Chapter 4
CHAPTER 4
BEAU
T his is Kiss County.
People fall in love here, don’t they?
It’s the first thought that crosses my mind as I open my eyes, a half-formed idea stirring somewhere deep down. I don’t know why it strikes me now—maybe it’s because I’m waking up beside her, hoping, as always, that today will be the day things feel easy between us again.
Or maybe it’s because of my second thought this morning.
Malcolm.
I look across the cabin just as he’s strapping on his coat and boots, tiptoeing so as not to wake us. He slips outside; the door closing with a muffled creak. Jessamy stirs, lashes flickering open, watching as he heads out into the cold. She sits up, still dazed with sleep, her eyes following him to the edge of the porch.
“Did you sleep okay?” I ask, lowering my voice to keep the quiet of the early morning.
She smiles, her gaze soft. “Yeah,” she mutters, nodding, though something about her answer feels absent. Not untrue, but like maybe it isn’t the whole truth, either.
I reach for my cellphone by my pillow. For a moment, I’m surprised by the lack of notifications or texts before I remember where we are, how far from civilization we’ve gone. Unreachable.
“We should get dressed,” I say, wiping the sleep from my eyes. “Get back on the road.”
Jessamy agrees with a quiet nod.
Soon, Malcolm’s silhouette reappears through the frosted window. He lumbers in, bringing a cold rush of air along with him. As Jessamy and I pull on our coats and gather our bags, I pour a second cup of coffee, already half-braced for whatever waits on the road to The Harmony Center.
“Well,” Malcolm says, stomping his feet on the mat, “looks like you two are staying put.”
“What?” The word drops from my mouth, a hollow thud of disbelief.
“Really?” Jessamy asks, her voice lighter, like she’s relieved to hear it.
“Is it the car?” I ask, dreading his answer, remembering the very expensive-sounding grind of metal against the trees.
Malcolm crosses the room toward the fireplace. “The car is fine,” he says. “A little beat up, but fine. It’s the snow. It ain’t letting up soon and those roads are nothing but ice. Sorry, but you’re not going anywhere.”
No discussion. Just facts.
I step to the window, needing to see it for myself, but all I can make out from here is a vast, unbroken blanket of white from here to the invisible road. Snow drifts down, delicate yet relentless. A freezing cold seeps through the windowpane, as if trying to reach through the glass. A sense of stillness clings to everything here—slowing us down, forcing us to be… stuck.
Just us and him.
“You don’t mind us staying?” Jessamy asks, her coat already shrugged off. She brings her coffee close to her face, the steam billowing up in gentle waves. There’s an eagerness in her tone, and she waits for his answer with a small, hopeful smile.
Knelt by the fireplace, Malcolm hovers his hands by the flame. He glances back at her, offering that calm, knowing smile of his.
“I don’t mind,” he says.
She returns his smile, and for a moment, there’s a light in her eyes that I haven’t seen in… well, a while.
“Go fish,” Malcolm says.
With nothing better to do but stay warm, Malcolm broke out a deck of cards.
And a bottle of whiskey.
The heat of the fire wraps around us, a strong contrast to the freezing storm outside. Jessamy squints at Malcolm, playfully scolding herself as she draws a card from the deck in the middle of our circle by the fireplace.
“Your turn, Beau,” she says, shielding her cards with a sly little smile.
I glance at the three queens in my hand. “Do you have any queens?” I ask her, hoping she pulled the final queen in her last draw.
“Dammit,” she mutters, playfully handing over the card.
I chuckle, laying the complete set down in front of me, feeling a rare lightness as I claim my small victory.
Across the circle, Malcolm eyes us over the tops of his cards. His expression is calm, but his gaze flickers like he’s observing more than just a game. “You two play card games often?” he asks.
Jessamy shakes her head. “Not really,” she answers. “I actually can’t remember the last time we did anything like this.”
“I can,” I say, glancing at her. “Any twos, Malcolm?”
He hands me two of his cards, and I add them to my growing stack.
“When?” Jessamy asks me.
“Our first Valentine’s together.” I can still feel the warmth of that night; the two of us camping out in my dorm room while a storm raged outside, the sound of her laughter filling the cramped room. “There was a storm then, too. Knocked out the power for a night or so.”
“Oh, right!” she murmurs, the memory bringing a faint smile to her lips.
“Your first Valentine’s, eight years ago?” Malcolm asks. “That’s a long time to go without playing games.”
“His job keeps him busy,” Jessamy says.
“Do you have any fours, Jess?” I ask, hoping to steer the conversation away, the tension creeping into my shoulders.
“Go fish!”
I draw a card from the deck — the king of hearts — and tip my head toward Malcolm, eager to pass the turn.
“What do you do, Beau?” he asks instead.
I hesitate, the weight of the question pressing on me. “I’m in real estate,” I say.
“He’s being vague on purpose,” Jessamy chimes in, her eyes a little brighter from the whiskey. “He’s the lead architect in a multi?—”
“Jess,” I interrupt.
She stops, looking down at her cards, a flicker of frustration crossing her face.
Malcolm’s gaze shifts between us, his voice calm and easy. “You don’t like talking about yourself much, do you?” he asks me.
“Do you?” I counter.
“More of a listener myself,” he replies. “Jessamy mentioned yesterday that your family was wealthy. Is it their company?”
I reach for my drink. “Yes,” I admit, feeling the drink burn as I swallow. “It is.”
“And they keep you busy,” he says, still watching me with those quiet, unsettling brown eyes.
“They do, I guess.”
“Very busy,” Jessamy murmurs. “Practically twenty-four seven.”
“That’s not true,” I say, catching her pointed look beside me, the fire’s warm glow reflecting in her green eyes.
She holds back a sigh. Maybe it’s the whiskey. Or maybe it’s that we’ve gone over this a hundred times before.
“Beau,” Malcolm says, cutting in. “Do you have any kings?”
I hand him the one I have. “What about you, Malcolm?” I ask, the words a little tighter than I intend. “What do you do all the way out here?”
“I get by,” he says, also incredibly vague, but neither of us seems keen to call him out for the moment.
I stare at him, noting his youthful, unlined face. Can’t be much older than myself, by my estimation. No scars. Not visible ones, anyway.
Malcolm sips from his glass, his cards close to his chest. “Any sevens, Jessamy?”
“Oh!” She laughs. “Go fish.”
His warm laugh matches hers, and for a moment, she’s almost back to the Jessamy I remember.
“How about you?” he asks her. “What do you do while he’s working?”
She looks down. “I work in a café,” she says hesitantly.
“You run a café,” I say, trying to give her the credit she deserves. “She started at the bottom and worked her way up.”
Malcolm gives her a nod. “Is that right?”
“Yeah,” she murmurs, her gaze lingering on the cards.
“That’s something to be proud of, Jessamy,” he says, his words gentle, sincere.
“See?” I say, watching her closely, hoping to catch a flicker of the pride she once had. “She’s an artist, too. A painter.”
She keeps her eyes down.
Again, Malcolm gives her a warm smile. “Really?”
“No,” Jessamy murmurs. “I used to paint, but not anymore.”
My chest twinges. I say nothing.
“Why’d you stop?” Malcolm asks, his cards dangling downward, his wrist limp as he focuses on her.
“Just haven’t felt inspired in a long time, I guess,” she says. “I have my job. Beau has his job. Neither of them leave much time for anything else.”
The hit lands squarely, and I shift in place. “Let’s not go there, Jess,” I say.
“Why not?” She straightens, holding her cards tighter. “We’re both stuck here, and Malcolm doesn’t mind listening. Do you, Malcolm?”
He shakes his head, calm and unwavering. “I do not.”
“So, why not?” she presses me, her words turning into a challenge.
I exhale, searching for patience. “Because you’re tipsy,” I say, noting her empty glass. “And you don’t know what you’ll say.”
She gives a hollow laugh, her eyes glittering with defiance. “You mean you’re scared of what I’ll say. Like how your snotty family hates me.”
“They don’t hate you.”
“Finger paintings.”
“Finger paintings?” Malcolm repeats.
Jessamy plows through, ignoring my glare. “The first time they saw my paintings, I overheard his mother tittering with her friends. She called them finger paintings.”
“She didn’t mean that as a bad thing,” I say.
“How else was I supposed to take it, Beau?” she asks.
“Fun! Whimsical!”
“Trash,” she spits. “She thinks they’re trash.”
“Who cares what she thinks? I think they’re beautiful. Isn’t that enough?”
She looks away, turning toward Malcolm instead. “His mother tried to set him up at the company Christmas party,” she tells him, her tone bitter. “Last year.”
“Jess,” I warn, but she ignores me, her words spilling out.
“They keep him at that job all day and night,” she says, her voice dropping to a raw, weary tone. “And away from me.”
“That’s not true.”
“We never see each other anymore. I’m up at the ass crack of dawn to open the café, and he barely gets home before two in the morning most nights.”
“Come on?—”
“We haven’t had sex in three months.”
“Jessamy!”
She inhales, her anger fading to a dull sadness. Her green eyes lose some of their fire, her lashes fluttering as she blinks away unfallen tears.
Silence presses down on us, as heavy as the snow falling outside. The crackling fire fills the space where her words linger, sharp and painful.
“Beau,” Malcolm finally says, his voice steady. “Is that true?”
A rush of heat climbs my neck, shame mixing with frustration. And whiskey. “Yes. But…” I struggle to find the words. “The rest of it isn’t true. Yes, I work a lot. But it should slow down soon.”
Jessamy scoffs softly, disbelief written all over her face. She’s heard that before, after all.
“It will,” I insist. “Another few months. That’s all I’m asking for.”
“And then we’ll move out of the city?” she asks, her voice tired. “We’ll buy a house? Start a family? Or will you find another excuse to wait?”
“Jess, it’s not that I don’t want to?—”
“It’s that they don’t want you to— with me.”
“No!” I abandon my cards to face her, desperation clawing at my chest. “I don’t know where you got that idea, but it’s not true. And that thing at the Christmas party was just a misunderstanding.”
“Yeah, right,” she mutters, her eyes on her cards again.
“Nothing happened. I swear on my life.”
“Do you have any threes?”
I grab the cards from her hands, startling her. “Jessamy,” I say. “What do I have to do? What proof do you need?” Her gaze wavers, so I pinch her chin, forcing her to keep her eyes on me. “I’m with you, Jess. Just tell me what you need.”
Her eyes glisten. “I need my husband.”
I fold our hands together. Her skin is soft and cold, trembling with a nervous energy. “I’m right here.” My voice catches as I whisper, begging her to hear me. “Okay? I’m here now.”
Jessamy presses her trembling lips together.
“And when you return home?” Malcolm’s voice cuts through, his words landing with a punch to my gut. “Will you go back to the same old routine?”
The truth in his tone grates against me. I clench my jaw, choosing to keep my focus on Jessamy. My wife. Only she matters.
“Your wife has told you what she needs, Beau,” he continues despite it. “If you don’t provide it, someone else will.”
“I know that,” I say, his comment leaving a mark on my pride.
“Then, show me.”
My stomach twists as I look over at him. His face remains unreadable, every movement deliberate, like he’s orchestrating this scene with expert precision.
“Excuse me?” I ask.
Malcolm folds his cards, gently tossing them to the floor before standing up. He walks around us and sits down in his chair by the fireplace. With his hands folded in front of his chin, he looks at us on the floor and says, “Show me you can give your wife what she needs.”
“Clarify,” I say, barely keeping the edge out of my voice. I’m pretty sure I know exactly what card he’s fishing for, but I’m giving him the benefit of the doubt. Just this once. “Now.”
Confusion reflects in Jessamy’s eyes, her gaze shifting between the two of us as her spine stiffens.
Malcolm doesn’t blink. “Give your wife an orgasm,” he says, every word stabbing my pride even further. “Or someone else will.”
My jaw clenches. “Someone else meaning you. Right?”
He doesn’t answer, but his silence says enough, his expression a twisted invitation.
“Is that your game here?” I ask, as every muscle in my body tenses. I push up onto my knees, bracing against the anger burning in me. “Is that why you hide all the way out here in your little cabin, you sick fuck?”
“Beau,” Jessamy says, her voice so small as she reaches for me.
“I’m just trying to help,” Malcolm says, his tone irritatingly composed.
“Help?” I spit the word. “Are you fucking serious?”
Jessamy raises her hands. “Okay. Everybody just… calm down for a second.”
“He’s a pervert, Jess!”
“I… don’t think he is,” she says.
I shake my head at Malcolm; the moment casting a dark shadow over all of us. My stomach churns, my mind wrestling with it. “We’re leaving,” I say, pointing to our bags near the door, ready to escape this place.
Jessamy looks at me as I stand up. “What?” she asks. “We have nowhere to go, Beau!”
“I’d rather brave the elements than be subjected to this bullshit!”
A heavy silence falls behind me as I grab my bag and sling it over my shoulder.
“Really?”
I turn back, drawn to the pain in her voice. She’s still seated in front of the fireplace, her body outlined in flame.
“You’d rather die from exposure,” she says, “than fuck me right here and now?”
The words slam into me, and I can barely swallow past the sudden heat in my throat. “That’s not what I said.”
“That’s exactly what you said.”
“That’s not what I meant!” I let my bag slide off my shoulder to the floor. “You’re my wife.”
“I am.” The intensity of her stare grips me, challenging everything I thought I knew. “And I still will be afterward.”
“Jess, this isn’t the time for one of your jokes.”
“I’m not joking.”
I snort, unable to believe it. “You want to do this? You want to have sex in front of some stranger?”
Jessamy glances at Malcolm with a kind of recklessness I’ve only ever caught glimpses of. “Yes,” she answers.
“Why?”
“Why not?”
“It’s… it’s wrong!” My voice stumbles. I scramble for logic, for any foothold that makes sense. “And you’re drunk.”
“I’ve had one drink,” she counters, her voice a steely calm. “And what’s so wrong with it? We’ve done it before.”
Malcolm’s brow rises with an almost amused curiosity.
“Jessamy,” I say, my tone a warning.
She turns to Malcolm, recalling the memory with a hint of satisfaction. “His junior year in college,” she says. “We were fooling around in his dorm room when his roommate came home early.”
“Jess.”
“And he didn’t leave.”
I clench my fists. “Stop.”
But she goes on, her gaze playful yet piercing. “You told me once that you sometimes think about that day while you’re alone in the shower,” she says, her words cutting me open, leaving me raw. “Is that still true?”
I bite my tongue, not wanting to answer.
Malcolm slices in, authoritative, almost coaxing. “Beau,” he says, “is that still true?”
“Yes,” I admit, shame and desire blurring together until I can’t tell where one ends and the other begins. “But that doesn’t mean?—”
Jessamy pushes onto her knees, her movements quick and deliberate as she peels her sweater over her head and tosses it aside.
I’m trapped in the moment, unable to look away, powerless against the pull she has on me. She slips off her undershirt, leaving only her bra. The flickering firelight catches the curve of her bare shoulders, highlighting her in the most vulnerable, provocative way.
“Jess,” I breathe, my pulse hammering in my ears. “What are you doing?”
“I need my husband, Beau,” she says as she reaches behind her back.
Utterly hypnotized, I watch my wife undress. She casts off her bra, exposing her bare breasts, her nipples hard and pointed in the cold. Then she unzips her jeans, pushing them down with a quiet resolve before kicking them away.
Jessamy lies back down on the blanket. She stretches out by the fire, her skin kissed by the orange glow, and she waits for me.
For her husband.
As Malcolm watches.