now he has a standing Saturday night dinner invitation.
Life is so weird.
I drive the Huracán because sure. I bought it to show off and show him up, but I kinda like that monster. It definitely sends the right message pulling up to the Boston Brothers’ building.
Now that building is a character in its own right. And not that I stalked the Boston boys when I moved here to the city with the girls for Bright Berry Beach headquarters, but OK, maybe I did stalk them a little. Because I know all about this building.
Called the Bossy Building by locals and built mid-last century, it’s a contradiction of sorts. On the one hand it’s tall, and flat, and smooth. Very modern in that respect. But it’s also made of these almost-white stone blocks and tapers up to a point as it climbs into the sky.
There are open terraces surrounding the top five floors and they used to throw parties up there when the father was still alive. There are also gargoyles. Very creepy gargoyles. You can’t see them from the ground, they’re way too high up, but I’ve seen pictures. Weird contorted faces, some half-human, half-animal. A few that are all animals—a bull, a stag, a bear, and a horse. And then there are six that resemble the Boston Boys themselves. Including the father, the uncle, and that cousin of theirs.
No one knows when those were made. There doesn’t seem to be a record. But it had to have been in the last forty years because that’s when Boston Senior bought the building.
But crazy as that is, the really interesting thing about this building is the land surrounding it like a moat. You can’t drive up to the building. The street is a good hundred yards away on all sides. It literally takes up an entire city block.
And in that space there’s one of those spurting water sculptures. The kind that shoots water up in a straight line in a random pattern. Only, there’s hundreds of those little spouts around the perimeter of the block so they make a walled-in-water courtyard of sorts. And the only way to get past without getting wet is to enter the courtyard on the west side of the building.
It’s not the only building in the city with these water fountains, there’s a few in other neighborhoods. Kids are constantly running through them and families hang out at those other city water parks during the summer.
But the Bossy Building is deep in the financial district in a neighborhood where people like to work, but not necessarily play. They certainly don’t raise families there.
So the whole thing comes off more like a way to keep people out or herd them to the west side of the building than it does a work of city art or park for recreation.
Privacy. Yeah. That’s what those water spouts say.
Keep out.
Two valets appear immediately when I pull the Huracán up to the west side of the building. One opens my door while the other offers me his hand and says, “Welcome to the Bossy, Ms. Dumas. May I help you
out of your car?”
“Sure,” I say, taking his hand and stepping out of the low sports car.
“This way, please. Mr. Boston is waiting for you over there.”
I walk around the car and stand at the entrance carved out by the wall of water spouts and look down the marked stone path that leads to the front doors to find, not Jesse, but Zach Boston, waiting patiently about halfway between me and the building. Illuminated by spotlights aimed at that particular spot on which he stands. His hands clasped in front of him. Head up and back straight. Wearing a dark gray suit and silver sunglasses.
I glance up at the building. It’s dark out, so the top five floors are also lit up with spotlights and I swear, they are positioned just so, so that the gargoyles cast shadows upward like demons in a horror movie.
Dramatic, right?
These Boston Boys really know how to make an impression.
But why am I surprised?
My first date with Jesse Boston was thirteen years ago and he’s been haunting me ever since.
I take a deep breath and walk forward. The valet does not follow me, so I approach Zach Boston alone with more than a little bit of apprehension.
This is what I wanted though, right?
Yes, I tell myself. This is what I’ve always wanted.
Zach waits until I am three paces away before he greets me. “Ms. Dumas,” he says, extending a hand. “I’m Zach, Jesse’s assistant. Would you like to come with me?”
I shake his hand politely then say, “Yes, thank you.”
We walk forward towards the building and there’s a cool breeze in the courtyard that seemed to be missing from the rest of the city. A chill runs up my body and I rationalize it by coming up with all kinds of semi-scientific explanations due to the water wall, and the slight mist, and the night air.
But I’m not sure any of that makes as much sense as the real reason I’m chilled.
They are a little bit scary, aren’t they? These Boston Boys.
So secretive, so elusive, so rich and powerful.
And dirty, I remind myself.
They’re dirty.
But I push those thoughts away when Zach and I pass through the automatic doors and into the lobby.
It’s an austere space. No chairs. Not a single one. No reception desk. Just a line of metal detectors—not operational at the moment, since it’s Sunday night—and just past those there are dozens of electronic turnstiles that must be activated with a badge before you’re allowed to pass through.
There’s no security. At least, that’s what I think until I look up and spy the cameras.
Zach and I bypass the turnstiles, instead walking through two glass double doors under a large steel archway, which also requires an electronic signature to activate.
These people take their security seriously.
“It’s all very dramatic,” Zach says, chuckling a little bit to put me at ease. “But the companies who rent space here in the Bossy all require it. The private elevator is this way.”
He waves a hand to a little wing of sorts and I go first, stopping in the middle of a bank of elevators. There’s four. Which seems excessive when the private floors only house three brothers and an assistant.
But what did I really expect?
This is who they are.
Dark brothers with dark secrets. And that little admission Jesse gave me the other night was just the beginning.
The elevator is as austere as the lobby. Plain stainless-steel box. But it’s quick and the floors tick off in rapid succession as we ascend.
Then we’re there. The doors open and before me is… not what I expected. At all.
Because it’s another lobby. A vast long lobby with floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the twinkling night skyline of the city.
And standing at the windows, dead center in this lobby, and backlit by the city lights, is Jesse.
He turns to face me as I walk forward, my wedges silent on the shiny black floors.
“Well,” he says. “This is me.”
The elevator doors close and when I glance behind me, I see that Zach has disappeared. Either in the elevator, or possibly down one of the two long, wide hallways that open up on either side of the lobby.
“Does it scare you?” Jesse asks.
“Should it scare me?” I ask.
“Probably,” he says.
I smile. Unsure of who he really is. But his tone is light and when he steps out of the shadows I see he’s smiling. So I make myself take a deep breath and relax.
It’s still him. Same golden boy I spent the weekend with.
Just a little darker now. My fantasy not quite matching up with his reality, but it’s OK.
“Well,” I say when he stops just two paces away. “It’s definitely imposing.”
“Which part?” he asks.
“Um.” I laugh. “All of it?”
“There’s a lot you don’t know about me,” Jesse says. “About us, actually. What I’ve told you so far is just… what I know, Emma. And I don’t know much either.”
“What do you mean?”
He shrugs. “It’s all very need-to-know. They never wanted me to know, I guess.”
“Who?” I ask.
He’s wearing a suit now. Dark gray, from what I can tell in the hazy light. Deep red tie. Hair groomed slick and a little bit of stubble on his chin that looks dark, but can’t be. Because I know for a fact that he’s blonde. So that golden-boy persona really is gone now and in its place is this… other man.
This mysterious figure with secrets so deep, he doesn’t even know them.
“Johnny. My dad. My uncle too, I guess. Though I’m not sure how much blame he’s earned, since he died back when I was twenty.”
“That day,” I say. Picturing our last day together on that very first date.
“Yeah, that day.”
He leaves the rest unsaid. The part we’re over now. The drugs and disappearing act. And we stand there in awkward silence and hazy, filtered light from the outside world.
“What is this place?”
He looks around, then back at me. “My home, I guess.”
“It’s a lobby, Jesse.”
He nods. “I know. Not very homey. But…” He shrugs and looks a little more innocent and light. More like the man I thought I knew instead of the one I don’t. “But it’s all I really have left, you know? So I stay, I guess.”
“It’s not bad,” I say, glancing around. There’s literally nothing to look at but him and the windows. Or the floor. But the floor is creepy. So shiny and black.
“There’s more,” he says. “I have a whole floor, remember? You wanna see it all?”
I don’t know why I hesitate, but I do.
“Or… you can leave if you’re not into it.”
And I have to admit. I might want to leave. “I just don’t understand what’s happening,” I say.
“No, me either.” Then he closes that short distance between us and places both his hands on my hips as he leans in. Kisses me. The kiss is just as nice, just as perfect, just as sexy as it’s always been. But then he whispers, “I won’t hurt you, if that’s what you’re afraid of, Emma. None of us will.”
Which implies… what? That they hurt other people?
“Should I take you back downstairs?” he asks. “Or can you find it in yourself to take one more chance with me?”
And I don’t know what to say.
I really have no clue what the right choice is. Because that power play game we were playing all weekend was bullshit. The whole thing was bullshit.
I am nothing and no one compared to these people. And it’s not about who has more money, or who has a bigger jet, or a better, flashier car.
My influence over him was a carefully crafted illusion.
The last three minutes since I pulled up to this building tell me all I need to know about how different Emma Dumas and Jesse Boston really are.
And how decidedly unequal the division of power
would be in a relationship with him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT - JESSE
She’s gonna run.
I see it. Picture the whole shit show in my head. Maybe she gives some babbling explanation or maybe she doesn’t. Won’t matter. I know how this ends. I’ve lived in this world, in this building, in this skin my whole life. And even I don’t know what to think about it. Even I don’t fully understand it.
Why do people think I escaped with drugs and alcohol? Why did I run away to sail the world? Why does Joey fly all over the fucking planet partying like an asshole? Why does Johnny lock himself up in that tower of his own making?
This is why.
No one knows this, of course. Because no one knows us.
Not even us.
So how can I expect Emma to get it?
“Listen,” I say. Because I don’t know what to do to make her feel better. I don’t know how to change something that is so… intrinsic. So much a part of me. But I know I have to at least try. “Just give me ten minutes, Emma. Just ten minutes. That’s it. That’s all I’m asking for.” I look down at her. Have the urge to kiss her again and make this all go away. Pretend it’s not happening.
Part of me wishes I didn’t invite her over. But if we’re going to be together—and I really want to give that a try—then she has to know what she’s getting in to. And she has to find a way to navigate her way through this… whatever it is that hangs over our family like a thick, black cloud.
She lifts up her head and meets my gaze. Locks eyes with me. “Who are you people?”
“I wish I had a straight answer for that. I really do. But all I can say is… we’re just… us. That’s all I know. This is me, OK? And I invited you here so you can know me. The real me, Emma. Not the messed-up guy in the tabloids. Not the drug addict or the alcoholic. Not the guy you thought I was when I left. And not the guy you think I am now.”
“So… this whole weekend was what? A lie?”
“It wasn’t a lie.”
