45. Nora
CHAPTER 45
NORA
The next evening is our last one. It’s what the entire Lost Weekend has built to, and it hangs in the humid air, the scent of jasmine and anticipation. A poker table has been set up on the terrace outside the villa.
I have played poker before, but it was a good while ago, so I read up on the rules earlier today by the pool. The chips I’ve won during the days here are in my bag. A jangle of black and red plastic, and I slot them through my fingers.
Alex is already sitting at the poker table. One leg bent over the other, his hands braced against his shin. He still plays a lot of sports, and you can tell in the muscles bunched beneath his shirt. He’s the heir to a whiskey empire that practically runs itself. Too much money and too little sense.
He grins when he sees me. “You made it.”
“Of course.” I hold up my stack of chips. “Please tell me you guys will trash talk. I’ve been practicing insults in my room for the past half hour.”
He laughs. “That’s the spirit, lass. Come. Sit next to me. Calloway will be here soon. Our dear duke just went to get some more liquor. Your brother, I don’t know. Probably working on that deal he’s trying to close.”
“He does love to work,” I say.
“They all do. It’s their one failing.”
I sit next to Alex. “I’ve heard you guys can get pretty intense during these games.”
He nods to the pool behind us. “Someone’s going to get tossed in there tonight.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“Because I’ll be the one doing the tossing,” he says.
I roll my eyes. “God, I walked into that one.”
“You did, and I thank you for it.” He looks past me, and his grin widens. “Look at that. He finally tore himself away from ruling his empire.”
Rafe joins us. He’s holding a drink in one hand, and in the other, he’s got a small box. He sits to my right. “You sure you remember how to play?”
“Yes. You’re the one who taught me, so if I’m bad, you know whose fault it is.”
Rafe lifts an eyebrow. “I like the attitude.” He nods at Alex. “We’ve got over a decade of seeing through each other’s bluffs. No one knows yours. Use that to your advantage.”
“If you coach me too well, I might win,” I tell him. “Do you really want me in charge of where your next lost weekends will be?”
Rafe runs a hand through his dark hair. “You can try. And don’t go head-to-head with Alex in recklessness. He’ll win every time.”
“I’m sitting right here,” Alex says. “And thank you.”
“That wasn’t a compliment.”
“Sure it was.”
“Are you giving your sister tips on how to win?” West asks. He’s appeared opposite me, hand gripping the back of a chair. The gravity shifts beneath my feet, and I straighten up in my seat.
He slept in this morning. He cursed when we woke up, kissed my forehead, and slipped out my door as quietly as possible.
“Or he’s ensuring I lose,” I say lightly. “I can’t be sure yet.”
“I’d never. Family over everything,” Rafe says, but he’s wearing a crooked grin that tells me he’s full of it.
“Where’s James?”
“He’s tending his dukedom,” Rafe says.
“Shut up,” comes a tired, cultured voice. James takes the seat between Rafe and West and puts a bag on the table with a clink. “Let’s get this over with.”
“The enthusiasm,” Alex says. “It’s heartwarming to see, really. You love us so much.”
“I put up with you all,” James says, “because I must.”
West glances from person to person at the table before looking at me. “There’s a buy-in. It’s not our earned chips, though.”
“It’s much better,” Rafe says. “You buy into the game in one of two ways. Wager a one-of-a-kind object of high value… or share a secret. Something the others will want to hear.”
James tips the pouch and out falls a thin diamond necklace. It settles snakelike on the table. “Heirloom. It’s priceless, et cetera and so forth.”
“No secrets for us this time?”
“No.” James crosses his arms over his chest. He’s gotten a tan during our days here, his skin not as pale as his hair. “I enjoy the fallout from yours far more.”
I stare at the diamonds in the center of the table. That’s worth… I can’t even fathom. And an heirloom? Was he joking? If the buy-rate is either something that priceless or a secret, the secret must be good.
“You guys are sadists,” I say. “Or masochists. I can’t decide.”
“Alex’s the masochist, James’s the sadist,” Rafe says. “I’m also buying out of the secret this time. Here.”
He offers up an Artemis watch from an old collection, and I stare at it. How many of those do we have left? It’s one of the originals, from when our grandfather started the small Swiss clock shop. Before it became a giant and that giant was turned into an empire.
Alex drums his fingers against the table and looks around at us all. “Right. My turn, then, and I’m going to preface it with… I’m sorry.”
“Here we go,” James says. “If either of you gets so angry that we don’t finish the game, I’ll stop servicing your planes for a full year.”
Alex looks over at West with a single shrug of his wide shoulders. “Sorry, mate. So, Vivienne’s last party? The Paradise Lost themed one that only Calloway could attend? He took Nora as his date, and I’ve heard that they looked real cozy next to the poker table.”
“Alex,” I whisper.
His blue gaze slides to mine, and there’s a real apology there. “Sorry, lass. There are no secrets here, I’m afraid. And I do very much want to win.”
West is staring at my brother with a steady, unfazed expression on his face. Like we haven’t done anything wrong. Like my heart isn’t pounding out of my chest.
“You took her,” Rafe says in a low voice, “to one of Viv’s parties?”
James groans. “And that’s why you should have brought a physical item, Alex.”
“I forgot.”
“My cousin was there, and I wanted to send a signal,” West says evenly. “She was safe the entire time.”
“It was just a party,” I tell Rafe. “It was fun.”
He keeps looking at West. “Looked cozy?”
“You wanted us to fake date.” His voice is cool and controlled. Like we might as well have been talking about the weather. He reaches out and grabs his chips. Stacks them with one large hand, deft fingers shifting. “So we pretended to date. You know who goes to those parties, Rafe. People talk.”
“That’s what we wanted. For people to talk,” I remind my brother. My heart is still in my throat, and the threat of a confrontation hanging in the air tastes sour. Maybe I haven’t gotten as used to arguing as I thought.
Rafe sighs. “It was a risk.”
“Marginally,” West says. “Nora can speak for herself too. She just told you she had fun at the party.”
“I did, and the stalker is my problem too. I don’t want to avoid parties just because of some asshole,” I say. My tone is placating. “Let’s play.”
My brother hesitates only a second before nodding. “Fine. Just two more buy-ins. Calloway?”
West’s gaze meets mine for a second before he looks back out at the ocean. He could say anything. So could I, when it’s my turn next. Unless he takes that secret we share first and spills it to this table and lets the crumbs fall where they may.
“The Paradise Lost party,” he says, “was at the Whitman house.”
Alex groans. “Fucking hell. That’s a bit on the nose.”
“You didn’t tell us earlier because you wanted to save it for a buy-in,” James says.
West’s gaze slides to him. “Yes.”
He nods, a faint look of amusement on his bored features. “I respect it.”
“Was Hadrian there?”
“I didn’t see him. But he was invited.” West’s jaw works once. “The place was half empty and trashed.”
“Fuck,” Alex repeats.
I look around the table and clear my voice. “He used to be your friend, right? When you were all at boarding school.”
“Once upon a time, yes,” West said.
There are unspoken secrets between them, tightening and pulsating in the air. I wonder at the four friends who are more like brothers, and the fifth one who fell away all those years ago.
It’s James who finally speaks. “He’s irrelevant tonight. Nora, you’re next.”
My gaze flickers up to West again and then over to where Alex is grinning. “The secret doesn’t have to be about me. Does it?”
“Sure doesn’t,” he confirms.
I meet West’s gaze. He’s watching me beneath those thick eyebrows, one scarred, one whole. Then I move on and look at my brother. “When Rafe was nine?—”
“Oh no,” he groans.
“Oh yes ,” Alex says.
“—he lost at Monopoly to one of our cousins and cried for six hours straight. He had to be carried upstairs and threw a fit in his room. What did you destroy? Books, right? Ripped out every page.”
“Yes,” he mutters.
“ Six hours?” James asks.
“I’m committed to making money. What can I say?” Rafe sends me a dark glare, and it doesn’t make me wilt. Doesn’t make me feel guilt.
I smile at him in triumph. “Whoops.”
Alex holds up his hands. “Look, mate, is that what happens every time you lose one of these games? Is that why you disappear for six hours?”
“Six hours,” West repeats, “of crying?”
“Thank you very much for sharing that with the group,” Rafe tells me in a pained voice. “I appreciate it so much.”
“I do.” Alex reaches out to pat me on the shoulder. “You’re playing with us every time from now on.”
My cheeks warm. “I could have done worse, Rafe.”
He mutters something unintelligible and starts dealing out the cards. Across the table, West’s eyes are on me. There’s a smile in them, and I don’t need to hear him speak to see the praise he’s sending my way. Well done. Heat spreads down my chest, pools in my stomach.
I lift my cards and keep them close to my chest. The others do the same. Alex groans, and James tells him to shut up and stop bluffing.
And so the game begins.