Page 37 of Broken Brothers

Just the fact that you’re calling it sweet, sweet love. Goddamn, Chance, what happened to you, man. This girl had better work out for you.

“Lunch, remember,” Layla said, although she didn’t exactly speak with the greatest conviction. I think both of us would have jumped into the alleyway for a quickie, trash and onlookers be damned.

“OK, fine,” I said. “I guess we’ll save it for tonight.”

“Oh, you just wait,” she said with a wink. “You have no idea what I have in store for you.”

I tried not to let my face give away too much excitement or my pants bulge too much. Both were pretty much losing battles.

At lunch, we discussed everything but business and love. Which, I suppose, was the best thing I could have asked for inthat moment. The more I could avoid the awkward conversation about the deal that I had struck and agreed in principle on with her father, the better. The more I could delay the “I love you” conversation, the better.

Instead, we talked about mundane topics that somehow seemed exciting when I was talking about them with Layla. Future trips to the Central Park Zoo, upcoming vacations after the rounds of investing… the possibilities were most certainly endless and full of potential. We could go anywhere together with our resources, we could do anything together, and we could be anything we wanted.

I supposed right then and there that my definition of mundane probably differed from the average person. Oh well.

As lunch wrapped up, Layla stood.

“I have to be somewhere at 1, so I have to go now,” she said. She came forward and kissed me. “Maybe you can come over to my place.”

“Is that an offer?”

I expected her to smirk, say something sexy, and then leave with a tease. But instead, I got a completely different reaction.

“Well… maybe for later,” she said, clearly wanting to push it away. I felt a tinge of disappointment, if only because it felt like I could never get her to agree to anything beyond what was in the present moment.

“Why not tonight?” I said.

“I’ll see you later, OK? Let me know when you want me to come over.”

Well… at least I was going to see her tonight. At least she was coming over to my place that evening.

But why in the hell was it so essential for her to keep her place secret? Why couldn’t I see it?

Maybe I didn’t want to know the answers to those questions. Maybe it would just unearth more problems for me. Maybe, Ithought with a sigh, I needed to step back and not indulge in the thoughts that Melanie had planted in my head three years ago.

15

Amazingly, Mr. Burnson showed up to the office in the afternoon. He patted me on the back when he saw me, saying that I had helped contribute to the amazing deal that “we” had put together. Of course, I wanted to smack him for that.

“We” had not done anything; only I had done something. And it was an amazing deal for only one party, us, and even then, when the Taylors realized how much we had screwed them over, they would look to back out and our amazing deal would fall apart. I even expressed as much to Mr. Burnson.

But like Mr. Hunt, he saw negotiation not as a chance for both sides to come out happy, but as a chance to win.

“If they don’t notice, they lose,” he said.

I had no choice but to agree in the moment, given he was still my boss. But…

As poorly as it sounded from a business perspective, I had to swear to myself that I would not fuck over Layla. I wouldn’t fuck myself over to make her happy, far from it, but I couldn’t be giving her a deal this bad. The percentages added up over theyears—I preferred lining the pockets of the Taylors than I did the Burnsons.

Nevertheless, the conversation didn’t last long, in large part because I was too busy to spend much time on it and because I had something more important—a date that night with Layla, a rising tide of emotions, and some questions I couldn’t shake in my head.

I had a feeling that when it came down to it, tonight was going to have some very interesting conversations. And I had no idea if they would go well or not, but they were conversations I couldn’t keep silent.

When I got home, I quickly changed into something comfortable—for once, we weren’t going to get dressed up in fancy clothing. We were just going to be two lovebirds, Netflix and chilling, or probably just going straight to the chilling; no need for fancy bars or restaurants, and no need for subtlety. I spent the next hour waiting patiently for Layla to come, hoping that she remembered the address and would come—and that she hadn’t suddenly gotten cold feet, again.

But, as my good fortune would have it, she knocked at my door at almost precisely 7 p.m. I opened the door and smiled at the brown bags she had in her had.

“Taco trucks,” she said. “I thought you might be hungry before we get to the good stuff, huh? Besides, I’ve seen you eat.”