“Not always.”
“You are really good,” I said, getting a good look as she tucked it back in her pocket. “The proportions and those unsettling grins.”
“The Nikon D4S camera, it’s the best there is, right?” Her attention was on Wyatt.
“Depends on your purposes, but it’s definitely up there.” The overeager bastard was already getting the camera out. “Want to see?”
“Are we bowling or looking at photos?” Bradley said, back from his turn.
“Just a second,” Wyatt said.
“I could bowl for Wyatt,” I suggested slyly.
“Yeah – no,” he said.
As he and Britt craned over the photo, her mouth became an ‘o’ of reverence. “The things you don’t really notice. You’re really good at bringing them out.”
Wyatt lapped up her words like an eager dog. “Yeah, that’s one of the main reasons I do it. Even as a kid, that’s what always held my attention – the little things at the edge of the big things. The ones that have their own forgotten breed of beauty.”
“I’m more for faces and the stories they tell. How life literally writes a story in the lines and proportions.”
Bradley handed me the ball, and I said, “Taking Wyatt’s turn in three… two… one…”
“Hell no, Dickston.” Wyatt grabbed the ball out of my hands last minute. “You’ve fucked up your score enough, no way am I gonna let you start on mine.”
“Suit yourself,” I said.
“He’s just grumpy his family’s coming in town next week,” I told Britt. “His brother’s an asshole up there with Baddeley’s.”
Bradley gave me the finger.
“Me? I’m a blessed only child.” My fingers skated across the smooth flesh of my freshly-shaved bald head, and I grinned.
“Who has a blessedly bitchy ex-wife, to boot,” Bradley said.
I scowled. “You really have to mention Hailzilla now?”
“Hailzilla?” Britt asked.
“Yeah, not her real name,” I admitted. “Though you’d agree a thousand more times fitting if you knew her. The woman’s an actual monster. Before we separated, she threw all my clothes out of the house onto a tree outside.”
“Wasn’t that because you wouldn’t put your dirty laundry in the basket?” Wyatt asked.
“No,” I said haughtily. “It was because I didn’t put my dirty laundry in the odd plastic tub that was inconveniently located in the closet in the hallway outside. Who wants to walk ten feet and out the door every time you have a stinky sock to chuck?”
“Anyway,” I said, turning to Britt with a firm smile. “Luckily, Hailzilla is a part of my long-ago past. Two years, in fact.”
Damn Bradley. Had to mention my goddamn ex wife. Wasn’t like being divorced was exactly a female panty-dropper.
“So what about those tips?” I asked her.
“I’m game,” she said.
My ‘tips’ turned her game from ok to stellar in all of tow bowls, while they were a nice excuse to get up close and reposition her hands and feet personally.
“It has been a while, but I used to play a lot,” Britt explained once we got back to the seats and I was still staring. “One of my foster moms used to work at a bowling alley.”
“That must’ve been fun,” I said while filing away the fact that this was the second time she’d mentioned being a foster kid.
“Kinda was,” Britt said noncommittally.
At my questioning look, she continued, “Got old fast, how Margo’d work these killer 12 pm to 12 am shifts, and make me hang around for like eight hours after school. I got to bowl and play the arcade games free and have hotdogs and whatever, but doing that five nights a week? By the end, I’d just sneak out and let her yell at me at home.”
“Shit, ok, that does suck.”
“Yeah, she did make a real good meatloaf, though.”
“Speaking of food, do you want anything?”
“I’m not super hungry.”
“She’s fine,” Bradley said.
“You reading her mind, bro?” I asked.
He responded by storming off, presumably to go to the can.
“Must’ve broke a nail or something,” I said. Wyatt and I chuckled, although I was pretty sure Bradley was actually pissed that I was making the moves on the girl he was both attracted to and had classed as bad news.
“If you just saw his grooming kit,” Wyatt told her.
Her look growing puzzled, I explained, “Three of us are roommates.”
Her look growing slightly weirded out, I further explained, “After my ex and I divorced, Wyatt was kind enough to take me into his little artist loft bachelor pad. When Bradley and his fiancé split, it just made sense that the three copsketeers move into a new and improved apartment together.
She nodded, smirking. “Copsketeers, eh?”
I delivered her a lofty smile. “Gets them every time.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Didn’t answer the question before, though.” I stood up, lingering. “I mean, I’m getting myself something to eat so I can grab you something if you want.”
She rifled in purse response, producing a five dollar bill she extended to me. “Alright. A hotdog with mustard would be great.”
“Cool,” I said, turning away without taking the money.
If there’s one thing I knew about girls it was that six times out of ten, they loved it when you bought them stuff. Here’s hoping Britt was one of those six.
At the counter, I ordered our hotdogs and waited.
As I strode back to the lane, Wyatt greeted me with a grin.
“You really didn’t have to,” he said, glancing at the hotdogs in my hand.
“I didn’t,” I said, frowning. “Where’s Bradley and Britt?”
He shrugged.
5
Britt
After Kingston left, I tore myself away from Wyatt’s enigmatic blue eyes and headed for the bathroom.
On my way in, I bumped into Bradley.
He gave me only the most cursory of smiles and, before I could stop myself, I blurted out, “What’s your problem?”
He stopped, his frown bringing furrows all the way to the top of his forehead.
“Is it me? Do you want me to leave?”
His frown sagged. “Sorry about being a dick. It’s just Wyatt. I’m worried about him.” His gaze spanned over to the corner around which Wyatt was still sitting and staring at the panorama of lanes before him like he was taking a series of mental photographs.
“Bradley. A few weeks back, he got a warning about this crazy stalker chick he’d slept with once coming into the station looking for him.” He scowled. “Right now, he needs to lay low and any more drama.”
“What?” I interrupted him. “You think that just because he gave me a ride home the other night that I’m going to jump his bones and become some sort of psycho?”
“No,” he said, the corner of his mouth dipping, although the rest of his expression said ‘possibly’. “Just… he can’t afford another straw.”
I nodded. Maybe Bradley was right. He was just looking out for his friend.
“I can leave,” I offered. “I mean, you guys were the ones that invited me to stay.”
He frowned. “We’re in the middle of the game, and besides…” He sighed. He looked at me as though it was painful for him to do so.
“So what, then?” I finally asked.
“I don’t know, I don’t usually encounter someone who just tells it how it is like you do, okay?” Bradley smiled sheepishly, shaking his head. “I didn’t come over here intending to tell you all this.”
I nodded. “I mean, I am who I am. Life’s too short to beat around the bush. Anyway, I’ll go now, you know, so I’m not tempted to jump your friend and boil his bunny.”
I walked off a few paces.
“Wait,” Bradley said. “Just-”
I turned around and he had his hands shoved in his pockets, looking like a
big awkward teenager.
“You don’t have to go, you know.”
“No.” I nodded. “I do. Thanks for returning my wallet.”
It was probably for the best, leaving like that. I meant what I’d said to Simone, I wanted to focus on my art. And these past few months I’d been alone, working through the pain after my breakup, I’d gotten more done than I had the six years before that combined. Now, all I had to do was start on the more practical parts of promoting myself, finally uploading pictures of my art onto my Instagram and DeviantArt, hitting up all those art events I’d been planning to.
There was simply no room to get involved with a guy right now. Even if three hot ones had just been dumped into my lap. Getting over my ex last time had been hard enough – I’d only barely done so with the promise to myself that I’d never go through such pain again.
--
Taking the Metro back, I realized another reason why I’d been antsy lately. It had been a while since I’d visited Miguel.
So, instead of getting off where I planned, I got off a few stops earlier.
Walking along the well-lit street, I wondered what the cops would say if they saw me now. I didn’t know many people who walked NYC’s dark streets as much as me. Maybe I was asking for trouble? Maybe. Bradley would be worried, Kingston would be jokey, and I’m not sure what Wyatt would say. Maybe he would only fix me with those unnerving rain-colored eyes and let my mind make its inferences.
Anyway, I was there now: at the house on the corner that looked like an ode to weeds, but was really a carefully untended jungle of plants, shrubs, and trees that were long past being cared for. I’d tried one ambitious afternoon and been left scratched and defeated for my efforts.
Four knocks with the brass elephant door knocker, then four more, and, a minute or so later, the Cherrywood door opened to admit me.
“Brittany,” Miguel said, “What a nice surprise.”
I smiled. Miguel was the only one I let call me by my full name, mainly because there was something about his Spanish-accented voice that made it unfamiliar, unconnected to all the flops of foster families who’d used it willy-nilly (“Brittany, your room is FILTHY, what did you do in all those other homes!”, “Hey Brittany girl”, “Aw, Brittany, you thought you were staying here for good? That’s so sweet”).
“Looks like your new job stuck,” he said, looking down at my uniform.
I blushed. Damn, it really had been a while. Three months, now that I counted back.
“Sorry I’ve been nonexistent” I said. “I was just trying to focus on my art.”
“And not returning to your minotaur of a boyfriend,” Miguel said smoothly, with a sharp nod of his ponytailed head. “I understand.”
I couldn’t help but smile. “I did it. I finally stayed away. Last I heard from him he was screaming at my voicemail a month ago.”
Miguel clasped my hand warmly and squeezed. “I knew you could.”
“What about you?” I said, looking around the towers of books that spanned the walls. “How’s the dissertation going?”
“You know,” Miguel said, throwing his hand out in a helpless gesture. “About a line a week if I’m lucky.”
He wandered further down the hallway, letting his pasty hands slide over the towers of books, a few shaking at the contact. “But at least I have company.”
I followed him, smiling wistfully. Poor Miguel. Thanks to a rich father and a heroically promising university career, Miguel had settled here with a happy wife and rich hopes for the future. He and Minerva had gotten me at the tail end of that period, when his dreams had eroded away to the realization that his wife loved his reputation and his reputation was furnished on a need to give speeches, make connections – things he despised.
“Would you like some tea?” Miguel asked. “I have the peach rooibos you love.”
“Sure. Thanks,” I said.
I settled down in his study, moving aside some books to make space on an armchair, while he busied himself in the kitchen. That was another thing I loved about Miguel. His doors were always open. He never asked me why I came, only enjoyed my company and always welcomed more of it.
This time, in particular, I wasn’t sure why I’d come. Only that after the bowling encounter with the cops, my mind was so swirling that I’d wanted to go somewhere safe. Somewhere I couldn’t be alone – not yet. I wasn’t sure I wanted to make sense of what had happened back there without getting Miguel’s take on it.
“You brought some of your art for me to see?”
I groaned as Miguel handed me the mug of tea. How could I have forgotten?
“Actually…” – I grinned as I took out a napkin sketch from earlier in the day, one I’d made of Simone when she was busy rushing about the guests, not seeing me. Those were my favorite, when the subject couldn’t assemble its features into how it thought it was supposed to look.
Taking the napkin and raising it to his face, a lazy smile crept over Miguel’s features. “Ah yes, you really captured it. When time blurs together and work takes over.”
As he handed back the napkin, his look grew searching, and I stirred to life, “Speaking of, want to work a little? I can just sketch here, no need to move or anything.”
Anything to take my mind off the incessant need to blurt out what had happened with the guys, almost getting mugged, then today the bowling alley.
Miguel smiled with the side of his mouth, his mocha eyes twinkling. “You know how I love my work.”
It was a running joke between us, how Miguel loved to work and yet could never seem to force himself to.
As Miguel settled himself into his oak desk, I flipped the napkin over and began sketching absently.
How exactly could I bring the subject up to Miguel? Maybe it was because he was the closest thing to a father I had ever had that I was so uncomfortable with the idea of admitting to him that I had a crush on not one, not two, but three cops who just all happened to live together. And if my intuition was correct, at least Wyatt and Kingston felt the same way. I still couldn’t pin Bradley down. He seemed to be in a constant inner struggle with himself in my presence.
And I certainly didn’t want to tell him about how I’d met the guys. He’d be horrified to know that I’d been attacked. Miguel already felt guilty enough about how I’d been taken away from him when I was seventeen when he’d let the house languish in neglect. I knew he worried about me enough, why make it worse?
“New TV show?” Miguel said. I looked up to realize that he was craning over me, perhaps had never started work at all. “Sorry, I couldn’t resist. Your drawings are so good by the end, that I guess I wanted to see how they started out.”
A glance at my napkin revealed I’d been sketching them – Kingston with his bald head and armful of tattoos, Bradley with his All-American good looks, Wyatt with his enigmatic smile.
At least that solved the issue of bringing it up to Miguel.
“Not exactly,” I said. “They’re these guys I met recently. Cops, roommates and I…”
“Are attracted to them,” Miguel said simply.
As I gaped at him, he shrugged, tapping a long finger on them. “Haven’t you always said that art gives away the truth about life?”
“I guess,” I admitted. “But still.”
“You don’t know what to do.” He smiled slightly. “And thought I could help.”
He shook his head wistfully. “No, Brittany we both know I am not the one to ask of such matters.”
“But still-”
He held up a hand, leaning back to sit on his desk. “All I would say is what I would say to any: there is no shame in what the heart wants, so long as it doesn’t harm anyone.”
“But that’s the thing,” I said. “I’m worried it will. Hurt me and hurt them, if I actually pursue something with any of them and still can’t make up my mind.”
Miguel was cleaning his glasses on his shirt “Have any of them asked you out personally?”
“No.”
“Have you kissed any of them?”
“Miguel! No.”
He returned his glasses to the bridge of his nose with a shrug. “Why worry, then? Perhaps nothing will come of your acquaintance.” He flicked his brows up. “Perhaps everything.”
I spent a few more hours there, updating Miguel and getting updates. His life was a gradual unspooling of time. From the first time I’d visited here a few weeks after I’d been taken away until now, Miguel was unchanged, like a reassuring statue.
And so, I left his place, reassured. Telling myself that there was no point in worrying. I’d probably never hear from them again.
6
Bradley
“For Christ’s sake, really?” I muttered to myself.
As the feline strolled across the street, I revved my cruiser’s engine. But the cat only fixed me with a bored look, walking even slower now.
Not only did I get the shitty evening shift since Kingston has a ‘dentist appointment’ (aka parked in front of Halo) and Wyatt had ‘laryngitis’ (also in front of Halo), but now I’d been called into some wedding drama and a freaking fat tabby cat had to saunter in front of my car.
Finally, the cat on the curb, I barrelled ahead, flipping on the siren. What the hell, why not. The faster I got this thing over with, the better.
As the Greystone castle-esque building came into view, my scowl deepened. Out of all the places to be called into.
I parked, got out, and made my way there, feeling Deja-vu nipping at my heels annoyingly.
All the guests were massed outside, murmuring, weeping, and bitching. I strode through them, to the man waiting by the door, the one who’d presumably called me.
He looked like the KFC man, only he wasn’t smiling.
“Damn boy lost his temper. He’s not armed, though, just locked the door and destroying everything he can get his hands on. Won’t listen to no reason. Reagan. Reagan Lafferty’s his name.” He shook his head darkly, then pointed through the open gold-gilded doors. “He’s in there. Third door to the right.”
I strode through without another word. There were a few other people lingering, watching me with wide eyes.
Her Protectors: A Reverse Harem Romance Page 3
