Page 18 of The Good Liar

Daniel arrived home around midnight to find me brooding outside on our bedroom deck. It was freezing out, and I’d blindly gone out there with only my racing thoughts to keep me warm.

Didn’t matter the temperature or the hour, the city still pulsed energetically fifteen stories below, the magnitude of it reaching me, crawling along my skin. Pedestrians skipped across streets without the right-of-way, horns honked at their stupidity, while I winced at their death wishes.

Daniel’s warm hands skirted up my exposed arms, raising gooseflesh. I couldn’t say if the tiny buds were sparked by repulsion, or the drastic change in temperature on my frigid skin. “You’re freezing, Jasper. Come inside.”

I swung round on him, tearing open his shirt, buttons pinging along the metal railing.

“Jas—”

I silenced him with my tongue, needing him to shut up, to not sound like himself. I backed him up. “I know this isn’t like me.”Like the me you’ve come to know.“But I need this. I need you to not be nice, to not watch where we land, to not calculate how long it’ll take for our bodily fluids to permanently stain… Just…fuck me.Please.” If I could just get this from him, if he could just give me what I needed, then I wouldn’t have to think about Cole in the ways I had been, and our marriage would be fine. He’d make partner at the firm, he’d be happy, content, even. He’d grow to accept me for who I was, and we would be fine.Fine.And Cole and I could be brothers, friends, fucking priest and parishioner for all I cared. I just neededthisto be okay forthatto work, or we were doomed.

Daniel relented, following my lead, and therein resided the problem. I needed him to take, to make me pay for whatever he could come up with, even if the transgression had to be imagined. I needed to choke on my breaths, and die a thousand deaths in his arms, at his hands. I needed to lose control, to have it stolen from me. I needed to be robbed of free will.

I was a ball of repression, of pent-up aggression, and he was pleasant, a tranquil sea, when what I needed was a fucking tornado to come through and rip everything down to its foundation, including me.

I needed him to be Cole.

“Wake up, sleepy head,” Daniel crooned, and I groaned, tugging a pillow over my face. The scent of coffee filtered through the goose feathers, and I lowered it, peeling an eye open.

Daniel chuckled, waiting for me to sit up against the headboard and accept the mug containing my other addiction. My brain fog cleared after my first sip, and the first thing I noted was our bedroom had been cleaned while I’d slept. It bore no signs of our lovemaking. Then I homed in on Daniel, fully dressed with a carry-on by his side.

“Where are you going?”

“Last-minute business trip. A meeting with the head of the company Cole wants a controlling stake in.”

“What? When did you find out about this?”

“I got the email not too long ago. My flight leaves in a couple hours.”

“Can’t you do a Zoom thingy or something? Do you have to leave?”

“You’re cute when you haven’t had your first cup of coffee,” he said indulgently. “No, this is too important. Cole thinks it’ll make a stronger impression if I’m there. All senior level employees will be in attendance. I have to go—”

“Okay, I get it. How long will you be gone? You promised you’d make it to the fundraiser.” Sensing I was in a mood last night, Daniel had volunteered to attend as my date. I hadn’t planned on asking; he always magically had a good excuse as to why he couldn’t make it to these sorts of things, why he couldn’t support me. Him agreeing to go, without being asked, was a sign he was trying, and it meant everything to me.

“When’s the event?” he asked.

“Saturday evening.Fivedays from now,” I emphasized.

“That works out perfectly. I’ll be back Friday evening.” He kissed my forehead. “I really have to go. Maybe get some quality time with your brother while I’m gone?” It landed like a question.

“What?!” I asked as hot coffee spilled over the edge of the mug and onto the comforter. “I thought you said all senior staff members were going?” It didn’t get more senior than Cole.

“He has something pressing he needs to handle here.” His eyes widened on the quilt, but his phone chirped before he could go into a decent tailspin about it. “That’s the front desk. My car service is here. I’ll call you when I land,” he shouted as he hastily made his way to the stairs. “Scrub that with a block of ice before it sets in!”

The front door clicked shut, and I was out of the bed in a flash. Face washed, teeth brushed, hastily dressed, and at the curb hailing a cab in under ten minutes. I hadn’t been this pissed in ages. Actually, I had. The night Cole exploded back into my life like a fucking life-altering grenade.

I cursed the Manhattan traffic as I peered anxiously through the Plexiglas, urging my feet on an invisible gas pedal, needing to get to Cole’s office yesterday. “I’ll walk from here,” I said, after the driver in front of us got out of his car to road rage with the guy who’d cut him off two lights back. I stuffed a bundle of bills into the payment slot and hopped out, holding a hand out for the driver in the next lane to slow so I could make it onto the sidewalk. My palm collided with the hood of his car, and he laid on the horn before flipping me off.

I had to dodge a motorbike riding against traffic, and a lady walking her poodle by the time I rounded the corner and entered Cole’s office building. The skyscraper took up one half of a city block.

I signed in, slipped my temporary badge into the rightful slot on the turnstile, and searched for the bank of elevators that went to his floor. I drummed my fingers against my thigh the whole ride up.

“Excuse me. Sir!” the receptionist called as I blew past her desk in search of Cole’s office. It’d be the biggest one with the unfettered eastern view of the city. Couldn’t be that hard to find.

Leland shoved to his feet as I charged for Cole’s office doors but wisely didn’t stop me.

“I’ll call you right back,” Cole said into his desk phone receiver, sliding it into its cradle as he took in my appearance with concern. “Is everything alright—”

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