Tempt Me: A First Class Romance Collection

by Jessica Hawkins

  “Hold up,” Keane says. “You’re telling me you’ve been bonin’ the fuck outta this chick for a month, Lionel-Richie-style, and she hasn’t so much as dropped a hint she’d prefer you not stick your dick inside another chick?”

  “Well, I currently have no desire to ‘stick my dick’ inside another woman, regardless—not every guy burns through ‘chicks’ as quickly as you do, Peen—I genuinely like focusing all my energies on one woman at a time. But it doesn’t matter, anyway, because, so far, Olivia doesn’t want exclusivity, either. Honestly, she doesn’t seem to have a jealous bone in her body.”

  “Bullshit. Every woman’s got at least thirty-seven jealous bones in her body. If this chick isn’t showing you hers, she’s just gaming you.”

  “Nah, Olivia’s an open book. Super chill. Honestly, from what I’ve seen so far, there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with her.”

  “Ooph. Say it ain’t so, Rummy-o. Gigantic red flag, dude. You best be finding at least a couple things wrong with this girl, pronto, or two months from now, you’re gonna find out every damned thing wrong with her, all at once, in a flash flood of batshit-crazy.”

  I open my mouth to tell my brother he’s a dumbshit, but before I can say a word, the tip of Keane’s rod bends and jerks sharply, instantly drawing our mutual attention.

  “Fish on!” Keane exclaims, leaning forward excitedly.

  “Reel him in slowly,” I caution.

  “We’re not nine and fifteen, Ry. You don’t have to coach me through this anymore.”

  “You’re gonna lose him, Peen. You haven’t set the hook.”

  “I know what I’m doing. Watch and learn, son: I’m fucking Ahab.”

  Keane continues reeling, but after a few seconds, the tip of his rod straightens and his line goes visibly slack. “Fuck!” Keane shouts. He raises his fist to the sky dramatically. “Damn you, fish gods!”

  I laugh my ass off. “Maybe don’t compare yourself to Ahab next time, son. I hate to spoil the ending for you, but Ahab never actually catches the whale.”

  “What?” Keane says, looking genuinely shocked. “But the book’s called Moby Dick. What’s the point in calling a book Moby Dick if no one ever catches Moby Dick? That’d be like Jaws if Roy Scheider doesn’t blow up the shark but instead says, ‘Oh well, I guess we just won’t swim in the ocean anymore.’”

  I laugh.

  Keane continues, “Or Finding Nemo if no one ever finds Nemo and the dad-fish goes, ‘Meh, I never liked that annoying clown-fish anyway.’”

  “Or maybe it’d be like Titanic,” I offer, “if, at the end, a big ship called Titanic sinks?”

  “Aaah,” Keane says, raising his eyebrow.

  “See what I did there, little brother?” I say.

  “Touché, big brother. That was a teaching moment, for sure.”

  I wink at him. “Watch and learn, son.”

  “Well, Titanic notwithstanding, Captain Ahab not catching Moby Dick is a shitty-ass, pointless ending, if you ask me.”

  “Peenie, Ahab not catching the whale is what makes it literature instead of Fast and Furious 7. The whole point is that Ahab becomes so obsessed with catching his great white whale, his obsession drives him to madness and, ultimately, hastens his demise.”

  “Hastens?”

  “Hastens. Causes something to happen quicker than it otherwise would. Read a book on occasion, man.”

  Keane shrugs. “I’m too busy watching Fast and Furious 7.” He flashes me his dimples. “Seriously, Ry, does your head hurt from being such a fancy-pants literary scholar?”

  “It’s not like I’ve got a PhD in American literature,” I say. “I read Moby Dick in high school English, same as everybody else other than you, right along with The Catcher in the Rye and The Great Gatsby.”

  “Were the endings of those other books as shitty-ass as Moby Dick?” Keane asks. “As long as you’re spoiling the classics for me, you might as well spoil ’em all.”

  “How the hell did you make it through high school without reading any of the classics?”

  “Dude, I was too busy striking out batters and slaying it with the hot-chick brigade to waste my time reading about whales and rye-catchers and Gatsbys.”

  “But how the hell did you pass English Lit?” I ask.

  “I had help from some tutors.” Keane winks. “Some very pretty tutors.”

  I laugh. Classic Keane.

  “So tell me the endings of those other books already, Master Yoda,” Keane says, casting his line out into the lake again. “Were they as shitty-ass and pointless as Moby Dick?”

  I take a long sip of my beer, gathering my thoughts. “Well, it’s been over ten years since I read them, so don’t hold me to it, but I think Holden Caulfield winds up in an insane asylum and The Great Gatsby dies without getting the girl.”

  “What the motherfuck?” Keane shouts, much too loudly for our serene environment. “Nobody gets the whale throughout all classic literature?”

  “You want a happy ending, read a romance novel, son.”

  “Well, shit, maybe I will. Life is shitastic enough without reading books with depressing endings. If I ever write a book, it’s gonna be whales and weed and wahoos for everyone!”

  I laugh.

  “Hand me another beer, would you, baby doll?” Keane says. “Literary analysis always makes me hella thirsty.”

  I hand my little brother a beer out of the cooler.

  “Thanks, Captain. That’s why I love you the most.”

  For several minutes, we sip our beers in silence and stare at the glassy lake.

  “I think we should use a different kind of bait next time,” Keane says after a while. “The fish are laughing at us. You hear ’em down there? They’re like, ‘Hahaha! What a couple of twatheads!’”

  “A good workman never blames his tools.”

  “Okay, then I blame you for buying shitty bait.”

  “Hey, back to Olivia for a sec,” I say. “What’s the ‘gigantic’ red flag you see? I don’t get it at all.”

  “Then you’re blind. Dude, if she’s not showing you anything but beauty-queen perfection for a solid month, then she’s most definitely a closet psycho.”

  “Fucking Colby. When did you talk to him?”

  Keane looks genuinely surprised. “I didn’t. Colby said Olivia’s a closet psycho?”

  “Yeah, in those exact words. We were together when I met Olivia in a bar, and Colby was like, ‘You dabble with the blonde one, there’s gonna be a Fatal Attraction-style boiled bunny in your future, man. That one’s a closet psycho, for sure.’”

  Keane laughs heartily. “But you dabbled anyway?”

  I shrug. “If you saw Olivia, you’d understand.”

  “There you go thinkin’ with your dick again, Ry. Haven’t you learned by now?”

  “Oh my God. You’re one giant dick, Peen. For fuck’s sake, everyone calls you Peen.”

  “Yeah, but we’re talking about you, not me.” Keane shakes his head. “Rule number one for a handsome and happy life? Listen to Colby Morgan, every time. And rule number two? Listen to me, occasionally.”

  “Well, this isn’t one of those ‘occasional’ times. You’ve never even met Olivia.”

  “I don’t need to meet Olivia to know she makes my batshit-crazy radar go off like gangbusters.”

  “Based on what?”

  “Based on the evidence. You said there’s nothing wrong with her. That’s enough right there. But, on top of that, you’re the prettiest Morgan brother of us all—which is saying a lot, considering how pretty we four are, especially me—and women are biologically programmed to want to mate with the prettiest males. Just look at peacocks. You think that tail is just for yucks?”

  “Dude, I’m not even remotely thinking about ‘mating’ with Olivia. It’s been a fucking month.”

  “Bullshit. You’re always thinking about mating—I’ve never met a dude who wants babies more than you. It’s not normal, Ry.”

  “I hav
en’t said a word about that to Olivia. Of course not.”

  “Good. Don’t talk about that shit with any woman for at least six months or you’re gonna get yourself mixed up with a gold-digging baby-momma in record time.”

  I shake my head.

  “It’s true, brah. Open your eyes. You’ve got a fancy-pants career that’s bringing in the duckets-by-the-buckets. Plus, along with that pretty face of yours, you’ve got those coolest-guy-in-the-room tattoos on your arms and a permanent I’m-gonna-fuck-you smolder. Women can’t resist that shit. Add to all that your boner to change shitty diapers and any woman’s gonna tell you whatever you wanna hear to lock you down.”

  I roll my eyes. “You haven’t even met Olivia, Peen. She’s not like that.”

  “Dude, stop being Forrest Gump about this girl. She’s Katniss-Everdeening you with her crossbow and you’re sitting there with a hard-on talkin’ ’bout, ‘Life is like a box of chocolates.’ Well, you know what I say to that, Rum Cake?” Keane puts his palm to the side of his mouth and shouts his next words at the top of his lungs: “‘Run, Rum Cake, Run!’”

  I laugh. “Not so loud, Peenie. You’ll scare the fish.”

  “There ain’t no fish to scare, son.” Keane leans back in the boat. “But, regardless, you’ve got bigger fish to fry than a few skittish fishes. I hate to break it to you, Captain, because I really do love you the most and respect you even more, but odds are two to one your new gal pal’s a bunny-boiling loon. Based on the totality of the circumstances, this girl’s nothin’ but a huntress on safari and the big-game prey she’s hunting is one Captain Ryan Ulysses Morgan.”

  “Okay, enough. I wish I’d never brought Olivia up in the first place. I never said I was in love with her or that she was The One or that I had any desire whatsoever to procreate with her. All I said was, ‘So far, so good.’ Now shut the fuck up and at least try to catch a fucking fish before I pummel those dimples right off your face.”

  We sit in silence, staring at our motionless fishing lines in the lake for a long while, the silence between us thick with my extreme annoyance. But when I notice Keane absentmindedly rubbing the bright pink surgery scar on his left elbow, my irritation with him instantly vanishes.

  “How’s the arm?” I ask.

  Keane’s eyes are trained on the surface of the water, his lips pressed firmly together.

  “Keane?” I ask.

  He looks at me.

  “How’s the arm?”

  He exhales. “The team flew me out last week to check on my progress. It was no bueno.”

  My stomach tightens. “What happened?”

  “It was worst-case scenario, man. I got on the mound and couldn’t get my fastball going and my curveball was for shit.”

  “But it hasn’t even been a year since the surgery. You just need time.”

  “Most guys are back on the mound after seven or eight months, Ry. It’s been nine. I’m out of time.”

  “Bah. A little bit longer and you’ll be good as new, I’m sure of it.”

  Keane shakes his head. “They cut me.”

  “What?”

  “Nine days ago.”

  “But... why didn’t you say something?”

  Keane shrugs.

  “Have you told Mom and Dad?”

  “I haven’t told anyone but Zander—and that was only because he walked in on me one night when I was crying like a baby.”

  “Aw, Keaney.” My heart physically hurts inside my chest. “You should have told us. We’d have circled the Morgan-wagons around you.”

  “I’ve just been processing it, I guess.”

  “Aw, Keane. I’m so sorry. I know how long you’ve dreamed about pitching in the major leagues.”

  “Yeah, well, a dream plus ten cents will get me two nickels, right?”

  I grimace. “Don’t say that. I know you’re disappointed, but don’t talk like you’re giving up on dreaming altogether. You’re only twenty-two, little bro. Keep your chin up. I tell you what: how about I pay your rent for a couple months—you know, just to give you a little breathing room while you figure out your next dream?”

  “Thanks, but it’s okay. I’ve got some money saved and Zander said he’s good to cover rent for a couple months.”

  A loud cheer erupts from a nearby boat and we both look toward the noise, just in time to see a young boy pulling a ridiculously large trout out of the water.

  “Ho-lee shit,” Keane says. “Look at that thing.”

  “That’s a huge fucking fish.”

  “What kind of bait was that kid using, I wonder? Should I row over there and ask him?”

  “Nah.” I hold up my beer can. “I’m good just sitting here, talking to you. Fuck the fish.”

  Keane flashes me a crooked smile that melts my heart. “Okay. Cool.”

  “Is that k-e-w-l?”

  “Of course. Top honors, brah.”

  For several minutes, we sip our beers and watch as the kid in the other boat takes photos of himself with his monstrous fish, his whoops of laughter wafting to us on the breeze.

  “Remember when Colby caught that huge fish that time?” Keane says.

  “I’m surprised you remember that. You were only like five or six.”

  “I don’t remember much except the look on Bee’s face when he pulled that thing out of the water. Oh, and I remember Kum Shot puking on Dad’s shoes that day in the boat. Ha! That was awesome.”

  “Poor Kat,” I say, memories of our poor seasick sister flooding me. “Half my childhood memories of her involve her puking.”

  “Half my adult memories, too,” Keane says, and we both laugh. “Man, I truly thought Colby was Superman that day.”

  “So did I.” I take a sip of my beer. “Still do.”

  Keane looks at me. “Hey, Ry, seriously—I really think you should respect Superman’s intuition about this Olivia chick. Just, for all our sakes, do a serious gut-check before you fall fast and hard and start bringing her to family dinners.”

  “Who do you think I am? Zander Shaw? I never fall ‘fast and hard’ for anyone—you know that. And you know I’d never bring anyone to a family dinner unless I was one hundred-percent sure she was The One. Now shut the fuck up and catch yourself a fucking whale, Ahab. I got this.”

  “Oh, you got this, baby doll?”

  “I got this, sweetheart.”

  “Then perhaps you won’t mind putting your money where your mouth is?”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “Twenty bucks says, within three months, So-Far-So-Good-Olivia turns into What-the-Fuck-Was-I-Thinking-Olivia—the worst fucking nightmare-shit-show-bunny-boiling-loon-catastrophe of your entire dating career.”

  I laugh. “You’re on, fucker. But, just to be clear, the bet isn’t whether Olivia and I break up within three months from sheer apathy, it’s whether she’s turned into an epic nightmare of staggering proportions.”

  “Precisely.”

  We shake on it.

  “You know what?” I say. “Fuck it. Let’s make it fifty bucks, just to make things interesting.”

  “Oh, Mr. Fancy-pants wants to up the ante, does he? Okay, High Roller. You got yourself a deal.” He shakes my hand again and chuckles to himself. “Oh, man, I can’t wait to profit off your misery, you cocky fuck. You committed the cardinal sin of disregarding Superman’s advice, and now you’re upping the ante on me? Ha!” He throws his head back and lets out a demonic laugh that reverberates across the quiet lake. “Let the bunny-boiling begin!”

  2

  Tessa

  “Hey, Tessa,” my best friend, Charlotte, says, answering my call.

  I’m sitting at a small desk in the corner of my brand-new bedroom in Seattle, surrounded by stacks of still-unpacked moving boxes, gripping my phone in one hand while massaging my forehead with the other. “Josh just called,” I say into the phone. “He and Kat are back from their trip to South America and you’ll never guess what’s happened—not in a million years.”

&nb
sp; “Miss Perfect is having Josh’s quintuplets?”

  “Even more shocking than that. Josh just flat-out said to me, ‘Theresa, I’m gonna ask that woman to marry me.’”

  “What?” Charlotte blurts, sounding as flabbergasted as I feel. “Have aliens captured the real Josh Faraday?”

  Charlotte’s never met my boss, actually, or his perfect, pregnant girlfriend of mere months, Kat Morgan; but after listening to me babble and drool about Josh “The Playboy” Faraday for years, including listening to me throw major shade at the insufferable string of heiresses and supermodels he dated before finally falling in love with regular-girl-from-Seattle Kat, we’ve both just sort of gotten used to chatting about Josh like Charlotte knows him personally.

  “Oh my God, Tessa,” Charlotte sputters. “When’s Josh gonna pop the question?”

  “As soon as he can ‘find a ring worthy of her.’ He’s going ring shopping on the down-low with Kat’s mom tomorrow.”

  “I’m shocked.”

  “You’re shocked? For the past six years, every time one of his friends has gotten engaged or married, Josh has sworn marriage isn’t in the cards for him. And now he’s like, ‘T-Rod, I’m gonna get Kat a rock so damned big, she’s gonna need a crane to carry it around!’”

  “Well, hang on. Just ’cause he’s buying the girl a rock doesn’t mean he’s ready to commit to her for the rest of his damned life. Über-wealthy people get engaged all the time and never actually tie the knot. I’ve seen it a thousand times on TMZ. To a guy like Josh, buying The Hope Diamond for his girlfriend is the equivalent of a normal guy buying his girlfriend a twenty-dollar gift card to Claire’s.”

  I burst out laughing. Thank God for Charlotte.

  “Maybe he’s just feeling pressure to give Kat a ring to keep her parents from hurling an axe into his back?” Charlotte suggests. “You know, for knocking up their precious baby girl?”

  “No, he’s not proposing to Kat because of the pregnancy—that’s what trust funds and support agreements are for. And he’s certainly had plenty of friends who’ve gone that route to show him how. Nope, The Playboy wants to ask The Party Girl to be his wife for no other reason than he’s madly in love with her.”