Ruthless (Playboys in Love)

by Gina L. Maxwell

  In an instant, my heart softens. “I’m so sorry. Did you guys get into an argument?”

  “No.” His lips twist into a self-deprecating smile. “I was reminded that happiness is temporary.”

  My softened heart turns into that brick from earlier and drops to the bottom of my stomach, crushing every light, fluttering thing in its path. “Are you talking about us?”

  I jump as he springs to his feet, his massive body unfolding like a striking cobra. I have a split second to process that, unlike the night we met, I feel more like wounded prey than a “don’t give a fuck” honey badger. Then, he stalks over to crowd me. I don’t know if he’s trying to get me to back down, to cower in the shadow of his anger, but I won’t do it. I might be the emotionally weaker one in the room, but I’ll be damned if I let him see it.

  “I’ve never hid from you what kind of man I am. I told you about my depraved needs, and despite not sharing them, you insisted you wanted to try. Wanted me to show you the pleasure of multiple lovers. Do you remember that, Addison? That you told me not to worry about the consequences or the fall out. You wanted me to show you.”

  “I remember,” I say. “And you did. You showed me, and you were right. I never thought I’d be comfortable with something like ménage, but the times you’ve brought Austin in have been exciting and erotic.”

  The muscles in his jaw work as he stares at me with intense ferocity. I have no idea what he’s looking for, no idea what he’s thinking. “I taught you well, didn’t I? You like it when he plays with us. You like the way it feels to have two men pleasuring you, filling you.”

  “Yes,” I answer slowly, wary of where this is going. “I do.” It’s not a lie. He asked if I like it, not if I want it. Part of me wants to keep reassuring him that I’m fully on board with his sexual needs, that I’m fine with continuing on as we’ve been. The other part of me is rebelling, wanting me to admit the kind of relationship that I truly want with him.

  “I wonder,” he says, tilting his head at me curiously, “just how impressionable you really are.”

  Red flags shoot up in my mind. Shitty end to his dinner or not, he’s acting strangely, and I don’t like it. “What are you talking about, Roman?”

  “It wasn’t very hard to get you to try something that, by your own admission, didn’t make you comfortable. I’m merely wondering if experimenting with ménage is like a gateway drug to you. How far are you willing to go? Can I persuade you to do more?” He lifts a hand to caress my cheek. His touch is deceptively soft for the harsh slap his words deliver. “Can another man?”

  I rear back like I’ve been struck. Does he seriously want more? I’m afraid to even ask for clarification. I will, but not now. He’s not in the right frame of mind to discuss anything. “You know what? You’re drunk and obviously not in a good mood. Call me tomorrow when you’re thinking clearly.”

  Turning, I head toward the entry hall. I hear him following me, but I don’t look back. When I reach the console table, I swipe my purse and continue on to the door.

  “You don’t like what I have to say so it’s my fault for saying it, is that it? Just like with your parents.”

  I freeze and turn around slowly to face him. Keeping a tight leash on the rage bubbling inside me, I speak in a deadly calm voice. “Excuse me?”

  “You don’t like what they have to say, so they’re the ones in the wrong. But do you think that maybe—just maybe—you’re the one with the problem?”

  It would be easy to make excuses for his piss-poor actions, to brush all the ugliness under the rug, do my best to ignore the lump, and hope I don’t trip over it and regret my shitty housekeeping habits. Lord knows I’ve made excuses for my parents. My entire life I’ve excused their disappointment in me because of their own failures. I felt bad for them and dealt with their condemnation of my personal choices, vowing to prove to them that I can be great in my own right, doing the things that make me happy and give me purpose.

  But I shouldn’t have to make excuses for how I’m treated by the people who are supposed to care about me. I shouldn’t be made to feel as though I’m not enough, that nothing I do is ever fucking enough. I realize now that their disappointment isn’t a reflection on me. It’s a reflection on them. When they look at me, they don’t see me. They can’t, because they’ve placed a mirror in my hands so that all they can see is their own failures staring back at them.

  Roman doesn’t see me. He doesn’t see my love for him. I may not have said the word, but I’ve let it shine in my eyes. I’d let my guard down with him, let him see the real me with all my fucked up insecurities. And now he’s using them against me.

  He acted like he cares about me, but these aren’t the actions of a man who returns my feelings. He’s not just trying to hurt me. He’s trying to break me.

  But I won’t let him.

  Not him. Not my parents. Not anyone.

  I’m a goddamn honey badger, and if I’m not enough for them, I simply don’t give a fuck. I’m enough for me, and I’m the only one who matters.

  “On second thought, don’t call me tomorrow. In fact, lose my number, because I’m calling for a moratorium on whatever this was. Good-bye, Roman.” I yank open the door.

  “Addison, don’t you fucking leave, I’m not done with you.”

  “Oh,” I say, pausing over the threshold. “And I quit.” Stepping quickly into the hallway, I pull the door closed behind me just as I hear Roman roar and the sound of expensive crystal smashing into the other side of the wood makes me nearly jump out of my skin.

  I need to go home, give myself the next couple of days to get all the crying out of my system, and then it’s back to kicking ass and taking names come Monday.

  Taking a deep breath, I square my shoulders and walk away from the only man I’ve ever loved, because for the first time in my life, I’ve learned to love me most of all.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Roman

  My cell phone vibrates on my office desk. For the last three months, every time it lights up with a call or text, a tiny whisper of hope grabs me by the throat. I pause in my rifling through the file folders in front of me, and glance at the screen. Like every time before this one, the hope dies swiftly, and I bury it as best I can until the next time. If I had any sense of self-preservation, I’d toss the thing in the Chicago River and never look back.

  Austin’s name and picture are the ones staring back at me instead of hers. I hit the button to send him to voicemail and go back to what I was doing. I’ve done a stellar job of avoiding everything in life other than work or working out, which has given me the excuse I need to avoid Austin without raising too many questions. I know I can’t do it indefinitely, but I’m not ready to hear that he swept in and scooped up what I tossed away.

  Regardless of it being my fault that things ended the way they did with Addison, it would feel like a betrayal knowing one of my best friends is with her. I wrote my own mother off for less than that. Confronting him—and the ugly truth—will be a complete shit show, and I’m not ready for it yet.

  “Goddamn it,” I mutter then punch the intercom button on my phone. “Maggie, where are the Newberry files?”

  “On top of your file cabinet, sir, where you asked me to put them this morning.”

  “No, they’re—” I swivel in my chair and sigh in exasperation at my own idiocy. “Right where I asked you to put them. Sorry about that, Maggie. Thank you.”

  “No problem at all, sir.”

  The woman is sweet to lie for my sake. I’ve been nothing but a problem since Addison left. I can’t fucking think, I drop the ball on shit, and any time her name comes up in professional circles, it’s all I can do to keep my mask of apathy in place.

  “Do you need anything else before I head out for lunch?” Maggie asks politely, though I’m sure she’d rather tell me off.

  I grab the Newberry files and drop them onto the only clear space remaining on my desk. My organizational skills have gone to complete s
hit. It’s no wonder I can’t find anything. “No, that’s fine, Maggie. I’ll be fine, thank you.”

  She signs off, and I hear the distant click of the front door to the suite closing behind her. It’s the Wednesday before New Year’s and the office isn’t even technically open this week. Coop is on a cruise in the Cayman Islands, and Martin is in California visiting family for the holidays. But when Maggie caught wind that I was coming in, she insisted on working, too. I agreed only on the condition that she gets paid double-time. For what she’s had to put up with from me these past few months, the woman deserves double her pay on a daily basis.

  Blowing out a deep breath, I get up and pour myself a couple of fingers of whisky before resuming my place behind my desk. Unmotivated to pore over the dissolution of the Newberry marriage and splitting of assets, I turn my chair to face my windows and stare at the wintry cityscape with my favorite brand of self-medication in hand.

  We haven’t had much snow this season, and what we have gotten disappears almost as soon as it touches down, but everything else is just as it should be for late December in the Windy City. Freezing temperatures, blustery wind blowing off the lake, bare trees, and brown grass. The world is temporarily numb, waiting patiently for the spring thaw to breathe life back into the city once again.

  I keep telling myself that’s what I’m doing. I’m dealing with the numbness and eventually it’s going to be replaced with sensations and feelings. Eventually I won’t be waiting to live again, I’ll actually start to feel alive. I just have to wait it out, to get through this winter in my life.

  Christ, I had no clue what living was until I met Addison. I’d merely existed in a small tidal pool, happy in the shallow world I’d created for myself. Without even knowing she did it, Addie encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and showed me what it was like to live in the beauty of the ocean…the beauty of her love.

  But at the same time she was teaching me how to open up emotionally, I was teaching her to open up physically, because that’s what I thought I needed. I thought I needed to share her like I’d needed to share so many others. My first mistake was lumping her in with every woman I’d been with before.

  Addison is the most unique woman I’ve ever known. She has two sides to her coin, just like I do. She can sound crass and obnoxious, or professional and intelligent. She can look like a sexy librarian in her work attire, or dress herself up like a Playboy bunny attending a mansion party. She has her hard exterior—her honey badger persona, or what I considered her wildcat side—and yet she showed me her tender and vulnerable interior.

  Then I used it against her like the fucking asshole I am, all because she turned into the woman I’d coached her to be, and I couldn’t handle it. For that, I deserve a lifetime of numbness.

  Clutching my glass until my fingers blanch, I raise it to my lips and drain the contents, reveling in the burn as it slides down my throat.

  “A little early to be drinking the hard stuff, don’t you think?”

  I flinch at the sound of Austin’s voice so close behind me, and the blood rushes in my ears as my pulse races. “I’m busy, Massey. If I were able to talk, I would’ve taken your phone call.”

  “Yeah, you look real fucking busy staring off into space while you enjoy a liquid lunch. Why don’t you cut the shit and face me already? I was hoping you’d come around on your own, but apparently fifteen years of friendship means fuck-all to you.”

  Indignation burns through me as I spin my chair around to see Austin in one of the guest chairs in front of my desk. I must have really been lost in thought not to hear him come in, much less sit down mere feet from me. “Friendship means fuck-all to me? That’s rich coming from the man who was fucking my girlfriend.”

  “I told you she was different, Roman. That the games we were playing weren’t going to be enough for her. I fucking told you, man, and you didn’t listen.”

  “Yeah, you also told me that if I didn’t give her what she wants, someone else would. However, you failed to mention that someone would be you.”

  “What the fuck are you talking about? The only time I was ever with Addie was with you. At your instruction, I’d like to add.”

  “Really,” I say, my tone laced with sarcasm. “So you were never with her outside of our arranged times?”

  “Fuck, no.”

  It only takes seconds to pull up the picture of them on my phone and hold it up for him to see. I tried deleting the pictures and video at least a hundred times, but for whatever sick reason, I’ve never been able to pull the trigger.

  Surprise casts shadows in his eyes, and he drags a hand over the lower half of his face, releasing a heavy sigh. “That’s not what it looks like, brother.”

  I scoff and drop the phone carelessly to the desk as I lean back in my chair. I don’t really care to hear his backpedaling or bullshit excuses. “Whatever.”

  “I was getting her legal advice, Roman. We met a couple of times to discuss things, and she drew up some paperwork for me, but that was it. I swear.”

  “I find that hard to believe. I’ve been handling your legal affairs since before graduating college. Now you’re saying that you suddenly needed Addison’s help and couldn’t even tell me about it?”

  “Yes, damn it, that’s what I’m saying. I couldn’t go to you, not with this. And I needed someone I could trust beyond just the attorney-client privilege shit. She wanted me to at least confide in you that I was asking for her help, but I made her promise not to tell you anything.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I knew if I did you’d ask questions—”

  “That’s what I’m doing now. I’m asking why you couldn’t come to me with whatever you needed.”

  Austin scrubs his hands over his face then gets up to stalk over and pour himself a drink. “Refill?” he asks, holding the bottle up. I nod. He brings it over and splashes some of the amber liquid into my glass before setting the bottle on a stack of files and sitting back down. “I needed a contract and NDA drawn up to protect my reputation as a civil servant.”

  My brows draw together. Firemen, along with other city employees, can get in big trouble—even fired, depending on how bad the situation is—if their reputation comes into question. Discretion is something we take very seriously with our guys at P4H, for that very reason. Austin is only known by his nickname, Rowdy, and he doesn’t do gigs in the same district as his firehouse. In five years, he’s never been recognized by a client, and chances of it ever happening are slim to none. Unless…

  “Did someone recognize you at a job? If so, that still doesn’t explain why you didn’t come to me.”

  He’s shaking his head before I even finish. “This doesn’t have anything to do with P4H, Roman. It has to do with my personal life.” That explains jack shit, so I continue to stare at him. He sighs. “My sex life.”

  Hearing him refer to his sex life in conjunction with Addison only serves to piss me right the hell off. “As you can see by the shit all over my desk, I have work to do. Maggie’s at lunch, but you know the way out.”

  “Goddamn it, Roman, it’s a sensitive fucking topic for me. Is it so hard to believe that there might be something I can’t discuss with you?”

  “Yes, actually, it is,” I bite out, my voice rising. “From the time we were fifteen it’s been you, me, and Chance. We’re brothers. I wasn’t aware we kept secrets from each other. I sure as fuck haven’t. I’ve shared everything with the two of you. I even shared the woman I loved with you!”

  The anger leeches from Austin’s face. “Jesus, bro. Love? I knew you cared for her, but damn. Does she know?”

  “My relationship, or lack thereof, with Addison isn’t up for discussion.”

  Leaning forward, Austin grabs the Glenfiddich and pours himself a double. He drinks half of it in one swallow then braces his elbows on his legs, holding the glass in both hands and staring down into the mouth like a fortuneteller gazing into a crystal ball. If a man could find the answers to wh
atever’s troubling him that way, I would have had shit figured out months ago.

  Finally, he speaks. “Like you and Chance have your kinks, I have mine, but I’ve kept it to myself.”

  I’m literally speechless. Chance and I have no room to judge anyone based on what gets them off. Of everyone, we’re the ones Austin should feel he can be honest with about that kind of thing. Hell, even Liam, who’s like our little brother and basically the fourth in our tight group, has his own thing. “What would make you think you couldn’t tell me and Chance?”

  He avoids looking at me and tosses the rest of his whisky back. “Chance and Liam know about it.”

  I wince before I can mask the hurt. I’m the only one he kept it from. I feel like I’m being betrayed left and fucking right lately, and the pain burns through me, razing what little civility I have left to the ground. I shoot to my feet, slapping my hands on my desk, and lean in with my teeth bared. “If I’m not good enough to know your secrets, then maybe I’m not good enough to be your friend, your brother.”

  “Get your head out of your goddamned ass,” he shouts back as he gets up and mimics my stance. “I didn’t tell you because you’re my brother.”

  “Bullsh—”

  “It’s forced fantasies, Roman!”

  I freeze and the rest of my protest sticks in my throat as what he said pings in my brain. The reason my friend thought he couldn’t tell me is because he gets off on the illusion of forcing a woman…and my sister was raped when we were still in high school. Dropping into my chair, I plow a hand through my hair and take a deep breath. Austin takes my silence for disapproval and rushes to defend himself.

  “Don’t you see, man? I didn’t want you thinking I’m just like the sick fuck who hurt Rhona. I’m not, Roman. I would never hurt a woman, or force her for real.”

  “You think I don’t know that? Jesus, Austin, I fucking know that. I wouldn’t have been down for letting you bring that into anything I was involved in, but that doesn’t mean I would’ve judged you for it.”

  “I think you forget the times in college when you went into a rage because Chance got a little rough and degrading with a girl, even though she was literally begging for it.”