by Cari Quinn
And what the hell was he supposed to say to Kendra?
He was the silent partner in this rapidly devolving relationship. The face of the relationship was Randy and Juliet. It was better that way. Operating in the shadows was usually how he liked to roll.
How the hell was he supposed to tell them that wasn’t what he wanted anymore? How could he even demand that of her? Of them?
Jesus.
“Chef?”
Cripes, he’d totally tuned Kendra out. “You know me, Ken, no one on the regular for me.”
“Yeah, well, I was hoping this time was different.”
Me too.
He curled his fingers around the steering wheel until the leather squeaked with the pressure. “I figure you earned a Thanksgiving menu to yourself.”
“Thank you, Chef.” The appreciation in her voice made him wince.
Altruistic he was not.
Before he could disabuse her of her reverence—or at least make it look like not such a big fucking deal—she had to hop off the call. Shouts and the reverberation of a steel bin made him count to five.
She could handle it. Everyone could handle a night without him.
And evidently, that was exactly how tonight was going to go. Maybe he’d just get rip-roaring drunk and head out into the city.
He took a hard left and tore down a side street and around the traffic congestion. A humorless laugh bounced around his car.
Right.
Like he’d touch another woman other than Juliet. He downshifted as his street came up. Gravel spit up as he fishtailed into his parking lot. The cloud of debris followed him out of the car and dusted his jeans before he slammed his door shut.
He was being unreasonable, but he couldn’t get rid of the anger tangling inside of him. They weren’t a usual couple and he couldn’t expect them to be viewed as such. And not just because of Juliet.
Hell, Juliet might be the only one of them who would actually fit in the supposed lifestyle—save for her uber conservative Boston branch of her family. Hell, the whole goddamn tree resided in Boston. He wouldn’t be surprised if they could count their heritage back to the Mayflower somehow.
Beyond that clusterfuck was his own.
He was the head chef of a major hotel. It would be easier if he were gay than being involved in a poly relationship. At least gay was understood in Los Angeles. Sharing? Yeah, not so much. There was still a lot of side-eye going on around that topic. Hell, more silence than side-eye.
Then he’d be the kinky chef instead of what he was known for now—California and Japanese fusion with a side of his own eclectic flavor.
Nerves crawled around his shoulders and neck.
Fingers of need were slipping under his carefully crafted armor. Letting people in only caused problems down the line. He knew this—knew it with a certainty that had only been proven over the handful of relationships he’d allowed himself.
And still.
Her.
Always her.
And Rand. With his need to help friends and family, and his selflessness when it came to this woman they both couldn’t stay away from.
Yeah.
They were both fucked.
He crashed through the heavy door to the stairs, escaping to the rooftop instead of his loft. It had always been his sanctuary. The sky and the garden. Finding an oasis in the dingy hub of Los Angeles had been the main reason he bought his place.
He passed the lemon and lime trees that prettied up the doorway and found the other third of his clusterfuck.
Dammit, couldn’t he just be alone for a second?
Even here?
Rand—Sparks, funny how Juliet’s nickname was sticking in his head now too—was standing at the half wall, his fingers digging into the brick, his shoulders tight with stress.
A little of the rage melted out of Tris. Maybe he wasn’t the only one fucked up about this after all.
Sparks always seemed to have it all put together about Jules. She was his focus, and the world and the crap around them always seemed to fall to secondary status. Protective and white knight syndrome to the extreme.
It made Tristan feel awkward as hell.
He wasn’t that guy, but damn if she didn’t bring it out in them both.
“Aren’t you supposed to be at clan McCoy’s?”
Sparks turned. Part of his face was obscured by aviators, but the tension in his shoulders was mirrored in the flex of his jaw. “Yeah. I forgot something for Lex.”
“Couldn’t wait until next time?”
“You remember she’s a four-year-old right?”
Tristan shrugged. Four or fourteen, there wasn’t much difference as far as he was concerned. “All girls are the same.”
“Not all girls.”
“No, I don’t suppose so.” Tristan’s fingers ached. He had to force himself to uncurl them.
“So let me guess. A dolly?”
Sparks snorted. “Not for my niece. More like a dozen pads of paper and as many different types of markers as I can find. She’s a fiend for drawing and coloring.”
“Four, you said?” Tristan stuffed his fists in his pockets.
“Yeah, she’s a little prodigy.”
He could hear the pride in his best friend’s voice. Wariness added another layer to his already heavy shoulders. Sparks was by far the most traditional of them all. He’d mentioned that he wasn’t into kids, but was that just talk?
Seeing a mini-Jules was pretty terrifying as far as he was concerned. Wild child worked when you couldn’t wait to get her under or over you, but as a Tasmanian devil living in his space?
Fuck.
“Did Juliet get off?”
Tristan’s eyebrow rose. “A few times.”
“A little liftoff before the flight, Tris?”
“Nah. I’m not the solo artist on her. That belongs to you.”
Rand’s fingers went white. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing.”
He turned toward Tristan. “I’d say there was a bit of something in there. You were there, man. Every inch.”
“Not every inch. Not backstage where the dirty gets done between songs. Do you push her up against the guitars? Or is it just the trunks?” Images in his head fired up the caged animal in his chest.
“Fuck you, Tris.”
His voice cooled. “So it’s just trunks then?”
“No. Fuck no. We don’t have sex outside this—outside of us. Not until you gave us the go-ahead.”
“Oh, so now that permission is on the table, it’s all good to get it done wherever.”
“Where the hell is this coming from?” Sparks pushed his shoulder until Tristan faced him. “This isn’t about any one of us. It’s always been about all of us.”
“Until it isn’t. Until someone asks questions?”
Sparks took a step back. “What? I thought you were okay with this. You made it seem as if you were.”
“What? That I’m the dirty little secret of this little triad? As long as the triad lasts. Look, it’s fine, man. I get it. You guys have all the things in common. I’m just the dick on the side that can’t help myself from getting inside her. It’ll wane. Don’t worry about it.”
“Fuck off. Fuck you and fuck off.”
“I got off plenty this morning.”
“Yeah, okay. Play it off as just sex. You know it hasn’t been just sex since the night of the wedding, dickhead.” Sparks’s chest heaved. “You might not want to own it, but I know it is.”
“It is for you. You’ve had a thing for her for months.”
“So have you. You can’t tell me that she doesn’t get under your skin like no other woman. She doesn’t make your head and your dick hurt in so many ways there’s nothing but her sometimes.”
“Sound more like obsession to me, bud.”
The fist came out of nowhere. Tristan stumbled back, his jaw lit up from the inside as pain sizzled across his cheek. Instinctively he ducked down to driv
e him back with a shoulder to the chest. The anger that had been twisting inside him snapped free. He swung out and Sparks ducked.
Tristan wouldn’t have pegged him as a fighter, but it was always the wiry ones you had to worry about. Rand was lean and tall with an arm span that Tristan couldn’t compete with.
“Let’s not do this, man.” Sparks bent at the waist and watched him carefully. “You really don’t want to do this.”
“You swung first.” Tristan swiped the back of his hand over his mouth and came away with blood. Fucking left hook like Rocky.
“If you want to call what I feel obsession then you better start analyzing your own, friend. I see the way you watch her. I know because I watch her the same way.”
“I have to watch.” Tristan’s chest heaved. “I have to watch from the sidelines because you two put me there.”
“Not on purpose.”
“You couldn’t keep your damn hands off of her.”
“Like you can? The minute she’s in this space you’ve got her stripped and taking your cock. Taking our cocks. There’s nothing we wouldn’t do with her or for her, I’m just man enough to admit it.”
“It’s just attraction. It’ll fade. It always does.”
“Yeah, watch how that works. I tried telling myself the same. Just get her out of my system, just take all I can until it doesn’t work anymore. Well, fuck that. I don’t want just scraps. I want it all. I want us to work. It doesn’t make fucking sense, but I do.” His shoulders sagged. “This isn’t supposed to be like this. I’m not supposed to even question sharing her.” Randy tipped his head back. “I see her on stage with her band—even Michael, who I know is in love with his wife—and I want to rip his arms off and hang them from the rafters.” His gaze crashed into Tristan’s. “That doesn’t happen with you. Not with us. We’re different.”
Tristan shoved his hands through his hair. “Fuck.”
“That’s the problem, isn’t it? It’s not just fucking.” Sparks clamped a hand on his shoulder. “She’s ours. It doesn’t make sense, but there’s the truth of it all.”
Tristan stared at his boots. “In public, she’s yours.”
Sparks dragged him in and whomped him on the back with a tight hug. “Just for the cameras.”
Tristan stiffened. He wasn’t used to any sort of comfort from a man. Jokes and insults, swings and cuffs to the head—that was his life. What he knew before Sparks and Jules.
His arm slowly rose from his side and he slapped Sparks’s back before he stepped back. “I didn’t realize it was bugging me until I took her to the airport. Until I stood with her and all those people knowing I couldn’t touch her. Knowing I couldn’t even kiss her goodbye.” He paced away to the wall and looked out on the city. To the winding road of Mulholland in the distance. To the blocky buildings that made up the old warehouse district.
Even here he saw the beauty of it. Carved out of the shadows of Hollywood that was so close, and yet so far away from their little corner.
This was his home. He’d once thought it was just a stepping stone to bigger and brighter, but now he knew this was where he belonged. It remained to be seen if he belonged there with them too.
That future didn’t seem so clear to him. No matter what Sparks said.
“I don’t know the answers, man.”
Tristan gave a humorless laugh. “You and me both, Sparky.” He slapped the brick and turned back to his friend. “Well, now that we got our…what does Jules call it? Mantrum?”
Sparks grinned. “Yeah. That’s her word.”
“Now that we’ve had our little mantrum time to get our asses in gear to play nice with family.”
“I thought you had to work.”
“I did. I do, but I’m blowing it off. Hunter invited me to the dog emporium for dinner. They got another goddamn stray. Menagerie central over there. Somehow Kennedy keeps it from smelling like they live in a barn, though I don’t know how.”
“Girls, the mystery of the ages.”
“Truth.” They both left the roof and stopped in at the loft to gather supplies. Sparks for the kid, and Tristan packed up the fixings for a dessert. Seasonal fruit was barely a thing in California, but he’d picked his way through one of the farmer’s markets yesterday.
He changed out of his jeans and motorcycle boots to a pair of black slacks and plum colored button down. Fitting since he was making an apple and plum torte for dinner.
Sparks shouted out his goodbyes while Tristan was washing up. He sent off a text to Hunter just in case he was actually interrupting. His many exclamation points in response actually made Tris feel a little guilty. He’d been so wrapped up in work and the drama at the loft that he’d blown off more than a few texts from his buddy.
At first, Tris had been the one that felt left behind. Married dudes didn’t get out as much as the single days. Hell, even the dating days, but now that Tristan had been wound around a woman with a pair of killer brown eyes and endless legs to match, he could see how it happened.
With bags in tow, he used the elevator this time. He wasn’t the type to talk shit out, but he had to admit he felt a little better after the rooftop conversation. Things weren’t perfect, but at least he could think again.
He snarled at the traffic as he roared up Mulholland to Hunter’s place in the hills. He had moved in with the wife after they got married. Suburbia, for fuck’s sake. What the hell had happened in their lives?
Did the specter of thirty come with this much responsibility?
Christ, he hoped not.
Noah’s beast of a black truck was already in the driveway when he arrived. Looked like it was a family affair, after all. Hunter’s brother had a crazy security job that kept him out of pocket most of the time.
Tristan parked along the cul-de-sac at the center of the semi-circle of houses. Dogs barking and laughter greeted him as he approached the door. The storm door was open leaving a newly installed screen door as the only barrier between him and the chaos.
He took a deep breath and opened the door.
Nails scrabbled over tile, thumped over carpet, then changed to marble as a dog came tear-assing around the corner.
“Sammy, come back here you, little fucker.”
Hunter came running around the corner and down the hall. Sammy, Kennedy’s dog, had a turkey leg in his mouth and a wiggling four-pound dog hanging from said turkey leg.
Tristan held up his bag above his head. Sammy managed to flip off Cujo, Hunter’s dog—well, sort of a dog, more like a toy in Tristan’s opinion—against the wall. There was barely a snarl before Cujo hurtled after the collie mix and leapt on his back.
Sammy’s butt slammed into the screen door, then he took off back down the hall with Cujo flying like a cape off his shoulders.
“Hi. Welcome to chaos. Would you like a drink? I need several.” Hunter held up a finger. “But first, I have to murder a few dogs.” He disappeared from view. “Stop laughing at them and help me, you asshole.”
Tristan heard male laughter. Actually more like choking hisses of breath between guffaws. He approached the end of the hallway carefully to see Noah’s big hand wrapped around the turkey leg. Cujo picked that moment to sink his little teeth into the space between Noah’s thumb and forefinger.
Noah swore and pitched forward. Then it devolved into a fur pile, a rolling turkey leg, and Kennedy’s shrill whistle to break it all up. Cujo had his tiny mouth around the meatiest part of the leg and was trying to drag it along the carpet when Kennedy bent down and dislodged it from his mouth.
“Bad dog.”
His little face was greasy from the meat and unapologetic.
Tristan almost turned around right then and there. At least his loft was quiet, but Kennedy’s gaze zeroed in on him. “And you, in the kitchen. I need your help to make things pretty now that I’m missing a damn leg from my presentation.” Kennedy went back to the island, muttering something about the dogs ruining her first family function.
Noah fo
llowed Tristan into the kitchen. “Nice to see you. Thought you had to work today.”
Tristan went over to the sink and snagged the little first aid kit Kennedy stashed under there. There had been a few fingers in peril when he gave her knife lessons during the summer. He set the kit on the counter next to Noah. “I’m playing hooky. Though from the sounds of it, maybe I should have gone in. Has it been like this all day?”
Noah washed his hands and ignored the first aid box. He only hissed a little when the water hit the little bite mark. “Christ, Cujo is aptly named.”
“Don’t get between him and meat.” Hunter came into the kitchen and brushed a kiss along Kennedy’s temple. “Right, Kenny?”
She pushed him away. “Everyone out of my kitchen. It’s the size of a postage stamp with all you tall men in here, for God’s sake.”
“Aw, c’mon, babe. Don’t be like that.”
“Don’t babe me. Your dog literally jumped from my step stool, to the bar stool, to the counter.”
“Now he’s my dog? Not our dog?”
“Damn right.” Kennedy pointed at her platter of meat and the pieces scattered over the counter.
Hunter picked a piece of white meat off the opposite side. She slapped his hand. “Oh, my God. Get out. Just go. Take Noah and sit at the table.”
Noah’s eyebrow rose as he paused with the bottle just before his lips. “What did I do?”
She pushed Noah and Hunter both out of her space. “You’re guilty by association. Every Jordan out of my kitchen.”
Hunter looked back over his shoulder. “You’re a Jordan now, woman.”
“I don’t count.”
“See, this is why I’m not married,” Noah muttered.
Hunter stooped to pick up Cujo. “Come on, buddy, Mommy is just a little worried her turkey is too dry.”
“My turkey is perfect, jackass. Get!”
“I don’t know why I’m in trouble. Sammy was more than happy to take a chunk out of the turkey leg as well.”
“Cujo started it.”
“It’s always our fault,” Hunter said with a huff.
