Chapter 6
During the two hours (not one) my wife takes to get ready for the lunch I’m trying to arrange now, I also think on surveillance. I want to hire it out, but having to speak with random people and make my own arrangements sits as well with me as a hot bucket of spilled coffee on my jeans.
I dislike making arrangements with people I don’t know and have a trust-issue streak a mile long, which is likely why I’m sitting here tapping the laptop, contemplating calling my brother, Blake, and asking him to call his Serbian connection, that one data guy who can sift through the security footage for me.
Ruminating on my feelings about the damn footage, I realize I don’t quite want to know if she had a man over until tomorrow. I choose not to know. I want to spend my day in blissful ignorance. I opt to have this thought of her with another man fester inside me for a while longer.
I also realize my wife mesmerized me within the first five minutes of meeting her.
I remember the moment as clearly as if it’s happening now.
We were at the gala dinner. My brother Blake had just told me he was getting married to a woman I don’t know.
Seeing as I have trust issues, I immediately called her out on gold digging and proceeded to threaten her, not giving a rat’s ass that she might actually become my sister-in-law and hang around for the rest of my natural life.
Not that I’d know how they’re doing. I was on a fucking business trip, and Blake and I never discussed his new married life.
I should’ve asked him. I should’ve asked how he is doing.
I pick up the phone and dial Blake, then check the clock. He should be on his lunch break, which is good because he can actually be interrupted now and not at other times. Blake’s the most time-anal person I know.
“Hey,” he answers and opens his camera.
He’s at one of the restaurants we own by the bay.
A pretty brunette woman shows on the screen. Vanessa waves. After the way I behaved when I heard of their engagement, I don’t know why she even greets me. Clearly, she forgives easily. I slide right into the conversation.
“Hey, lovebirds,” I say. “How’s it going?”
Blake wipes his mouth. “As well as a well-tuned clock.”
I bet. Blake’s disciplined streak stretches back to when he was seven and started first grade.
Because he and Bishop went to school at the same time, and Blake wakes at the same time every day (holidays, weekends, no matter), he would also impose the same discipline on Bishop, who indulged Blake’s habit of waking at the crack of dawn.
But then came one Easter Sunday, and when Blake insisted on getting up at 7:00 a.m., Bishop hurled an alarm clock at Blake’s head.
The nurse stitched the cut, and Blake still has a small scar right above his left eyebrow. The good part about his madness? My brother is a walking timer, and he shows up and executes like a fine Swiss watch. Some say he’s obsessed with time. I say he’s a money-making machine.
“Wanna come down for lunch in an hour?” Blake asks.
I purse my lips. Princess and I have to eat, and I was gonna take her out. Why not spend time with Blake and his wife? “I’ll try to make it in an hour.”
“We’ll wait for you.”
My eyebrows shoot up. “You will wait?”
Blake nods. “Sure.”
I bring the phone to my face to be sure it’s Blake and not Bishop. They’re identical. I’ve never had a problem telling them apart, but now I’m questioning my eyesight. “Aren’t you on your lunch hour now?” I check the clock.
“At one thirty.”
“You moved the time?”
“Mmhm.”
“Did you have brain surgery?”
“He got married,” his wife says and comes back into the picture. “So did you. How is Benny doing?”
“She’s well. Thank you.” I clear my throat.
“You want to tell me why you called?” Blake asks.
The fact he knows I didn’t call to shoot the shit bothers me, and it never bothered me before.
In fact, I haven’t even called my parents since Blake’s engagement announcement.
I never call a single person I care about to ask how they are or to shoot the shit.
I call only when I have something important to say.
“Hudson?” Blake prompts.
“Hm?”
“Time is wasting.”
Ah, Blake at his finest. “I’d like your guy to go through my security footage.”
“Sure. What’s he looking for?”
“Anything.”
Blake lifts an eyebrow, and I spot the tiny scar from childhood, reminding me again of the Easter Sunday Dad wasn’t home. “Time frame?”
“Last three weeks.”
He smiles. “I see.”
We are brothers. I know him, and he knows me. I don’t have to explain much of anything. I’m looking at the security footage of my wife while I was away. It is what it is.
“Deadline?” he asks.
“Yesterday.”
Blake’s jaw works. He’s glitching. No deadline. Blake can’t function right now.
I chuckle. “If he can have it back to me tomorrow morning, that’ll do.”
“Twenty-ninth, then. I’ll pick the hour. Consider it done. Anything else?”
“Nope.”
“Try to make it to lunch,” he says.
“See you soon, Hudson.” His wife waves. “Say hi to Benny for me.”
Since everyone calls her Benny, I’ll stick with Princess. She’s my little princess. Nobody else can call her that.
My princess strides down the steps, wearing something new. Black leather tights, a fuchsia crop top, and a flimsy bra showing the curves of her big breasts. They’re perky with hard nipples that I clearly see through the thin cotton.
“What the fuck are you wearing?” I ask.
“Clothes.” She sashays past me as if I’m the butler and stands by the door. I open the door for her (I am the butler, apparently) when my phone pings.
My brother and I share a schedule, and this alert sound is his fifteen-minute warning for when he thinks I’m gonna be late. I don’t know why I agree to do anything with Blake. Or my wife. “Half of Chicago will want to fuck you.”
“I only care about my better half.”
In the open doorway, we stand there, complete strangers, and yet she’s trying to get closer and tell me she likes me while I’m the same ol’ asshole I’ve always been.
“I worry about shooting someone,” I say.
She pats my shoulder. “Don’t bring your gun, then.”
I laugh as we walk out to the car.
“Hey, Hudson,” she says as she slides into the front seat. “Were you ever in the military?”
“Navy. Why?”
“Just wondering.”
As I drive off the property, I ask. “Do you want to hear about that? The time I spent in the navy?”
Benny turns in her seat and gives me her attention. “I want to hear about everything.”
And so I tell her stories, realizing I’ve never actually had a woman ask me anything about me before. My princess is special.