Busted (Stacked Deck Book 11)

by Emilia Finn

  She’s gonna make a wonderful second ex-wife to a poor desk jockey someday.

  I don’t reply.

  Instead, I slide my phone – and the half dozen unread texts from Em – into my pocket and, stepping up to the cabinet above the fridge, I snag an almost full bottle of Hennessy and bring it down to unscrew the cap. I forgo a glass and ignore the dozens of sodas in the fridge I could mix it with, and instead, match intensity for intensity; I hurt Emma, my baby isn’t my baby, and I’m fighting with everyone, so I tip the bottle back and chug.

  The liquor is like fire racing down my throat. Like barbed wire using my esophagus as a skating rink. But coming up for air, I gasp to combat the pain, then I tip the bottle back again and ensure I’m going to sleep for the next twenty-four hours straight.

  After that, maybe shit will be a little better.

  Warmth fills my stomach within minutes of the first swallow, and soon after that, a smile stretches across my face. Now when I drink, it doesn’t burn, and whaddayaknow, my heart doesn’t hurt as much either.

  I make my way back to the couch in sweatpants and a wife-beater tank – I feel like it’s the look I’m going for right at this juncture in my life – and plopping back down, I bring the bottle to my lips and take another long swallow.

  The more I drink, the less I feel, and hell, I know that’s a terrible coping mechanism, but for today, I think I’ll allow it.

  Tomorrow, I’ll do better.

  Tomorrow, I’ll fix everything I broke.

  Promise.

  My eyelids grow heavier the more I swallow, so I lay on the couch and lift my feet to stretch along it lengthways. My head rests on one arm, and my feet hang off the other end, and exhaling a gusty breath when I get comfortable, I think about Emma. And sex. And more Emma. And love.

  She and I fucked on this couch one time. When Luke was in his room, messing around with some chick on the phone, Emma and I decided to get a little naughty and see how far we could go before it got too risky.

  From holding hands, to touching. From kissing, to me sliding deep inside and groaning at the perfect feel of her beneath my body.

  I don’t think either of us intended to get so far as fucking, but once we started, there was no stopping it, and Luke was distracted enough in the other room, there was no need to quit.

  Now I lay on that same couch with a belly full of fiery alcohol, and a hard cock.

  My cock is hard again! Hallefuckenlujah!

  My phone vibrates in my pocket, which doesn’t help my hard dick situation, but tucking the bottle between my ribs and the back cushions, I grab the phone and scowl at Grace’s flashing name.

  I’m careful, suuuuuper careful, not to fumble my phone and answer that call, because I can’t talk to Grace right now and not lose my head. Instead, I navigate through the screens and hit dial on Em’s name.

  The new call cuts Grace’s off, and rings for Em.

  “Rob?” she answers almost right away. Questioning, kind, and so fucking sweet, I wanna drop to the floor and beg for her back. “You there?”

  “I’m standing in my window, EmKat. And I’m hollering for your attention.”

  “You’re…” She pauses. “Huh? You’re not in your window, stupid. I’m sitting by my window right now, and there’s no one out there.”

  “Oh, I meant metaphorically,” I mumble with a small grin. “Why aren’t you at work? You naughty girl, always cutting class. Now you’re cutting work too.”

  “I do whatever the hell I want, and because I’m experiencing somewhat of an emotionally draining time in my life right now, I made the executive decision not to people today.”

  “Mm. Same.” I belch, and snigger when the burn is almost as hot coming up as it was going down. “You remember that time we said we just have to call, and the other motherfucker would come running?”

  “Well…” Em does something on her end, puts her sketchpads aside or some such thing, and grunts as she moves. “Yeah, I remember. All except the motherfucker bit. Pretty sure we didn’t say that.”

  “Pretty sure maybe we did,” I counter. “Speaking of motherfuckers, you ‘member that time Iowa kissed your mom?” I burst out in piggy snorts. “Bry clocked him so bad.”

  “So you’re day-drunk, huh?” Emma sighs and – well, I dunno. Because this isn’t a video call, so I can’t tell what she’s doing. “Why are you drunk in the middle of the afternoon?”

  I snort and wiggle on the couch until I get more comfortable. “Perhaps the question is, why aren’t you drunk in the middle of the afternoon? It’s fun, EmKat. Just sayin’.”

  “Maybe you’re right.” She shrugs… well, I assume she shrugs. Sounded like a shrug to me. “Maybe I’ll try the middle of the day drunk thing in a few days, if my emotional stuff doesn’t smooth out.”

  “I’m sorry I yelled at you last night,” I blurt. “I panicked when I saw Grace. She looked scared, and lesbehonest, you’re fully prepared at all times to kick her pert little nose in until it no longer exists.”

  “That is absolutely true. And another reason I stayed home today,” she says. “I needed to be kept indoors, because if I see her in town, I’m gonna get my ass sent to jail.”

  “My mom’ll probably unbutton her blouse for you if you get a dude judge.”

  “Lovely offer,” she drawls. “What are you doing right now? And P.S. I’m still really mad at you.”

  “But you took my call,” I singsong, “and you said the thing about being my best man instead of nothing, so I knew you would.”

  “Arrogant of you. I might change my mind at any moment and leave you on your ass.”

  “Please don’t,” I whimper and let a pout replace my grin. “Don’t leave me, Em. I miss you so fucking much that it makes my hair follicles hurt.”

  “Your hair f—” She cuts her words off and shakes her head… well, I assume she’s shaking her head. “What the hell did you take, Robert? Did you take pills with whatever you’re drinking? Anything with white powder? Anything at all from Luke’s bedroom?”

  “Nah. But I’m drinking the expensive stuff, it’s mixing with grief, and now I’m a little bit tipsy.”

  “Little bit,” she scoffs. “Sure, if that’s the version of the truth we’re running with. Why’d you call me?”

  “Cuz I missed you, silly. Ya wanna know a secret? It’s a good one. Big and fat and juicy.” I look down my body, and grin at the tent I’ve made of my sweatpants. “Big and fat and juicy, kinda like my dick.”

  “Probably not,” she sighs. “You’re on the blackout side of drunk, so whatever you tell me right now, you’ll either forget or regret. I don’t want either of those things. Sober up, then call me again tomorrow. Then you can ask me if I wanna know.”

  “I thought of you when I fucked her.” I say it anyway, like air bursting from a balloon. “Back in high school, and you were dancing with that fuckwit at prom. It made me so mad, so jealous,” I groan, “so Grace and I ended up in her room…”

  “Rob, stop.”

  “I lost my virginity thinking of you. It felt so weird,” I tell her, “Because I wasn’t supposed to think of you like that, but it’s what got me hard, and then it’s what made me come. And the next day, when you told me you did it with your date, I swear, EmKat, I swear,” I guess I’m a growler now. “I wanted to Hulk-smash the whole town when you told me. I was so fucking angry and sad and mad and sad, and I didn’t like that he touched you.”

  “I lied that day,” Em murmurs quietly. “Since you’re gonna forget all this tomorrow anyway, I can admit that I lied. I didn’t lose my virginity that night. But you did, and it made me feel, like… I dunno. Weird. It bothered me that you slept with someone, so the lie slipped out.”

  “Wait!” I surge up on the couch, and catch the bottle of liquor before it topples over. “You didn’t lose your virginity to that dude?”

  “Well,” she hedges. “Eventually I did. But it wasn’t that night. I lied to you, so then I undid the lie and made it truth.�
��

  “Fucking gag!” I faux-retch, only for it to turn real and for my stomach to jump. “Emma! Why’d you do that, huh? I was losing my virginity and thinking ‘bout you, and you were still untouched but making up lies because you didn’t like that I’d been with someone else. And all along, we could have been doing it together… no lies, no regrets, and maybe instead of me standing in an OBGYN office with Grace, I could have been standing with you.”

  “Wait.” Emma sits up tall, straight as an arrow – I assume. “What?”

  “I would make babies with you,” I whimper. “Can you imagine how fuckin’ cute they’d be? Your eyes, and my ink.”

  “They don’t come out with ink!” Em shouts on a laugh. “Jesus, Rob.”

  “Your eyes,” I repeat. “And your smile. Your blonde. Your cute little Reilly dimple. Your bad fuckin’ attitude, and complete and utter selflessness and perfection.”

  “Your kindness,” Em replies. “Your loyalty. And if it’s a boy, your strength and wisdom.”

  “Girls can’t be strong or wise?”

  Emma giggles. “Not if she’s my daughter. We both know she’s gonna be wild and mean. And hypothetically speaking, I have Kit Kincaid’s psycho gene, right? It’s potent, but singular. Mix that with your family – with Tink – and that shit is gonna be crazy.”

  “No daughters for us,” I declare quickly. “The whole town depends on us not making a daughter.”

  “Yeah,” Em’s giggles soften, quieten, and then stop. “Hypothetically, of course. I doubt it’s going to be a problem for us, seeing as you continue to send me away and hurt me.”

  A groan, deep and demanding, rumbles along my chest and ends with a sigh. “I’m sorry, Emma.”

  “I don’t think you understand how much you hurt me,” she pushes. “I know I seem untouchable and silly, and I know I’m talking to you right now, which implies that I condone your behavior. But there are chunks you’ve stolen from me, Rob, and I’m never gonna get them back again.”

  “Em…”

  “I’m not sure I’ll ever truly trust you,” she whimpers. “Because you flip so fast, and because I’m your safe space, and you’re so confident I’ll keep coming back, you hurt me without caring about the damage you do.”

  “Emma, I’m sor—”

  “You should never have tossed me out.” She hammers me, one sad declaration at a time. “That should never have been your instant solution. And then last night, you should not have assumed the worst of me, especially not after I told you what happened.”

  “Emma—”

  “But you’re blackout drunk, so I can tell you this stuff, then tomorrow, I can keep coming back, because you have my heart, and I can’t live without it.”

  Her voice catches and breaks, and just like that, my cock deflates.

  “I’m gonna go, okay?” she sniffles. “I have things to do, and a best friend I don’t wanna give more of myself to right now.”

  “I love you, EmKat. Don’t go yet.”

  “I have to,” she whispers to hide the tears. “But I’ll come back to you tomorrow. We can pretend you and I didn’t just fantasy plan our future awesome daughter, and we’ll forget the bit where I lied about when I lost my virginity. You need to take care of your business right now. Deal with Grace, deal with you. Date, or don’t, do crazy things, or not. I don’t have the emotional bandwidth right now to be part of it. My entire being is wrapped up in hating Grace, and that’s really unhealthy, so I need to work through that.”

  “I miss you, Emma!”

  “I miss you too,” she cries, soft and gentle cries that may precede the rocking-in-the-corner type of cries. “I’ll be back, and we’ll pick up the best friend stuff where we left off. Everything will go back to normal, and I’ll heal, and you’ll heal. And fuck, Grace is the source of a lot of trauma for us both.”

  “I’m sorry I ever said yes to her to prom.”

  “Same,” Emma chokes on the word. “In hindsight, I realize we should have stayed home that year. Then when we were seniors, we should have gone together. Who knows, maybe we’d be married right now, and I’d have a psycho in my belly. A baby that was planned and wanted.”

  “You’d have married me?” I rasp past the lump in my throat. “Really?”

  “Well of course,” she answers on a faux tease. “You’re the catch of the county, Rob Hart. Sweet and handsome, smart and strong. Up until the last couple months, you were perfect in every way. But then you hurt me, and now…” She shakes her head – I think – and I take a swig of my booze. “No, I don’t think I would marry you now. Your loyalty swings away too easily for me to trust. You don’t have my back, and I kinda need that in a man.”

  “Emma—”

  “I have to go.” She sniffs one fast, sharp, booger-catching sniff. “I’ll see you tomorrow. See ya.”

  “I love you, Emma!” I shout it at the dead call. At the silence, but for the single beep to indicate she’s gone. “I love you,” I repeat. “And I’m sorry.”

  When nothing magical happens, no reconnected calls, no declarations of love being flung back my way, I toss my phone to the floor, set my bottle of liquor on the coffee table, and when there’s a knock on the door, my head comes up and around the way a meerkat’s might in the wild.

  “Emma?”

  I bound up too fast, uncoordinated, and as I go, the alcohol swirls in my brain until I stumble three steps to the right and catch myself on the end of the couch.

  “Rob? Are you there?”

  “Emma?” I call for her, hand extended, hopeful smile on my face. “Emma? Where are you?”

  “Front door, silly. Let me in.”

  I lope through the kitchen, past the table we like to play poker at, and stop at the front door. With a goofy grin on my lips, and my cock flying proudly again, I swing the door open and stop.

  “Wait… This ain’t… You ain’t…” I narrow my eyes, like that’ll help me see. “Grace? You’re trickin’. You’re not Emma.”

  She steps through the door without invitation, moves onto her toes, and places a gentle kiss on my lips. “You can call me Emma if you want. You can call me anything you want.”

  “I don’t…” I look around in search of… something. Anything. Emma. “I’m confused.”

  “You also smell like hard liquor and bad choices,” Grace snickers. “Come on.” She holds my hand and pulls me toward the hall. “Come to bed with me.”

  “No.” I try to slow our trek through the apartment. “Not going to bed with you. That’s bad.”

  “Rob, it doesn’t have to be b—”

  “No. I’m going to have a shower.” I move into the bathroom and work on making my steps straight and not-drunk. It’s a lie, and my brain may be suffering from alcohol poisoning. But I make it to the shower in a mostly straight line anyway. “Go away, Grace. I don’t wanna hang out with you right now.”

  But she doesn’t go away. Nope. She doesn’t. Instead, she helps me with my tank, and undoes the drawstring on my sweats. A minute after that, she takes her top off, and follows me into the shower. And just a minute after that, the apartment door opens and closes again, Luke stomps through, and he saves me from terrible choices.

  “Get the fuck out, slut!”

  Emma

  It’s Time to Tell Someone

  I remained in my bedroom all day yesterday. I ignored all but one phone call, I told everyone who knocked on my door to go away, I had a protein shake for dinner rather than stay downstairs and eat with the family, and then I slept – really badly, while I dreamt of Rob hooking up with one woman after another. My dream slammed at me, punishing and mean, as woman after woman walked through my subconscious and smiled for my best friend.

  Every single woman was beautiful, slim, fit, and had an amazing smile. They were all better than Grace – less toxic, more genuine – which means I probably shouldn’t consider it a nightmare.

  Rob deserves someone good, and since I don’t think that person can be me, I should celeb
rate the good kind that walk on through…

  Right?

  I mean, in theory, yes. But in reality, I’m not there yet. So I wake in my bed with tears in my eyes. The soft, silent kind. The kind of tears that make me unbearably sad, and then I sit in my window for a while and watch the men who live on my estate wake.

  The cooler air is coming, and with it, the need to be extra quiet in the a.m. Lights come on in living room windows, but the lights upstairs stay off, and then a couple minutes later, front doors open, and the guys step out, one by one, in some variation of sweatpants and tanks. Sneakers. Hats.

  They all look the same, but different. They all have the same goal: a five-mile run, build up a sweat, then come home and enjoy breakfast with the women they love.

  Bryan is the first out the door, and though he usually runs with Iowa, my brother-in-law is absent today. Running late, or just not running at all, who knows. Not everyone jogs with a partner, but my brother and my brother-in-law are basically BFFs at this point. Which is nice, I guess. They could be enemies, since Iowa is boinking Bry’s sister. But that’s not the way it went, and watching them hang out is always fun.

  Uncle Jimmy is the next out, and when he reaches the gate, he’s joined by Jamie, and right behind him, Will. The second two don’t live on the estate anymore, but they swing by and pick Jimmy up, and then they go bolting into the forest that surrounds the estate, rather than the road that leads toward town.

  Uncle Aiden goes next. Uncle Jack. Even Rob and Luke’s dad steps out and grumbles about not wanting to run today.

  And all the while, I sit in my window and people-watch while I sketch.

  Drawing is how I calm myself. It’s meditation for my brain while still moving, since I feel the need to be hyper and active all the time. It’s how I can be still but still feel productive, because nine times out of ten, I sell the images I draw, even if I drew with no real plan in mind, no real look I was going for.

  My sketches, in these moments, are drawings of how I feel. And luckily for me, clients tend to find them beautiful, and ask to put them on their body.