37. Kicked Out
Chapter 37
Kicked Out
Griff
“Kai, how are you, my boy?” A man with an American flag pin on his lapel came at me, hand out for a shake. He had one of those faces that meant I was in for five minutes of small talk, before I was obliged to introduce him to my father, where this man would invariably ask for a campaign donation, or some other governmental favor.
Problem was, I had no idea what his name was. Mike? Mitch? Mark?
“Hello, sir,” I said, going for the deferential youth persona, as if I was just happy to be here. I wasn’t.
And why the hell was Sierra taking so long with Taz?
“Hello, I’m Kaleb,” My brother materialized out of the ether and plopped himself beside me. “I don’t think I’ve had the pleasure…”
We were tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum.
“I’m Makem Smith,” the old man obliged. “From the great state of New Hampshire! I was just coming over to say hello and inquire after your father.”
Like clockwork.
“Our father is up on the top deck, probably smoking a cigar,” I lied. My father was probably in the downstairs study, which also had a deck. Though he was, indeed, probably smoking a cigar.
“Well, that sounds fun. I think I’ll go join him,” Makem said, giving us both a polite nod. “It’s swell to see you boys.”
He clapped us each on the arm, before leaving.
Kaleb looked at me and rolled his eyes, and I shrugged, “Their elevator pitches are getting shorter.”
“It must be the old generation’s need for immediate gratification.”
“Damn their loud music, and palm pilots,” he said, dryly. “Good to see you, big bro.”
“Good to see you too.” I said, and without turning my head commented, “Nice tie.”
“Think anyone will notice?”
“Nope.”
My brother had a very subtle scarlet “A”. Which, on its own, was not meaningful. But the presence of paint blotched looking circles, all hidden within the texture gave a very punk rock impression of the Anarchist sign. It was, no doubt, a quarterlife crisis rebellion against our father and everything he stood for.
Unfortunately, no one in this lauded gathering were likely to notice.
“Listen, Kaleb…” I finally turned towards my brother. “You’ve got my back, right? I know you and I don’t always see eye to eye, but when it comes to our parents…”
“Oh, Jesus. Did you get married without telling them?”
“Close, but no cigar.”
“Oh, shit!” Kaleb said, amusement coloring his features.
“Shh!” I said, “It’s all new, and I don’t want mom scaring her off.”
“Bad news, brother,” Kaleb said, tilting his whiskey glass in front of him, as if he was pointing at something, but I wasn’t sure what. “It’s not mom you have to worry about. It’s… her. ”
“Speak of the Devil and the Devil will come,” I groaned, just as her voice swept over me like CS gas, choking me with its Ralph Lauren musk.
“Kai, so sweet to see you,” Kristin said, coming over to adjust my tie. I batted her hands away and rolled my eyes.
I clamped my mouth shut, ever walking the tight rope of being cordial, while also not slapping her in the face.
Kristin, leggy, blonde was perfect for some social climbing weasel. What had I ever seen in her? Even back then, during our white-tie wedding, with champagne in the Grand Acadaemia ballroom, facing the lake, and filled with two thousand of our parents’ closest business associates and potential campaign donors, I had been sick to my stomach. The clenching in my gut, and the way I white knuckled through our arrangement still made every fiber of my being tense up that I feared I’d cramp all over.
An arranged marriage. An arranged marriage that I thought was real. An arranged marriage that was designed to put together electoral votes for the perfect candidate for the country’s highest office. An office I didn’t even want.
“Nothing to say?” Kristin’s curved brow shot up, and if you didn’t know her, or us, you’d think she was sweetly making conversation.
That was what she was good at. Seeming sweet, and all-American. Wholesome.
“Nope,” I said, taking a deep pull of my whiskey, hoping she’d get the hint.
“Hey, Kristin,” my brother said, his smile somewhat genuine. Like he was giving her a lifeline, but she ignored him.
“I think you and I need to talk,” she said, and I laughed.
God bless her, she didn’t flinch, though I could tell she wanted to. She was made of plastic.
“So talk,” I said, after I caught my breath.
“The end of our marriage wasn’t just my fault.”
I laughed even harder.
Too hard for the quiet society we had gathered around us. I was being downright rude, as people around us looked at the spectacle I made.
“I didn’t know that you knew him,” Kristin said, stoically trying to fight the blush that crawled up her cheeks.
“ That’s your takeaway? You think it would have all been fine if I didn’t know who you hooked up with?” I laughed again, downing my drink in one gulp.
“No! But you can’t tell me that you were faithful either.”
“Bullshit! I never cheated on you,” I said, putting a finger in her face.
She stared at it, and almost rolled her eyes. It was more expression than she normally had.
“If you hadn’t before, you would have,” she said, her eyes the color of fucking steel.
“Bullshit!” I said, loud enough that heads turned again.
She looked around, glaring at anyone who dared eavesdrop until one by one, the conversations around us resumed.
“You and I were always supposed to be a team,” she said through her teeth, reminding me of a snake, its tongue slithering out.
“We were,” I insisted, though my delivery did not match my lack of conviction.
“No, we weren’t,” she said shaking her head.
She looked… sad. I didn’t know Stepford Wives were capable of that emotion.
“Tell me you weren’t already in love with that… Guerro. ” She spat out Trinity’s name as if it replaced a different word. One that started with a b and rhymed with glitch. “You talked about her all the time. Far more than you ever spoke about me. Tell me that you weren’t in love with her, and I will take full responsibility for everything that happened between us… even to your mother.”
I froze. I wanted to say it. I wanted the words to spill out, so that I could march her over to Kamilla Griffith and have her say that the failure of a marriage lay all on her shoulders.
But I just… wasn’t sure.
I hadn’t touched Taz before that one night. I hadn’t even thought of her that way. I had forced my mind to compartmentalize her into “teammate” and “friend” only .
But being “in love” was different that being a “lover”.
Even if everything had been innocent, I couldn’t disavow my firefly. Even in the past.
“That’s what I thought,” Kirstin said, in that perfectly clipped, eastern seaboard private school voice. “I’m sorry I cheated. But you can’t say that you were faithful either.”
I heard the rattle of a knob as the double doors on top of the golden, Titanic-like staircase opened and in sauntered my bedazzled partner in crime – Agent Sierra. The one-sleeve dress hugged her every curve and pushed up her generous bosom. She knew it. Everyone knew it.
But my eyes trailed to the bemused, silver and white angel that came behind her.
Taz’s hair was down, pushed over her shoulders, the curls landing right at her small breasts. She wasn’t slim, or leggy - but she had the wide shoulders, and slim waist of an athlete, along with the rounded hips of a woman who was used to physical labor. She came to the banister, and lay her hand on it, her eyes scanning the crowd. She didn’t find me right away in the sea of monkey suits, and I took the time to marvel at her perfection.
The dress was… vaguely bridal. Probably Sierra’s idea.
She frowned as she scanned the crowd, and I stood, waiting, until those rich colorful eyes landed on me.
Her smile was slow, like the sun peaking over the horizon right before night turned into day. Like Stand-to, before the first move.
She smiled, her eyes wrinkling, as she mouthed a gentle, “hi”.
But then that light disappeared, just as her eyes snapped to something behind me. I didn’t need to know what she had seen. Fucking Kristin.
I wasn’t going to do this. I wasn’t going to let that happen. I wasn’t going to give her a chance to run - not that she could. We were on a boat.
Though I wouldn’t put it past her to dive off and swim back to shore. I knew she could do it. Special Forces weren’t known to be crap swimmers.
“That’s what I thought,” Kristin whispered, and I felt her disappear.
Or maybe it was the cloud of her perfume drifting away.
“Oh, so…” Kaleb said, coming to my side. “That ring is an engagement ring? Really? It looks like you got it from a flea market.”
“When the hell was the last time you went to a flea market?” I asked.
“My new house is furnished with nothing but flea market shit!” Kaleb chuckled, as he sipped at his drink. “So, are you introducing me to my future sister-in-law, or should we wait until she can confront the whole family at once, and get ambushed by Kamilla?”
I had no idea.
All these swirling thoughts of her, and my family, had to go on the backburner, when a waiter dropped a tray, and yelled for everyone to get down, and the murmuring whisper was replaced by screams.