by Leslie North
He felt like a climber rediscovering a well-loved peak. He pinched and rolled the flesh, and lost himself in the keening noises she made. His mouth found the curve of her neck again, and he flicked his tongue out to catch a bead of perspiration that trickled down from her temple. He palmed the entirety of her breast, giving it a gentle, but no less possessive squeeze; her answering moan was winded, wanton. Sam pulled his hand back to start undressing her in earnest. He was confident she would let him.
The front door handle jiggled. The two of them leapt apart like guilty children caught with their hands in the cookie jar. Sam turned, shielding Trinity from view as she hastily buttoned her blouse. He heard the telltale sound of a key being twisted inside an already disengaged lock. By the time Eddie figured out how to admit himself into his own apartment, Sam was back in the kitchen, and Trinity was perched on her stool as if nothing untoward had ever passed between them. As if Sam hadn't just been fondling her naked breast seconds before, and as if her nipples weren't still rigid with the memory.
"Hey, Trinity! You made it!" Eddie called out happily. Sam had to turn away and pretend to busy himself with mixing another Manhattan to buy himself time to cool down. His half-drained stout still sat on the table by the window.
"Hey Eddie." If Trinity's voice sounded less enthused than it should have given the circumstances, Eddie was beyond noticing. He tossed his coat down on the couch and loosened his tie as he joined them.
"You guys celebrating without me?" He clapped Sam on the back and leaned over his shoulder. "That drink for me? It better be. Today I pulled off the impossible."
"So I heard." Sam passed Eddie the Manhattan, and watched him drain it in a single appreciative gulp. "That's not a shot," he noted darkly as Eddie passed him the glass back for a refill.
"You haven't even let us toast you yet!" Trinity manufactured a laugh—it sounded forced to Sam's ears, anyway—and raised her own untouched drink. "To Eddie! The rising star of Jameson Ad Agency! Here's hoping there are many more incredible conquests in your future."
"To Eddie," Sam repeated.
"To me," Eddie said gleefully. He pointed to a far corner of the room like he was Babe Ruth calling a home run. "And to the babelicious burlesque girls that are going to help me win a continuing contract!"
"Burlesque girls?" Sam echoed. Though he had never patronized a club personally, an immediate image of jouncing breasts and helicoptering tassels came into his head. Trinity turned to him with a sharp look, clearly not liking his tone, but the more Sam registered what he had just heard, the more he couldn't believe it. "You've got to be fucking kidding me."
"No joke," Eddie said. "I've already set up the dinner meeting for…"
"You're setting us up for scandal. Again!" Sam interrupted him fiercely. "The contract with Goldfinch is practically signed, in your hands, and you decide to, what—surprise Adrianna Finch by taking her out to see a bunch of naked girls gyrate in tearaway bikinis? Why is it so hard for you to follow the God damn company rules?"
"Easy, Sam." Eddie looked legitimately confused by Sam's words: his expressive eyebrows pulled together, and his mouth formed a puzzled half-smile that Sam had seen get him out of plenty of uncomfortable confrontations (usually with women) before. "It's just The Bombshell Factory down on New Brooklyn. Everyone's talking about it."
"And you're okay with this?" He threw his question pointedly toward Trinity.
"I'm sorry, but why wouldn't I be?" she demanded. She crossed her arms over her breasts, as if she already suspected the direction he was heading, but intended to make him say it anyway.
It had all the signs of a trap, but Sam was all too happy to oblige. "Do you really want prospective clients to think our agency subscribes to this crass party boy culture? Promotes it, even? Do you really think that's an acceptable image for us? Don't you find it the least bit degrading?"
"I assure you that I personally find nothing misogynistic about this arrangement," she replied. "And that there is nothing that would be publicly scandalous about the placement of this meeting. The Bombshell Factory is hands-down the new 'it' club, and the fact that Eddie even secured a reservation is something of a miracle. Most people I know find burlesque shows fun and empowering—including myself. He's not taking them to a strip club, Sam."
"And frankly, I find your own presumption sexist," Eddie interjected self-righteously. "Trinity, with your permission, I'd like to revisit the idea that Sam is the one in dire need of that live workshop course you—"
"Eddie," Trinity said. "Shut up." Eddie complied with an immediate click of his jaw. Trinity's hazel eyes lit on Sam. "But he has a point. All this focus on Eddie's behavior is ignoring a bigger problem, Sam: your behavior. Your inflexibility is more than just an adherence to the rules—it's actively threatening to set us back in our process."
"What are you talking about?" he demanded. An inner part of him broke off to watch the exchange, viewing their argument from a dejected distance. "If you want to accuse me of anything, you should focus on the fact that I am the only person in this room fighting to make sure Eddie fulfills every requirement so he can succeed!"
"You jumped to conclusions, and let your obsession with the rules get in the way of appreciating a creative win!" she retorted. "Sam, can't you see it? This is what always happens with you! I thought you were getting better. The other night at karaoke you…" She cut herself off abruptly and shook her head, as if she was already trying to shed her memories of that night. Sam's gut twisted. "But now I can see that I was wrong. You're farther from being able to compromise than ever before!"
The room lapsed into an uncomfortable silence. Eddie glanced between them, and Sam realized that every party to the argument knew what it was really about.
Trinity was the one to break the stillness first. She averted her eyes to the floor, smoothed her already impeccable hair and turned to leave. "I'll be in touch," she muttered as she put her shoes on and snatched up her purse. "Congrats, Eddie. William counts this as a win."
Her words left a sting that lasted long after the door had slammed shut behind her. Sam stood, staring at the door, willing Trinity to return and willing himself to make that impossible change that everyone else seemed to be calling for. How was he supposed to learn to rework his standards...and maybe not have so many to start with? How was it so easy for everyone around him to just go with the flow?
The silence was broken again, this time by a resounding snap! as an ice cube fractured and sank lower in Trinity’s untouched Manhattan.
"Anyone going to drink that?" Eddie asked in the tone of a rhetorical question.
Chapter Six
Split
"Are you serious?" Trinity demanded.
"Yeah." Eddie was quick to pile onto her incredulity. "Is that even really you, Sam? Because I never thought I'd hear the word 'compromise' come out of your mouth. Who are you and what have you done with my brother?"
Sam sat at the kitchen table in the brownstone, alone, with his laptop folded open in front of him. Eddie's image occupied one side of the group chat, Trinity's the other. Sam had been up all night brainstorming a way to get back into their (mainly Trinity's) good graces, and now that he was pitching it to them, he couldn't stop trying to read every little detail of his ex-wife's expression. He tried to forget about their more intimate encounter the other night and just focus on the work to be done, but every time she shifted her shoulder, and he saw the bra strap peeking out from underneath the wide collar of her T-shirt, his concentration flew out the window.
"If you jesters are finished throwing my olive branch back in my face, I'd like you to seriously consider my offer," he replied. "A communication workshop would not only occupy an unfilled slot in the agency's workshop series, but it will also showcase Eddie and help dispel any rumors that he's unfit and ill-equipped. We can explain our...differing strategies in a professional environment with a panel discussion followed by a Q&A. And we can make 'compromise' one of the main themes of the workshop: why i
t's important, when to look for it, and how to achieve it. William has already signed off on my idea."
Eddie and Trinity exchanged looks; or at least, they did as well as they could considering they were confined to little boxes on a computer screen.
"He may have signed off on it, but what about scheduling?" Trinity asked. "Do we have a room? A time? The workshop series is right around the corner. It might be too late to get attendees on board."
"We'll make attendance mandatory for employees," Sam said.
"Of course we will," she responded.
"I mean, I think this might actually be a good idea, Trini," Eddie said. "You know I'm good on my feet. And I can get more facetime with agency employees this way. It might be a good way to get ahead of any gossip that would surround the onboarding and let everyone see firsthand that I'm a competent professional." Eddie craned closer to his screen and nearly connected with his camera nose-first. Sam sighed as he watched his brother battle with his newly-issued company laptop; the picture pitched horizontal, and a splash could be heard in the background as Eddie lunged for his computer. "Holy shit! That was a close one!" Eddie laughed as the picture righted.
"Eddie, are you in the bathtub?" Trinity exclaimed shrilly.
"Not a bathtub. Jacuzzi!" Eddie lifted his laptop to give them all a better look at the roiling jets and rooftop view. "Want to guess where I am tonight? Better yet, want to guess what color trunks I'm wearing?" He waggled his eyebrows. To call the expression 'suggestive' would be to misunderstand the very concept of subtlety.
"Ugh! Just...try not to kill yourself before the workshop," Trinity ordered him. "I don't need any more messes to clean up. What I do need is coffee. Excuse me, Eddie. Sam. I'll see you at our next meeting." Sam could have sworn he saw a flash of approval in her eyes as she nodded to him. Her screen went black and minimized as she hung up the call.
"That sound like a 'yes' to you?" Sam inquired.
"That sounded like a 'yes' to me," Eddie agreed. "You're in, bro. As far as I'm concerned the panel's on. And it's probably a good thing she didn't guess about my swim trunks, because I'm not wearing any." Eddie grinned, and Sam massaged his forehead with his fingertips. "Not a great segue, but want to come over? I'll text you the address. I'm housesitting for Greg and his place is cush. He puked at your wedding, remember?"
"I remember," Sam replied. "Have a good afternoon, Eddie."
He ended the call and sat back. He flung his arms wide, stretching, and found there was less tension in his shoulders than there had been previously. He decided he'd go for a run...in a bit. Right now, he wanted to bask in his success. He had finally brainstormed an idea that Trinity seemed willing to get behind—and it was an idea that would also thrust Eddie into a favorable light within the company culture. There was no way his brother could fuck up something so straightforward on his watch.
So long as he convinced William to put him fully in charge, he didn't see how anything could possibly go wrong.
"...and you just know Sam's going to find a way to control everything about the workshop!" Trinity groused. "I'm not even sure he knows what 'compromise' means. And now he wants to make that the overarching theme of the talk? He'll beat his own fucked-up definition of the word into the minds of our attendees like a square peg into a round hole!"
"Hmmm. Haven't heard that one in a while." Jessica, her best friend—and once maid of honor—sat across from her at their usual coffee table and blew the steam off her Americano. "All I know is that's the third metaphor I've heard you use this morning that's involved trying to fit something into a hole. Sounds like someone needs to get laid."
Trinity bristled. "I'm not...I don't...look, don't you think I've been trying to get laid?"
"No," Jessica deadpanned. "I don't."
Trinity wanted to rise and storm out to exemplify the injustice of Jessica's claim, but she couldn't retreat. This relationship-talk terrain was too precious to lose. "I've been going to all these singles' functions, haven't I?" she pointed out. "I'm going to ballroom dancing tonight. I'm actually enjoying my life, unlike Sam!"
"Mhmmm." Jessica pushed her blond curls back and took a stab at the chocolate muffin they shared.
"I just wish he'd acknowledged the other night," Trinity muttered. "Considering it's Sam, I guess this whole workshop scheme is the best resolution I can hope for. Obviously our...meeting at the brownstone has been on his mind, it's just…" She shook her head in exasperation. She wanted to discuss the moment she had shared with Sam, but she wanted to do it with him.
She could still feel the wet heat of his mouth on her neck, and the warm imprint of his hand beneath her shirt. She had let her own touch linger over her breast in the shower that morning; she had even let herself imagine for a moment that he was there.
"What happened the other night?" Jessica's prompting drew her out of her daydream. She leaned in, and Trinity retreated by pretending to check her phone. "Oh, come on, Trinity! Spill!"
"He's just...always around now," Trinity said. "We have a lot of things to discuss between us. In general. Work things."
Jessica sat back and pursed her lips. She didn't look convinced, and Trinity didn't blame her—it was a weak cover. "All right. I'm going to run with what you just said, since it's obviously all I'm going to get out of you for now. Why do you want to work with Sam again?"
Trinity blinked. "I'm not...we're partners in onboarding Eddie. William's the one who set it up."
"And William only agreed to this workshop after Sam pitched it to him," Jessica pointed out. "You could have said no. Sounds to me like you're taking your partnership extracurricular."
Trinity opened her mouth to protest, before biting down on her tongue when she realized she had no good defense. Instead, she took a defiant sip of her coffee, even though she knew it was still too hot, and she wound up singeing off every taste bud in one fell swig. She tried to conceal her wince.
"Don't you want Sam to go?" Jessica asked her. "The sooner the onboarding's over, the sooner he's back in L.A., right? So why fill every hour of every day with whatever emotionally-stunted attempts to win you back he can come up with?"
"Jessica!" Trinity didn't know why she leapt to Sam's defense now, after using the term herself. "I'm not...he's not...give me that." She reached across the table for the muffin, but Jessica pinned the plate with her finger.
"Quit trying to distract me. You're the one who invited me out this morning insisting you wanted my advice. Well, I'm going to give it to you: don't let Sam back in."
Jessica levelled her sharp blue eyes at Trinity, but all Trinity could think about in that moment was Sam's eyes, and how—when you looked close enough—you could see that they had a little black ring around the outside that only made them glow more brightly by contrast....
"Are you still in love with him?" Jessica asked skeptically.
Trinity opened her mouth for easy denial, but suddenly found her throat was too dry to cooperate. She would take another sip of her Americano to work the words loose if it wasn't so damn hot. She pressed her lips together, swallowed, and tried again.
Silence.
"Oh my God," Jessica said.
"I have to go." Trinity shoved her chair out and rose. "This was supposed to be my day off, but now I have to call William about the workshop. The muffin's all yours."
"Who gives a shit about the muffin?" Jessica interrupted. "Trinity, I'm serious! Are you really considering giving Sam a second chance? This is so not a good idea!"
"If Sam can't prove to me that he's changed...if he can't even bring himself to acknowledge why our marriage failed in the first place...then I'll be done with him," Trinity promised her.
Jessica folded her arms and sat back in her chair. "Are you telling me that, or are you just telling yourself that?"
I wish I knew anymore, Trinity thought as she navigated through the tables toward the exit. "I'll call you after my class!" she called over her shoulder.
"You need to get laid!" Jessica shouted
back. Trinity doubled her pace to avoid the alarmed glances she was suddenly getting from strangers on all sides of the room.
God damn you Jessica...the last thing I need is for you to be right about that too.
Chapter Seven
Trinity
Dance class was meant to be an exercise in stress reduction for Trinity. She worked hard all day for the whip-cracking Jameson brothers, and she deserved a break to pursue some physical release...because she sure as hell wasn't getting laid.
"Damn you, Jessica," Trinity muttered as she scrolled through her texts. Cursing her best friend had become the day's mantra. Sometimes Jessica was too perceptive when it came to knowing the more intimate details of Trinity's nonexistent love life. What the hell was that about, anyway? Did she wear it on her face?
Would Sam know all her attempts to find a date since their divorce had ended in abject failure?
Trinity shook her head to dispel the thought. When had Sam ever noticed anything in the past? Moreover, why did she care now? She sighed as she pocketed her phone, and glanced around at the rest of her class. She had arrived early, and was now stuck waiting out on the sidewalk until the last class got out. It was important for her to attend these sorts of activities—at least, if the post-divorce blog her mother had forwarded her was to be believed. It wasn't healthy to throw herself wholesale into work and work alone.
Especially not when her ex-husband was also an employee of the same company.