"I was feeling so good, after Coping Together. I was on such a high, I wanted to show him my most favorite place. So we went to the conservatory. You remember it," I asked, watching my brother carefully.
"What the hell does that have to do with the price of rice in China?" Christian asked through clenched teeth.
"Well... The place is dead now. Slated for demolition... You remember how much I loved that place?" He nodded slowly, glaring at me between slitted eyes. "I had to get out of there. Seeing the shape it was in... it broke something in me. If... if I had been here, instead of trying to stay away from here, I could have saved the place. I would have made sure it would have stayed alive. So, when we left... I just... I... I couldn't keep it in me anymore. I couldn't protect you from her. I couldn't protect myself from her. And now, because of her, the Conservatory died. So, I told him. I told him, because I needed someone else to know what I had bottled up inside me. Someone that I trusted." I wasn't even sure he had been listening, or maybe hearing me. He just sat there, his fingers wrapped around his glass.
"But why him? Why not, anyone else?" He slammed his glass down, and I was surprised it hadn't exploded on impact.
"I trust him, Christian."
"Tell me. Tell me what you are holding back. Tell me why you trust him like that. Tell Me!"
"I will, but dammit to hell Christian, keep your voice down. Please? You said Ana needed her sleep," I said, hoping that this would settle him a bit.
"Okay, I think I am... okay. For now," he grumbled and finally nodded so, inhaling a calming breath, I continued.
"Okay, so, why do I trust him?" Christian nodded. "Well... see... Gideon and I... we've known each other for... well, years. We met in college, actually." I heard his sharp intake of breath, and turned to see his eyes burning into me.
"How-How did you know him that long and never said anything?" he stammered, anger sitting in his gut like a hot coal.
"Like anyone is going to know everything about me? You're my brother. I love you, but there is no way in hell you will ever learn everything about me, and, vice versa. But, unlike you, I don't need to know everything."
"What the fuck does that mean?"
"You desire control and you bank information. Filing it away in the thought that maybe, someday it will come in handy."
"There is nothing wrong with that," he muttered, even though hearing me say it, it threw a different light on it.
"Anyways," I said, back tracking back to the original thought. "We met in college. I had him in a few classes, and we got along well. He was dating some chick then, who made it perfectly clear that she was his and he was hers." I closed my eyes, taking another sip of my cognac, remembering that bitchy, self-righteous attitude of his then girlfriend. "He was odd, in class. When we were in class, it was like he was free. He sat, took notes, passed me messages that were only subject related."
"What do you mean?"
"You know like... in American Lit he had sent a note while the professor was droning on and on and on about the background setting the author had written, what all the symbolism was supposed to mean. That even though the author wrote this, he actually was meaning this... Well, Gideon would send a note that would be like, 'Do you think that was what the author meant? Or was the foggy river banks just foggy river banks?'"
Christian nodded now, understanding that. "I hated when the teachers enforced their theories on stuff like that," he mumbled as he nodded his head.
"Yeah. So, that's what we were like. And he was very smart. Like you, and controlled in most things. And we would have these great theorologic talks. We just became good friends. Despite Corinne." Christian looked at me, his eyebrow hiked, looking for a explanation. "She's the catty bitch he had been dating. After college, well, we each went our own ways. I married Mike and Gideon started creating his empire. After Mike died, I went to New York. It was hard to do my business there, as you know. When I had my footing there, suddenly he was there. I mean, he had been there, but, now, every time I tried to make a business move, his company stepped in. Undercutting me, or over bidding me. Then some little puke who tried to advance his own career in journalism, started writing stories about me and Cross. How we were feuding, dueling over property, land rights, sky rights, and even suggesting that I was actually you, trying to extend your grip on the East Coast."
"That's why you started using Darqlee," Christian murmured, and I nodded.
"So... one day, he and I met up. We met in the middle of the night, in a dark bar on the West Side." I finished my glass, Christian filled it, and I set it down in front of me, my finger running along the rim of it, circling it as my mind tried to focus a bit more.
"So, what happened?" Christian asked after my silenced carried on far too long.
"Well," I started, taking a deep breath. I trusted Gideon, and I trusted my brother. They were rivals, but could be so much more. Or less, depending how the story is taken. Without knowing it, I reached down, sliding my hands into my pockets. The jeans I had worn the day before, that I had slipped on before running up here to check on him to make sure he was really okay. My fingers found what Jason had handed to me earlier. I pulled it out, looking at it as my thumb ran over front of it. Enim fortitudo, tempe et fortitude Amicitia, I thought before continuing. "We realized a few things..."
Christian sat waiting, watching. I saw his grip on his glass, saw his knuckles whiten, and then return to their normal color. He was trying hard to contain his feelings. He probably knew what I was about to tell him. "And that was...?"
"That... it was fun." I looked at him, watched him, but he seemed to not grasp what I had meant. "We... enjoyed the fight. The public bickering, the battle for land and property, the media choosing sides. But what we loved most of all... was hiding the truth."
"So... It was all... lies?" His voice low and disbelieving, he shook his head, looking away from me as he had said it.
"No, not all of it." I took a deep swig of my drink, taking half of what had been in my glass. "I... Things were getting out of hand, and I liked my time with him, but, outside of that, it was getting harder."
"That would be the lies you were living to enjoy your need," Christian growled at me. He was right, of course. I couldn't look at him then. I could feel the cold in his core seeping towards me. A disgust for me starting to grow in him.
"We started fighting. Our arguments were... loud. And many were public. It wasn't any different then it had been before, except the words actually had truth behind them now." Christian looked at me, his eyes colder, piercing. They were searching for what I hadn't told him.
"What started the change," he asked, his voice low, tinged with ice.
"He... He wanted to stop," I admitted. Words no one ever heard, a truth I wanted to deny, but that's what it was. It was the truth. I got up and walked to the large windows that banked the wall of his office. I felt cold, staring out into the dark of night that enveloped the city below. "He wanted to stop. He wanted it to become public. To let it be known we were actually a couple."
Christian sat there, waiting for me to continue, but as I looked out into the darkness of the sleeping city, my mind drifted back to Gideon and I. The yelling, the arguing, the way when... more and more of what was said hurt as they cut deeper and deeper.
"What happened Sha," his voice was low, but he was no longer angry. His voice carried concern, and then hand he placed on my shoulder, it showed me that he was there. That he was listening, and that he cared.
I shrugged, leaning my head against the glass. "He asked me to marry him." I felt his fingers grip my shoulder tightly, felt his head rest against mine.
"What did you say," he asked. I am pretty sure he knew though, but wanted to hear it from me.
"The sex between us, it was fucking awesome. But all the other stuff... and the fighting... It was too much. I couldn't say yes." I exhaled a shaky breath and sniffled, trying my best to hold back the tears that were sitting in my eyes, waiting to fall. "I couldn't say yes, and I broke his heart."
"He was the one, wasn't he? The one that you fell in love with. You told me you didn't know you were in love with him though. Not until after your broke up." I nodded, my chest getting tighter from just thinking about the loss. That tightness that comes before you really start to shed tears. "Why didn't you go back and tell him?"
"Because... Because I was stupid, arrogant and I didn't want to admit I had been wrong." Christian pulled me away from the window, and wrapped me in his arms. "When I saw the light, and wanted to go back to him... He was dating Eva. And, I will admit, they looked like they were good for each other. So, instead of telling him the truth, I told him I missed our friendship and wanted to know if we could still be friends."
Christian slowly released me from his arms and we walked over to the small sofa that was in his office. We sat down and waited in the silence before either of us said anything again.
"We found that despite the time between us, and the break up, we still could be good friends."
"So...," Christian started. He paused and tried again. "That is why you trust him? Why I should trust him with this one secret that you had promised to keep?"
"No. Not because of our relationship." I looked down at my twiddling thumbs. In for a penny, in for a pound, I told myself. "Because of two reasons."
"And they are," he asked, rubbing his lips with his index finger.
"The first reason is that after I told him about Elena, he created a few NDA's. One was that anything he learned about you, me, our entire family or our businesses, he wouldn't disclose it. The other was for me to sign, so that anything I learned or heard about his family or his business wouldn't be disclosed. And, you should know, he said I didn't have to sign it. I could if I wanted to, but I didn't have to." Christian sat at me and stared. His pulse was lower. (Visible motion from the vein in his neck making it easy to tell.) But beyond that, he wasn't making a move. It was like I had crashed the main server in his brain.
"He created and signed a NDA after you told him?" I nodded. "Wow." I nodded again. "What's the second reason?"
I paused then, not sure I actually wanted to say it, but in the end, I knew I had to. "Christian, if he asks me again, I'll say yes."
