by JA Huss
“Well, damn. I never saw that coming.”
“But Quin—”
“Bric. I can’t. It was hard for me too. It hurt so bad when I left. But I did leave. And I had a good reason.”
“What was your reason? Because he’d be into the whole baby thing if he knew.”
“He doesn’t know?” I’m shocked. But he put money in my account every month.
Bric shakes his head. “I never told him. He thinks you had the abortion. I never told him you called me last summer.”
“Sorry about that,” I say, looking away. I walk over to the couch next to the chair and take a seat. “I had just given birth and my hormones were all out of whack. Plus I felt like a total failure because I couldn’t get the hang of the breastfeeding thing. I was really looking forward to that. But I shouldn’t have called.”
“We would’ve been there for you, ya know. Even me, Rochelle. Even Smith. He’s the one who went looking for you first. He couldn’t stand to see Quin so unhappy and confused.”
“Hmm. I never saw that coming either. The Smith looking for me part. Not Quin. I knew Quin would be hurt but… he hurt me too, Bric. You have no idea how bad.” We sit there in silence for a minute. Adley is playing with my hair as she drinks her bottle, wrapping long strands of it around and around in her tiny fist. “If Quin didn’t know… then why was he sending me money all year?”
Bric shrugs. “He loves you. He probably wanted to make sure you had what you needed.”
“He doesn’t love me.” I roll my eyes.
“Shit, Rochelle. He’s a fucking mess. He won’t even talk to me these days. He’s so mad about how it ended.”
“You’re… not playing the game anymore?” I almost can’t believe it. Elias Bricman is nothing but a game. I can’t even imagine this man living a normal life. Not just the sexual stuff he’s into. But everything. His whole life is wrapped up in controlling people.
“Not with him,” Bric says. “Not with Smith either.”
“Then who?”
“That new guy. Jordan Wells? Did you ever meet him?”
I shake my head. “But just one guy?” That’s not like him either. He likes to keep things off balance. Anything less than plural is just not dynamic enough to satiate his dark appetite.
“I’m not really here to talk about that game, Rochelle. I’m here to beg you for a favor.”
“I’m not going back. I told you that. In fact, you’re lucky you came today. I’m about to move again.”
“Where?”
I shrug. “Dunno yet.”
He exhales loudly like he’s really frustrated now. “I really think I need to know.”
“You don’t deserve to know where I’m going.” My own frustration is building. Where does he get off? How in the world does he figure I owe him something?
“Not where you’re going,” he snaps. “If I’m the father.” His head is downcast, but he looks up through a wave of hair. It’s longer than I remember. Not long. But shoulder-length. And some of it falls over his face until he runs his fingers through it, putting it back in place.
“Why?” I ask. “It’s not like you ever wanted kids.”
“Didn’t want them. That’s right. But if I have one, Rochelle, that’s different. I’d need to know that. We really do need a DNA test.”
I shake my head. “No.”
“Why?”
“I don’t want to know.”
“Well, we do.”
“Quin doesn’t even know about her. So he can’t want that.”
“I’m gonna tell him tonight when I leave here, and once I do, he’ll come looking and he’ll demand a DNA test.”
“Is that a threat?” So many things in that statement make me uncomfortable.
“No,” he says. “No,” more emphatically. “That’s not why I’m here. I just… need to know. And I need to make things right with Quin. So I have to tell him.”
We have another long silence as Bric picks up a toy from the floor. A red plastic block. He turns it in his hand like he’s never seen anything like it before.
“You said you came to beg for a favor. Was that your favor? The DNA test? Because if so, it’s not happening. I get why you’d want to know, I do.” I look at him with an earnest expression. “I even sympathize about your situation with Quin. But I cannot get involved with you guys again. It was…” I stop and try to pull myself together. I’d forgotten about the feelings. All those desperate moments last year. All the crying and craziness. I know it was just the hormones, but it was real while it was happening.
“It was what?” Bric prods, ever the psychoanalyst.
I let out a long breath of air. “It was hard. I didn’t want to walk away, Bric. I wanted what every pregnant woman wants.”
“The happily ever after?” he asks, shooting me another small, but genuine, smile.
I shrug. “I guess you could call it that. But right after I found out I was pregnant, after I told you—like the next day, I think—Quin and I were at your last garden party on the Club roof and we were dancing. It was such a great night. I told him I loved him and he looked at me, Bric… he looked at me like I was a stranger.”
“So you left.”
I nod. “I left. I knew he… I knew I was important to him, right? But the minute I admitted that I loved him, I saw the fear in his face.”
“What fear?” Bric asks.
“That the game would end. I knew right then that ending the game was the thing he feared most. Not me, Bric. He wasn’t going to miss our couple relationship. But us. Me and you and him. That’s what he wanted. That’s always been what he wanted.”
They both want that. I thought Smith did too, so that doesn’t fit into my assessment of them. Why play this game over and over again? But I don’t know Smith that well. I do know Bric. And Quin is just like him, minus the dark Machiavellian side.
Bric picks up a blue block and stacks it on top of the red one on the arm of the chair. He watches Adley for a few seconds. Another smile creeps out. So many real smiles from Elias Bricman today. “She looks just like you.”
My gaze falls down to my absolutely beautiful daughter. “I think so too. She’s got my blonde hair. And I still have a baby picture of me.” I nod to the photo frame on the mantle of the fireplace. It’s a cheap frame. Something I bought at the local drugstore after I got Adley’s first pictures taken last month when I made a rare trip to the Durango mall. It’s me and her, side by side. And we could be the same baby, that’s how much alike we look.
Well, except for the eyes. Adley has bright blue eyes and mine are hazel. But that might change.
Bric stands, walks over to the fireplace, and picks up the frame. “Jesus.”
He stares at the image for so long I start to feel weird. “That was the favor then? The DNA test?”
“No,” Bric answers, still gazing down at the photo. “That was just to piss you off.” He smiles, looks over at me from under that curl of hair again. “Because I know you. I know how to push all your buttons, Rochelle.”
Right. Bric is all about manipulation. “Then why are you here?”
He places the frame back where he got it. Gently. With reverence, almost. “We could play a new game,” he says. And then, ignoring the confused look on my face—“A game called Make Quin Happy Again. Give him what he thinks he wants.”
I shake my head and huff out something that isn’t a laugh. I know Bric cares about Quin. They are like brothers. But he’s not here for Quin. He’s here for himself. Everything Bric does is for himself.
“Because I think you’re right,” Bric says. “He likes the us. The three of us, you know. But I think he wants you, Rochelle. And he’d want this baby if he knew about her. I came here because I thought I could bring you home with me. Chella is making us have lunch together tomorrow at the Club. I know Quin doesn’t want to see me. Can’t even fucking look at me.” He winces at his swear word, but doesn’t apologize. “So even though when I got on the jet this aftern
oon I was coming here to beg you to stay away… I had another thought along the way. A small idea crept in. A little fantasy, you know? That I’d show up with you and the baby tomorrow like a… like…”
“Like a gift,” I say, filling in the missing word. He nods. Slowly. I say, “I thought you were playing a new game with that other guy?”
He huffs out an exasperated laugh. “It’s so fucked up, Rochelle. It’s never gonna work. And I miss you too.”
We stare at each other for a few moments. I’ve talked to Bric lots of times. He’s an easy guy to confide in. But I’ve never talked to him about our relationship. And he’s never offered me up anything more than the casual, You look nice tonight, remarks. Or, I like your hair that way. They always felt so… mandatory. He was always nice to me. Always generous with his money. And careful during sex. But he never looked at me the way he’s looking at me now. It makes my heart flutter a little. “You miss me,” I whisper. “With you and Quin?”
He nods again. Even slower than the last time. “I have been talking myself into thinking you leaving was the best thing to ever happen to me. But it was a lie. Just like you’re trying to lie to yourself right now. What we had was good, Rochelle. Better than good, really. It was pretty fucking great.”
I look down at Adley, wondering how I went from hating the fact he was here to… reconsidering all my choices.
He’s good, I tell myself. He’s always been good at playing on people’s emotions.
“Don’t you get lonely? Do you have boyfriends?” he asks.
“No,” I say. But I’m only referring to the boyfriend part. I get very lonely. I just hide it better than I used to.
He comes over to the couch and sits down next to me. Very close, so our legs are touching. “Can I hold her?”
I almost snort. “You want to hold her?”
Another slow nod of affirmation. “I can’t stand it.” He laughs. “I need to touch her. She’s so fucking pretty.”
“Have you ever held a baby before?” I ask, not sure what to make of this unexpected turn of events. Hell, so many turns in this one conversation, I’m getting dizzy.
“I played Santa last year at Christmas.”
“You did not.” I laugh.
“I swear to God. Smith was busy with Chella so I stepped in. I’m that kind of guy, Rochelle. I step in.” He holds his arms out, like this is a done deal. And I’m a little off my game right now, not sure what the next move is, but handing him Adley can’t be a wrong move, no matter what, right? So I gently slip her into his waiting arms and watch his expression change from badass Bric to melty Elias in the same moment.
“We could make him happy again, brat.”
This time when he calls me brat I don’t feel defensive. It feels… like affection.
“He’d be my friend again. You’d be my lover. We’d be what we were, Rochelle.” He looks up from the baby and stares at me. “But we’d be better.”
A new take on an old twist. My head is whirling with ideas, and possibilities, and… maybe even regrets. Did I bow out too soon? Did I not give them enough credit? Did I misinterpret every signal they ever sent me? “I have a car here, remember?” I say, almost whispering.
“We’ll have someone bring it to Denver. We’ll get you your own place if you want. It might be weird if you stayed with one of us. Quin won’t want you at my place and vice versa. It would be much better, Rochelle. I promise. We won’t play that game anymore. We’ll start something brand new.”
“Something… real?” I ask, almost afraid to hope.
He gives me that slow nod one more time. “Something very real. I’ve missed you. And I know you think I was never invested—and that’s fair. I probably wasn’t. But I am now, Rochelle. I am. We could start again. Pick up where we left off, but with new rules.”
“What rules?” I ask, my heart sinking at the thought of all those fucking rules. I can’t do that again. It was way too confusing. The best thing that ever happened was Smith distancing himself from our game and letting Quin and Bric do whatever they wanted.
Bric shrugs. “Make them up as we go, you know? I don’t know what this might turn into, but I’d do just about anything to get another shot at it.”
“Do you love me?” I ask, confused.
“Yes,” he says, no slow nod this time. Nothing but commitment. “I love you in my own way.” He shrugs. “We all loved you, Rochelle. We just didn’t pay much attention to that feeling until we realized you were gone.”
“We’re not supposed to turn back,” I say.
“Fuck that,” he says softly. “We make our own rules. There’s nothing wrong with admitting you made a mistake and then correcting it, right?”
I let out a long breath. “I don’t want to get hurt. What if Quin—”
“He won’t,” Bric says quickly. “He loves you. He really does. He’s fucking miserable, Rochelle. If I bring you back to him…” He trails off, shaking his head.
“I’d be your gift to him?”
“Yes,” he says, smiling down at Adley. “And her too.” He looks up at me again. “I have a jet waiting. We can’t leave until morning but one night alone won’t hurt, right?”
Jesus Christ. I’m instantly horny. “But it’s Monday.”
He laughs so loud, Adley starts crying. I take her, laughing with him, because my immediate reaction was to morph back into the game. Then shush her until she’s settled again.
“Well?” Bric finally asks, his fingertips playing with my hair. “What do you think? Should we break all the rules tonight and start something brand new tomorrow?”
I look up and bite my lip. Some of this feels wrong. The one night alone with Bric, for sure. Because I’ve never wanted him. Not alone. It’s Quin I dreamed about at night. It’s Quin I really love. It’s Quin I wanted a million different ways for the rest of my life, and couldn’t have.
But I am lonely. I have been so lonely for so long I forgot what it feels like to have someone. Someone you know. Someone you love, because I do love Bric. Not the way I love Quin. But I do love him. He’s someone I trusted, even though I knew better. And now he’s here, asking me to reconsider.
It feels… wrong, but right. Because Bric and I are not going to be a couple. We’re going to be a ménage with Quin again. A kind of family.
It’s not how I imagined it when I left. Not what I wanted back then. But that’s because I didn’t think Bric would be interested in a real family. I thought he’d kick me out and they’d all walk away.
But this… this is what Quin wanted, right? The three of us forever?
Just imagining myself with both of them again. God. It was good. All the fun Quin and I had. The way he made me feel so cherished when he came over every week and made love to me. All the crazy shit Bric likes to do in private. The way he was careful with me even though he wanted to do so much more.
All the… sharing.
We’d stopped that for a while because Bric was always looking for more submission. But the times we did share… it was amazing. I loved the way it felt to wake up between them both in the morning.
Why did I leave? Was it the hormones? Was I just mentally unstable?
“OK,” I finally say. “It’s been so long I could use a night of rule-breaking.”
Maybe he’s right. It could be good again. It could be so much better. Maybe some part of him has changed? Maybe he’s not the selfish, narcissistic player I thought he was? Maybe my time away has made him reconsider the dark part he hides inside that head of his?
I get a big Bric smile for my answer. “Good.” And then he leans in and kisses me. One hand touches my face with honest affection, while the other drops to Adley’s soft tufts of blonde hair. “Good,” he says into my mouth.
It’s like I never left. Like we didn’t have a year apart. I didn’t have a baby. And all three hundred and sixty-five days between then and now never happened.
It’s like a second chance.
“Do you want to spank me?
” I tease. And then I immediately feel stupid. What is wrong with me?
You’re lonely, Rochelle. And sad. You’re just really good at hiding it.
“I really do,” he says, pulling back from the kiss. “After we put the baby to bed.”
We?
We?
For some reason that gives me a little panic attack. Did I just agree to share my child with them too?
But Bric stands up and offers me his hand. “Come on. I hear this dinky town has an amazing hot spring. Let’s go have some family fun.”
It’s just one night without rules. I can handle one night, right? I’m a professional game-player. I did this for three years.
But if Bric came to get me, that makes him number one. And we all know why I shouldn’t fuck number one.
I’ll get attached.
And where will that leave Quin when I see him tomorrow?
Elias Bricman thrives on control. If I let him control me again, nothing will have changed. He’ll be the same guy, with the same motivations, as he was when I left last year.
I don’t want what we had last year. I need more than that.
“I change my mind,” I say.
Bric squints his eyes at me, frowning. “Which part?” he asks.
“All of it.”
Chapter Four - Quin
At nine AM on Tuesday morning I was one hundred percent sure I wasn’t showing up for lunch with Chella at the Club. By nine-thirty I was at a solid eighty-five percent.
You can see where this is headed.
I show up at Turning Point ten minutes early.
Margaret, Bric’s White Room manager, is gushing over me like a mother because I’ve been MIA for so long. She takes my coat and straightens my tie, asking me a million questions that both annoy me and make me feel special at the same time.
“I’m fine, Margaret,” I say, brushing her hands away from the lapels of my suit. “Stop it.”
