I’ve never deserved it.
“I promised her I’d be faithful.”
“You’ve fucked me.”
“I don’t know if that counted.”
She looks at both of us before she sits down. “Don’t know if what counted?”
“Ben sleeping with me.” Isaac says the words and then pours more wine into Blair’s glass then his.
“I don’t think it did.” I feel her looking at me while she speaks. “In the same way I don’t think it mattered when I did things with Isaac.”
Words have never been my thing. I do. I have the actions, the strength, not the pretty ways to explain myself so right now I don’t know how to go there. I know this isn’t her way of saying I’m not enough for her; I don’t have a complex.
But she has a kink.
We all do. Clearly.
“Ben, I can’t go to Cuba any more. Or to clubs where people wear masks and pretend they don’t recognise each other. I love what we do. I love what we did as a three. If you see Isaac when I’m not there, I can live with that. If you can – when you’re not there.”
Isaac’s silent, watching the two of us.
I face him, move my leg away from his and feel the cold.
“Would you keep it to just me and Blair?”
“Be faithful to you both?”
“Yes.” Because there is such a thing as pillow talk.
He nods. “Happy to.”
My cock hardens and the air that was thick before is now crackling.
“We have an agreement.” Blair puts down her wine glass. “And we all have enough to lose to make sure this stays just with us.”
It didn’t need saying. We all have more than a lot to lose.
Maybe me more than most.
Chapter Sixteen
The fact that Majken is in the coffee shop when I finish my conversation with an old comrade doesn’t surprise me.
I’m surprised she’s there today, and that she’s trekked all the way out to the Isle of Skye, but not that she’s done it. Found me.
Majken always found me.
There’s no point pretending to ignore her; she’ll just create a scene. Again, something else that she excelled at along with being stubborn and fixated. Obsessive.
She’s coloured her hair red and it suits her, goes well with her tan from Barbados. The man with her I recognise, his fingers interlinked through hers on the table. They look like any other couple in their thirties who’re in love.
But he’s not the man you’d want for your sister. Or even your ex who shat on you from a great height.
“Can I get you both a drink?” I don’t bother with any pleasantries, that’s about as much as I can muster. There’s a reason they’ve tracked me down and bothered to come here and it won’t be to see how I’m doing.
“Decaffeinated for me.” Majjie smiles beatifically. “They have it.”
