Thomas

 

The drive was a bastard, my knuckles white on the steering wheel as I sped across country to my fight of a fucking lifetime.

I’d take him. Show him up for the useless piece of shit he really was under all the bullshit bluster he’d been carrying around his whole life. I’d show his pretty wife who the real man was in the room, leaving her with no uncertainty whatsoever that her quaint little life on the coast was nothing without the thrill of a real man’s cock inside her.

I’d up the stakes this time, so huge they’d have to balk at the pressure or push themselves into an outcome that would fuck them up beyond all doubt and reason.

One hundred grand on the table for a week with Grace in London. At my place, doing my every bidding and feeding my every whim.

I pulled into their car park expecting the same pitiful straggle of cars I’d seen last time around, but the place was bustling, people hogging the front and chowing down on ice creams as they watched the sea, and a couple of kids dashing along the railings brandishing buckets and spades.

I held the door open for an elderly couple before I’d even stepped inside the place, finding the Fosters busy behind the bar serving lunchtime drinks, Brett’s hand resting on the small of Grace’s back every time he wasn’t pulling a pint. My gut shrank at the sight.

I hung back in the doorway, watching. This wasn’t the scene I’d imagined walking into. I expected thinly-veiled misery, her eyes scanning for mine every heartbeat, needing another helping of the filth I could deliver like she needed a gulp of sea breeze.

Brett noticed me first, eyes narrowing as his chin dipped in a barely courteous nod. A scotch was waiting when I stepped up to the bar and took a seat, shunted gruffly across the woodwork with a flick of his hand.

“Customers. What a novelty,” I said with a smile. “I’d make the most of this trade. You’ll be all on your lonesome when the beast down the road opens its doors for the summer.”

“Glad to see we’re interesting enough to keep tabs on,” Brett commented. “You didn’t strike me much as a hotelier, so I guess it’s just our sterling personalities you find irresistible.”

“Not your personalities,” I countered with my voice low. “Just your wife’s dirty little holes begging for my dick.”

He leaned over the bar top. “I wouldn’t call it begging,” he told me. “She just fancies trying out a double helping of dessert. I’m sure she’ll find yours is bland and tasteless when we’re both side by side on the serving platter.”

“I admire your optimism.” I raised my glass to my lips. “I hope you’re as optimistic when we set up the stakes.”

Grace stepped up beside him in time to hear my statement, and I despised the look that passed between them, eyes laughing at some private joke.

A joke about me.

The feeling was both alien and uncomfortable, dredging up points in time when every joke I ever heard was about me. Worse than their shitty humour was the way Brett saw my discomfort before I’d had the chance to hide it.

“Oh, come on, Heath,” he said. “You didn’t seem the tetchy type. Life got you down these past few weeks? Another couple seen through your crappy little marriage-wrecking games and proved themselves immune to your meddling?”

“No,” I told him. “No couple ever sees through my intentions. I’d go easy on the self-congratulations until they’re truly warranted.”

It was Grace who rolled her eyes and waved her hand between us. “Alright, guys, save it for later. We’ve got customers to take care of.”

She handed me the key to my bedroom and I retreated into a marginally safe space while I got my thoughts together. The place was immaculate. Polished to perfection and neat enough to appease the very fussiest consumer standards in my soul.

It took me a moment to notice the chairs were missing, and that at least brought a smile to my face.

Three in a bed this evening, in the real sense of the word. I unpacked my case carefully, ensuring every item of clothing was hanging neatly before I ventured up to the window and stared out at the front.

I’d forgotten how pleasant this place really was, so snug in the sandy cove between rocky outcrops. For a split second I wished I was a genuine guest looking forward to kicking my feet back and appreciating a break from the city madness. Maybe one day.

But not today.

Not this week.

They were enjoying a chilled bottled water at an empty bar when I re-joined them downstairs, freshly suited in a finely pressed suit with gold cufflinks and a fresh sweep of my hair.

I refused another scotch, opting instead for a water of my own, and that’s when I decided to begin the negotiations in earnest.

“One hundred grand,” I told them, pausing for the unavoidable hunger to sweep behind their eyes. But it didn’t come. I cleared my throat before I repeated the figure. “One hundred thousand pounds,” I said, but Brett raised his asshole fingers and encouraged me on.

“Yeah, we heard you. One hundred grand. We don’t want it.”

I laughed my favourite bitter laugh. “Sure you don’t.”

“Believe it,” he said. “We don’t want it. There’s not a sum in the world we’d take from you, so save your bargaining chips for someone who wants them.”

I looked over at Grace, but her face was a picture of easy calmness, not even a flash of disagreement in her eyes.

“Money makes the world go round,” I told them. “Don’t be fools.”

I’d forgotten just how beautiful that woman was until she stepped up to the bar top and stared right at me. Her curls were bouncy and her cheeks were healthy pink without being flushed. Her eyes were excited and her nervousness was well disguised, her stance all natural as she leaned in close.

“Money might make the world go round,” she whispered. “But it doesn’t make the man.” I didn’t flinch as she reached over the counter and pressed her fingers to my chest, cursing the prospect that she’d feel the speed of the beats under my shirt and find them racing. “What’s in here makes the man,” she finished.

It was so preposterous I laughed until my sides hurt, barely coming up for air until she’d stepped away.

“Did you two join some hippy love commune in my absence?” I smirked. “Or maybe it was all the therapy you needed in the aftermath.”

“Sad,” she said. “It’s sad when people are so cynical of human truths. I think it’s maybe you who needs the therapy.”

“Sex therapy,” I countered. “So, let’s get back to business. One hundred grand on the table, up against one full week with Mrs Foster in London on my home turf.”

They both laughed as they shook their heads.

“What part of we don’t want it don’t you understand?” he asked, and for the first time in the whole poxy exchange it occurred to me they might actually be serious.

“We just want you,” Grace added, and that really did spark a rise of something uncomfortable in the depths of me. “No stakes, no bargains, no crazy cash offers. Just you, and us. No time restraints, no buzzing alarms, no silly red lines.”

“Bar closes at ten tonight,” Brett told me. “We’ll be up at your door at ten thirty. Feel free to have a few drinks on the house in the interim.”

“I’ll think about it,” I replied, acting as nonchalant as I could muster. “And in the meantime I’d suggest you consider your own sanity too. You’ll be thankful of my generosity when summer comes calling and this place is dead around your ankles.”

They were laughing between themselves again when I knocked back the rest of my drink and made for the exit.