Chapter 9
Dawson couldn’t avoid having dinner with his two best friends, not after cancelling the week before. He’d look suss as fuck. He’d acted suspicious enough by spending the last four out of five nights not at home. It’s not like he hadn’t before, when he’d been dating someone, but he generally gave Sadie a heads-up that she had the house to herself. This time he’d behaved more like a child sneaking out than an adult doing what he wanted without having to tag his whereabouts every second of the day.
Mostly his own feelings twisted it into something else. Or it could be the fact that he was fucking Sadie’s brother behind her back, with no desire to stop. Which simultaneously made him feel like a piece-of-shit friend and had him craving more. Riley and Gideon were fucking catnip, and every time he told himself to stop, he found himself right back in their arms.
Sadie beamed from her place on a stool at the kitchen bench. “Well, look who it is. I’d almost forgotten what your face looked like. Forget where home is?”
“Google Maps just isn’t what it used to be,” Dawson retorted. “Hey, Darce,” he said, greeting the third friend that rounded out their trio.
At six-foot-ten and built solid, Darcy Timms was the biggest thing in the room and pretty handy at getting things off the top shelf. As a professional footballer in the AFL—a ruckman, no less—his height had more than a few advantages. And some hazards, including tripping over everything and smacking his head on the top of doorframes.
Darcy didn’t answer, all his focus on carefully pouring batter into a muffin tin.
“Guess he forgot who you are too. Bad luck, buddy.”
“He’s not even listening,” Dawson said. He tried to get Darcy’s attention again. “What are you making?”
“Yorkshire puddings,” Darcy said absently, concentrating hard, with a hint of his tongue peeking out between his lips.
“Where have you been, though?” Sadie asked curiously. “It feels like you’ve been sneaking away in the middle of the night like a thief. Something you need to tell me?”
Dawson slid the cooler bag filled with food he’d bought at the supermarket onto the counter. “I’ve been out,” he said defensively. He worked weird hours since a lot of the events that he worked on with his bosses could be any time of the day. And he could have a love life that didn’t need to be spread around like a Sunday newspaper.
“You’re being deliberately vague.”
“I’m being deliberately private ,” Dawson corrected. “And I’d like to keep it that way.” Not like he could tell her. Not until he’d worked out how to without losing her forever.
“Are you seeing someone new?” Sadie gasped with exaggeration, placing a hand on her chest. “Someone special enough that you’re keeping him all to yourself? That’s really selfish, Daws.”
“I hate being friends with you.”
“Don’t lie, you love it. Alright, keep your secrets. I hope we get to meet this paragon of perfection at some point?”
Not fucking likely. It wasn’t—he couldn’t—this thing with Riley and Gideon had to be temporary. He couldn’t hide a relationship from Sadie forever, that would be ridiculous. At some point, he would have to make a choice. Future Dawson’s problem. He wanted to enjoy the way that the two men made him feel, just for a little longer. He’d never meant it to go in that direction when he’d confronted Riley about his behaviour. Marshall had said his impulsiveness would get him into trouble one day. That day had come and gone even if he doubted Marshall had meant it this way.
“Come sit down, show me what food you brought. I”—she dragged the plastic bag already on the counter over to herself—“brought yo-yos for dessert.” She pulled a package of them from the bag and presented it with a flourish. “Ta-da. I stood in line for like half an hour at this place to get these; you’re welcome.”
The bakery sticker on top had a familiar logo. A popular place, all the way on the other side of town. Damn. It had been ages since he’d had anything from there—too much hassle to go all that way if he didn’t have another reason to be in that area.
“Can we have dessert now?” he asked. “I vote yes.” Sadie moved the container out of his reach right when he lunged for it. Rude.
“What did you bring?” she asked loftily.
“Y is a stupid letter. Why’d you pick it for today, Darcy?”
Darcy glanced up from stirring something in a bowl. “I didn’t.”
“The letter didn’t just fall out of the sky. You’re the one that texted it to us,” Dawson pointed out. That had literally been the whole text. Just “Y.” If it had been anyone else, Dawson would have been confused as fuck.
“I can’t believe that you still haven’t told us how you pick it, even after all these years,” Sadie said. “My bet is still on that you have a hat of them, and you just pluck one out every Sunday morning on your way to the shower.”
“There’s no hat.”
Did it fall out of the sky? If Darcy said he walked over a rainbow to a pot of gold where a leprechaun waited to let him know the letter of the week for alphabet day, Dawson would believe him.
“What did you bring?” Dawson asked. “Other than what you’re making.”
Darcy beamed and lifted a cooler bag from behind the counter. He zipped it open and pulled out a few stacks of containers, spreading them out.
“Forest made us glazed yams.”
Sadie reached over and grabbed a container, flipping it open before plucking one out with her fingers, the sticky food dripping on the counter. She took a bite and moaned, throwing her head back obscenely. “Oh my God, I love your husband.”
“Me too,” Darcy said, nodding seriously.
“We’d hope so, considering you married him,” Dawson said, snickering. He speared a piece and took his own bite. Damn. Along with being a great footy player himself, Forest sure knew how to cook.
“He said we should warm them, though,” Darcy said, concerned.
“This is fine,” Sadie said dismissively, grabbing another one. It wouldn’t be the first time they’d finished a meal standing around the kitchen counter because they hadn’t waited to serve it up properly.
“Riddle me this, though,” Sadie said, plucking out another yam. “Is it still technically Y if they’re glazed yams. Would that be considered G?”
“The yam is still the food. The glazed bit is just how it’s prepared,” Dawson said.
“It still starts with G, though,” Sadie insisted.
“You’re thinking about it too hard.”
Darcy finished pouring the Yorkshire pudding batter into the muffin pan and slid them into the oven. “That should be ready in twenty minutes,” he said, clearly uncaring about the semantics of alphabet day. He’d been doing it with his parents since he’d been a kid, so it probably never occurred to him to question the logistics of the choices.
Sadie considered the other foods in front of them and casually flicked off the lid for the yo-yos. “I think we could finish all this before then?”
“Is that a challenge?” Dawson asked. He’d take it. Everything on the spread said, “Eat me.”
“Fifty bucks says we can.”
“Who are betting against? I’m agreeing with you. Darcy?” Dawson gave him a fake scandalised look. “You don’t think we can?”
“No?” Darcy blinked. “Wait. Yes. What was the question? Yes and no,” he decided.
“You can’t pick both,” Sadie said at the same time that Dawson explained, “For if we can eat all the food.”
“Oh. It’s a lot of food, but I eat a lot—that’s why Forest packed extra—and Sadie is pregnant. So, yes.”
“Who are we betting against if we all agree?” Dawson wondered. “One of us needs to be contrary.” Not him. He planned on eating everything.
“Is that an ‘eating for two’ joke?” Sadie asked.
“You are eating for two? I’ve been reading books about this and—”
“You’ve been reading pregnancy books?” Dawson asked. “Is there something you want to tell us?”
Darcy nodded enthusiastically. “It says that you should see a doctor now if you haven’t. Also, that you might be tired. But you might not. And your morning sickness might be at its worst. Or it might not.”
“How decisive,” Dawson remarked, snickering. “Hear that, Sade? You might be tired, or you might not. You might have morning sickness, or you might not.” She definitely had the days that he’d been home.
“And it still looks like a tadpole but is starting to develop human-like features,” Darcy finished. “Such as—”
“An adorable tadpole, right?” Sadie interrupted, holding a hand to her stomach.
“The most adorable,” Dawson said if only to placate her. What did that even mean? It probably resembled a bean more than a person at this stage.
“A tadpole that looks like all me and not the idiot that donated his sperm.”
“Is that what we’re calling it now?” Dawson asked with a stifled laugh. “ Donating sperm?” If so, he’d experienced sperm donation frequently over the last week.
“It’s not like he was particularly good in bed,” Sadie said wryly. “What else should I call it? He thrust a few times, grunted, and went to sleep.”
“I do hope that’s not an accurate representation of your sex life,” Dawson said. “Because that’s just sad.” It couldn’t be true. She’d been with Richard for three years, and she liked sex. If it had been that bad, Dawson doubted she’d have put up with the rest of his sparkling personality that whole time.
Sadie made a face. “Let me keep my illusions, please. I don’t want to remember the good parts.”
“That’s not how Forest does it,” Darcy supplied helpfully.
“You know,” Dawson said slyly, unable to resist the perfect segue. “I have always been so curious about that. He is… a very solid man. How does he do it?”
Sadie slapped her hands over Dawson’s mouth and glared at him. Dawson’s stomach dropped uncomfortably. She looked like her brother when she looked at him like that. Almost fucking identical. He wished he didn’t know that.
“Don’t answer that,” Sadie said sternly. “Stop being a perv.”
“I think it’s a legitimate question!” Dawson protested through her hand. Darcy’s husband, Forest, who happened to be captain of the same team that Darcy played for, had been built with those Greek god statues in mind. Not as big as Darcy but still all solid muscles and thick thighs that could absolutely crush a watermelon. Dawson didn’t go for guys that big, much preferring the lean strength of Gideon, and Riley’s toned… all of him.
That didn’t mean he couldn’t be curious or appreciate the effort it took to maintain that kind of body.
Dawson tugged her arm down and blurted, “Is he a top or a bottom?” before she could jump in.
“We don’t have bunks, we sleep on the same bed,” Darcy answered.
Dawson really should have expected that. That was on him.
“Stop it,” Sadie hissed. “Forest will actually kill you, and then who will I get drunk to puke with me through my morning sickness?”
“I really think you need to find a Plan B for that,” Dawson said. His liver could only take so much abuse, and they’d already put it through its paces in their early twenties.
“And what should my Plan B be? Projectile vomiting all over Richard?” She sat back with a thoughtful expression. “Actually, that has merit.”
“I’d vote for it,” Dawson said. In fact, he’d set himself up somewhere nearby so he could record it and put it online for everyone to see. He’d never claimed to not be a petty person. It also meant no more drinking vodka until he couldn’t see straight. Only more bad decisions lay that way.
Sadie huffed and grabbed a yo-yo, taking a large bite, crumbs falling to the corner of her mouth and all over her chest and lap. “I kind of want to punch him in the face. Is that allowed?”
“You won’t get any argument from me.” Dawson plucked the last of her yo-yo out of her hand and popped it into his mouth. “I’ll hold him for you,” he said through his mouthful.
Sadie grabbed another one, unfazed. “I’d appreciate that. You in, Darcy?”
“Fighting gets me a suspension. And a fine.” His forehead wrinkled, and he stared intently at the Yorkshire puddings he’d just pulled out of the oven. “Ten thousand? Maybe half that? Under? They’re worse if you have a lot of them. I don’t have any. Nothing that’s not incidental. I got one when I elbowed that umpire in the face. They didn’t believe me when I said it was an accident. That was six thousand. Wren paid it for me.”
It had been the most satisfying thing Dawson had seen on TV for a long time. Some umpires just needed a good elbow in the face. And Forest had looked like he’d been about to do it with real intention when the umpire had gotten snippy at Darcy as he’d tried to explain.
“As if you’d fight during a game deliberately. But would you do it and cop the fine? For Sadie?”
Darcy nodded. “If you want me to?” he said tentatively.
“I feel dirty, like I’m trying to convince my elderly grandmother to run someone over,” Sadie said, face twisting. “Maybe you can stay home and bake us cookies for when we get back?”
Dawson agreed with that. Best to leave Darcy out of any major wrongdoing. He couldn’t even mention that he knew a cop now. Couldn’t because he got the real title of asshole here. Richard might be a stain on society who’d cheated, but he hadn’t lied to his best friend’s face. Wasn’t sleeping with her brother behind her back. It felt worse because in one night, Dawson had destroyed all of the trust they’d built from their years of friendship. And he kept going back for more.
“I don’t want to stop him from being a father if that’s what he wants—though I’m not convinced he really cares, and we won’t really know until they’re born—but I can’t help but think about the people that they could have had in their life and won’t. And is that my fault?”
Years learning Sadie speak didn’t help him with this one. “What are you talking about?”
Sadie shifted her hand, rubbing her still mostly flat stomach. “They have an uncle that they’ll never meet, the same way I never really got to meet him as my brother.” Her lips wobbled. “They’re a tadpole , and already somebody’s rejected them.”
“Hey, c’mon, that’s not fair,” Dawson said, guilt stabbing at him. “Nobody rejected the tadpole. It wasn’t—he didn’t—nobody got rejected.”
“That’s not true. He told me to leave, and he doesn’t want to be part of my life or even try to see if we could have some sort of relationship. What is that if not rejection?” She clenched her hand into a fist against her stomach. “Maybe I should go back, try to talk to him again? Give it another chance?”
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea.” The words were out of Dawson’s mouth before he’d had a chance to really think about them. Was he trying to protect her or himself? He obviously wanted to be in the running for “world’s worst best friend.” Going for gold.
“It can’t make things worse.”
It could, and Dawson couldn’t properly explain to her why. How much he’d fucked up, how much he would keep doing it until there was nothing left to salvage in the wreckage it created.
“You should give him some time,” Darcy said, eating some kind of potato dish—what the hell was it, that it started with Y?—out of a container, with a spoon. “It’s barely been a week, and it was big news. You needed time after you found out too.”
“A couple of days.”
“Not everyone jumps in feetfirst the way you do,” Dawson said dryly. “Some people actually need time to think.”
Sadie huffed. “How long?”
“I think that’s up to him? You left him your information, right? So that he could contact you if he wanted to?” At her look, Dawson’s eyes widened, lips parting. He knew that face. “Oh my God, you didn’t ? What the hell, Sade?” Even Dawson had left his number when he’d gone there. A good thing, too, since Gideon had been able to contact him, and he’d had the best sex of his life that night. And almost every night since.
“At what point was I supposed to give him my number and say, ‘Call me’? He had me escorted out like a criminal, remember?”
“If he wasn’t your brother, it would be an interesting meet-cute,” Darcy mused.
Sadie grimaced. “Really, Darce?”
“Just saying. Want some yakhnet batata ?” he asked, holding out the bowl. “I skip the first step and make it without the chicken; it’s still yum.”
“Now you’re just making up words,” Dawson said. “That’s not—those aren’t real words.” Smelled nice, though.
“You’re so uncultured,” Sadie said, taking the container and shoving it in his hands. “Try it.”
Not his usual fare, but not bad.
She leaned over, gathering a few bites of her own. “Maybe I could call, in like… end of next week? Just… test the waters? That’d be enough time to let it all simmer, and him to cool off?”
Darcy nodded. “That seems reasonable.”
What did Darcy know about reasonable? He thought hermit crabs were good pets. And he bought them hats.
Dread set in. A week. Is that all the time he would have with Riley and Gideon? He couldn’t say she shouldn’t; he’d only be saying it for his own benefit, and he’d dug his hole deep enough already.
“You really don’t think I should?” Sadie asked, misinterpreting his look.
Dawson tried to think of the response that would have come from him a week ago before he’d majorly put his foot in it. Before he’d gotten stupid drunk and confronted Riley and gotten his first glimpse of both of the men that had slid the ground out from under him too damn quickly. Almost quite literally led by his dick.
“Maybe two weeks?” he said weakly, feeling like the worst sort of person.
Sadie nodded thoughtfully. “Okay. I can be patient.” At Darcy’s look, she said, “I can, excuse you. I’ll even make it three weeks, just to prove you wrong.”
“Is this what we’re betting on now?” Dawson asked, trying to laugh off the flutter of panic rising in his throat. “How long before you cave?” How many days did he have left before this all blew up in his face, and no one ever spoke to him again? Would Darcy still talk to him? There was some sort of comfort in knowing that at least one third of their trio would still act like he existed after this. A tiny, miniscule kind of comfort.
“A hundred bucks and you’re on.”
Dawson took the bet and hoped to God that he lost this one because he needed more time. To figure out what to do, or who to spend it with? He didn’t know. Did it matter?
“Uh—I need to—make a phone call,” he said, standing abruptly.
“Right now?” Sadie asked, raising her eyebrows. “Are you alright? Did the potato go right through you? It’s okay, you can tell us. We’re all friends here.”
“What? No. It’s just for work. I’ll be right back. Leave me a yo-yo.”
“No promises.”
He rushed from the room, ignoring their concerned gazes. He slammed his bedroom door shut, leaning back against it. He took a deep breath, willing his rapidly beating heart to calm down. Before he could talk himself out of it, he called the last number he should have in his phone.
He blurted out, “I need to see you,” the second that Riley answered in his brusque tone.
A pause. “Right now?”
“Yes.” Please . The almost-unbearable urge clawed at him from inside.
“Just me?”
“I’ll take whatever I can get right now,” he said honestly. Did he want to see them both? Hell fucking yes, he did. The two of them together were his kryptonite. But expecting them to both drop everything because he needed to touch them seemed too much to ask.
Riley didn’t speak for a long moment, and Dawson braced himself for the inevitable rejection. Then he’d have to go back out there and pretend that everything was fine. Smile when Sadie spoke to him, act like he wasn’t betraying her in the worst way. Easier to ignore it when he couldn’t see her face.
“I’ll text you my address,” Riley said eventually. He hung up before Dawson could answer him.
Dawson closed his eyes, the squeezing in his chest easing enough that he could breathe. He shoved some clothes into a backpack along with some extra toiletries.
“Hey, there’s an emergency at work, so I need to head off—I don’t know when I’ll be back.” Please don’t notice the bag. “Eat all the food for me, and I’ll text you later, okay?”
“Okay?” Sadie said warily. “Tell Eli we said hi!”
Dawson nodded, feeling like the biggest ass.
It didn’t stop him from leaving.