Chapter 7
CHAPTER SEVEN
Dexter
Hollie Lumen. She’d finally confessed her last name. It had only taken two days and God knows how many messages. She was a challenge indeed.
“Have you fallen victim to Fortnite?” Beck asked me as I set his water in front of him.
“What are you talking about?” I replied and slid my phone onto the table and went back to the bar for my whiskey.
“You’ve looked at your phone about ninety times since I said hello three minutes ago,” he said as I pulled out the stool and took a seat. Beck and I were almost always the first to arrive at our weekly mates’ night. It gave us a chance to catch up before everyone else arrived.
“No, I haven’t.” I had been kind of caught up with my phone in the last few days, but Hollie was funny. I looked forward to her messages.
“Yeah, you really have. Is work okay?”
“Yeah, it’s fine. How’s Stella?” I knew mentioning the love of his life would be the best way to throw him off the scent of the phone obsession I didn’t have.
“Oh, you know. She blows my mind every day.”
“You know if you say things like that, it’s almost mandatory that I have to make an oral sex joke.”
“Why? Because you’re fifteen? Or you’ve turned into Tristan?”
“You just make it so bloody easy. It’s ridiculous.
” He’d left the door open, true, but we both knew Stella was the best thing that had ever happened to Beck.
I was pleased for him. I knew what it was to find the love of your life.
I’d been there. And Beck had done better than me.
He’d hung on to his and was living their happily ever after.
“You need a woman who blows your mind,” he said. “That’s your problem. It’s all about the sex for you, but there’s more to a relationship.”
“Sorry, did you just become my mother?” Ever since Beck had finally sorted it out with Stella, he’d become the world’s biggest proponent of serious relationships. I got it. But he needed to understand—I wasn’t looking for Mrs. Daniels. That ship had sailed.
“You talked sex with your mother? I just want to see you happy.”
That’s why I couldn’t even stay mildly irritated at Beck. All he wanted was for all of us to be as happy as he was. Judging by the grin on his face, that was pretty bloody happy.
“So, what’s going on?” he asked. “You stressed about the competition?”
“No, that’s not it,” I replied. I had nothing to hide.
And maybe if I threw him a bone, he’d get off my case.
“I’ve actually been messaging a woman I want to take to dinner.
She’s funny. And . . . pretty.” I couldn’t help but grin like a ten-year-old who had been given a United season ticket as I thought about her.
“This is news. You never talk about women.”
“I’m not talking about her. I’m just explaining—”
“I’m not complaining. Who is she? Do we get to meet her? I have to tell Stella.”
He grabbed his phone from where it lay face down on the table. Before he could start to gossip with Stella, I pulled it from his grasp. “None of your business and no. We’ve not even been on a date yet. Put a hold on that hat.”
“Wait, what do you mean you’ve not even been on a date? You lost your bollocks and haven’t asked her?”
“When I lose my bollocks, you can take an ad out in the Times.”
“So why haven’t you been on a date?” he asked.
It was a good question. We had chemistry.
And I didn’t normally have trouble getting a woman to have dinner with me.
But there was something about Hollie that made her scared to say yes.
That only made me more intrigued about what lay beneath her beautiful surface—what had made her so scared.
I wanted to take her to dinner more than ever. “I’m not sure.”
“So, you’ve asked her?”
“Yeah. She said no and then confessed that she’d wanted to say yes.
We’re messaging back and forth.” I’d thought about calling her but I didn’t want to spook her.
I couldn’t tell Beck that, because Beck would ask me why I cared—and I wouldn’t have an answer.
I also wouldn’t have an answer if he asked me why I was checking my phone incessantly in case she messaged me back.
I wouldn’t have an answer if he asked me why my stomach flipped whenever a message finally came through.
“The thrill of the chase,” he said. “I was never like that but—”
“It’s not that.” I had never been into the chase. “That’s Tristan, not me.”
Beck nodded, and I could tell by the controlled movement he was dying to ask more questions.
“I don’t know what it is,” I said. “She’s American.
And . . .” I had dated American women before, so that wasn’t the reason I liked Hollie.
It was more that she managed to be both wide-eyed innocent and devilishly suspicious at the exact same time.
She was direct enough to refuse to give me her number and to ask for my card, but not so open that she’d tell me why she was refusing to have dinner with me
“Maybe it’s because you like to torture yourself a little,” Beck said, fishing out the lemon from his water and placing it on the table. “Bloody lemon.”
“I like an easy life. That’s why I end things whenever they get heavy. I’m not into self-torture at all.”
“That’s total bollocks,” Beck said. “I can’t let you get away with that, mate.”
“What?” I said, offended. “I like women. I like sex with women, friendship with women, but I’m not into torture. I’m not a masochist, physically or emotionally.”
Silence echoed off him in waves. Beck rarely held back telling me what he thought. None of us did. Meeting when we did—facing the challenges we’d faced together—had created an intimacy between us that meant we were brutally honest with each other, and as open as it was possible for six guys to be.
“You don’t agree?” I asked him.
“What about Bridget?” he asked.
“What about her?”
“You like to torture yourself about her.”
“I blame myself. That’s not the same as torture.” I’d been young when it had all fallen apart, but that was no excuse.
“I’m not sure about that. I think you two breaking up has become almost mythical to you.”
“What the fuck are you talking about? It is what it is. We were together. We were happy. We were in love. I screwed it up by ending things over some stupid argument. When I finally got my head out of my arse and tried to get her back, she’d moved on.
I’m an idiot. That’s not self-torture. That’s facts. ”
“Well they’re not the facts as I see them.”
I liked Beck. Loved him. Not just like a brother, but as my best friend and confidante. Tonight, though, he was pissing me off. I checked the time on my phone. Where the fuck was everyone?
At that exact moment Gabriel swept in. “I swear to God, if I was ever gay, it would be Gabriel I’d have the hots for,” I said, watching him as he strode over to the table.
“Is this your coming-out party?” Beck asked.
“You’re gay?” Gabriel asked, looking at me as if he’d just asked me whether I was enjoying my water.
“Nope but if I was, I think you’d be my type.”
Gabriel rolled his eyes and pulled his pint of Guinness from the small circle of drinks in the middle of the table. “Good to know.”
“He’s trying to distract us because I just told him some home truths.”
“Interesting,” Gabriel said, taking a seat beside Beck. “Go on.”
“No, you didn’t. You just floated some ridiculous theory about me enjoying self-torture.”
Gabriel’s gaze flitted between us like he was at Wimbledon.
“Because of the Bridget thing,” Beck said as if that explained everything.
“Oh, right, yes,” Gabriel said as if he completely understood.
“What do you mean, yes? Beck is being ridiculous, right?”
“Look, mate. I just got here—you two keep your playground fight between yourselves. I’m going to sit and enjoy my Guinness until some sane people arrive.”
“You’ll get splinters sitting on that fence,” I replied. “Beck just said I like to torture myself about Bridget and I said stating facts wasn’t the same as self-torture.”
“I’m not sure it’s self-torture,” he said, giving Beck a look that said don’t be so dramatic, “but it’s weird how you just write yourself off as never being able to find happiness because things didn’t work out with the girlfriend you had at nineteen.”
It took all my effort not to stand up and walk out.
Was he serious? These guys knew me inside out, or at least I thought they did.
Maybe they didn’t at all. Maybe I knew them.
Understood how each of them ticked, what their strengths and weaknesses were, but perhaps that knowledge wasn’t reciprocated.
Because I wasn’t torturing myself about Bridget.
I was accepting responsibility. I wasn’t bitter or broken by what happened.
I just understood that I’d messed up and would never be in love again.
“What we had was special and that doesn’t come along twice in a lifetime.
I’m completely at peace with that. No torture. No drama.”
Gabriel started to chuckle. “Yeah. No drama at all.” He raised the back of his palm to his forehead. “I’ll never love again. It only happens once in a lifetime.”
Beck began to copy him. “She’s the only woman in the entire world—Jesus, mate, you were basically a kid. Get over yourself.”
Harsh.
I leaned back in my chair as if pinned by a sudden g-force. Honestly, I thought I’d been the opposite of dramatic as far as Bridget and I were concerned. And it wasn’t as if I’d sworn off women or anything. I’d rarely been single in the last decade.
I looked up to find Tristan glancing around our silent table.
“What did I miss?” he asked.
“We’re giving Dexter shit,” Beck said.
“I think we should stop,” Gabriel replied, shooting me a sideways glance. “If you want to torture yourself, that’s your business. We’re here for you whatever.”
“So, what’s your solution to me being dramatic about Bridget? I barely talk about her . . .”
“We’re talking about Bridget again?” Tristan asked before collapsing on his stool. Gabriel pushed him a pint of beer.
“You make it sound like I’m mooning around, constantly talking about her—”
“No, you don’t talk about her,” Gabriel conceded and I gave him a nod in appreciation. “It’s just that the women you hang out with—your relationships are all a reaction to Bridget. Still.”
“That’s a good way of putting it,” Beck said. “They’re a reaction.”
“You assume you’ll never meet anyone to be with long-term—commit to, fall in love with—because of Bridget.”
Well that was true. “I’m not complaining. I’m not heartbroken.” I was an idiot, that I could accept. But it’s not like I was pining over lost love.
“Doesn’t mean you’re over her,” Beck said.
“No,” Gabriel corrected. “Getting over her isn’t the solution. You need to get over your relationship.”
I was pretty sure that was a distinction without a difference. I’d had enough. I’d come out tonight to relax and kick back, not to suffer a character assassination.
My cell buzzed in my hand.
Okay dinner. But only if it’s fondue. And you must not distract me at competition events. We’re strangers if we ever bump into each other outside of cheese. Agreed?
Finally. And even though I didn’t understand her terms, I didn’t care. I needed to be distracted from thinking about whether I was still hung up on Bridget.
“Did I tell you that David was there at the launch of the competition?” I said in a final ditch effort to stop these guys going on about Bridget.
“David who?” Tristan asked. It had been a long time since I’d brought up my brother in conversation, so Tristan’s confusion could be forgiven.
“Your brother?” Gabriel asked.
“Apparently,” I said. Seeing his name on the list of attendees had reignited the anger inside me.
“I guess he and Sparkle are still colluding. Fifteen years later, they’re still making money by rereleasing and rehashing my mother’s designs.
I guess they have a lot to be grateful to him for.
” Maybe he’d taken some kind of shareholding in the company when he sold them my parents’ business? Were we competitors now?
“Sparkle? You think he took additional money from them?” Beck asked.
“It wouldn’t surprise me. He has the moral compass of an alley cat. Why else would he be there? I looked him up. He still works at a bank. Not in the industry.”
“Wow, that’s low,” Beck said.
“And fraud,” Gabriel pointed out, ever the lawyer. “Potentially. If he was offered an incentive to sell to Sparkle and didn’t tell you about it.”
“He didn’t tell me about any of it,” I reminded Gabriel. I hadn’t gotten a say in what happened to my parents’ business. David had made all the decisions and had taken the opportunity to betray me in the process.
When I’d entered the competition, I’d every intention of winning. I’d wanted to carry on my parents’ legacy—to link my business with theirs by bejeweling the next generation of Finnish royalty. But now winning wasn’t enough.
I was going to have to destroy the competition.