3. Eric
ERIC
“Max, you’re such an asshole. A first rate, manipulating, stinking pile of shit.”
“Tell me how you really feel.” My brother actually laughs.
To my credit, I sat through the rest of the meeting in total silence. I only made one noise, the moment my brother happened to mention when Alex was leaving for Hawaii. I made an honest-to-god choking sound when he said that the conference starts in forty-eight hours.
I’ve been railroaded into traveling five thousand miles. And now that Alex has left the building—escorted by my father and Scout—I can finally tell my brother exactly what I think of his plan. “Of all the asshole maneuvers you’ve ever pulled, this is the assholiest.”
He snickers. “Come with me. Upstairs.”
“Why?” I snarl. “It’s not enough that you’re sending me to Hawaii against my will? You have to march me around your office, too?”
He rolls his eyes. “I thought you might want to play some ping-pong, that’s all.”
I make an angry noise. But the truth is that smashing a ball into my brother sounds pretty good right about now.
The jerk calmly tosses a few bottles into the recycling bin and then holds open the conference room door for me. It’s a brilliant move on his part because out here in the center of the suite, I can’t yell at him without sounding like a dick.
“Hey, Eric!” Shelby greets me as we emerge. “How were the tacos?”
“Great,” I say because none of this is Shelby’s fault. “But now I have heartburn,” I mumble.
My brother walks me past the main elevators to a smaller one just beyond.
He presses his palm against a metal plate on the wall.
There’s no call button here. This elevator only responds to Max and a few of his closest associates, and it’s the only way to get to his apartment on the penthouse floor above us.
The door opens immediately, and we both get in. As soon as the doors close again, I’m back to giving him the business. “I can’t even tell you how uncomfortable this is. So awkward. So obnoxious. This is heavy handed, even for you.”
“A little,” he admits as the doors open again. “Dad said you’d be mad. But there wasn’t time to find someone else. Come on. Let’s play.”
I follow him into his ridiculous apartment where everything is brick and leather and ten times larger than necessary. The ping-pong table is in the center of the space, between the dining table and the living room furniture. I choose a paddle and take up a position at one end.
“A thousand dollars a point,” Max says. “But I serve first.”
“Sure.” Ping-pong is perhaps the only interest we’ve ever had in common. From birth, the two of us could not be more different. Which is why I’m continuously baffled by the fact that he and my father keep trying to pull me into the family business.
Max serves, and I return it, kicking off a fierce volley. We slam the ball back and forth seven or eight times in a row before I’m able to put one out of his reach near the corner of the table.
He pauses before serving again. “It’s a week in Hawaii,” he says. “You don’t have any better plans.” Then he serves, the bastard.
“You don’t know that,” I snap, my eyes focused on the ball. “And why blindside me?”
“Because it works,” the infuriating pissant says.
I will kill you with my bare hands. But first I’m going to destroy him at ping-pong. Our volley lasts twice as long this time, but after a dozen returns, I’ve lulled him into a false sense of security. Bam. I sear his backhand again. He gets the paddle on the ball, but his return misses the table.
I chase flying objects for a living, after all.
“Nice one,” he says calmly. “You are going to help Alex, right?”
“Of course I’ll help Alex. And then I’ll never accept another lunch invitation from you again. Why would I, when you manipulate me? You could have just explained the situation, and then asked for my help.”
He leans against the table. “Because every other time I’ve explained a situation and asked for your help you turn me down.”
“Those other times it wasn’t Alex.” Even if she doesn’t remember me, I remember her, and her family’s kindness. They housed me at their beach mansion for eight weeks at a difficult time in my life.
Besides—only an asshole would let a predator menace an old friend. Maybe I’m self-centered, but I’m not an animal. Alex and I used to be friends. She was eleven that summer, going on thirty-one. She was fierce and clever and completely entertaining.
So this won’t be a boring week. And—not that I’m admitting this to Max—I can probably work out as hard in Hawaii as I can at home. With better scenery.
But there are a few details that don’t add up. “What’s the deal with this ex of hers? He was violent?”
“He’s a dickweasel,” Max says. “There are other complications, too.”
“Like what?”
“She’ll explain. What else are you going to talk about on the twelve-hour flight? You’d better go home and pack.”
“You’re just trying to get rid of me before I score on you again. You got what you wanted, and now you have other people to manipulate.”
He shrugs. “Your flight leaves at six p.m.”
“Six…today? The conference doesn’t start until Thursday!”
“Sure, but she took meetings for Wednesday, and there’s a six-hour time difference. Alex needs to acclimate.”
I make a noise of rage. “You arrogant, controlling, manipulative motherfucker.”
Max’s eyes go to his smart watch, where I’m sure he gets an incoming message every seven seconds. Ignoring the insults, he asks, “She honestly didn’t recognize you?”
“No!” I bellow.
He glances up and smiles. “Ouch.”
I want to choke him. I really do. It might be the end of me, though. This fucking apartment is probably equipped with a mechanism that senses danger. If I lunge for him, the ping-pong table would probably swallow me whole and digest me slowly. Like a high-tech Venus Flytrap.
“Just tell me why,” I say. “Why me? Anyone could stand next to Alex and ward off her ex-boyfriend.”
“Because you’re real,” Max says, simultaneously typing about ninety-eight words per minute into his watch.
“Your story checks out. Professional athlete. Friend of Alex’s family from way back.
You don’t have to fake anything. Even your ill-fated meeting this spring fits with the story. Old friends who reconnected.”
Or failed to. When I roll my eyes, I catch a glimpse at the clock on the wall. It’s titanium, and probably doubles as a grenade launcher. In this place, nothing is exactly what it seems. Except for the time, which is pushing three o’clock. “Fuck me. I really do have to go home and pack.”
And here I thought I was going to spend the evening watching violent movies in my underwear and eating take-out. As one does. But now I’m getting on a twelve-hour flight?
How do I get myself into these situations?
“Safe travels,” my brother grunts. He taps the screen, oblivious to my irritation. “I just deposited two grand into your bank account. Good game. And don’t let that fucker near Alex.”
“I won’t. Jesus.” Just because I don’t want this job doesn’t mean I won’t do it well.
This ex of hers hits women? If he so much as blinks in our direction, I’ll crack him in half.
And I’ll enjoy it. “Later, then.” There’s no chance Max wants a hug or to walk me out, so I just turn and head for the exit.
“One more thing?” he says.
I pause on my way to the elevator. “What now?”
“Don’t fuck her. She’s vulnerable right now.”
“Oh, please,” I mutter, remembering how quickly she shut me down in Florida.
Then I get the hell out of there.
I’m barely out of the building by the time Max’s travel coordinator starts sending me texts. Check your email for a packing list. Car arrives in 2 hours, 7 minutes.
I read the email on the train back to Brooklyn.
Pack the following clothing:
White dress shirt
Business suit in gray or navy blue
Silk tie
Dress shoes
Casual shoes
Resort wear for a 5-day stay. (Laundry service available)
Bathing suit, beach wear
Socks, underwear, toiletries
Technology and Identification:
Personal electronics and chargers
Passport
Weaponry and tech equipment:
K-Tech phone
Await further instructions and hardware.
I’m on the road with my team eighty nights a year. It’s a hard way to live, and probably goes a long way toward explaining why I’m single.
But the upside? Packing a suitcase is as easy as breathing. Within thirty minutes of stepping into my apartment, I’m done. Then I ask the front desk to hold my mail. That takes three more minutes.
Then? I search my brain for anyone else who might need to hear that I’ll be gone for five days, and I come up mostly empty. My calendar has me out to dinner with my teammates on Thursday night. But that happens seventy nights a year. I’m not sure they’ll even miss me.
Max is just lucky that I’m aggressively single.
The black sedan that Max’s travel team sends to pick me up is right on time. “I’m heading to the private air terminal at LaGuardia,” I tell the driver.
“Yessir. It’s been handled.”
Of course it has. This car was probably hired before I even turned up for lunch today.
What a dick my brother is.
Sometimes, my conscience adds. Max is a good man. A loyal man. In a foxhole, there’s nobody I’d rather have at my side. But he doesn’t do emotions like normal people.
He used to, I guess. When we were kids, he was pretty normal. We cried in the same Disney movies. He smiled as often as anyone else.
Something changed, though, after he went to work in Washington, DC.
My brother was a spy, even if he never admitted it.
“Intelligence analyst” is as much as he would ever say.
And that job wears on a guy, I guess. He spent several years in Washington before leaving whichever agency had crushed his spirit.
I don’t know the whole story. And he’ll never tell me, anyway.
When we reach the airport, my sedan pulls up behind an identical black sedan, whose driver pulls a mango-colored suitcase from the trunk.