“Oh, I don’t know. He’d probably turn around and try to charge me for last night.”
“You defended yourself from a previous attacker.”
“My word against his.”
“Which is entirely different from you having medical records of a broken arm from the real assault,” Cal said. “Even if it doesn’t stick, the truth will be out there to better protect you and any future partners roped into his clutches.” He didn’t mean to push; he just tended to get heated when it came to his loved ones.
“You’re right,” Owen said. “I know you’re right. It just feels so much more real again.”
“I know, but you are so strong. You didn’t only prove that at the gala but for months moving on without him. You are remarkable, Owen. Never let him make you doubt that. As for the rest, Orion Labs will see reason with the venture. If Harrison ends up without a job, excuse me for not shedding any tears.” It might have been a cold thing to say, but it broke Owen’s somber disposition.
“What about you?” he asked, snuggling closer to Cal instead of untangling like they should. “Merlin and that video?”
Like a fresh trill from the alarm clock, Cal’s phone on the nightstand began to ring. Lara’s name blinked at them.
“Let’s find out, shall we?” Stretching back to snag it, Cal answered with a jovial, “You’re up early.”
“Please, as if you’ve even slept the past two days despite not leaving the bedroom,” she teased.
“We’ve slept. And left the bedroom.”
“Oh really? Where are you now?”
Owen stifled a giggle into Cal’s shoulder.
“It’s seven thirty in the morning,” Cal defended. “Any news on Merlin?”
Lara snorted at the change in subject. “You won’t have to worry about him.”
“What happened?” Owen asked, perking up at Cal’s side.
“Marsh and Merlin didn’t count on you two being a unified front,” she said louder for his benefit. “Now that we have that footage, who could be blackmailed changes. Did you really think he could blow this up as proof of prostitution without making himself culpable? If he so much as breathes wrong in this city, especially in the direction of any escort services, he’s the one who’ll be prosecuted.
“Not that Dick would ever throw you under the bus by revealing that footage.” She dropped some of her teasing edge. “But he certainly made it sound convincing to Merlin.”
“Tell him I owe him a fruit basket,” Cal said. One of the many reasons he’d been so loyal to Nick of Time was that Dick could be one scary bastard when necessary.
“It’ll really be okay?” Owen leaned over Cal to speak into the phone.
“Merlin has no ammunition, Owen,” Lara said, “and his bed is going to stay cold for a very long time. You just worry about you and Calvin. And invite me to that next dinner party! I’ll bring the wine.”
Owen’s renewed giggle soothed Cal better than any news about Merlin’s downfall. They’d be okay, but first they had to finish taking down Harrison.
After hanging up the call, it was like a day in the life of Owen Quinn—heading into the city to attend his lesson with Lorelei, then his routine on the way to work getting his favorite morning coffee, and finally entering Nye Industries where everyone, security included, showed Owen such deference that Cal felt humbled by how much of the city understood Owen’s worth as well as he did.
Owen’s support structure was growing, with Lorelei and Frank especially, who both offered bodily harm to Harrison after hearing about Saturday night.
“I’m aware my combat reflexes are next to nil, but I can still look intimidating,” Frank said. He was sufficiently tall and broad, but Cal would hardly call him intimidating. They’d been stopped by Frank in the hall on their way to see Keri.
“Owen can handle himself quite impressively, as it turns out,” Cal said.
Frank smiled with a ready response only to flounder, eyes widening as they focused over Cal and Owen’s shoulders. “That’s, uhh, good… coz apparently security sucks today.”
Cal spun around, already anticipating who they’d find before his eyes landed on Harrison headed toward them. The man’s severe expression had Cal prepared to step in front of Owen to protect him, but Owen pulled Cal behind him first.
“Owen, if you don’t want—”
“I got this. Frank, alert Keri and security for me, will you?”
“If you’re sure,” Frank said and backed up before turning tail to rush the opposite direction.
The loathing Cal felt for Harrison didn’t need any encouragement. When Owen first told him the story of what happened, Cal had pictured his father. He saw the similarities in the men clearly in person, not in appearance, but in the foundation of their sneers, like they believed they had a right to whatever they wanted no matter who got hurt along the way. That Owen could stand up to Harrison now was a sign of how far he’d come.
“You’re pushing me out?” Harrison said, stopping closer to Owen than Cal liked. “All this put at risk, and for what? Him?”
Owen touched Cal’s arm as he kept him guarded behind him. “If Orion Labs is willing to shift ownership of the venture elsewhere, that doesn’t change that we’re still moving forward with it. When you first came here, you said you understood if that’s what I wanted. But you didn’t mean that, did you? You only said it to trick me, and when I didn’t act the way you wanted, you shed your skin like the snake you are.”
Instead of anger, the lie of sympathetic pleading surged up in Harrison. Cal saw now who the real con artist was. “You don’t see the danger in fraternizing with someone like him? Given your position, your career?”
“After the things you’ve done to me, you dare—”
“I love you, Owen.” He stepped closer, causing Owen to back up and draw Cal back with him. “I always have. I only want what’s best for you.”
“No you don’t. You want what’s best for you. And that includes having me bow to everything you want. That’s not a partnership, Harry, and it’s time Orion Labs and everyone else learned what you are.”
Harrison’s carefully constructed mask flickered. “Are you threatening me?”
“You threatened me. You threatened Cal. I’m just telling the truth.”
“Are you now?” he huffed, gesturing widely at the office space beyond the hallway. “All these people know what your publicist really is? Have you been truthful about that?”
Heads had started popping up from surrounding cubicles and out of office doorways, creating the exact scene Harrison wanted, assuming he could grab the upper hand if only he cornered Owen again.
“You started those rumors to discredit me,” Owen fought back, “to force me into thinking I needed you, and you expect me to thank you for that? To run back into your arms? With you, I could have been anyone. You never cared about me. You wanted someone who was easy to control. But you were never enough for me, Harry, and you never will be.”
“So you have to pay for it instead?” he barked.
That, of course, was when Frank returned with Keri. Cal heard them coming and glanced behind him, only to see that it was more than only two pairs of feet, because Adam and Mayor King were with her.
“I do pay him,” Owen said, not knowing how much their audience had grown. “And I’m sleeping with him. But I do not pay him to sleep with me. That was never what this was about.”
“You expect me to believe that?” Harrison scoffed. “He’s a prostitute.”
That word carried enough weight for Cal to feel the scrutiny of the many eyes on him, but Owen didn’t falter. “You can think whatever you want.” He reached back to take Cal’s hand. “I’m happy. It’s a shame you only know how to make a partner miserable. You were never worth the effort I put into you, and it feels good to finally get that.”
“Owen,” the mayor spoke as the initial voice of authority. Owen turned, stepping to the side to accept the new additions to their circle, while King spared a
n icy glance at Harrison. “I see you have things handled. The three of us feared you might need additional support today. Pity we were right.”
“Mr. Marsh,” Keri addressed Harrison directly, “security is on its way to escort you from the building. I trust you won’t resist.”
Even Adam, who Cal had come to think of as an overlarge puppy, looked menacing, with Frank holding back like witnessing a slow-motion car crash.
Recognizing that he was vastly outnumbered, Harrison scrambled for something, anything to reclaim the conversation. “Owen, you’re making a mistake. You—”
“No.” He shot down the man who he’d worked so hard to put behind him. “My mistake was you. Now I’m moving on.”
Cal saw the rage spring to life on Harrison’s face like the fuse of an explosive lit, but Owen turned to depart through his circle of friends and didn’t notice. The expression was familiar to Cal, so when Harrison lurched forward, wild and angry, he was ready to intercept.
He gripped Harrison’s wrist before the man could grab Owen’s and used his hold as leverage to power a fierce punch across Harrison’s jaw. When he let go, Harrison stumbled, dazed. Cal’s hand stung, but it was worth it to see that bastard topple.
“Better watch that temper, Harry. It’ll get you into more trouble than you know.”
A spattering of applause sounded from the spectators—even Frank let out a laugh that he stifled with his hand—but while Keri, Adam, and the mayor stood stoic, Owen’s reaction was all Cal cared about, and he looked so moved that even if he didn’t need rescuing, Cal was there to watch his back.
Cal reached for Owen’s hand that had been rudely ripped away when he stepped in to stop Harrison’s lunge.
“H-he assaulted me!” Harrison sputtered.
“Not the way it looked from our angle, Mr. Marsh,” Keri said, crossing her arms and nodding curtly at security as they finally arrived from down the hall.
They swarmed Harrison and lifted him from the ground.
“Wait!” he tried, but no one was listening to him anymore.
In short order, he was carted away, leaving Owen holding gratefully to Cal’s hand, while he looked at the three powerful figures who’d become his friends, at Frank who’d become a dear friend, and at their audience, who was starting to return to work.
As strong as Owen had been while facing Harrison, he was still reserved deep down and hunched in on himself now that the commotion was over. “About what Harrison said—”
“Your personal life is your own, Owen,” Adam interrupted, smiling congenially again. “If you found love with your… publicist, well that’s just good fortune since you spend so much time together.”
“You’re welcome to stay through the interview, Mr. White,” Keri added, “and as long as you’d like after that.”
It was obvious to Cal, in the case of Mayor King in particular, that they knew there was truth to what Harrison had accused them of, but they respected Owen too much to care.
“I think I will stay,” Cal said, looking to Owen beside him. “If you’d like that?”
“Yes. Thank you. Thank you,” he said again to the people who’d come together for his sake, Frank included. “And if it’s all right with everyone, since I have all of you here… I’d like to tell you what I plan to say in that interview.”
EVERYTHING had a pattern. The trick to understanding the data was in the models. The algorithms. The points along a timeline that indicated the probability of what should come next.
Owen’s whole world revolved around patterns, but some things couldn’t be predicted. Whenever that happened, he thought back to something his mother once told him.
“Meet every surprise in life like you had a plan all along.”
Owen still didn’t have a plan. But he was starting to be okay with that. Some things he could predict, he’d built his entire career off that, but the rest would work itself out with time and effort and the belief that he was finally fighting for what he wanted.
Next he had to get through introducing Cal to his family.
His adopted father Doug, Alyssa, and Casey were coming for a visit, with Mario tagging along. Cal’s sister, Claire, was coming too. They’d had several dinner parties over the past few weeks since the interview made Owen’s personal life public—adding Lara, Cal’s friend Rhys, and his girlfriend Danielle to the usual suspects. Even Keri and Wesley, and Adam and Teresa attended a few. But this was the first time their loved ones from Middleton would all be in the same room.
Orion Labs had fired Harrison in the aftermath of the scandal, but they appreciated the heads-up Keri gave them before the story went live and happily continued the partnership with a new representative sent to work in Atlas City.
Harrison would likely get a new job eventually, once the scandal died down, though Owen tried not to think about it. Sometimes he’d catch himself wondering what Harrison was up to, if coming clean had been the right thing, but then he’d look at Cal, at his apartment, at the life he’d built here and remember why he’d put Harrison behind him in the first place. He deserved to be happy and here was where he’d found it.
Merlin hadn’t shown his face since, not in any circles that mattered. Life moved on, and Owen moved forward, for once feeling safe and excited for what came next, even amid the unexpected.
“What do you mean hack the nanomachines?” he said, busying himself in the kitchen, while Cal organized the counter.
“I mean, if this project with Nye and Walker revolves around chip technology and nanomachines for gene therapy… what happens if someone hacks the program? Could they manipulate the amount of medication being given or the direction the gene therapy takes? Cause irreparable damage maybe? Even make someone devolve into a monkey?”
Owen snorted. “Okay, King Koopa. Now you’re thinking like a supervillain. Although….” The inner working of Owen’s mind buzzed with probability. “I should probably make sure that’s not possible.”
Now it was Cal who laughed, obviously having only meant to tease Owen, but it got him thinking. There was always more to consider, more work to be done, and Cal inspired Owen and led him down paths he never expected. Challenging each other, bringing out the best in each other, that’s how a relationship was supposed to work. It amazed Owen sometimes that he’d never realized that until he had it.
Everything was ready now for their families to arrive. Dinner waiting, the apartment spotless, any items of Cal’s that had matriculated into Owen’s home displayed proudly. Cal still had his apartment, but they rarely spent nights apart. If they managed to avoid disaster tonight—even if they didn’t—Owen planned to ask Cal to move in with him over breakfast tomorrow.
While Cal finished setting out the wine and beer glasses for initial drinks to break the tension, Owen walked across the apartment to turn on some background music. The first song that started was Ella Fitzgerald singing “Someone to Watch Over Me”—just like the night they met.
Owen smiled, eyes closing as he hummed along and swayed in place. A few seconds later, when fingers alighted on his wrist, tentative but surer in their grip when Owen didn’t flinch, the world seemed to have come full circle as he was spun about and pulled into Cal’s body for a dance.
“Hey—” he started to protest.
“I am wearing shoes. You are not. Therefore, at the moment, I’m taller,” Cal said, continuing to lead with an arm around Owen’s waist. “Besides, this way I can finally prove to you that I am more than two left feet.”
A giggle left Owen as he gave in, well trained in how to be the partner who followed, but with Cal, he could be both, he could be everything, including himself.
The steps didn’t matter before long, just the touch of Cal’s hand guiding him, their fingers clasped and held between them, and Owen’s head falling forward to rest on Cal’s shoulder. Again, he hummed and eventually began to sing along.
“You have a lovely voice, you know.”
“Really? I was always too shy to sing in f
ront of people.”
“Given your new lease on life, I’d say that calls for karaoke this weekend.”
“Oh no!” Owen pulled up with a laugh. “Don’t tell Mario that. He’ll insist. But it would probably be fun. Gotta keep everyone entertained while they’re here, right?”
Cal led Owen across the floor, faster and faster into a twirl, where he spun Owen outward and back in against him for a low dip that made Owen giggle that much harder.
“I cave,” he said. “You are much better at this when you know the steps.”
“See? But I don’t mind it the other way.” Cal proceeded into a slower sway again. “You’ll just have to teach me more, Scarlet.”
That sounded wonderful. Everything sounded wonderful when Cal called him Scarlet. “Remember now, no matter what Doug says once they get here, if he tries to do the whole passive-aggressive ‘you’re not good enough for my son’ bit, he’s just like that, he means well, and he will not sway my opinion.”
Nothing but confidence shone on Cal’s face. “I’m not worried. He’s going to love me. My age notwithstanding, I am not Harrison, and all he’ll need to see to understand that is how happy you are and how much I love you. You are happy, aren’t you, Owen?” He brushed a stray hair from Owen’s forehead.
“More than I’ve ever been, because I love you too.”
They kissed, softly, intimately, and swayed awhile longer, well into the next song. Owen thought to himself like he had the night Harrison first breezed into his life again that he’d never really loved Harry because he hadn’t known what love felt like until now.
A chime from Cal’s phone reminded them that there wasn’t much time before company arrived. They kissed once more before Cal moved to retrieve it from the kitchen counter.
He snorted when he read the message. “Apparently, Claire ran into your family on the metro. She recognized Alyssa. They’ve been getting to know each other at Impulse, you know.”
“I know.” Owen crossed the room to join him. “I kind of love that. Did she say anything else?”
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