I can’t show Taylor that sort of disrespect, and I refuse to throw Hank under the bus by saying he’s lying to his Dom.
“Yeah,” I say. “We talked.”
“Who is he?”
“He...”
That’s such a hard question.
“Spit it out, Mallory.”
“He’s my brother’s best friend.”
“I didn’t know you had a brother,” Taylor says carefully. My body tenses, and I know that both he and Hank notice that.
“I don’t. I mean...not anymore. He...he died. A few years back. Car accident.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” Hank murmurs quietly.
Taylor offers no such condolences.
“Why did he come here? Did he come to find you?”
“I think he wants to talk about my brother.”
“Why? Was he involved in your brother’s death?”
“I...”
Shit.
Fuck.
How the hell do I explain this?
The truth is that I’m rarely open with anyone about what happened with Matthew. I don’t like anyone to know that my brother died because I don’t like talking about Matthew. It’s not that I don’t love him. I do. I just don’t like sharing personal stories about my previous life. I don’t like telling people about what happened because I miss him so very much.
If people knew what happened to Matthew, they’d either pity me or they’d want to talk about it.
I don’t want either of those things.
Unfortunately, I can already tell that Taylor isn’t going to let me off the hook.
“No.”
“But you were.”
“Sort of.”
“What happened, Mallory?”
“You want to talk about this here?” I look around.
“No one is listening.”
“But, still...”
My voice trails off. He wants to ask me questions about Matthew dying and we’re in the middle of a sex club. This seems like a horrible way to mix up real life and fantasy.