Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 123153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123153 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 616(@200wpm)___ 493(@250wpm)___ 411(@300wpm)
“How did things go?” I ask as I take a seat on the floor in front of the table the board is on.
“It went. The job was done,” Ny says.
“You guys had plenty of time to get up to more than the task. Did you make up for lost time?” I say more tightly than I mean to.
Ny pulls off her jacket and unzips her boots before she takes them off and sits across from me. She settles and glares at me. I lift a brow and wait.
“We didn’t fuck, if that’s what you want to know. We did the job and made sure we were seen here in New York. We were about to eat before you called. Anything else, or are you ready to play?”
I reel it in. The last thing I want to do is argue. Jace wouldn’t betray my trust, we’ve worked too hard to get to where we want this all to go. Keeping that in mind, I turn my attention to the game.
Placing my phone on the table beside me, I then reach for the glasses and fill all three with wine. Ny takes a glass and sips at it as she looks over the board. I wait for her to make her first move.
Jace takes out the trays of food and hands one to each of us. My mouth waters and my stomach growls. I don’t think I’ve eaten more than a bagel all day.
I tear into the burger and nod at Ny’s first move before I counter. As she contemplates her next turn, my thoughts seem to take me from my body. It’s as if I’m watching the room from above.
Ny looks focused on the game, but there’s something sad in her eyes. When I turn my focus to Jace, he’s watching us both. The more we eat and settle in, the happier he seems to get.
It’s always been this way. If we’re happy, he’s happy. I’m thrown back in time as I take him in.
Ny had just turned fourteen and started with the goth look. I hated it. There was nothing dark about her back then. It felt like she was hiding her light—under the clothes, beneath all the dark makeup.
Yet, I knew. I knew with everything I was, I was in love with her. Things were changing between the three of us, but my love for her was a constant.
“I’m in love with her,” I had told Jace one afternoon after she left to go home with her mom.
“I know,” he replied.
I remember how, over the next few weeks, he invited her into our circle of friends. He knew I’d protect her and make sure everyone else respected her. Most of all, he knew we’d be happy. He kept us from drifting apart.
“Say what’s on your mind, G. Clearly, you have something to say,” Ny mutters, bringing me back to the present. I turn my gaze to her brown eyes and knit my brows.
Focusing back on the board, I make another move and collect my thoughts. I have to get this right. I’m not sleeping another night without her in my bed.
“I’m not your enemy,” I say after my move.
“I never said you were.”
“Do you remember what you said when I first bought you the house in Tuxedo?”
She tilts her head and gives a small smile. “Yeah. I told you; you kept your promise. The three of us would always be together, just like you promised that night, but I was seven when you made that promise. I didn’t understand why it was so wrong for Jack Tripper to live with two women. He lived with his two friends and that’s all I wanted.”
“It’s not wrong. You were never wrong. I made it wrong.” I sigh and crack my knuckles.
“Jace has always kept us together. He knows when we’re drifting, and he pulls us back in. I… I think a part of me was counting on that when we started this. I just got too comfortable knowing he’d be there to fix it, and I didn’t do my part.”
“You can say that again,” she mutters.
“Hear me out. When you first brought up the poly relationship, I was for it. It made sense once I started to read up on it for myself. I knew you weren’t asking me to get romantically involved with Jace. It all made sense if I didn’t involve my family life.
“What you never knew was that Riccardo started to lay into me around the same time, making me question why I didn’t have more of a problem with what you wanted. Making me question my manhood and my role in the family.
“Mom was teaching me the game. I was so focused on that I forgot the board I started with. Mostly because we stopped being a part of the game for me.