Dirty Deal (Perfectly Matched 2)

Fuck this.

She was right the first time for not wanting to talk about it. She should’ve listened to her gut. He already knew far more than he needed to. “So now I live in her house and my parents and I don’t speak,” she finished lamely and jammed a dumpling into her mouth whole to stop her loose tongue from wagging.

Time stretched between them, and Bryan drummed his fingers on the counter before setting down his chopsticks and shoving off his stool.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I think this is going to be one long night if we just keep asking each other questions. My life is a little too boring for all that.”

She let out a long breath, grateful for the change in topic. “Your life as a military trauma doctor?” She raised her eyebrows. “Yeah, sounds like a real snooze.”

“Your own life always seems boring to yourself. No matter how truly fascinating you are.” The words seemed weighty as he said them, and she eyed him as he walked around the counter and into her living room. “You got any board games? We can play checkers or something while we talk.”

“What? No. I mean, my gram might, she used to keep them under the TV, but I haven’t seen them since I was really young.”

She swiveled around in her chair to find him riffling through the cabinet under the television, five long, dusty boxes already stacked next to him.

“Trivial Pursuit, the 1930s. Damn.” He lifted up a box and set it with the others. “Do you know anything about Hoover towns?”

She popped one last bite of rice into her mouth and headed back to the living room. When she finally finished chewing, she plopped onto the sofa. “Nope.” She crossed one leg over the other and surveyed him for a long moment before adding, “But we could play a game I used to play in boarding school,” she offered.

“I’ll warn you right now I don’t pillow fight.” Bryan stood and joined her on the couch. It was wide enough so that they never touched, but the proximity still felt strangely intimate.

Shaking it off, Serena went on, “No, nothing like that. We only did that when we wore our schoolgirl outfits with the knee-high socks and miniskirts.”

“Wait, seriously?”

She rolled her eyes and tossed a pillow at him. “No, not seriously.”

He laughed and clutched the pillow to his chest. “So what’s the deal with this game, then?” he asked.

“I don’t really remember the name of it, and I think drinking was involved, but the basic rules are that there’s one serious question and one silly question. We ask them in rounds, and the first person who refuses to answer loses. Kill two birds with one stone. It will be more fun than just reciting our life histories, but we’ll actually get some useful info out of it.”

“Sounds fair enough. So who goes first?” Bryan asked.

He set the pillow he’d been holding to the side and stared at her questioningly. Perfect. She’d managed to derail the all-too-intimate conversation, but now, without a slab of countertop between them and with those hazel eyes drilling into hers, she was lost.

Lord, he was handsome.

…

Man, she was hot. But in spite of those catchy little sounds she made in the back of her throat when she ate and the porn faces every time she opened another little white carton, he’d gotten all the way through dinner without yanking the chopsticks out of her hand and seeing what he had to do to get that same reaction from her.

He was calling it a win.

“I can go first,” she murmured. “We’ll start silly.”

She sat quietly for a moment, tapping a manicured fingernail to her bottom lip as if in thought. Yeah, he was pretty proud of himself so far, but if she kept drawing attention toward that heart-shaped mouth of hers, there was no telling how tonight would end up. He was only a man, flesh and blood…even if most of it was pooling southbound.

“What was the worst thing you ever did to your sister growing up?” she asked at last.

“That is not a silly question,” he argued.

“It is, too. I bet it’s a silly answer.”

“Maybe so, but it’s not a silly question.” If he had to say the word “silly” one more time, he was pretty sure he’d have to hand in his man card, but he kept the complaint to himself.

She rolled her eyes. “Fine, then. You want me to start serious, since I clearly haven’t mastered the comedic art of twenty questions?”

“You can do whatever you please, but we can call this one a gimme. When we were young, the worst thing I used to do was trade Q’s dimes for nickels. I convinced her they were worth more since they were bigger.” And she still wouldn’t let him forget it to this day.

“I did that once to someone when I was young, but it was the au pair my father had hired.” Serena laughed. “She was in her midtwenties. Not too bright, but then again, my dad didn’t hire her for her brains.”

That caught him off guard. Not only because of the implications of what she’d said, but also the way she’d said it. Like it was no big deal. A fond childhood memory like feeding ducks in the park or ordering out on Friday nights. But most surprising of all was the fact that her words made him want to share something in kind.

“My father was a bastard, too.”

Serena surveyed him, her head tilted to the side, then asked, “To your mom or all of you?”

He shrugged, still struggling with the idea of letting her so far into his life. For Christ’s sake, they’d only just met the other day. Still, pretty much everyone in town knew the Metcalf story. What was one more person on that list?

But more than that, he wanted to tell her.

“All of us. He was in the military. Took it very seriously. His family obligations, not so much. He was like a visiting superhero a few months a year, coming into the house, fixing the roof, meting out discipline, pretending he’d never left…until he left again.” With every word, the admissions became easier. Like the understanding expression on Serena’s face was inviting him to continue. To pour it all out.

So he went on. “When I was around eight or so, my mom found out that he was a serial cheater while he was away. Had a woman at every port. My mother struggled with it for years, calling to check up on him, breaking plates, creating scenes when he came home, the whole to-do. It was ugly all the time, but she stayed anyway. I don’t know why. I think she could’ve forgiven him if he ever even attempted to ask for forgiveness.” And he and Q would have, too. Until they found out the rest of it. “Turned out he also had another whole family in Vietnam. Kids and all.”

“Wow.” Serena’s hand stretched momentarily toward his, but she dropped it just as quickly. “That must have been…”

“Yeah. Not good times.” He drew back and pursed his lips, wishing he could rewind. He was a grown-ass man now, and none of that should matter anymore. He might have opted to honor his father’s deathbed wishes out of the love he had for a wartime hero whom he couldn’t separate from the man himself, but he’d managed to avoid being like him in any other capacity. In his book, that made him a better man than his father had ever been. There was no point in crying over long-spilled milk.

“Anyway, that’s my sob story. Everybody has one. What’s the rest of yours?”

“You want me to follow that?” She raised her eyebrows.

“What do you mean?”

“What do I mean? Christ’s sake, yours is like a Lifetime movie, and I’m supposed to tell you why I’m fucked up? Poor little rich girl, two parents who are still living. You have the Led Zeppelin of horrible childhood stories and I’ve got, like, I don’t know…Yanni or something.”

The tension gripping his gut unfurled some, and he grinned at her, grateful that she’d read his mood and lightened things up. “Come on, don’t put yourself down. I’m sure your childhood was terrible.”

Bryan grabbed the throw pillow she’d tossed at him from the floor and chucked it back at her.

“Want me to ask that serious question, or would you rather show me how a silly que

stion is done?” She pursed those delicate lips in a way that made the rest of his body respond with adamant approval.

“How about you give the silly question another go.” They’d skated a little too close to home, and they could both use a breather for sure.

“Okay, then…what’s your secret?”

“You mean other than patrolling the streets of Gotham at night as a caped crusader?” He knew what she was referring to, but hell if answering that question didn’t seem like jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

“No, Batman. I meant what’s your secret with all these women? How do you get them to lose their shit for you? Is it the tall, dark, and handsome thing? Because no offense, but I’m not sure I see the full benefit of your charms.” She smirked at him and tossed the pillow in her lap as if daring him to prove her wrong.

And, sucker that he was, he had half a mind to do just that.

He cleared his throat, trying to get a grip. If he didn’t, this whole plan was going to go to shit before they even got it off the ground.

“You can’t handle the truth,” he said.

“It’s quoting military movie lines? Equally lame,” she answered. She stared at him for a long moment, but when he didn’t bite, she tried again. “Are you one of those guys that writes poetry? Like, do you tell women that you’re super deep and then you go ahead and whip off a profound haiku or something? Is that your MO?”

“You got me. That’s it,” he said with a fake grimace and nod.

“No, no, no. Wait. I got it. You’re one of those guys who stares deep into a girl’s eyes.”

She crawled across the floor until they were nose to nose, bringing with her the smell of lavender that always clung to the air surrounding her. He tried to hold his breath, willed himself not to really look at her.

She wasn’t even there. No blue eyes. No blond hair. No perfect view down the front of her shirt…