Brutal Game Read online

  “Well, I’m not done. Michael Paul Flynn, will you make me the happiest woman in Boston and drive my U-Haul when I move out of my apartment and into yours when my lease is up at the end of May?”

  He laughed for real at that, feeling high and confused, but also pretty fucking delighted. Rain was soaking his shirt, trickling down the hollow of his back, but it was hard to believe; it felt so exactly like a sunny summer’s day.

  “Yes, I will. Now stand the fuck up.”

  She did, holding out the ring. It was a thick silver band, brushed, not shiny.

  “How’d you know my size?”

  “I didn’t. The guy at the store said I can exchange it if it doesn’t fit. Try it on.”

  He slipped it on his left ring finger but it got stuck at the second knuckle. He modeled it anyhow, angling his hand this way and that, making her giggle.

  “Guess they didn’t take me seriously enough when I said you have huge hands.” She tugged it free and slipped it back into her pocket.

  “How’d you know I wouldn’t prefer gold?” he teased.

  “Titanium seemed the butchest choice.”

  “When you put it like that.”

  “Seriously, would you like something different?”

  He reached out and cupped her cold, wet jaw, kissed her mouth as the rain ran down their faces. “No,” he said as he let her go. “I want whatever you pick out for me. You really wanna move in with me?”

  She nodded. “Only time will tell if it feels like enough space once we’re in each other’s faces twenty-four-seven—”

  “Faces and pants.”

  “—but if we can swing it, it’d save a lot on rent. I mean, it’d be nice to own a place before…you know. Before a baby came along. Someday.”

  “Sure.” He stooped for her umbrella, shaking the water out of it and holding it over their heads.

  “Plus I want to make sure you have a chance to see what it’s like to be with me, full time. Because of my depression, I mean.”

  “Oh?”

  “Don’t get me wrong,” she said, “you’ve been awesome for as long as we’ve been together. But it’s exhausting living with someone when they’re going through mental-health crap. Trust me, my mom taught me well.”

  He nodded, thinking of the years Heather had spent suffering through Robbie’s shit after he’d come home from Iraq. PTSD made Laurel’s struggles look like a rained-out ballgame.

  “The meds are helping,” she added. “Plus I won’t have the job guilt nagging at me for a change. Maybe I’m worrying too much. Maybe the future’s all glitter and butterflies.”

  “A future you’ll be sharing with me,” he said, cocky.

  “That’s the plan, it would seem.”

  “So, does anything else need to change, if you’re gonna be my old lady, officially?”

  She frowned. “Like what?”

  He nodded toward the bar’s side door. “You need to lay down the law about me getting punched in the head every week, maybe?”

  “What, make you quit fighting? Jesus, that’d be mean. No.”

  “No?” He’d been expecting such an ultimatum, if not happy about it.

  “One depressed person in a couple is plenty. You do what keeps you sane.” She studied his arm, the one holding the umbrella. “And insanely fit.”

  “Good to hear.”

  “Were you worried I’d tell you to quit?”

  “Not worried, exactly. But Heather’s always told me I better knock that shit off if I expect any rational woman to commit to my ass.”

  “I don’t know what that says about me, but I don’t think I could ever ask you to stop fighting. Not unless you were getting concussed. I do like your brain the way it is.”

  “You sure? ’Cause it’s got some terrible ideas about what I’m gonna do to you, later.”

  “I love it all the more, then.” She paused, distracted by the motion-sensor light that had blinked on above them—the weather had brought dusk early this evening. “Well, I’ve said everything I came here to. Why don’t you finish up downstairs, and I’ll get on top of dinner, and I’ll see you whenever you get home?”

  That sounded so bizarre—doing something as mundane as his daily workout with all this news to process. “Not a bad idea. I’ll probably need an hour alone for it to sink in that I’m fucking engaged.”

  She laughed. “You and me both. Okay, better say bye before we drown out here. See you in a bit. Hopefully my future apartment will smell like something delicious by the time you get home.”

  He gave her a kiss, both their sets of lips chilly, his hand feeling stiff and clumsy as he passed her umbrella back. “I love you so fucking much,” he murmured, letting her hear how fiercely he meant it, letting her see it in his face. “I hope you know that.”

  She nodded. “I do.”

  “I’ll show you exactly how much when I get home.”

  Pink warmed her pale cheeks and she smiled. “I’ll look forward to that.”

  He let the rain pelt him as he watched her walk away, down the alley and around the corner. When she was out of sight he punched in the code for the door and headed downstairs. He stripped off his shirt and wrung it out, laid it over a radiator to dry. As he began his warm up, jogging in place, he tried that word on for size again in his head. Engaged. When he got home tonight he’d open up his lockbox and slip that ring on her finger, finally. And soon enough the cat would be out of the bag.

  How did you propose? Heather would want to know.

  In the middle of the miscarriage. She said no.

  Well, how did she propose, then?

  In the rain, in an alley next to a dive bar. I said yes.

  He smiled to himself, thinking that was just about perfect, somehow.

  * * *

  Laurel turned at the sound of the deadbolt, a smile cracking her face wide open, too broad and goofy to possibly hide.

  “Hello,” she called. She was busy at the counter, wearing pajama pants while her jeans tumbled dry five flights below in one of the building’s coin-op machines.

  Flynn stepped inside, looking soaked to the bone. “Smells amazing.”

  “I stole your idea—we’re having rotisserie chicken. And risotto and veggies. You look like you swam here.”

  “Feels like I did.” He unlaced his boots, rain dripping from his hood when he leaned over. “But you won’t catch me complaining—if it ain’t snow, it’s fine by me.” He stripped to his shorts right there, leaving his clothes in a pile—or perhaps a puddle—by the door. And giving any neighbors across the street a free thrill, as the blinds were up.

  He stopped by the counter on his way to the bathroom, kissing Laurel’s cheek with icy lips and eyeing the cutting board.

  “Carrots.”

  “And broccoli and zucchini.” She ran her palm over his wet hair and his cheek. “Good God, you’re freezing. Get in the shower.”

  “You want your ring?”

  “I can wait.” She wondered if he could guess that she’d spent a good ten minutes poking fruitlessly around in his drawers and filing cabinet, trying to find it. “Go get warmed up.”

  “You make a bossy fiancée.”

  She started. “Oh my God, I hadn’t even thought of that. Fiancée.”

  “How about that? Earned yourself two fancy-ass new titles in one day.”

  “I guess so.”

  He headed for the bathroom and Laurel’s shit-eating grin bloomed anew. He’d find more than the relief of a steaming shower in there—she’d slung the old red towel over the rod. The note on the mirror read, simply, Whatever you want.

  She’d better hold off on starting the risotto. It’d only wind up a gluey mess if Flynn decided to take her up on that invitation the second he stepped out of the bathroom. She finished chopping the veggies, lowered the blinds and got comfy on the bed, studying the apartment. She bet she could convince the landlord to let her paint the walls. Heather’s place was painted. It might take the edge off the starkness of the
space—

  The bathroom door swung in and the fan and light flipped off. “Whatever I want?” Flynn asked as he appeared. The red towel was knotted around his waist.

  She nodded. “Whatever you want.”

  He walked to the closet. “What I want,” he said, opening the door and reaching up to the top shelf, “is for you to wear something very special, tonight.”

  Her eyebrows rose. Flynn wasn’t the lingerie type. Then the surprise changed to confusion when he turned, holding a gray box as big as a milk crate—a safe.

  “What— Oh.” The ring, duh. “I’ll have you know I looked all over for that, while you were out.”

  He set the box on the bed and crossed the room to unhook his keys from his abandoned pants. “That rock’s worth more than everything else in this apartment put together,” he said, opening the safe. “This shoulda been the first place you looked.”

  And there it was—from the big gray box came the tiny, gleaming wooden one. He sat at her side and popped it open. Just one glance at the diamond and her breath was gone, sucked clean out of her lungs.

  “Wow.”

  “You finally gonna put it on?”

  She nodded, mesmerized.

  He slid it free and held it out. Laurel accepted it with a surprisingly calm hand, studying it by the light of the reading lamp. “I have a job and a diamond ring,” she whispered.

  “That you do. Put it on.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to do it?”

  “Am I?”

  She shrugged. “That’s what they do in movies.” She was stalling, feeling tears brewing, emotion rising like a tide.

  “As you wish.” He took it and Laurel offered her ring finger, unable to hold back a sloppy, quavering smile as he slid it on. It couldn’t have been a better fit.

  Laurel had never been the type to lie around daydreaming about proposals or rings or weddings or babies, but it was undeniably powerful, this moment. Like stumbling across a threshold into a new stage of womanhood.

  “Nice work, Anne,” Flynn said.

  “Ha, indeed. I’ll have to take her out for a seriously overpriced dinner when my first engineering paycheck clears.” She angled her hand this way and that, watched the light dancing in the stone. “Jesus, it’s so beautiful.”

  “Glad you like it.”

  She paused her ogling long enough to pull him in for a kiss. Then another, another, probably a dozen before she finally let him go. “Wow. Thank you.”

  “Thanks for proposing. Saved me a lot of anxiety.”

  “I was a little worried you’d be all old school about it. About the dude doing the asking, I mean.”

  He shook his head. “Long as I still wear the pants in bed, I’m easy.”

  She laughed, then looked to his bare torso. “You’re currently wearing nothing but a highly contentious towel. What comes first—dinner or depravity?”

  “Seems pointless to get dressed, only to get naked again in a half hour.”

  “Very well. What’re you in the mood for?”

  “You’ll find out as soon as you get your clothes off.”

  She stood, smirking, and made a little show of stripping down, flashing her ring at him between shed garments. Heat sparked in his eyes with every item that hit the floor, his lips parting, lids drooping. Such a glorious sight, this strong man looking foggy and half helpless from lust.

  When she was completely naked, she joined him on the bed. He tugged the towel off and urged Laurel back until she was lying down and he was braced above her. His cock was ready, resting warm and stiff along her belly.

  “Fiancée,” he whispered.

  “Weird, huh?”

  “A little. I like it.”

  “Me too.”

  “Can I take a rain check on the goring?” he asked. “I don’t feel like any fucked-up shit tonight. I just want you and me.”

  “That sounds lovely.”

  “Lemme get you ready. Tell me how.”

  She blushed, from the sweetness of that order as much as her own reply. “Your mouth.”

  She let her nails graze up his back and shoulders as he edged his way down her body, raked them through his damp hair when he brought his mouth close. Cool fingers parted her sex, warm breath caressing her folds, then his lips. She shut her eyes and searched for his scent behind the aroma of dinner, finding only his soap, not his skin. No matter. In minutes he’d be all around her, his sweat and the smell of his arousal, and the sounds of his excitement ringing in her ears.

  Mine, and no one else’s, she thought, registering the subtle weight of the ring on her finger. In time the feel and the sight of it would grow as familiar as any other part of her body, and she welcomed that change as well. Like the presence of Flynn beside her as they slept, there was a comfort to be found when something once novel turns mundane. It was the taking-for-granted you had to be wary of. For decades to come, Laurel hoped to slip this ring off and polish it lovingly, feeling dazzled by it all over again, just as this man’s rare smile always did to her.

  When his mouth had her slick and aching, she tugged at his shoulders, welcomed that sinful weight atop her. He sank deep, slowly, gaze moving between her face and the spot where their bodies met, eyes restless and needy.

  “No cramps?” he asked.

  “No.” A few times in the last couple weeks the IUD had triggered a sharp twinge—unwelcome reminders of the miscarriage—but nothing tonight. “Go as deep as you want.”

  He did. Still slow, as though savoring each long slide in and out. As though he, like Laurel, was feeling all of this for the first time, somehow.

  Before long came those scents she’d searched for, then the sounds of his mounting excitement. Her own rose in tandem, pleasure shifting from a curious hum to a growling hunger. She eyed the cock surging between her thighs, eyed the ring shining where she gripped his shoulder. She reached her other hand between them but he knocked it aside.

  “Let me.”

  She did. She marveled at his strength and physicality in the way he held himself up on one arm, amazed by those deft fingers and by how well he knew her body and what she needed. It was strange to think she’d ever had to teach him a thing about touching her; he could please her as easily as she might herself.

  When she came it was his face she sought, locked in those eyes, his name riding the crest of a moan as the spasms swept through her. When she was spent, his hands splayed across the covers beside her ribs and his pumping hips began to pound. “Gimme your nails.”

  She traced his arms, teasing, then gave what he was after—the mean dig of her fingers in his back as he chased his release. Whether he reveled in the possession of her touch or imagined it as something more akin to resistance, she didn’t care. All that mattered was the anguish of his pleasure, the set of his jaw and the power of this body, claiming hers.

  He came in no time at all, transformed to a panting, wild-eyed beast, only to go tame and dozy as the pleasure ebbed. He dropped to his forearms and pressed his face to her throat, groans guttering to a happy sigh.

  “Good?” she teased.

  “Always.” He moved to her side and grabbed her a washcloth.

  She tidied herself and passed it back. “We’ve been engaged for all of two hours and it’s already Missionary City. You going vanilla on me?”

  “Never. Plus missionaries don’t eat pussy, do they?”

  “If I meet one, I’ll ask him.”

  He tossed the cloth aside and pulled her close, kissing her forehead, filling her up with the scent and sounds and heat of him. His voice was a low and lazy rumble. “If you’re worried marriage is going to mellow me, next time I’ll fuck you in such disgusting ways you’ll be sprinting for the nearest confessional.”

  “That’s so sweet. Thank you, my betrothed.”

  He pulled back. “Lemme see that ring.”

  She slipped her hand from where it was pinned between them, showing him.

  “It’s so shiny.”

  “I know. I
could stare at it for an hour, but I better get busy finishing this dinner.”

  “It’ll keep. Gimme ten more minutes.”

  “You’re the boss.”

  “In this bed, yes, I am. And I’m not done with you.”

  “No?”

  He urged her to turn so he could pull her close, her back plastered to his front. “Mm.”

  For a while they lay in silence, rain pelting the shaded windows and the faint tick and whir of the thermostat the only sounds. In time Laurel said, “Things feel right again. Between us.”

  His only reply was a kiss pressed to the back of her head.

  “I worried maybe they’d changed for good.”

  “They probably have,” he said. “Not sure how they couldn’t, when two people go through something like that together.”

  “No, of course. But us, this… It feels the way it should again.”

  “Amen.”

  “I hope it always feels this easy. Even after we’ve been married a decade or three.”

  “We’ll be okay.” His deep yawn pressed them tighter together. “We’ll both fuck shit up now and then and hurt each other, too.”

  “I guess that’s inevitable.”

  “But even when we’re a hundred there’ll still be times when it feels like this.”

  “When you’re a hundred and I’m ninety-seven,” Laurel corrected.

  Another “Mm” warmed her scalp through her hair, sleepier than the first.

  She ought not to get too comfortable, but she couldn’t bear to leave this bed just yet. In a few more minutes, when Flynn predictably passed out. He could nap and she’d dress and finish dinner, and they’d eat and later watch a movie, or maybe just lie here, talking, or not talking, or maybe nothing so innocent as any of those things. Like the shape of their future marriage, like the details of her new career, she’d have to wait to find out.

  And until the answers arrived, she’d savor every second of the anticipation.

  13

  Laurel made her way back from the bathroom, edging through a bustling kitchen and out onto a spacious back deck. South Boston was awash in spring sunshine, neither warm nor cool but promising longer days, balmier nights.