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He doesn’t deny it. “The way I feel, it doesn’t make any sense. I know that. But…”
Dominic leans forward. “Carter,” he says gently. “Chloe was your sister, and you loved her. She was also not the greatest of parents. The way she died—can you really blame Noah for repressing that memory? But you are not her. You stepped up. You gave Noah stability. You surrounded him with love. No matter what happens in this damn custody case, Noah’s not going to forget about you. He adores you. He’s called you every single day. He can’t wait to tell you about his adventures. His memories of Chloe might be traumatic, but his memories of you aren’t.”
“Until I got into a shouting match with Ed,” Carter replies glumly. “I don’t know what he told the judge. What if it’s too late, Dominic? What if Noah doesn’t want anything to do with me again?”
“He calls you every single day,” Dominic repeats. “It’s not too late.”
Carter doesn’t respond. He lapses into silence, one he doesn’t break for what seems like a lifetime but is probably less than three minutes. Finally, he looks at me. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I shouldn’t have involved you in this, Gabby.”
Okay, now I feel like an asshole. I did one big-girl-panties thing today; time to do another. “You didn’t have to twist my arm too hard,” I respond uncomfortably. “I wasn’t doing it for altruistic reasons.” Ugh. Honesty might be the best policy, but it doesn’t make confessing the truth any easier. “Last Saturday, I played poker in New York, and things got out of hand.” I pause and reconsider my words. “I let it get out of hand. I was reckless and stupid. I lost almost a hundred thousand dollars.” I swallow the lump in my throat. “I figured that I could win some of it back here.”
I brace myself for their reactions. Shock. Disgust. Contempt.
It’s not there. Carter tilts his head. “Why were you being reckless?” He sounds quiet and contemplative, not angry and judgmental.
“I’m not sure…” But that’s a lie, because I do know. “I wanted to start my own business. I had some savings, but it wasn’t enough. I got greedy.”
“You were close enough to taste it,” Dominic murmurs. “You don’t like asking for help. Your dreams were within your reach, and you forgot to be careful.”
Oh God. “Am I that transparent?”
Carter meets my gaze. “You’re not the only one that wants something so much that it blinds you to everything else.”
“No,” Dominic agrees seriously. “You certainly aren’t. I think we’re all guilty of that.”
He’s Carter’s best friend. He’s probably one of the few people who could make him see reason about Ed. Does he feel partly responsible for this situation? It certainly sounds like it.
“If you need money to start your own business,” Carter asks. “Why are you trying to give me your winnings?”
“Because it’s not mine. I was playing with your money.” I push the envelope toward him. “This belongs to you.”
“Gabby—”
“I called my father earlier and asked him for help. He took care of it. Let’s be honest: I’m pretty lucky. If you called me spoiled, that would be accurate too. But spoiled or not, I know right from wrong, Carter. I’m not going to take your money. Please don’t make this a big deal.”
Dominic cuts in again, ever the negotiator. “It was Carter’s seed money,” he says. “But you won because of your skill. If the two of you agree to split this down the middle, we can move onto more interesting things.”
Carter nods reluctantly. “Fine,” he says. “Half?”
I can live with that. I start to smile. “Deal. What kind of interesting things?”
“The kind where we get naked and pick up where we left off on Wednesday.” Dominic’s eyes meet mine. “If you want to.”
I very much do. When I first slept with Carter and Dominic, they’d been two impossibly gorgeous men. The sex was off-the-charts good, but the men hadn’t become real to me, and our one-night stand had felt very much like a fantasy.
But things feel different now. In the last week, I’ve learned more about Dominic and Carter. They’re still gorgeous. But they’re not fantasies any longer. Just like me, they’re real, flawed people.
And somehow, it’s only made them more desirable. It’s only made me crave them more.
“I want,” I reply.
“Kinky or not?”
“If you have a dungeon somewhere in this apartment, Dominic, that’ll make you the biggest cliché in the world.”
He laughs easily. “Nothing that exciting. You say no, and we stop. It’s that simple.”
A shiver of anticipation runs through me. I take a slow sip of my wine before answering him. “Yes to kink,” I reply. “Yes to you.”
Dominic looks like the cat that’s swallowed the canary. “I was hoping you’d say that.” He gets to his feet and holds his hand out to me. “Shall we?”
