by B. B. Hamel
Emily was going to be the end of everything. I knew it and she probably knew it, too. Maybe I really hadn’t changed so much from my past self. Maybe I was still that selfish asshole, taking whatever he wanted just because he wanted it.
I kept going back and forth, back and forth. On the one hand, being with Emily felt good, and she clearly wanted it as much as I did. I felt for her something I’d never really experienced before. But on the other hand, I was putting her directly into danger and threatening to destroy everything.
I couldn’t tell if I was being selfish and noble or if I was following my feelings. It was probably a little bit of both, if I was honest with myself.
Nothing is ever black and white. Good and bad are never simple, obvious things. People go through their lives convinced that they knew what’s right, what’s good, what’s decent, but most of the time reality exists in the spaces between our perceptions. Evil men, truly evil and bad men, are incredibly rare, as are truly good and saintly men. The vast, vast majority of people are both good and bad, well-meaning and stupid pricks. I was a well-meaning, selfish, stupid asshole that wanted to do right by the people I cared about while also doing whatever the fuck I wanted. That was the contradiction I lived every day.
And that was how life worked or didn’t work. It wasn’t simple or clean or obvious, and my closely held beliefs were often flawed and inaccurate when held up to scrutiny. I tried always to scrutinize and consider the other side, but it’s hard for people to get past their prejudices.
In a lot of ways, I was blinded by Emily. She was my central axis, the thing I kept spinning around, shifting from one pole of myself to the next. One moment I was selfless, trying to distance myself for her sake, and the next I was fucking her in the pool-house, giving us what we both wanted.
There had to be balance. That was the only way we were going to survive this. It couldn’t be all of one thing or all of another, because nothing ever worked that way.
All of that was on my mind and more as I walked into my bedroom. I used the bathroom, brushed my teeth, and came back out into the main room, mind still elsewhere. It took me a minute before I noticed the now-familiar white envelope with my name written on it in blue ink.
Danger prickled down my spine, a tingling sensation. I hadn’t felt that before, not with the other notes, but this one was so fucking different.
It was in my goddamn bedroom.
That meant someone with access. My room was always locked and was only supposed to open to my particular fingerprints unless in an emergency. Only a few people had access to this room aside from me. Evelyn was one of those people, but it couldn’t be her.
Then there was Cox . . .
I shook my head and slowly opened the piece of paper. Instead of a note, this time it was a picture. It was grainy, taken in a dark room, and probably taken by a security camera based on the timestamp in the lower right corner.
In the picture, Emily’s legs were wrapped around me, her breasts were exposed, and we were clearly having sex. Both of our faces were visible and there was no questioning what was going on.
There was no other information, no other note, nothing. The feeling of danger intensified until I felt like I was being watched. I quickly got out my phone and called the security desk.
“Yes?”
It was Cox’s second. “Marty,” I said. “Where is Cox?”
“I don’t know,” he said. “I was actually just getting concerned.”
Fuck. Shit. “Remove his access privileges.”
“What?”
“Do it right now. Remove his access privileges and any other access codes he may have been aware of. Lock down everything.”
“What’s going on?”
“Do you want a raise and a promotion?”
There was a slight pause. “I understand. We’ll find him.”
“Good. I need the security footage from my bedroom and the surrounding hallways. Send it to my phone as soon as possible.”
“Understood.”
“Get your best guys on this Cox thing, Marty. I want him found.”
“I will.”
I hung up my phone and collapsed onto the bed, staring at the picture.
It had to be Cox. It had to be him the whole time. Nobody else was close enough and knew the house enough. The person that taped the picture to the front door was never found leaving the grounds, which meant maybe he had never left. Maybe he taped the picture, ditched the clothes in the furnace, and went upstairs to the security room.
Fucking shit. Cox was a traitor.
I couldn’t think of anyone else that it could be. But I didn’t understand why Cox would do this. I paid him well and treated him very well, let him have essentially anything he wanted. He’d always been loyal.
Unless he got a better offer.
Cox wasn’t doing this on his own, that was for sure. He had nothing to gain by blackmailing me. He was smart enough to know that he had more to gain by sticking around and getting close to me than by trying to coerce some money out of me. He had to know that wouldn’t end well for him, not when I had the sort of resources that I did.
Unless someone with equal resources bought him off. That was the only thing that made any sense. Cox was a loyal man, but loyalty only got you so far. Maybe he got sick of seeing me act the way I did, or maybe he just really needed more money. I couldn’t imagine his reasoning, if it really was him that did all this.
I did know who was ultimately behind all of it, though.
Bruce had to be the mastermind. He wanted to destroy me, to get rid of me. Bruce hated me more than anything. What I didn’t get was why he didn’t go right to the media with the picture of me fucking Emily and finish me off that way. Why all these veiled threats and underhanded tactics?
I couldn’t make sense of it all. There were games within games being played all around me, and I had to keep my wits sharp or else I’d stumble and lose. At least now I knew who my enemies were and could do something about it.
I stood up, groaning to myself. I had to talk to Evelyn and explain to her what was going on, and she was going to be fucking pissed. She knew that Emily and I were interested in each other, but I doubted she knew how far it had gone already. I was not looking forward to that.
Most of all, I wasn’t looking forward to showing Emily. I knew that this was going to push her away from me again, and I should have been okay with that. Maybe I was, on some level, but most of me wanted to continue what we had.
It didn’t matter. I had to do the right thing and tell them what was happening.
Even if they were going to flip shit.
21
Emily
It was a gorgeous day in downtown San Francisco. I was walking along the bay, trying not to think about the events of the day before, trying to distract myself.
I loved the way the light played off the water. The graceful curve of the hills across the way complemented the flat, slightly rolling way the water moved along the land. I walked slowly at first then faster and faster as I began to realize that I couldn’t outrun my memory.
That image was haunting me. Carter looked like he was in physical pain as he showed it to me, like it was the most difficult thing he had ever done or something like that. I couldn’t believe someone had gotten a photograph of the two of us sleeping together and was now threatening him with it, but everything pointed toward this being a real dangerous situation. The memory of that dog head came back to me in that moment as I looked at the picture, and everything seemed to click into place.
There was a real menace, a real attack happening, and I was at the center of it. Really, Carter was at the center, but our relationship was an important aspect of that. I was the reason that he was being blackmailed so easily, that things were crumbling apart. Mom didn’t seem to blame me and wasn’t angry with me, but I could tell that she was disappointed. She was angrier with Carter, and for good reason.
I didn’t blame him. I was as much to blame as he was.
I didn’t have to sleep with him in the pool-house that day. I knew the risks when he told me about what had happened with the note and why he had turned me down, but I still slept with him anyway. There was just something so intense between us, so undeniable. It was animalistic and pure in a way that I’d never experienced before.
Carter was a man in every sense of the world. He wasn’t like the boys I’d been with. He knew what he wanted and he took it. Maybe that was getting him into trouble here, but I couldn’t help but admire him for it.
There was no turning back now. It was too late for all of us to go back to pretending like Carter and Mom were happily married. We had to figure out who exactly was after him and find out what they wanted. Carter said he had some ideas, but nothing concrete yet.
I had to leave the mansion. I stayed there that night, but I left early the next morning. I had no plans or anywhere to go, I just knew I couldn’t sit around that house and obsess about someone watching a video of me and Carter sleeping together. I thought maybe hanging around San Francisco would be a good distraction, but so far it wasn’t perfect.
I kept coming back to that picture. You could see both of our faces so clearly in it. Worse than that, though, was the way my mother looked at me with such disappointment clear on her face.
I was supposed to help her with this. She had high hopes for this scheme and thought maybe we could finally get some money to make our lives better. I screwed it up, though, and nothing was going to fix it.
I headed off the path near the bay and headed toward downtown. I wanted to get where there were more people and shops, maybe grab something to eat. I had to stop thinking about all of this. I was going back to the mansion soon enough and there was no changing that fact, so I might as well try to enjoy myself a little bit for the day.
The problem of Carter himself wasn’t resolved though, not by a long shot. I didn’t know where this all left us, if we were going to still sleep together, if he even wanted that. Despite the stupidity of it, I knew I still wanted him and that wasn’t going to change. I didn’t say that, of course, because he needed to make up his own mind. But as far as I was concerned, I knew that if he wanted me again, he could have me. He could have every inch of me.
As I passed into a more populated city area, I got a really strange feeling. I walked a few blocks, trying to shake it off, but I just kept thinking that someone was following me. I stopped and turned back twice, but couldn’t tell if there was someone back there. Disturbed, I kept moving, and eventually wound up at a Vietnamese sandwich place for lunch.
After eating, I kept walking, and again I got that feeling. This time, I thought I spotted him: bald, on the short side, wearing khakis and a polo shirt. He looked about as nondescript as possible.
Freaked out, I went into a shop for a few minutes. When I thought the coast was clear, I left again, and started walking. I went right up to the first crosswalk and turned left, looking back behind me as I went.
I spotted him again, and fear spiked through me. He was wearing a hat now, but I recognized the rest of his clothes and his face.
Panic rose up through my throat like bile. I started walking faster, nearly jogging, weaving my way through traffic. I walked through a few more lights before ducking into a doorway and watching behind me, breathless.
I couldn’t see him. Maybe I was making it up and he just happened to be following me. I stared down the street, waiting. Two minutes went by.
I looked to the other side of the street and nearly screamed. There he was, leaning against a stand, reading a newspaper.
I ducked inside the shop, heart hammering in my chest. I didn’t know what to do. Clearly the man was following me, and I was sure he had something to do with Carter. I didn’t know if I should call him or try to lose the guy on my own. I couldn’t decide what was worse.
I was kidding myself. I couldn’t lose this guy. He was probably a professional of some sort, and I didn’t know anything about being followed. Trying not to freak out too much, I called Carter’s phone.
He answered on the second ring. “Emily,” he said. “What’s up?”
“Carter,” I said, surprised at how breathless I sounded. “I’m in downtown and I was walking, trying to clear my head, when I got this weird feeling on my neck. You know, like tingling—“
“Emily,” he interrupted me, “Slow down. What’s wrong?”
“I’m being followed.”
There was a short pause. “Where are you?”
I looked around, becoming aware of my surroundings for the first time. “It’s a natural food store called Wholesome Grains.”
“Okay, I got it. I’ll be there in ten minutes. Stay where you are, okay?”
“Okay,” I said.
He hung up the phone. I slipped it back into my pocket and moved deeper into the store, putting the racks of grains and vegetables between me and the guy that was following me.
My mind kept jolting back and forth between feeling like I was being silly and feeling like I was exactly right. I was a normal person with a normal life, I never had someone follow me before. It was completely bizarre and insane to imagine that a man would be after me, but I knew why at least. It wasn’t exactly me he was after, but Carter and my connection to Carter. There was nothing I could do about it except wait.
Ten minutes later, almost exactly, the door to the store opened. Carter came in, looking around wildly. When he spotted me, he walked over to me quickly and wrapped me in a rough hug.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m okay,” I said. “Let’s go.”
“Alright.” He let me go, glancing around. I followed him out of the store and looked across the street, searching for the man.
He was gone. I lingered next to Carter’s car, searching around, until finally I spotted him up the block. He looked back at me and I could have sworn he smiled.
I got into the car, terrified. Carter pulled out into traffic and we left the man behind.
“What did he look like?” Carter asked.
“Average height. Bald. White. Thin. Had nice clothes on like he was gong to church.”
Carter frowned. “Could have been a reporter.”
“He didn’t have a camera.”
He sighed. “Could have been one of Cox’s guys.”
“Aren’t they the ones watching the mansion?”
“Not anymore. I fired the men Cox brought on and Marty is in the process of finding new ones.”
“Can you trust Marty?”
“Probably not, but he’s all I have right now.”
I nodded, lapsing into silence. The tension between us was thick, and I knew that I had violated some unspoken rule by calling him for help. It was best if we weren’t seen together by anyone, just to be safe, but I didn’t know who else to turn to.
He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t even question me, even though claiming that I was being followed probably sounded nuts. He didn’t hesitate to believe everything I was saying, which made me feel good. He took me seriously, which was maybe more than I deserved after everything that had happened.
“Let’s go somewhere to calm down,” he said. “Then I’ll bring you home. Okay?”
“Sure.”
We drove for ten minutes in silence before he pulled off the road. He got out of the car and I followed him down a short path toward the bay. The path ended in a turn-around with a little bench at the end of it overlooking the water. Carter sat down on the bench and I sat down next to him, looking out over the water.
“I used to come here in the early days of Valor,” he said. “When things were crazy. I needed silence to think sometimes.”
“What was that like, being a kid and starting a company?”
“Hard to describe it,” he admitted. “On the one hand, you were the boss, but on the other, you’re still just a kid. People looked at me for advice and guidance but also looked at me like the twenty-year-old I really was. I couldn’t drink but I could order adults twice my age around. It wa
s totally bizarre.”
“You’re still pretty young.”
He nodded. “But I’ve learned a lot in the last fifteen years.”
“The world has changed a lot,” I said.
“It has,” he agreed. “There was so much optimism around the internet back then. People thought it was going to change the world. And it has in a lot of ways, but not as radically as we wanted.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, we thought it would make everyone all love and peace and equal. Instead, we got Facebook and Twitter, which is all about being empty and fake. They replaced the real stuff with the fake stuff all to get more advertising dollars. Facebook is just one big advertising platform these days.”
“Everyone knows that. But there’s a lot of good stuff on there, too.”
“Sure. Where there are people, there are good things and bad things. I’m just saying, our expectations have been lowered a lot since I started out.”
“Have your expectations changed?” I asked him.
He didn’t answer right away, staring out over the water. I watched him and felt that strange thing inside of me again, that welling-up of genuine tenderness. I wanted to reach out and touch his face, to tell him that everything was going to be okay, but I didn’t. There was a closeness and a distance still between us that I didn’t exactly understand yet.
“Yes,” he said finally. “My expectations have been lowered in some ways. But in others, they’ve gotten higher. I believe in what my company can do. I believe we can bring meaningful change to the world through the internet still, and it doesn’t need to be just about advertising dollars. I guess I’m still an idealist at heart.”
“There’s nothing wrong with that. You’ve done a lot already.”
“I want to do more. It’s just hard. Sometimes I feel like I’m two people.”
“What are the two people like?” I asked, fascinated that he was opening up so much.
“I’m part selfish asshole and part idealist, I guess.”
I laughed. “I just get the selfish asshole part mostly.”
