Page 6 of The Laughing Game

I nodded. “I. Yeah. I thought it was a business-owner-slash-client thing.”

“Did it feel like a business-owner-slash-client thing?”

“Oh fuck,” I whispered. “Have they been seducing me?”

“I’m sure they’ve been trying,” Sebastian said, barely keeping a straight face. He seemed delighted.

“Sounds like they succeeded,” Jacob muttered.

“But…but they’remarried. Why would they be trying to… I don’t get it.”

“Angel, Angel. Sweet summer child. Vihaal and Gideon are married, yes. But their marriage is far from traditional, in any sense of the word.”

“Oh my God.”

My brain was exploding, my belly was swirling at the thought of getting together with them for more than a coffee or a meal, and my palms were definitely sweating. I gazed at Sebastian with desperation.

“So…what do I do now? Now that I know?”

“That you’ve been denying a part of yourself your whole life? That you have a crush on them? That they’ve beentrying to get you into bed?”

I whimpered. “Help.”

Chapter Two

Talking to Jacob and Sebastian about taxes calmed me down. I was in a bit of a spin, but the brandy helped.

“You can have more, you know,” Sebastian said, gesturing to my glass.

“I’m driving,” I said.

“You know, Angel,” Jacob murmured from his place behind the desk. “It’s not always as easy as saying ‘I like girls’ or ‘I like boys’. Sometimes you have to leave room for the possibility that your heart—and other organs—don’t fit into a tidy little box. Plus, there are so many gender variations out there. Why limit yourself?”

“Yeah. I’ve been…curious…before. But I never expected to find another man—or men—to be more alluring than any of the women I’ve ever encountered.” I shrugged.

Sebastian smiled and gave Jacob a knowing look.

“Anyway, I’d better get out of here. You’ll email me the files and information?”

“Already done,” Jacob said, closing his laptop. “How long do you think for you to prepare and submit?”

“Not long. A couple of weeks, maybe? I haven’t got a ton of other business clients, and my personal clients have fairly straightforward paperwork.”

I rejected their kind offer of a round of cards in the gaming parlor. I needed to get home, if only to wrap my head around everything I’d learned—about myself, and Vihaal and Gideon—and decide what the hell was happening and what I was going to do about it.

It was hard to believe there were so many bets on my sexual orientation. I’d mostly assumed I was straight and that I looked straight. Although if anyone had asked what looking straight meant, I couldn’t have defined it.

Then again, the fact that I was comfortable hanging out with so many gay guys and coming into Maverick Molly’s on a frequent basis was perhaps courting speculation. Maybe I was drawn to Jacob, Sebastian, Gideon, Vihaal and Maverick Molly’s because it addressed something I’d been denying about myself for a long, long time.

Gideon and Vihaal seemed very happy together. Were they looking for something outside of their relationship? A fling? A fun afternoon? Initiate the supposedly straight, but probably bisexual, man into the world of gay sex?

Whatexactlydid they want from me? The question left me with a strange, excited feeling in my gut. Maybe I should start listening to that normally quiet place inside me that seemed to be sending out flares to get my attention.

We shook hands and they followed me into the hall. I glanced toward the door to the Bordello—the kink room that Jacob and Sebastian rented out by the hour.

“You, uh, got anyone in there right now?” I asked, pretending a casual curiosity.

Jacob shook his head. He glanced at Sebastian, who seemed to be trying to keep from smiling.

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