Bossy Brothers: Jesse

by JA Huss

  “No.” Joey sighs. “Fuck Johnny too. Sometimes…” He takes a moment to look at me. Like… really look at me. “Sometimes you gotta say, ‘Enough is enough.’”

  I squint my eyes at him. “Are you OK?”

  He nods his head. But it turns into a shake pretty quick. “No. I’m not OK.”

  “What happened?” I ask.

  “Nothing you need to worry about.”

  “What’s that mean?” Zach asks.

  “It means… I’m gonna handle it.”

  “OK,” I say. “What the fuck are we talking about? Me? Or you?”

  “It’s not all about you, Jesse. It never had anything to do with you.”

  Zach and I trade looks. And I’m just about to push Joey for more when the security buzzer rings.

  Zach and I trade another look. He says, “I’ll get it,” then gets up and walks out to see who is downstairs.

  “Are you expecting someone?” Joey asks.

  “No,” I say. Because I’m not. But… I am secretly hoping that’s Emma.

  “So listen,” Joey says, lowering his propped leg, clasping his hands together in front of him, and leaning forward. “I don’t think Johnny is ever going to tell you, so I’m gonna do it for him.”

  “What?”

  “Do you know why they love to hate you?”

  “Who?”

  “Everyone, Jesse. Surely you’ve noticed that you’re the only one they follow around. I’ve been selling myself at that bachelor auction for years and no scandal ever come out of it even though every date was definitely a scandal. And I’m not blaming you, so before you get defensive, that’s not what I’m saying.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m saying it’s not your fault. You were just… the deal.”

  “What deal?”

  “The one Dad and Uncle Chuck made when you were born.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about?” I snap.

  “They had to make a trade, OK? Dad and Uncle Chuck. To get this business they had to give something up, and that something was you.” He stares at me. “And Mom.”

  “Mom? Dude, I’m not following.”

  “You’re the black sheep and not because you’re the black sheep. You’re just… a way to redirect the heat off everyone else.” He leans back in his chair again as these words echo in my head. “Not me, of course. I guess I got lucky. No one gives any fucks at all about me as long as I play my part. You are the reason Johnny can do his job. And honestly, he’s not gonna be upset about this. He’s probably upstairs celebrating right now.”

  “What. The fuck. Are you talking about?”

  “You really don’t know, do you? All these years living in this building, underneath the shadow of Dad and Johnny, and you never did figure it out.”

  I’m not going to repeat myself a third time. So I say nothing.

  “Just play along if you want. But I’m here to say, I’m out. I’m done. I’m moving on. I’m not even looking back. Johnny can go fuck himself because I’ve got a life and I’m gonna stop running, and hiding, and start living it.”

  It is in this moment that I realize… I don’t know my brothers. I don’t know a goddamned thing about them.

  “The story’s good,” Joey continues, rubbing his hands up and down his face like he’s tired. And he looks tired. He looks like shit, actually. He might’ve been wearing a suit earlier but right now he’s just in dark slacks and a white button-down that’s only halfway tucked in. His sleeves are rolled up and he’s got several days’ worth of stubble on his face.

  I’m just about to ask him if he’s OK again when he continues. “Deny it, of course. That’s expected. But not too hard. Let everyone be suspicious. Let that Dumas woman take your heat and clean it up for you. Just… stay away from her from now on and everything will be fine. You can go back to being…” He waves his hand in the air. “Whoever the fuck you are.”

  And that’s when the doors open and Zach appears with Emma at his side.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE - EMMA

  The Bossy lobby wasn’t empty when I entered. It’s Monday now. Late, sure. But it’s a work day and there were half a dozen security guards standing between me and Jesse Boston.

  They didn’t approach me, just glared at me as I approached them. I told them I was here for Jesse, they had a little meeting, and then I guess Zach was summoned, because that’s who showed up to escort me upstairs.

  Didn’t even say hello. Just waved me through that security archway thing and led me to the elevators.

  The silence continued as we walked into the lobby and then turned to enter Jesse’s apartment.

  When I enter I notice two things.

  One. Joey Boston is here with Jesse.

  And two. They both look like shit. So shitty, in fact, I begin to worry about them and I’m just about to ask if they’re OK when Joey stands up and says, “I’ll leave you to it. Gonna go get this over with upstairs before I change my mind.” Then he looks at Zach and says, “Come with me. I could use the support.”

  Jesse looks at Zach. Hell, I look at Zach too. And Zach just shrugs and follows Joey down the hallway. There’s that telltale beeping sound I remember from when Jesse opened up the fire stairs last night, then the door bangs closed and I take my attention back to the reason I’m here.

  “You can’t be here,” Jesse says.

  “Well, I am here,” I say, huffing the words out with frustration. “And you’re going to listen to me.”

  “I’m sorry,” he says.

  But I put up a hand. “Just save it. I don’t care that you drugged me. I probably deserved that. Wiping the slate clean now, OK? New day.”

  He glances at the windows.

  “I know it’s night. Don’t get all specific on me. I have things to say.”

  Then he smiles. Not a big smile. But it’s a charming smile for sure.

  I walk towards him and grab him by the shirt. “Listen to me.”

  He looks down at my hands then up at my eyes. Smirks with raised eyebrows. “You’ve definitely got my attention. But you never did have a problem doing that.”

  “Your flirty eyebrow innuendo needs to wait, because I’m being serious now. We’re in trouble. We’re in a lot of trouble. We did bad things on Friday—which I’m totally sorry for—but the point is, we need to fix this. We need to get in front of this story and change it. And then, once that’s done, we’re going to date. Really date. For real. Like go out every damn weekend and eat dinner with my parents every other Saturday. Because I lost you once and I’m not gonna let you just get away again, Mr. Boston. You get me?”

  “I get you,” he says. But then all the charm and possible innuendo fades. And he places both hands on my shoulders. “I’d love all that. I really would. But listen to me, Emma. It’s not that easy.”

  “Of course it’s not easy!” I say. Maybe too loud. “Nothing in life is fucking easy. We have no good excuse for why we were dragging your body into a boat Friday night. But we’re all smart people. We can make one up. And if you’re not pressing charges—you’re not, are you?”

  “No.” He laughs.

  “Good. Then we just make something up. What can people do? OK. They’re gonna think we’re weird, and crazy, and maybe we need therapy. But who cares? And we probably are weird and crazy and need therapy. So fuck it. Why not own it?”

  He sighs. “Look, I like you. I’m in. One hundred percent. But there’s more you need to know before you decide this is the way forward.”

  “I know everything. I get you guys. I understand, Johnny is doing… whatever. I’m not gonna say it so I keep my plausible deniability. And it’s not about saving my ass, either. Bright Berry Beach will be OK. We’ll figure it out. Hell, maybe we need a little scandal in our lives for once. I just…” I stare at him. Memorize him just in case this doesn’t go my way. “I just want to give this a shot. That’s all I want. Just one more shot.”

  He steps back. Holds up a finger, and says, “O
ne. This isn’t what we think. I don't know what’s happening, but there’s more to this than I understand at the moment. Two. It doesn’t really matter what this is, it’s gonna get ugly. Every time something good happens to me, or for me—some tabloid asshole swoops in and ruins it. So if you want that one more shot, you have to go in with the understanding that they’re gonna do it to you too. And three.” He sighs again. “It’s not gonna be easy, Emma. I know this. I’ve been through it before. You can’t understand how much bad publicity can change your life.”

  “It’s gonna suck,” I say. “Fine. But I’m the boss of my life. Me. I get to decide how it goes.”

  “That’s not really true, Emma.”

  I shrug. “I’ll make it true. Me, and Mila, and Hannah, and Natalie. We’re a powerful force of feminine strength. I have them right behind me. And I have my family too. And you have your brothers and your cousin. So see, we can take it.”

  “Well, here’s the problem,” he says. “I don’t have my brothers. They’re not on my side. They’ve never been on my side. And I don’t really understand that yet, but—”

  “Hey.”

  Jesse and I both look at the hallway to find Zach. “Sorry to interrupt, but Johnny wants to see you, Jesse.”

  Jesse looks at me, says, “Wait here. I’ll only be a minute.”

  And what can I do? I don’t know that I have many choices, so I watch him walk away and disappear down the hallway.

  Zach walks over to me. Kinda looks me up and down. And not in the waggling eyebrows innuendo way, either. Kinda sizing me up way.

  “It’s not what you think,” he says.

  “Maybe it is,” I say. “Maybe it isn’t. But I don’t care.”

  “You probably should,” Zach says.

  “Well… I don’t,” I say, so frustrated. “I think I could love him, OK? Just put aside the fact that I’m in my thirties with no prospects for a moment. Erase the idea that I might’ve been obsessed with Jesse Boston for the last thirteen years and that’s why I never moved on and found someone else. Forget that I’m a bossy workaholic with control issues. Don't think about the fact that I drugged your cousin and helped tie him to a chair three days ago and then bought a two-hundred-and-seventy-thousand-dollar dick and flew him down to Key West in a private jet to be intimidated by my family just so I could one-up him. He might be my one. Not last chance,” I say, holding up a hand. “Let me make that perfectly clear. I’m not desperate.”

  Zach smiles and it’s only now I notice he’s got that classic Boston charm. “You’re coming off a little bit desperate.”

  “But in all the right ways,” I correct him. “I’m desperate to save us.” I nod my head. Because that was good. Very nice answer, Emma.

  A slow clap makes Zach and I turn towards the hallway where we see Joey Boston leaning against a wall and looking like he just got punched in the face because his eye is swelling up.

  “Great speech,” he says. “But you’re wasting your time on this Baby Boston here. He’s not the one you need to convince. That guy…” He looks back down the hallway. “He’s up there.”

  Joey walks forward, heading for the set of double doors that lead to the lobby elevators, and then, just as he’s about to open the doors, he looks at me over his shoulder. “And just to be clear? I’m not talking about Jesse. I’m talking about the one who bites back.” Then he points to his eye as exhibit A, pulls the doors open, and disappears as they swoosh closed behind him.

  I start for the hallway but Zach catches me by the upper arm. “Wait. You don't understand. Johnny Boston is—”

  “Johnny Boston is a bully, that’s what he is!”

  And then I shrug him off and head for the fire stairs.

  Zach doesn’t follow me. He probably thinks I can’t get into the stairwell.

  But he’s wrong.

  I’m a numbers girl.

  And I’ve seen Jesse Boston push this code twice now.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR - JESSE

  I could hear them fighting as soon as I opened the fire stairs door. I took the steps three at a time and burst out onto Johnny’s floor ready to join the fight.

  But I stopped in my tracks when I realized Johnny had a gun pointed at Joey’s head.

  Joey was face down on the floor. Johnny kneeling beside him.

  Johnny looked at me, then back at Joey. Then the gun in his hand.

  And he got up and walked away.

  I ran over to Joey and pulled him to his feet. He pushed me off him, then glared in the direction Johnny disappeared, and said, “Fuck you all,” and left the way he came.

  Now I’m standing in Johnny’s living room and can I just say… my big brother could really use a maid. Because this place is a disaster. Newspapers everywhere. Stacks of them. But not only newspapers, files too. Just boxes and boxes of files.

  There’s furniture here but I can’t see most of it, that’s how much fucking paper is filling up the huge, expansive space around me. And lined up against the wall are rifles. Dozens and dozens of them. Neatly placed like good little soldiers in formation. The pistol Johnny had pressed to Joey’s head is resting on a tall stack of newspapers, forgotten.

  This was what I expected down on the family floor, I realize. This was what I thought we’d find in those cupboards, but didn’t.

  Evidence like this.

  Evidence that my brother is something bad. That we are all part of something bad.

  The windows are covered with articles he’s clipped. And for a moment I assume they’re just like the ones downstairs. Death announcements of important people.

  But they’re not.

  Johnny comes back looking put-together. Hair slicked back. Face composed. He’s wearing a nice pair of black slacks, a crisp, starched white shirt, a white tie, and a pair of dark, expensive, highly-polished shoes.

  He pours two glasses of whiskey, then turns and holds one out to me.

  “No, thanks,” I say. “I quit that shit a long time ago.”

  “I know,” Johnny says. “Time to start again, brother. Take my word on that.”

  I can’t even manage to laugh. But that was funny. “No, I don’t think so, brother.”

  He glares at me.

  “So what do you want?” I ask.

  “I want to show you something,” he says. And then he looks at the windows. Specifically, at the clippings taped to them.

  “Yeah, I saw them.”

  “Did you read them?”

  “I read enough to know what they mean.”

  He smiles at me. “It wasn’t personal.” Then he frowns. “I want you to know… I did my best, Jesse.”

  I’m suddenly tired of this. All of it.

  Tired of being me. Tired of being part of this family. Tired of… him.

  I haven’t actually seen or talked to my oldest brother in years. If I’ve ever been in this room, it was so long ago, I can’t remember when that was.

  “You know who did all this?” he asks, pointing his glass at the windows so fast, whiskey sloshes over the side.

  “You,” I guess.

  He nods. “Me.”

  “Well… what should I say about that?”

  He turns towards me and for a second I think he’s gonna fight me the way he did Joey. But he doesn’t. He walks over to a door—a door my floor doesn’t have—and opens it up. “Come on. What I really want to show you is upstairs.”

  Upstairs. In the penthouse.

  “I asked Joey to come but he’s…” Johnny shrugs, trying to think of the right word to describe what my middle brother is, then decides on, “Not being cooperative.” He stares at me for a moment. “But you. You won’t be able to help yourself. You never did have his control.”

  I actually laugh at that.

  But Johnny doesn’t care. And he doesn’t wait for me either. Just disappears inside.

  I want to go back to Emma. Forget about all of this. But he’s right.

  I never did have Joey’s self-control.

 
; So I follow him. There’s no way I’m not going to follow him. I haven’t been up in the penthouse since my uncle died thirteen years ago. That’s when my father went insane and made all the living arrangement changes. Put us all on separate floors. Compartmentalized us. Why?

  I’ve thought about that a lot over the years. Why did he want us all separate?

  There was only one explanation that ever made sense.

  So when the day came… when the people came… they couldn’t get all of us at once.

  And they’d get me first.

  Did I believe it?

  Maybe not back then when Zach and I first came up with the idea.

  But I do now.

  The penthouse was my father’s office before he died. We never lived up here. We never came up to the very top of the building more than a handful of times.

  But I’ve never been up there through this door. So I have no idea where this will take us.

  Emma is right. Living in a building like this is not normal.

  Nothing about the Boston family is normal.

  Johnny is already throwing open the door at the top of the stairs when I start climbing after him. Neither of these doors have codes to enter. So whatever this is, it was never a secret from Johnny.

  Part of me feels sorry for him.

  But after seeing the clippings down there on his windows, most of me doesn’t.

  When I enter the penthouse I stop short and take in the small room, then look at Johnny and say, “What is this?”

  He downs what’s left of his drink, then places the glass gently down on a desk. Then reaches for a suit coat hanging reverently—almost ceremonially—on a freestanding valet stand.

  When he slips the dark jacket on a chill runs down my spine.

  There are white epaulettes on the shoulders. And matching white buttons. I watch him button those and adjust his sparkling cuff links as he adjusts his sleeves. Staring at me the entire time.

  I say, “What are you? A fucking general? What the fuck is up with that coat?” Because for a moment… I don’t recognize him. He has morphed into something I don’t understand. “What’s going on?” I ask.