Double Dare

by R. L. Mathewson

  cupped his cheek.

  “I’m not hiding who I am,” he bit out evenly as he glared down at his mother. “Marybeth and I got married three weeks ago.”

  His mother dropped her hand away with an exasperated sigh. “Sweetheart, there’s really no need to lie to me. I love you no matter what.”

  “Woman,” he bit out, forcing himself to take a deep breath before he continued and said something that he would regret later when his father hunted him down and beat the shit out of him for making his mother cry, “for the last time, I’m not gay!”

  “Darrin Bradford, we did not raise you to be ashamed of who you are!” she whispered softly, but no less firmly, the same way that she had when he was a kid and she was trying not to draw attention to the fact that she was seconds away from spanking him into the next decade.

  “I’m not ashamed of who I am! For the love of all that’s holy, woman, I’m not-”

  “I’m going to grab something to eat,” Marybeth suddenly said, cutting him off and cluing him into the fact that he’d married a disloyal woman.

  “Are you not going to come to my defense?” he demanded as the treacherous woman pulled her hand away and deftly snatched his wallet out of his back pocket.

  “No, not really,” she said, sounding bored as she relieved his wallet of twenty dollars before she tossed it back to him.

  “We took vows, woman!”

  Blinking, she looked up at him and said, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Marybeth,” he snarled her name in warning, but just like all those other times that she’d screwed him over for her own amusement, she ignored him.

  “Darrin,” she said, sighing his name heavily in a way that let him know just how much she was enjoying this, “it’s okay. She knows.”

  Eyes locked on his devious wife, he snarled the only warning that she would get. “Don’t.”

  “Darrin, Darrin, Darrin,” she said, tsking as she shook her head sadly as she reached up and cupped his face, “don’t hide who you are. Embrace the real you.”

  “I hate you,” he said, glaring down at his wife.

  “You know that you don’t mean that,” she said, giving his cheek a condescending pat before she dropped her hands away.

  “Oh, but I really do,” he said, glaring down at her even as he smiled that smile that he knew she would interpret correctly.

  Her eyes narrowed in an assessing manor as she glared right back up at him, obviously trying to decide if it was worth pushing him on this matter. After a minute and a groan, she reached back up, cupped his face rather violently, yanked him down and kissed him, right there in front of his mother and for the world to see.

  Christ, he loved this woman.

  He never wanted to let her go and if he had his way, he never would. Tilting his head, he deepened the kiss as his arms came around her generously curved body and pulled her close. For six years he’d waited patiently for the day when he was allowed to hold her in public like this and now that he had her in his arms he would do anything to whisk her back to their room where he’d pull her closer, kiss her harder, strip her out of her clothes and of course, get away from the crazed woman hitting him with her purse!

  “Ow! Why the hell are you hitting me, woman?” he demanded with a wince as he stepped away from his wife and ducked out of the way of the next swing.

  “Marybeth is your best friend and deserves better than to be dragged into this!” she hissed as she glared daggers at him. “If you’re not comfortable admitting who you are, that’s fine, but you do not drag sweet Marybeth into this!”

  Too stunned to speak, he glanced down at his wife only to find her biting back a yawn as she glanced over her shoulder towards the hotel gift shop. “I’m going to go grab something to drink,” she muttered, sounding bored while he stood there somehow resisting the urge to drag her over his lap and spank her beautiful ass.

  “Oh, a drink sounds like a wonderful idea,” his mother said, smiling approvingly before she murmured a goodbye to Patrick and shot him a pitying look and walked off, leaving him with the man still staring up at him.

  “I’m not gay,” he said, for some reason needing to say the words.

  “No, no of course you’re not,” Patrick murmured, not really sounding like he meant it.

  “I’m not.”

  Patrick blinked up at him. “Of course you’re not.”

  Eyes narrowing on the placating bastard, he snapped, “I’m not!”

  Patrick cleared his throat uncomfortably before he explained with a helpless shrug, “Look, you don’t have to worry about it. I didn’t want to hurt your mother’s feelings, but you’re really not my type.”

  He snorted at that, he really had to. “Like you ever had a chance with me.”

  “Sorry, I’m just not into….,” he started to say, only to let his words trail off as he gestured lazily towards Darrin and gave him another one of those damn shrugs that was really starting to piss him off.

  Before he could sprout any more bullshit, and they both knew that he was full of shit, Darrin held up his hand and shook his head with a long, sad sigh, “Let’s not play this game since we both know that I’m way out of your league.”

  “Butch is out,” Patrick said with a shrug as he pulled his phone out, clearly dismissing him, but he refused to be dismissed, especially by this little bastard lying his ass off.

  “I’m not butch,” he bit out, glaring down at the bastard giving him the brush off.

  “Uh huh, whatever you say,” Patrick murmured, absently shooting him an indifferent smile before he returned his attention back to the small cellphone in his hands.

  “I’m not!”

  “Okay, you’re not.”

  “I’m a fucking catch!”

  “Sure you are.”

  “You only wish that you could get someone like me,” Darrin snapped, not really caring that the other man had moved on.

  “Every single second of the day,” Patrick murmured dryly, clearly mocking him, but Darrin decided to pretend that he hadn’t heard his sarcastic tone.

  “That’s right. You do,” he said firmly, shifting his attention away from the poor bastard who just couldn’t seem to accept that Darrin was off limits to him and glanced around the lobby until he found his wife and the other lying bastard that he was going to have to deal with.

  Chapter 32

  “Why are you sitting on my lap?” Aidan asked even as he wrapped his arm loosely around her waist and helped himself to one of her chips.

  “Because I needed to talk to you,” she explained, handing him the small bag of chips so that she could take a sip of her root beer.

  “And you couldn’t do that from the comfort of your own chair?” he asked as he stole another chip.

  “No,” she simply said as she reached in the bag and grabbed a chip.

  “And why’s that?” he asked, waiting patiently for her to move her hand away so that he could grab another chip.

  “Because your mother’s apparently playing matchmaker and this seemed like the most effective way to get her to give us a little privacy,” she announced with a careless shrug as she grabbed another chip.

  Aidan went completely still as he shot a frantic look towards his mother, back to her and then over to Darrin who seemed to be trying to convince Patrick of something until he finally looked back at her. “Oh God, Darrin’s going to kill me.”

  “Probably,” she murmured in agreement as she glanced back at the gift shop and contemplated getting another bag of chips, but just as quickly dismissed it and decided to grab something to eat when they left the hotel.

  “Why exactly is she trying to push us together?” he asked, reaching into the small bag with a shaky hand as he sent another wary glance at his younger brother, who even she had to admit had always seemed to take immense pleasure in fucking Aidan over. She would never forget that time that Darrin had convinced all their brothers to pretend that Aidan was invisible for a year, she reminisce
d with a small smile and another chip.

  “Because she thinks that Darrin and Reese are gay,” she said with a shrug as she took another sip of soda.

  Clearly startled, Aidan’s hand froze halfway to the bag. “And why is that exactly?”

  “Jason and Trevor,” she simply said, because with the Bradfords, that really all that needed to be said.

  “Ahhh, I see,” Aidan said with a knowing smile that was a touch smug and would probably get his ass kicked if Darrin saw it.

  “Look, we don’t have much time,” she said, shooting another glance over to her husband to find him glaring down at the man clearly bent on ignoring him. “I need to talk to you about something.”

  “What’s on your mind?” he asked, frowning down at the empty bag with a slight pout that would have normally earned him an eye roll and probably another bag of chips to get him to stop pouting, but not today.

  Today she needed answers.

  “I want to talk to you about In Vitro Fertilization again,” she said, forcing the words out of her mouth and pretending that it was an option for her, because otherwise…

  God, she didn’t even want to think about what it would mean if she couldn’t do this for Darrin. She just couldn’t. She needed to do this for him, to give him the baby that he dreamed of so that she could tell herself that she deserved him. She couldn’t stomach the idea of sentencing him to an existence without children and grandchildren, because she knew that no matter what he said or did, she would never be good enough for him.

  “Marybeth,” Aidan said softly, dropping the empty bag on his lap so that he could take her hand in his and gave it that same comforting squeeze that he’d given her the last time that they’d had this talk, “I’m sorry.”

  Pretending that she still had some hope, she ignored the concerned expression on his handsome face and plowed on, hoping that there was something that she could say that would fix this. “There are studies out there, new experimental drugs that might help. They’re making breakthroughs every day, Aidan. They might have found something that could fix this and allow me to have children. Your dad already had my eggs harvested and put on ice years ago so I have a viable option. Maybe there’s a drug or a new procedure that would allow me to have-”

  “You have to have a hysterectomy, Marybeth,” he said softly, cutting her off by saying the five words that she’d been dreading since she turned fifteen and realized that there was something very wrong with her body.

  “No,” she said weakly even as she frantically shook her head, willing him to take it back and lie to her.

  “I’m so sorry, Marybeth. I wanted to wait until we got back to tell you,” he explained, looking like he was going to be sick. “Your test results came back. Your uterus needs to come out, soon. It’s enlarged and covered with cysts. We need to test those and see…”

  But she couldn’t focus on what he was saying, not when he’d just destroyed her only hope for a real future with Darrin.

  “Excuse me, but I need to go lie down,” she said hollowly as she stood up, wrapped her arms around herself and somehow managed to walk to the elevator just as the doors slid open. She stepped inside, barely aware of the curious looks the other passengers were shooting her or the fact that Darrin and Aidan had followed her and were talking to her, asking her if she was okay. She wasn’t sure how she managed to get to their room, but she knew the moment that Darrin took her into his arms.

  It was the moment that her entire world shattered.

  *-*-*-*

  “Get the fuck off me!”

  “Tell me what you said to her!” he shouted, shoving Aidan into the concrete wall of the stairwell, struggling to keep it together.

  “I can’t tell you!” Aidan shouted back, trying to shove him away, but he wasn’t going anywhere, not until he had some answers.

  “Bullshit!”

  “You know that by law I can’t tell you anything!” Aidan snapped, trying to shove him away again.

  “And you know that I don’t give a flying fuck about anything but her! Tell me why my wife can’t stop crying!” he said, slamming his brother into the wall, more terrified than he’d been in life.

  She was crying…

  Marybeth was crying and for the first time in his life, he had absolutely no idea how to fix this.

  “I can’t!”

  “Tell me!”

  “I-”

  “She needs a hysterectomy,” their father said as he walked through the door and joined them on the landing while Darrin tried to wrap his mind around what he’d just said.

  “W-what?” he asked hoarsely as his grip around his brother went slack and his legs gave out.

  Before he could hit the floor, his father and brother had him. They dragged him over to the stairs and helped him sit down.

  “You’re fine,” his father promised, sitting down next to him as he put his arm around his shoulders. “Everything’s going to be fine, Darrin. I promise. She’s going to pull through this.”

  “Dad, we shouldn’t be talking to him about this,” Aidan said, sounding miserable.

  “We’re not, so go take your mother out to lunch for me so that Darrin and I can talk,” his father said, his meaning crystal clear.

  “I’d love to,” Aidan said with a slight hesitation that told him everything that he needed to know.

  His brother wanted to be the one that told him.

  “It’s fine,” Darrin said, scrubbing his hands down his face. Aidan hesitated for a few more seconds before he reluctantly turned around and left, making sure to close the heavy steel door behind him.

  “Are you okay?”

  He chuckled weakly as he shook his head. “Not even close.”

  “She’s going to be fine, Darrin. I promise.”

  He turned his head and stared into eyes so much like his. “You don’t know that.”

  “I know that I’d rather die than see anymore of my children hurt, Darrin, and since losing Marybeth would kill you, I plan on doing everything within my power to make sure that she lives to be a hundred.”

  Shaking his head, he looked away, needing a moment to clear his head. “You should talk to Danny.”

  “Don’t change the subject,” his father said, giving his shoulder one last squeeze before he pulled his arm away.

  “He misses you,” he said, needing another moment to prepare himself for whatever his father had to tell him.

  “I miss him, too,” his father admitted softly. “I just have no idea how to fix this, besides letting him beat the shit out of me for what I’ve done to him.”

  “Have you tried talking to him?” he suggested, hoping that his father took the first step so that they could put this bullshit behind them. He hated the estrangement between his father and brother and would give anything to fix it.

  “I can’t seem to stop fucking up where your brother is concerned.”

  Darrin glanced back at his father to find him staring down at his clasped hands. “You still blame yourself for what happened to him, don’t you?”

  “Every day of my life.”

  “He doesn’t blame you, Dad. He knows that he fucked up, but I honestly think joining the Marines was probably the best thing for him,” he said, wondering when his father would stop beating himself up over what happened to Danny.

  “That doesn’t change the fact that I should have handled things differently,” his father said, shaking his head.

  For several minutes they both sat there, staring at the faded marble tiled floor until Darrin said the words that he prayed wouldn’t destroy him.

  “Tell me about Marybeth’s condition.”

  Chapter 33

  “Can’t we watch something else?” Duncan asked as he held the ice cream sundae out to her that room service had graciously delivered along with over two hundred dollars worth of food thanks to Lucifer’s credit card.