Chapter Eleven
Tristan
“Is there anything else I need to attend to before dinner?” I asked Ben.
“Not that I can see,” he replied.
I closed the files I had been looking at and stared off into the distance for a moment, contemplating the unusual situation I found myself in. I was afraid to have dinner at Albero’s nowadays, and that fear had everything to do with a certain Grace Kelly lookalike.
“Something the matter?” Ben asked, breaking through my haze of self-pity.
“No,” I said abruptly.
One of his eyebrows rose slightly, and I noticed one corner of his mouth turn up, as well. “What?” I demanded, with irritation.
“You’ve been a bad mood this last week,” he observed, completely indifferent to how rude I was being. Instead of shaming me into behaving, it made me feel as though I had the license to do so.
“I’m working around the clock,” I pointed out. “If you worked like I do, you would be, too.”
Ben narrowed his eyes at me. “I do work like you do,” he said. “In fact, I would argue that some days, I work harder than you.”
“Ha!” I said sarcastically.
“Scoff all you want,” he said, with a shrug. “It’s true. And I’d like to point out that despite my work ethic, I don’t make the kind of money that you do. So logically you should be happy all the time.”
“Not everything is about money, Benjamin,” I said, using his full name purely because I knew he hated it.
Ben rolled his eyes at my childish attempts to get a rise out of him. “Then why are you working yourself to the bone?” he demanded. “If money isn’t everything, why are you chasing it?”
“What are you?” I asked. “My shrink?”
“I don’t mind taking on the job,” he said sheepishly. “Provided I get paid for it.”
I cocked my head to the side and surveyed Ben carefully. “You’re an honest guy, aren’t you, Ben?”
“I’d like to think so, yes,” he nodded.
“Would you say that the two of us are friends?”
I could tell immediately that the question caught him by surprise. He processed it for a moment before he spoke. “Honestly… I think it’s hard to maintain a friendship when one person is providing the other’s salary.”
“Is that a no?” I asked bluntly.
“Not necessarily.”
I frowned. “Sounds like a no.”
“There are different kinds of friendships,” he said. “I think ours is simply…non-traditional.”
“Okay then, as my friend, I’m going to ask you a few questions,” I said. “And I expect you to answer them honestly and then keep my confidences.”
He rolled his eyes. “Do these questions have anything to do with Molly?”
I paused for a second, wondering if Ben knew me too well or if I was just that transparent. I decided I didn’t want to know. “Maybe,” I said, and then I corrected myself immediately. “Okay, fine; they are about Molly.”
“Go ahead.” Ben sounded bored already.
I ignored him. “Has she brought any of her dates up to her room with her after dinner?”
“No.” Ben sounded confident.
“How do you know?”
“Because I make sure security monitors any and all people staying at this resort who have not actually checked into the resort. Our suite guests are given leeway here and there, but anyone else is required to check in a visitor, regardless of how they’re related.”
“Huh… I didn’t realize you did that.”
“You don’t realize a lot of what I do.”
“Okay, okay, let’s assess your value later,” I said impatiently. “Would you happen to know if Molly went back with one of her dates…to their hotels, I mean?”
“No, she hasn’t,” Ben replied, and again, he sounded confident.
“How do you know?” I asked again.
“Security,” he replied simply. “Molly has slept at the resort every single night since she arrived here. And since she doesn’t bring up any of her dates, I’m safely surmising that she hasn’t slept with anyone—yet.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked, taken by an irrational panic.
“Molly is an attractive young woman,” he said. “At some point, she’s going to sleep with someone.”
I gritted my teeth together. “Fuck,” I said, under my breath.
“What is your hang up with this woman?” he asked curiously.
“You yourself just mentioned how attractive she is.”
“Sure,” he nodded. “But so are all the women you’ve dated in the past. Why is this girl different?”
I looked up at Ben, and a part of me realized that this was the first time we were having a real, personal conversation. It was strangely freeing. “I don’t know,” I said. “She’s just stuck in my head.”
“For how long?”
“What?”
“Has she always been stuck in your head?” he asked. “Or has she only been on your mind since she arrived at the resort?”
I thought about that question for a moment. I thought about the six years that stood between us and wondered… Had I thought of her often during that time? Did I feel as though something was missing, without really being able to put my finger on it? Sometimes I felt wisps of longing, but I had never associated those feelings with Molly...not directly anyway.
Then little things kept coming back to me. It was almost as though my own mind was throwing the evidence in my face. I remembered ordering pizza with mushroom for no other reason than Molly liked it. I remembered looking twice at every blonde woman I met, hoping to find some part of Molly hidden beneath her features. I remembered having a fondness for horror movies because it reminded me of those cozy nights when Jason, Molly, and I would pick a new horror flick and watch it in the family room.
Had I spent half my life pining for a woman without even realizing it? The thought seemed almost too preposterous to consider.
“I… She Jason’s sister,” I said. “She’s always been on the periphery of my thoughts.”
Ben pursed his lips at me.
“What?” I demanded.
“We’re friends right?” he clarified first.
“Yes,” I said reluctantly.
“Then as your friend, it is my duty to inform you that this level of preoccupation with a woman is not normal—unless, of course, you harbor deep feelings for her.”
I narrowed my eyes at Ben. “I take it back; we’re not friends.”
“Why is that such a bad thing?” he wanted to know. “So you have feelings for Molly—she’s single, and so are you.”
“Apparently, she’s not single,” I pointed out.
“She’s dating,” Ben clarified. “It’s different. If she were seen every night with one man, then you would have cause to worry. That means she’s getting serious with a guy. But until then, you may have a chance.”
“I know I have a chance,” I snapped. “That’s not the point.”
“I can’t believe I want to know what the point is, but I do.”
I gave him a short glare. “The point is she’s Jason’s sister.”
“You do get repetitive, you know.”
“Would you sleep with a friend’s sister?” I demanded.
Ben raised his eyebrows. “Is that it, then?” he asked. “You just want to sleep with her?”
“I…no…yes… I… Fuck!” I cursed. “You don’t know my track record, okay?”
Ben looked at me incredulously for a moment. “Debbie, Annette, Tiffany, Brooke, Laura, Tanya, Tiffany again, Sandra, Mona, Alison, Mona again, Ti—”
“Okay, okay,” I said, holding up my hands to stop him. “So you know my track record. My point is that I don’t stick with one woman for long. I move on, in favor of work or another woman. And if I were to get involved with Molly…”
“You won’t be able to treat her like crap because her brother would kill you?”
“Well…yeah.”
“So, you’re scared of Jason?”
“I’m scared of hurting Molly,” I said. “But the Jason thing, too.”
Ben smiled. “And you don’t think you can change?”
“Meaning, do I think I’m capable of commitment?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t know.”
“Then maybe it’s best you stay away from Molly.”
I sighed. “This honesty thing sucks.”
“And our hour is up,” Ben said, standing up and heading for the door. “You really should give me a second salary for moonlighting as your shrink.”
“You’re an ass,” I muttered.
He actually looked pleased with himself. “Shall I make you a reservation at the Lagoon, or perhaps Mosaic?”
“What?” I asked, in confusion. “I always eat at Albero.”
“And, Molly is always at Albero,” he pointed out. “Don’t you think you’d better avoid that restaurant for now?”
I was contemplating the sense in that, but as much as I hated seeing Molly with all her dates, I also wanted to see her. Ben seemed to realize this simply from the expression on my face.
“Have fun at Albero’s,” he said, with a smirk, before heading down.
Sighing at my weakness, I made my way to Albero’s determined to be an adult and simply allow Molly to do her thing while I did mine. The moment I entered the restaurant, however, my eyes searched for her.
She was sitting at the usual table in a silver mini dress that showcased her shapely legs. Her blonde hair fell down her back in waves, and I wondered what it would be like to touch her hair. I imagined it would feel like silk.
I was so mesmerized by Molly that I didn’t immediately recognize the man sitting opposite her. With a lurch of unpleasantness, I realized that Molly’s date was none other than Gregory.
“The fucking bastard,” I said to myself through gritted teeth.
I stalked over to my table, trying to be as visible as possible so that either Gregory or Molly would notice me enter, but neither one so much as turned their head in my direction. In fact, it looked like Gregory was utterly absorbed in Molly and vice versa. She kept laughing and touching his arm as though he were the most interesting man on the planet.
I, for one, just wanted to walk up to him and choke him. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to do that before or after I kicked him out of my resort.
I sat down at my table, but my appetite had completely disappeared. When Kani appeared before me with the menu, blocking Molly and Gregory from my line of vision, I all but bit his head off. He scurried off looking confused and frightened, and I felt like a complete asshole.
“Shit, this is not good,” I muttered to myself.
I couldn’t quite believe that Molly was on a date with Gregory. I remembered all the questions Gregory had aimed at me about Molly. Now, I realized that he had an ulterior motive the whole time. I was a fool for not having caught it sooner.
I was more than a little surprised with Molly, too. Gone was the shy young girl I had first met ten years ago. She had blossomed into a woman—and a confident one at that. It was obvious that men were lining up for her, and she was taking full advantage of that fact.
I ended up ordering a couple of appetizers because I didn’t think I could stomach an entire main, but I kept twisting and turning in my seat, trying to see what Molly and Gregory were up to. Every time she smiled at him, I wanted to throw something. Every time he touched her, I wanted to walk over to him and punch him in the face. I knew I was being juvenile and petty and completely irrational, but my feelings were completely unhinged from reason, and I couldn’t seem to rein them back in.
When my starters arrived at the table, I stabbed at the ravioli angrily until I realized that I was imagining Gregory’s face. The sound of Molly’s laughter had me turning back in their direction again. This time, I snapped. Before I could check myself, I was walking towards the table where Molly and Gregory were sitting.