Chapter Five
Graham
Why the fuck is Eli getting married way the fuck up here?
The thought has crossed my mind no less than twelve-hundred times since I shut down the bar, grabbed my shit, and caught a flight at the ass crack of dawn into Burlington.
Logically, I know the wedding isn’t happening in Vermont- that we’ll be driving into New York later this week for the ceremony and reception- but the sentiment remains.
What has possessed my best friend to submit us to the overly friendly, sweatshirts in June, tick infested rural hellhole that is Vermont?
I want to go home.
I want to turn around, book a flight using Eli’s card- I have a copy in my wallet for reasons- and get my ass back to South Florida. Maybe I can even make it back in time for the last show at The Pink Flamingo. A scotch and a cigar would be really fucking awesome right now.
Pulling my phone from the pocket of my hoodie, I scroll the wedding website for the fifth- okay, the sixteenth- time since I landed.
Poppy built the whole thing out herself using one of those online wedding planners.
It’s got everything from hotels in the area, to fun activities, to the wedding day schedule.
And of course, an entire page dedicated to the wedding party, of which I am a member.
There I am, smiling stupidly from a beach chair.
If I’d known this was what the picture was for I would have tried harder to look more charming and less like a degenerate.
I’m giving the camera scandalous smolder, hair a wreck from the water.
Luckily she cropped it so the way my bathing suit clung to certain places isn’t visible.
My name is accompanied by the title of Groomsman.
I was only mildly offended not to be offered Best Man, or at the very least, Second Best. But Rowan wasn’t in the running either now that Eli and Cristian are back on speaking terms, so I didn’t complain.
Afterall, if it wasn’t for Cristian sucking so hard at being a good boyfriend, none of this would really be happening right?
Though, sometimes I do feel the urge to punch that kid in the head for all the shit I saw him put Poppy through in the brief time I knew her as being in a relationship. I mean, what kind of fuck flakes on his girl’s twenty-first birthday party? The kind that deserve a punch in the head I reckon.
Scrolling just a little further, I stop, lingering several beats too long on the bridal party.
Poppy looks fantastic of course in a picture Eli took of her on their couch.
She’s in a sweatshirt with a glass of wine, her raven hair pulled into a high-pony and the biggest smile on her face.
She’s followed by Clara, her matron of honor, a professional shot from her last performance gracing the page. Then there’s her maid of honor—
I lock my phone screen, shoving it back inside my pocket. For warmth. My hands are fucking freezing. How is it this cold in June?! Unacceptable conditions. I’m filing a formal complaint.
“Where the fuck are you, Rowan?” I mutter under my breath. The older woman on the bench next to me throws some aggressive side eye. I take out a cigarette, lighting it just as a black Highlander pulls up to the curb.
The passenger window rolls down. “Can’t smoke in the rental,” Rowan calls across the cab.
Grabbing my bag, I tuck the cigarette between my teeth. “I’ll pay the fee,” I say as I toss my duffel in the trunk.
Sliding into the passenger seat, I immediately turn on the ass furnace and slap Rowan on the back. “Gracias for picking me up, big guy.”
“It was either me or Cristian, but Elias figured you’d be much happier to see my face than his.”
“Agreed, we see enough of his face everywhere we fucking look.” As if to mock me there’s a sports magazine in the glove box when I open it with guess who’s face on the cover. I hold it up, flicking ashes out the window. “Can he not go five minutes without a photoshoot?”
Rowan laughs pulling away from the curb to join the airport exit traffic. “He’s a good-looking kid and it makes him a fuck ton of money.”
I nod, sucking at my cigarette again while I look down at the picture. “You’re right. I should stop mocking him and start billing him for all the cleats and balls I bought him.”
The side eye Rowan throws me could melt snow. “How about you put it on Elias’ tab and call it even for all the times he’s thrown money at your problems.”
Okay, that’s fair…
“How’s our boy doing?”
Rowan snorts. “He’s marrying the love of his life in less than a week. How do you think he’s doing?”
I grin, flicking ashes out the window again. “Shitting bricks, huh?”
“Could built a house for a small family. Two bed, one bath, maybe a den.”
I snort out a laugh and a cloud of smoke. “And Poppy? How’s our little amipola doing?”
“Couldn’t be happier,” he smiles. “Not nervous at all, already fighting with Cris. They got in last night—” Rowan cuts himself off abruptly, turning my attention away from the smoke I’m blowing out the window.
They. Suddenly the cigarette isn’t doing its only fucking job which is to stimulate my brain in other directions of thought. They means Cristian didn’t arrive alone and I know only one other person we were waiting to fly in.
Rowan clears his throat. “Cristian is a welcome distraction for them both, I think.”
Sucking at my teeth I ask, “You saw his last game?” In an attempt to put the conversation back into safe territory.
“Of course. I watch all of them.”
I nod in agreement. “That last goal was sick.” I take another long drag.
“He’s really making a name for himself.” Rowan’s fingers make the leather squeal.
Silence permeates the air. I take another inhale, exhale a cloud of smoke. Fuck, I have to ask. “She got in last night too, didn’t she?” I murmur in Spanish.
The sigh that leaves Rowan is deeper than he is tall. “Yeah. Eli got them on the same flight.”
“And both arrived alive?” I smoke down the remainder of my cigarette, tossing the butt out the window. “Shocker”
“I believe Poppy already wrote both of their eulogies.”
“How unfortunate they’ll go to waste.”
I can feel Rowan’s eyes on the side of my face, but I refuse to meet his silent prying.
He doesn’t have to say it. We both know I don’t mean a word.
I fight the urge to light another cigarette as the quiet grows invasively louder.
Unfortunately, the question Rowan chooses to break the silence with is the one I’d prefer not to think on too long.
“How long has it been?”
Sucking at my teeth I mutter, “Since your wedding.” Rowan winces and I avert my gaze out the window to avoid his pity. I don’t want it nor do I deserve it. “And we’re not talking about it.”
The best quality Rowan possesses is that he knows when to just shut the fuck up even when he’s dying to check in, to make sure I’m not spiraling into dangerous territory.
Which I’m not. Spiraling, that is. I’ve never been more uninterested in my life. I don’t have a single goddamn care in the entire world as I light another cigarette and track the sun in beyond the mountain peaks.
We enjoy the remainder of the scenic drive in silence, separately surveying the rolling hills of the Vermont countryside.
It’s pretty, I’ll give them that. The trees and the wildflowers and the quaint little towns we drive through are all postcard perfect.
They don’t compare to Spain or Portugal this time of year, but it does what I expect Eli wanted for this week.
It’s a sweet escape, a place as far from all their woes as he was willing to make his family travel.
Even Rowan appears to breathe easier with every mile we gather.
I stretch out my legs to stop my knee from bouncing.
You’re here for Eli, I remind myself. Suck it the fuck up.
The truth is, I don’t do well in middle of nowhere, nothing to do places.
I don’t exactly do great in big cities either but for very different reasons.
Thanks to Eli and Rowan I kind of found my niche in Lightning Cove and the surrounding South Florida mainland.
No drama, plenty of distractions, a countless number of hobbies.
Where can I go python hunting way out here in the sticks?
We drive through another little town where some store owners are starting to open up shop, and I make what I think is an obvious observation.
“Are we the most exotic people to ever set foot in this county?”
Rowan snorts. “We?”
I glance between my hand and his. Okay, fair point. “What even made him think of this place?”
“I think Poppy used to come skiing here as a kid.”
Clutching my metaphorical pearls I gasp, “They didn’t go to Aspen?”
“Of course they did,” Rowan smirks. “The Winchesters have a resort, remember?”
How could I forget? The first-year Cristian told his dad he was going to learn to snowboard, Elias had rented out three rooms in my name just so he could be close by incase the kid broke his neck.
He didn’t- it was just his wrist- but for three days we’d holed up in those rooms, avoiding the Winchesters and watching the slopes through the best binoculars money could buy.
I was bored out of my mind. Rowan almost handcuffed me to the bed I was getting so antsy.
I’m typically not opposed to a little bondage, but Rowan is aggressively not my type. Too needy.
Mr. Cling pulls up along the side of the final cabin on a long, winding path to nowhere- seriously, whose idea was this- and pops the trunk.
The house, admittedly, is nicer than I expected.
Two stories with a wrap-around porch overlooking a lake encircled by towering trees.
There’s a firepit at the bottom of the sloping lawn surrounded by Adirondack chairs.
Two blankets are thrown over the backs. Not a single ripple disturbs the lake’s surface and in the distance…
“Was that a fucking falcon?!”
Rowan hands me my bag, clicking the trunk closed. “A hawk, maybe? Do I look like David Attenborough to you?”
Carnivorous birds, cabins in the middle of nowhere, no weapons because airplanes. Oh, and look at that, no phone signal. “This is how every cult horror movies starts.”
“You made it!”
I turn toward Eli coming down the porch steps and intercept his hug with my duffel. “Before you try to make me join a sex cult committed to celebrity elitism values, you should know I have absolutely no boundaries and will do butt stuff to you in a moment of weakness.”
“What,” Rowan groans, gripping the bridge of his nose. “The actual fuck is wrong with you?”
“Just establishing expectations.” I catch my bag when Eli tosses it back.
“No one would invite you to join a threesome, let alone a sex cult, Graham—”
“You’d be surprised.”
“You’re literally a walking STD.”
Glaring at his back, I follow Eli and Rowan up the stairs. “My dick is clean as a fucking whistle.” And whistle I do when I pause to take in the elevated perspective of the lake. “Not as clean as this view though, damn.”
“Nice, huh?” Elias smirks from the doorway. All the windows and the slider are thrown open to the cool summer breeze. “I bought this place for Poppy last fall. An anniversary present.”
“You bought your fiancée a cabin for your anniversary?” I snort, elbowing Rowan. “Tell us your rich without telling us your rich.”
Eli’s grin widens. “I didn’t just buy the one cabin, cabrón. I bought all the cabins.”
Blinking, I lean in. “Qué?”
“He bought the entire vacation estate,” Rowan explains. “This whole venue is his.”
“Puta madre- Wait, then why’d you say I had to sleep on the couch when I asked to room with you?!”
“Other cabins were already rented.” He shrugs, turning back inside. “I’m not kicking out paying guests for your freeloading ass.”
“Pendejo…” I turn to Rowan. “Where are you staying?”
He points a thumb over his shoulder. “Clara and I are down the hill.”
“How’d you get your own cabin?!”
He holds up his left hand where his black wedding band glints in the light, then shrugs. “And I negotiated a timeshare into my contract.”
Right, bodyguard privileges. “Shouldn’t his muscle be closer than three hundred yards?”
“Their room is upstairs.” He claps me on the back. “Any assailant would have to get through you and Cristian first anyway.”
“What the fuck is Cris gonna do?” I ask as I follow them inside. I drop my bag by the couch I assume will be my bed for the next week. Leather. Awesome. My back immediately gives a sharp twinge of protest. “Last I checked, your nepo baby doesn’t exactly have self-defense skills.”
“Pa’l carajo tú Tambien, pendejo,” the nep baby in question says as he comes through the side slider.
“Language, Crissy,” Elias sighs as his nearly thirty-year-old son sets down a drink caddy of coffees on the dining table.
Cristian just rolls his eyes, taking a sip from his cup as he settles into the matching armchair to my bed. Rowan goes in the opposite direction, following his wife’s bright laughter.
“Where are you sleeping?” I ask Cristian, noting there’s another bedroom at the end of the hall under the stairs. “I’ll pay you twenty bucks for the bedroom.”
“I don’t need twenty bucks, and certainly not from you.” He props his very expensive sneakers on the coffee table. “Nor can I help you,” he points up. “I’m in the loft.”
“Then who the fuck is in the bedroom—”
“Graham!” A petite body slams into my side, her raven pony-tail swinging wildly. “You finally made it!”
“Of course I did, Amipola.” I let my arm fall around her shoulders, kissing the top of her head. “I wouldn’t miss Eli fucking up his vows for all the money in the world.” Leaning down, I mock whisper loud enough for Elias to hear. “It’s not too late to run away with me instead—”
Eli yanks his giggling fiancée into his embrace, arms ensnaring her around her middle. “I’ll literally kill you, pendejo.”
"Language,” Cristian and I chorus. “Also,” I jab a thumb at the hall. “Why the fuck am I on the couch if there’s a spare room?”
Poppy’s brow furrows. “There isn’t a spare room.”
“Then who’s staying in there?!”
“I am.”
Time seems to lose all meaning, everything coming to a complete standstill at the mere whisper of a voice I haven’t heard in nearly two years.
I turn in time to see Rowan duck his face into his wife’s curls and Clara avert her gaze.
But I can’t. My eyes lock on the viciously cold eyes illuminated by the morning sun, nestled into the most sinfully beautiful face I’ve ever seen.
That face haunts my fucking dreams- the sharp cheekbones, the plump lips, the threaded brows.
Everything about it is immaculate, a testament to God’s craftsmanship.
Too bad it belongs to a self-serving fucking harpy.
“Dios mío…” I mutter.
“Good morning to you too.” Naomi holds up a heavy, brown paper bag. “Breakfast?”