Ch. 5
We chatted in the penthouse until sunset, then I grit my teeth and decided to face the music. "Come on, I don't know about Elliot's stamina nor do I particularly want to, but Kate will be getting hungry about now. She always forgets to eat when she's having marathon sex with a guy."
"I didn't need to know that," Christian chuckled good naturedly before taking my hand. We went to the SUV and Taylor drove us back to my apartment. I noted a red sedan with the Honda logo parked next to Wanda. The contrast was striking. Prescott got out of her Saturn to walk up to us as we got out of the car.
"Ms. Steele, here are the keys to your new car," Prescott said, handing me a keyring with the ignition key and a keyfob for locking, unlocking, and panic mode.
I thanked her and pocketed them. She went back to her car after a brief report to Christian and then Taylor escorted us to my door. I distinctly heard drunk thoughts coming from the other side, but thankfully they weren't particularly lustful.
"Want to bet they found the wine from last night?" I asked Christian.
"Elliot could find booze in a blizzard. No bet," Christian chuckled.
I unlocked the door and cracked it. "Are you two decent?" I called.
"No fun parts are showing!" Kate giggled.
I opened the door and saw Kate and Elliot on the sofa, playing footsie by the look of it while the TV played what I recognized as Season 3 of HIMYM. Kate and I both loved the show and she had every past season on Blu-ray. Kate was wearing the button-up Elliot had been wearing last night, which showed a lot of cleavage since she'd only buttoned a couple buttons, and her pajama shorts. Elliot was in nothing but boxer-briefs, a neon blue that revealed that, like Christian, he was an impressive shower. The champagne, Chardonnay, and Syrah bottles were empty on the coffee table along with a bottle of nearly-empty Jack Daniel's and a couple souvenir shot glasses. Kate collected them whenever she went on vacation, even before she could legally drink from what I heard.
"Cover up, Elliot, there are ladies present," Christian scolded.
"Katie Kat might be all woman, but she's no lady," Elliot chuckled. I tuned out his thoughts as he mentally replayed the last 24 hours.
I grabbed a blanket from the back of the sofa and covered Elliot's lower half with it. "Did either of you put anything at all in your stomachs to soak all this up?" I asked, indicating the alcohol.
"We got pizza earlier," Kate said, like that made the drinking all better. "And those awesome leftovers from your big dinner last night."
"And you crammed the box into the garbage instead of walking it to the dumpster like I've nagged you exactly 237 times, didn't you?" I said knowingly.
"I finished finals and met my soulmate yesterday, give me a break!" Kate whined.
"Soulmate? Really?" I asked, noting Elliot wasn't freaking out at Kate's statement. If anything, he was preening like a peacock.
"Perfect face, perfect body, perfect cock. AND he's got a great personality. I'm keeping him," Kate said imperiously.
"Two brothers with two sisters. Nice how that all worked out, isn't it, Chris?" Elliot asked his little brother, with a huge goofy grin on his face.
"Sure is, Lelliot," Christian nodded, not even protesting at the nickname he hated. He was too busy looking at me and imagining our future together.
I went to the kitchen and got to working on the dishes from last night. Christian volunteered to dry and stack everything. That done, I checked the fridge and planned a quick dinner for 4. Half an hour later, I was setting baked tilapia with broccoli and wild rice on the dinner table. Christian helped me coral Kate and Elliot to the table, and I couldn't help but check out Elliot since his body was right there. Christian was better, in my eyes at least, but I saw the appeal that Kate was so into. But I liked my men lean and lithe like a jungle cat instead of burly like a lumberjack.
Elliot took one bite and gave an indecent moan. "You can cook, too, Annie? Are you even human like the rest of us?"
"Jury's out, I'll get back to you," I shrugged, sipping my ice water. It occured to me that if Christian and I were to spend our lives together, it would be highly unfair not to eventually share the secrets of my superhuman status with him. Hell, with his airtight NDAs and resources, we might even be able to properly study my body and brain to get some answers. I began to mentally plan out how to break the news to him.
Kate was used to my cooking, even if she never ceased to appreciate it. "So, you two weren't here when we got back from the bar. Where've you been?"
"I stayed the night at the Heathman so you two would have privacy. We played a drinking game, so I was out of it until almost noon. We had lunch and just talked all afternoon until I came back here to feed you two," I reported. As promised, I'd keep Christian's newfound interest in guns a secret.
I needn't have bothered. "You left out the shooting lesson you gave me," Christian added, and I just knew he'd timed it with Elliot taking a sip of water.
I saw my first spit take in real life. "Shooting lesson?!" Elliot gaped.
"I've been firing guns since I was 12. I go on annual hunting trips with my dad. Christian wasn't comfortable with me owning guns, so I convinced him to give them a try to see what all the fuss was about. If he wasn't lying to me, he and Taylor are going to go to a range once a week from now on," I revealed to the male blond.
"I'll never lie to you, Anastasia," Christian promised.
"Dude, Mom and Dad will flip out," Elliot warned.
"Mom and Dad never have to know, Lelliot," Christian actually winked at his brother.
Elliot stared at his adopted brother in shock before turning to me. "Annie, whatever the fuck you're doing to my little bro, don't ever stop. I've never seen him this relaxed and happy," he said, serious even though his BAC was probably over 0.1.
"I won't stop until he asks me to," I swore.
"Never going to happen," Christian grinned, eyes just drinking in my face. Based on his thoughts, he'd never get tired of looking at me, or so he thought now. Give it a few decades, which I sincerely hoped we'd have together.
Kate squealed. "Oh, our kids are going to be cousins! This is so awesome!"
"Slow down, Kate. You're about 5 years minimum ahead of us," I chuckled. "And for the record, Christian, assuming we reach the 'house and kids' stage, I'm staying on birth control at least until I'm done with grad school. Let me become Doctor Steele before I become Mommy."
"No arguments here," Christian nodded emphatically. While he was falling fast for me, he was self-aware enough to know he'd be a terrible father for the foreseeable future until he made some real progress with his therapy and learning how to do 'vanilla' with me.
"Katherine Agnes Grey. Katherine Agnes Kavanagh-Grey… yeah, definitely changing my name," Kate nodded, not hearing a word we said.
"How good in bed ARE you Elliot? One night and she's hearing wedding bells!" I giggled, trying to move the topic past kids.
"For better or worse, I've probably put in those 10 thousand hours to be a master at it. And if my first girlfriend was telling the truth, I was a natural prodigy," Elliot grinned smugly.
"Can we talk about something besides my big brother's sexual prowess?" Christian groaned.
We chatted mostly about Kate's and my plans for after graduation. I was unsurprised to learn Elliot had already invited Kate to the Grey family dinner tomorrow night. When the food was gone, I put everything in the washing machine and set it to run. I grabbed all the wine bottles and the good-as-gone whiskey and put them in the recycling bin. Kate and Elliot were snuggling under the blanket on the couch. Christian had taken the loveseat. To my surprise, he patted his lap.
I went over and sat in the space between his legs, making sure to maintain a distance between my back and his chest. 'Worth a try,' I heard Christian think before he wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me back flush against his front.
I stayed perfectly still, waiting on tenterhooks for Christian to have an adverse reaction due to his haphephobia. Instead, he squeezed me tighter and leaned in to whisper in my ear. "No pain. You're like Mia, or even better. What did I ever do to deserve you, Anastasia?"
"Off the top of my head, donated over $1 billion in free food around the world," I chuckled, relaxing into his grip as I had my first proper cuddle with a boyfriend.
Kate was focused on the TV, but Elliot was staring like a bomb had gone off. I gave him a shrug and a grin and just enjoyed the feel of Christian holding me.
'I know Katie was joking, but if Christian doesn't marry that girl, he's the biggest idiot on the planet,' Elliot thought before turning away.
"What exactly is this?" Christian asked after a couple minutes of HIMYM.
The three of us stared at him. "Um, How I Met Your Mother? Spiritual successor to Friends? One of the most popular TV shows in America? Stop me when I ring a bell here," Kate listed off.
"Some of us are too busy running a multibillion dollar business to binge-watch sitcoms," Christian said defensively.
"We must correct this!" I declared. I ejected the disk and went to grab the Season 1 box set.
"Dude, when was the last time you even watched TV?" Elliot asked his brother with pity.
"The Super Bowl, I believe, Ros threw a party and convinced me to come," Christian recalled.
"Jeez Louise, you're worse than my Dad! You're 27, Christian, you gotta learn to relax and live a little. All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy!" Kate lectured.
Hearing Kate name Christian's calendar age, I couldn't help but wonder at his emotional age. He would have been stunted due to his abuse as a child, and any progress he made would have frozen once Elena started working on him. For all that he was older than me, and certainly mature and intelligent, he was probably still a teenager on the inside. I'd have to be patient with him.
"Hey, Annie, you're a walking Wikipedia. Why are Blu-ray discs blue and not silver like normal DVDs?" Elliot asked as I loaded the first disk.
"Normal DVDs are encoded with a red light laser. They cracked how to make a 'blue' laser, though technically it's in the violet spectrum, using gallium nitride. It encodes much more information in the same amount of space. The next major advancement in optical discs will probably be with an ultraviolet laser, or 'blacklight'," I rattled off.
"Cool. You really know your shit, Annie!" Elliot complimented.
"With her brains and Christian's money, their kids are going to take over the world," Kate chuckled. Wow, her mind really was on marriage and babies tonight.
I rolled my eyes and used the remote to start the disc playing. I settled back into Christian's lap as the Pilot of How I Met Your Mother played on the flatscreen.
Within 5 episodes, Christian was hooked. He laughed at all the jokes, he was getting involved with the characters, it was wonderful to see him relax and enjoy a TV show like a regular human being.
"Isn't NPH gay? Why'd they cast him as a terminally straight womanizer?" Christian asked as Ted started to do the Red Dragon shots in 'The Pineapple Incident'.
"Irony, he's a comic genius so they practically begged him to join the cast, and when you think about it Barney's character actually acts a lot like a stereotypical gay man. He's obsessed with his appearance, he's promiscuous, and he doesn't believe in long-term relationships," I answered. "That's my opinion, anyway."
"Isn't Lily that witch from Buffy?" Elliot asked.
"Alyson Hannigan, yeah. That, this, and the American Pie franchise are really her whole career, when you think about it," Kate nodded. She was sobering up as time went on and I'd cut her and Elliot off from any more hard drinking.
We stayed up past midnight watching the whole 1st season. Christian gasped at the ending cliffhanger. "No way! Marshall and Lily broke up?! That's horrible!"
"Relax, they get back together in Season 2," I reassured him.
"Can we watch that too?" Christian asked eagerly.
"Sure, but Kate and Elliot went sleepy-bye," I informed him, indicating the snoring couple under the blanket.
Christian blinked and checked his Rolex. "Is it really that late?"
"Time flies when you're having fun. I'm sorry it's so unfamiliar to you," I said genuinely.
"Can I sleep here? I'll probably have nightmares again if I'm not with you," Christian asked.
"Of course. And you'll always have my lullaby or one of my other songs when we're apart," I assured him.
We went to my bedroom. As was becoming a habit, we stripped nude and got into bed together. Christian, now knowing I could safely touch him to a degree, maneuvered me into spooning him. I had Eddie, the stuffed lion I'd subtly helped him get me on our 3rd date, in my own arms.
"Nighty-night, Christian," I wished, echoing what I said the first time we slept together.
"Nighty-night, Anastasia," he said, kissing my hair.
I drifted off the sleep, wondering if it was a crime to be this happy and comfortable with another human being. Well, bring on the cops, because I fully intended to stay with this man for the rest of my life unless he did something unforgivable.
The vision was much less happy than my last one. Christian and I were walking down the street, hand in hand, when a car with blacked-out windows came up next to us. A man wearing a ski mask leaned out the window and shot a freaking Uzi submachine gun at us. There was screaming and running and the car burned rubber driving away. I looked down, saw bullet holes in my clothes but no blood. Apparently, I really was bulletproof. Christian had not been so lucky. He was on the ground, blood leaking out his mouth, staring up at me with fear in his eyes. I fell to my knees and tried to assess the damage. Multiple bullets to the torso, at least one in the lung.
"Love you," he gasped with possibly his dying breath before his eyes rolled back in his head and closed.
I woke up feeling like my heart had been ripped out. I tried to sit up, but Christian was wrapped around me again. Feeling his heartbeat and breath against my back reassured me that, for the moment at least, he was still alive.
I went over the vision with a mental microscope, looking for every tiny detail. A rather beautiful engagement ring had been on my left hand, but neither Christian nor I had been wearing wedding bands. That calmed me down. All my visions came true, at least so far, and Christian couldn't die in the drive-by if he was to get me pregnant and marry me at a later date. There was always the possibility we had for whatever reason decided to take our wedding rings off that day, but I'd operate under the belief that the ambulance would get there in time and Christian survived his wounds.
I had gotten the license plate of the car. Maneuvering out of Christian's hold and silencing the alarm, I threw on clothes and grabbed my laptop. I had planned to dedicate my life to working with computers; Christian had been right when he'd said I could work the internet better than he could play piano. I hacked into the Washington State DMV registry to get around that dumb fee to lookup a license plate, and found the car from my vision belonged to an Elizabeth Morgan.
Now, there was every chance the car had been stolen. And the shooter had been a man, not a woman. But I hadn't seen the driver, so I decided to dig into the Morgan angle. I set up a background check program I'd written myself. It would trawl the whole internet, everything not hidden behind a firewall, and compile everything I wanted to know within 72 hours. It would even check the Deep Web, and the Dark Web. Just to be clear, the Deep Web was the 96% of the internet not indexed by Google or other standard search engines. The Dark Web was the part of the Deep Web dedicated to criminal activity.
I set the program to run for Elizabeth Morgan, using the license plate number to help weed out women with identical names, and started the mental countdown. The drive-by wouldn't happen until I was already engaged, and that was a long way away. At least, I hoped so. Thinking on it, the second Christian realized he was in love with me, he just might get a ring as soon as possible to lock me down and keep me by his side forever. That sounded like something he'd do.
I checked up on some side projects I'd had running, then closed the laptop. Based on my telepathy, all 3 of the others in the apartment were still sleeping. I glanced at my alarm clock and saw it was barely 6:30. My vision had woken me early. I decided to relax from the traumatic vision of the man I already half-loved coming close to death and ran a bath. I lit candles, used salts and bubble bath, the works. I set my phone to play my 'zen' playlist and slid into the hot water.
I was dozing to Enya when the door opened. The reason our rent was so high was because both bedrooms had ensuites. Christian, still naked, grinned at me. "Mind if I use the toilet?" He asked.
"Go ahead," I nodded, closing my eyes.
"You can watch, if you want," he told me, my sharp ears catching him lifting the toilet seat.
"Wouldn't do anything for me. Not my kink. Not sure I have any kinks at all. Then again, I haven't tried many," I acknowledged.
"What's the most 'non-vanilla' thing you've ever done or that you're into?" Christian asked curiously. I heard the liquid stream of his urine start to hit the toilet water.
"Remember those books hidden under my bed? Some of them are hardcore hentai doujinshi," I admitted.
"Is that Japanese?" Christian asked.
"Doujinshi means self-published, made by independent artists or writers. Hentai is a genre of anime and manga that involves sex in the plot and sexually explicit scenes and dialogue," I told him.
"You get off to homemade cartoon porn?" Christian asked in surprise. I heard him flush the toilet and I opened my eyes again.
"Don't knock it until you try it. The stories are actually complex and interesting, at least compared to standard American porn. And the scenes can be really hot, at least to me," I told him. "I got them all in the original Japanese though, so unless you feel like becoming trilingual I'll have to translate as you read or find some online already translated."
"I'll give it a try, but I don't see how illustrations can compare to actual people having sex," Christian shrugged. "Room for one more in there?"
"If you don't mind smelling all floral," I confirmed, sitting up and leaning forward so he could slide in behind me.
He slid into the water and pulled me back into his chest. It was a hundred times better than last night, since we were skin to skin now. I distinctly felt his penis settle into the crack of my ass as we got comfortable.
"Another first. Never taken a bath with a woman before," Christian told me.
"Never taken a bath with a man, either, unless you count Ray scrubbing me while I played with my Ariel toy when I was 3," I said back.
We relaxed for a half hour until the water was tepid. We got out and I pulled the plug so the water could drain. I took a quick shower just to wash off my own filth I'd been stewing in, Christian taking his own turn after. The shower stall was too small to fit both of us, which is why we didn't shower together.
I got dressed in smart casual, anticipating the Grey family dinner later tonight. I checked with my telepathy and found Kate and Elliot were still asleep. I opened my bedroom door and went to the kitchen to start breakfast.
"Is your laptop overheating? The fan was going at full speed in there," Christian asked as he took a seat at the island counter.
"I'm running a fairly intensive search program. The fact it's a used model from 2007 doesn't help," I explained as I set the coffee to brew.
"The Accord was part of your contract with GEH. Let me get you a proper graduation present. A new laptop and a phone, the latest models," Christian offered.
"I'll compromise. I'll keep my crappy laptop and I'll buy a new phone myself with my signing bonus. You can shell out the parts for my dream PC rig," I counter offered.
"Oh, right, serious computer geeks build a computer modularly from what's on the market. Barney, my CIO, did that. Talks about it every time he gets a new upgrade," Christian recalled.
"Just to warn you, the bill will probably be 5 digits. I want the absolute best components available to the public. I've been dreaming of building a computer that can keep up with what I really want to do for years," I told him
"Anastasia, I make roughly $100k an hour, 24/7/365, when you average out my salary and what I make a month in deals expanding GEH," Christian reassured me. "Just text me the list and it'll all be shipped here before you move out."
I pulled up the list I kept saved on my phone, updated each quarter as new items went to market. I copied it all and texted the list of over a dozen bleeding-edge parts to his phone.
He glanced at his phone, didn't even blink at the attached prices I'd added to each part, and made some command to Andrea to have them all purchased and shipped overnight to Vancouver and my apartment. "You know how to make them all talk to each other? Barney complains about having to write translation software because certain companies use proprietary code to stop exactly this kind of thing."
"I can handle it," I assured him.
Given it was Sunday and graduation was imminent, I'd gone for a proper brunch. The smell of pancakes, sausages, and coffee roused Kate and Elliot from the couch. I'd dug out the real butter and maple syrup from the cabinet I hid them in, and focused on slicing fresh fruit while juggling turning the meat and flipping the pancakes. I did hash browns too just to make sure we'd be full until dinner. It was a good thing I seemed stuck at my current weight, because otherwise my cooking habits might have made me balloon into one of those Mesopotamian fertility goddesses you see the statues of.
"You've lived with this for 4 years? What do you do for exercise, babes?" Elliot asked when he saw the veritable feast I laid on the table.
"CrossFit, 4 days a week, or so was my routine. The plague last week and then finals threw things a bit off. I've probably gained 10 lb since I stopped going. Worth it, though," Kate answered after drizzling half the bottle of syrup over her stack until her plate almost overflowed.
"You do manual labor for a living. And I know Christian has a personal trainer and jogs most mornings. Any idea what Grace and Carrick do for fitness?" I asked.
"Mom teaches an at-home Pilates class for the bored trophy wives of Bellevue," Elliot replied readily. "Dad still rows at least a 4k on an erg every morning if he doesn't have time to get out to the water and scull."
"How do you steer when you row by yourself? You can't just constantly look over your shoulder, can you?" I asked. Christian's own experience with rowing crew had been in teams of 8 or 4.
"That's exactly what you do, actually. No coxswain to steer for you, so you're basically running backwards down the river. Most rowers stick to a stretch of water they're familiar with to avoid environmental hazards, and they keep track of the traffic around them," Christian answered.
"How about Mia? How's she stay fit?" Kate asked.
"Gymnastics as a kid didn't really pan out, her last meet was when she was 11. She got into yoga to replace it. She got super into it too, if I have to hear one more lecture on 'aligning my chakras'," Elliot groaned with a roll of his eyes.
"To be fair, she's good at it. We took a visit to India and she got a class with a traditional yogi and actually impressed him," Christian recalled. "That was summer after my sophomore year at Harvard, so she would have been, what, 13?"
"No, 14, it was your junior year. I distinctly remember because that was the year you lost a dare and showed up back home for the summer blond," Elliot chuckled.
I laughed loudly as I pulled up the memories I'd absorbed from Christian. "Yeah, no, Christian's meant to be a redhead. Fun fact, an estimated 2% of the world population has natural red hair, it's a recessive gene unique to those with European heritage."
"Where'd you get it then?" Christian asked, reaching out to stroke a lock of my hair that shone dark auburn in the sunlight, as opposed to my usual chocolate locks.
"My maternal grandmother came off the boat from Munster, Ireland before she met Grandpa Wilks," I shrugged. "She died when I was 7, so I didn't get to know her really well. She had a thick brogue, though, and she used the word 'cunt' like it was going out of style."
"Sounds hardcore Irish," Elliot chuckled. "What about your Dad's side?"
Kate and Christian both winced, but I could forgive Elliot for his ignorance. "My mom got knocked up from a hook-up in a bathroom stall when she was my age. I have no idea about anything about my birth father, not even his first name. And technically I've had 4 legal fathers since I was born, my mom jumps into marriage fast."
Elliot blushed. "Foot, meet mouth. Sorry for bringing up a bad subject, Annie."
"You didn't know, no big deal," I shrugged. "But for future reference, when I mention my Dad, I mean husband number 2, Ray Steele."
My phone rang with the "Psycho" theme.
I frowned and took it out to answer. "What is it, Carla?" I hadn't called her Mom since I ran away from home after husband number 3 had tried to smack me for backtalk and she took his side.
"Why didn't you tell me you're dating a billionaire?! I had to find out from my friend Colleen!" my mother demanded.
"You've never been interested in my dating life before," I said flatly, seeing exactly where this was going.
"You've never dated a prime sugar daddy before!" Carla said, loud enough I was sure Christian next to me could hear.
"I could not care less about his money, Carla. And even if he was inclined to share some with me, for whatever reason, I wouldn't give you a cent," I got straight to the point.
"Anastasia, be reasonable! I've got bills!" The older but certainly less mature woman whined.
"Get a job for once in your lazy ass life instead of mooching off your current husband," I fired back.
"Don't you take that tone with me, I'm your mother!" She said angrily.
"Biologically speaking, yes. But you've never tried to do a proper job of it a day in your life. I'm blocking your number, if you want to reach me, email me or go through Ray. Bye, Carla," I said. I blocked the contact before she could hit redial. "Don't know why I didn't do that before," I said before getting a stack of pancake slices on my fork. "Sorry about that, what were we talking about?"
"Anastasia, are you okay?" Christian asked with concern.
"I've been maintaining contact out of nostalgia for better days. But she's confirmed beyond all doubt she only pays attention to me when she thinks she can get something out of it. Leeching off you through me, how shameless can you get? This isn't a snap decision, she just finally put the last nail in the coffin of our mother-daughter relationship," I assured him.
"Good riddance. Remember how she tried to pressure you to hookup with Ethan so she could be invited to family get-togethers? Or even me, if I recall, something about how all blondes are bisexual or some stupid phrase like that," Kate said after a sip of coffee.
"Damn, Annie. Your mom's really that bad?" Elliot winced.
"She's not my mom. She's the source of half my chromosomes and was my incubator for 9 months. As of today, she's dead to me," I said with a shrug. "Sorry if this sounds insensitive to both of you, but believe me when I say I'm better off without Carla Wilks in my life."
"I get it. Family and blood aren't always the same thing," Christian nodded, taking my hand and squeezing.
"Moving past that mood kill, should we bring something to dinner tonight? And how are we all getting there?" I asked.
"Just yourselves, Gretchen would take it as an insult if you bring wine or dessert or something," Elliot chuckled, and the conversation flowed from there.
We agreed to drive to Seattle and hang out at the Grey Mansion for the day before dinner and driving back afterwards. Kate got dressed, Elliot took the walk of shame or "stride of pride" as he insisted in Friday night's clothes to his car in the parking lot. I was eager to give my Honda a test drive, so Christian agreed to forgo the SUV with Taylor and sit in the passenger seat of my new car.
I didn't want to freak Christian, who actually was a fairly conservative driver even in his powerful sports cars, so I stuck to only going 5 miles over the speed limit following Elliot's car back to Seattle. We made a brief stop by his apartment so he could change (and have a quickie with Kate, I learned from my telepathy), and we were pulling into the Greys' family home by 2:00. Dinner wasn't until 6:00, so I hoped Grace and Carrick were in an entertaining mood.
Carrick answered the door this time. "Boys, good to see you! Anastasia, an honor to have you return. And may I ask who you are, young lady?" He addressed us, focusing on Kate at the end.
"Kate Kavanagh, Ana's roommate. Elliot's copying Christian and inviting me as our second date," Kate beamed, walking up to give Carrick a handshake.
"Happy to meet you, Kate. Welcome to our home!" Carrick grinned.
The Grey patriarch led us to a different room than the parlor, a proper living room. There were more seats, an obscenely large television, and a window with views of the water. Bookshelves occupied one wall, and I knew that each of the 5 Greys had their own assigned shelf for books and movies. Grace looked up from reading what I saw was some historical fiction piece. Her face lit up when she saw the four of us. "Dears, you brought guests! I recognize Anastasia, who is your friend, Elliot?"
"Mom, this is Kate. She's my girlfriend," Elliot said with pride.
"How do you do?" Kate waved, a bit nervous to meet the woman me, Christian, and Elliot had such a high opinion of.
"You're more than welcome, Kate! So, are you the same Kate who is Ana's friend, the one who was supposed to interview him for the college newspaper?" Grace asked, setting a bookmark in her novel and setting it aside to stand.
"Yep. Good thing I didn't, though, or none of us might have met!" Kate chuckled.
"Funny how things work out in the end," Carrick nodded. "So, Anastasia, I confess I looked you up on Youtube. Would you be willing to humor an old man and play us one of your pieces in the music room? I do insist on hearing you perform live."
"Sure," I easily agreed.
We were led to a different room, with thick doors to block out noise from polluting the rest of the house. There were 4 distinct sections, one with a Steinway Grand, the other with a classical guitar, one with a flute case, and the last filled with music equipment and other instruments.
I sat down at the Steinway as the others stood to watch. A bit nervous despite myself, knowing everyone in the room would applaud even if I just played 'Chopsticks', I pulled up my mental sheet music and started to play. The song I chose was blisteringly fast, filled with trills and sixty-fourth notes, and I will admit I'd been inspired by 'Flight of the Bumblebee' at the time. It was over after a little under 2 minutes. I turned around in the chair to see everyone bar Kate with dropped jaws.
"That was 'Krazy Kate', I wrote it after seeing Kate scramble to get everything before leaving for vacation. And she still forgot her passport, I had to run out to give it to her," I explained.
"It sounded like a robot playing or something, how do your fingers move that fast?" Elliot gawked.
"How do I do anything I do? For whatever reason, I was born more capable than the average human. I try to make the best of it," I shrugged, hiding how I felt like a freak after my display of inhuman talent.
"I thought you composed that purely on the app, I listened to it and thought even I would need weeks of practice to play it at the given tempo," Christian admitted.
"Ana's special. And she's very self-conscious about not being quote unquote 'normal', even though I tell her normal is dreadfully boring. So applaud, people!" Kate prompted.
The Greys' broke out in belated applause and I stood to give a little bow. Grace came up to give me a hug. "You're world-class, Anastasia! You're an amazingly gifted young woman, and I have no doubt you'll make history someday in whatever field you decide to pursue."
"I took the job at GEH so Christian would pay for grad school. I want to get into AI research, maybe run my own lab someday," I admitted. I tried not to outwardly react when Christian began idly thinking about buying an AI startup and giving me free reign and carte blanche to run it however I wanted. One step at a time, that was a lesson I'd have to teach him.
"How interesting! I admit I don't know much about artificial intelligence apart from how it's portrayed in the movies. What drew you to it?" Grace asked.
"The intellectual challenge, to start. It's the hardest problem we'll ever have to solve, making something at least as smart as us. Then I saw all the applications of even just basic soft AI automation and I became convinced that AI will also be the LAST problem mankind will ever have to solve. As soon as we make a conscious computer, the burden of scientific research and experimentation will be out of our hands. Oh, don't get me wrong, there's a million ways it can go horribly wrong. But if there's even a 1% chance I can help make sure it goes right, I think that's worth dedicating my life to," I told Grace. "I truly think AI science is my ikigai."
"What's that word mean?" Carrick asked, eyeing me curiously.
"It's Japanese. A rough translation is 'reason you are here'. Imagine 4 circles in a Venn diagram. One is what you like to do. One is what you're good at. One is what you can get paid to do. And the last is what the world needs. Where they all intersect is your ikigai."
"Most people settle for 2 or 3 out of 4, or sometimes just 1," Kate added. "I mean, not to be immodest, but I'm good-looking. I could get money as a model, but I wouldn't enjoy doing it and that's kinda useless in the grand scheme of things. I'm convinced they should make kids graduating high school do a worksheet or something to try and find their ikigai and what to major in before wasting thousands of dollars of their parents' money."
"Carrick's is the law, upholding the rules we write to govern ourselves. Grace's is in healing kids. Elliot's is building things. Christian's is fixing things. Kate's is finding out the truth and telling people about it. And mine is making the successor to humanity as the smartest species on the planet, or so I believe based on what I know about myself," I finished.
"But, Annie, if your creation goes all Hal or Glados on us, wouldn't you have contributed to the end of the world?" Elliot pointed out worriedly.
"A sentient AI is inevitable, short of a totalitarian world government outlawing any and all research. Even if the second coming of the dinosaur's asteroid hits and we're blown back to the Stone Age, we'll advance to the Information Age and be on the cusp of making an AI all over again eventually. And the first try, however benign, malign, or simply uncaring about humanity at all, will take over the world. So I'm going to do my best to make sure that first try goes well," I told him.
"Technology has always been a double-edged sword," Christian spoke up in my defense. "Fire gave us cooking and arson. Nuclear energy gave us reactors and the atom bomb. You can't have one without the other. AI has risks, potentially existential risks, but like Anastasia said, it's going to come anyway. Personally, I'd rather she had a hand in crafting it and sleep better at night."
"True enough. Well, anyway, it was a pleasure to hear you play, Anastasia. Would you and Kate like a tour of the house?" Grace asked.
The six of us spent an hour going around the house, the Greys getting lost in memories unique to each room. The kids' rooms had been left untouched, sort of like shrines to earlier days. Christian's room was filled with posters of kickboxers, rock stars, and had a cork board filled with pinned up mementos. I noted but didn't comment on a picture of what I was sure was Ella Liath, Christian's birth mother. We got a tour of the grounds, including the boat house that included all the trophies from Carrick's and Christian's rowing days.
We went back to the house and Christian asked "I've been thinking about that breakup all day, can we watch Season 2 of How I Met Your Mother?"
"Sure, your parents have Netflix, right?" Kate nodded.
We went to the living room and Christian did some eldritch sorcery with the remotes to pull up Netflix. Grace volunteered to make us popcorn, on learning we planned to have a TV show marathon. Carrick had some homework to do in his office and ducked out.
It was 5:30 and we were about to start the 8th episode when Christian's phone rang. He pulled it out and his face closed off. "Sorry, I need to take this," he said, leaving the room to take the call.
My blood turned cold as I shamelessly eavesdropped with my telepathy. That unimaginable bitch. Christian walked back into the room looking like he was going to be sick.
"Christian, dear, what is it? Who was that?" Grace, who'd been watching her sons interact with their girlfriends more than the show, asked, getting up in concern.
"Elena pimped me out," my boyfriend breathed. Then he really was sick, vomiting right onto the carpet.
I rushed to my feet and went to grab his head and pulled it into my neck. "If you need to cry, just cry," I said into his ear.
He clutched me tight and indeed began to sob, not even caring that his sick was getting on our shoes.
"What the fuck's going on?!" Kate asked, staring at us in shock.
"That thing is going to die tonight," Elliot growled, standing up with every intention of finding a baseball bat or crowbar and tracking Elena down to beat her to death.
"Get in line, son," Grace said slowly. Her plan was to bar the doors of Elena's mansion and start a fire, less evidence.
"She's already in custody. Even I can't get you to her in the middle of a precinct's holding cells," Christian said in between sobs, sniffing as his nose began to snot up.
Carrick must have been on his way to ask us for a drink before dinner, because he came in. He took one look at his family and knew something was wrong. "What happened?" he demanded, wanting to know the problem immediately.
Christian was in no fit state to answer, so I spoke without thinking. "They pulled Elena Lincoln's financials and found some irregularities. Large sums of unreported money appearing in her account. The forensic accountants went digging and found 15 women had paid Elena just shy of $10 grand. Each was one of the women she set him up with. That, for lack of a better word, woman, charged a fee to introduce women to Christian for him to start a relationship. She's in custody for, of all things, tax evasion."
"How do you know all that, Anastasia? Christian hasn't said anything about what he just learned on that call," Grace asked, eyeing me oddly.
I cursed myself for a fool and thought of a quick excuse. "I don't know if other people can do it. I call it Listening, capital 'L'. I block out my other senses to enhance my hearing. I heard every word of the call Christian just had in the other room.
"I knew you had ears like a bat, but I didn't know you could do that," Kate said with raised eyebrows.
"Christian, is Anastasia telling the truth?" Carrick asked.
"Yes," he nodded, wiping his eyes. "They arrested her earlier today. The Chief of Police told me himself just now what they found out. Unless Anastasia is a telepath or has an in with SPD, there's no other way she could have known all that."
"Well… that's an impressive talent, Anastasia, dear," Grace finally said. "So, Lincoln is in custody?"
"Now that they have solid evidence to hold her, the DA's getting search warrants for her computer and phone and her whole house, every room. They'll build the underage rape case alongside the tax evasion case, and whatever other crimes she's guilty of they dig up. She's going away for a long, long time," Christian said.
"Um, hello? Still clueless here. Who's Elena Lincoln?" Kate spoke up.
Christian took a deep breath. "Normally, I'd make you sign an NDA before I told you. But fuck it, she'll go down swinging, she'll plead not guilty and I'll have to testify and the whole world will find out anyway. A woman named Elena Lincoln seduced and raped me from ages 15-21. She did a very good job grooming me, I thought she was my best friend. Even after we 'broke up', she was the one to find all the women I ended up having a sexual relationship with. And now we know they had to pay for the privilege."
"Jesus H. Christ," Kate breathed. "Ana, did you know about this?"
"He told me after our first date. I'm the one who convinced him that he was raped, instead of just introduced to sex at a young age by an older woman. He invited me to dinner here last week so I could be there to help him tell Grace, Carrick, and Elliot."
"Christian, I don't know what to say. Do you need a hug? I'm an excellent hugger," Kate offered.
"Chris doesn't do hugs. Long story," Elliot spoke up, most of his rage bleeding off now he knew Elena was in a cage for the foreseeable future.
"He's hugging Ana right now, though," Kate pointed out.
The other three Greys only just seemed to notice that fact when Kate pointed it out. Christian indeed had me pulled flush up against his chest, my cheek resting over his heart.
"Good God Almighty," Grace breathed.
"Wow," Elliot blinked.
Carrick didn't say anything, but I distinctly heard the world 'miracle' in his thoughts.
"I'm a special exception, and we're not sure why," I answered for Kate's benefit.
"It's simple. You're an angel. You're here to make all the darkness go away," Christian said with a grin, tears still leaking from his eyes. "You're perfect, and I'm 50 shades of fucked up, but you're still with me anyway."
"I'll take your 50 shades any day of the week," I promised. "You fix things, but maybe I'm here to fix you."
It was a tender, beautiful moment, so of course it was ruined. Murphy's Law and all that. "Um, dinner is served," Gretchen spoke up.
Grace burst into laughter with an hysterical edge. She recovered within a few seconds, but I could tell Gretchen was thoroughly freaked out now at seeing her employer have an outburst like that. "Give us 15 minutes, Gretchen. And get some paper towels, please, Christian got sick on the carpet."
Gretchen returned with a roll of Bounty and we mopped up Christian's vomit from the carpet and my and his feet as best we could. Then, we all went to the dining room. Gretchen poured the wine she'd selected to pair with dinner, but we all ordered generous portions of liquor to go with it to recover from the horrible news we'd just received.
"So, you were raped?" Kate asked, as gently as she could. "You don't really think of women raping men, but I know it happens."
"It wasn't until 1997 that male rape was even criminalized in the United States. And even then, it was used to apply to male-on-male assaults. Female-on-male assaults are all but taboo, most men who try to press charges against women suffer public ridicule and lose their cases," I informed them all. I'd done some research in my free time.
"What, even when the guy is drugged or something?" Elliot demanded in outrage.
"From what I can tell, most people seem to think an erection, let alone orgasm, constitutes consent. Which makes no sense if you have a basic high schooler's understanding of how the male reproductive system works. You can get a corpse hard and cumming with a cattle prod up the ass, what should matter is the frame of mind the man was in and whether he could give true consent," I sighed.
"And since I was a minor, I couldn't consent the first time. And every time after that, even once I turned 18, was fruit of the poisoned tree, according to the DA," Christian added.
"Any more surprises I should know about?" Kate pressed.
Christian took a big gulp of Dutch courage. "Elena is a Domme, a female Dominant. She had me sign a contract to be her Submissive. It was a BDSM relationship."
"... Ana, you knew that too?" Kate asked with wide eyes.
"BDSM is all Christian's ever known, I'm his first 'vanilla' relationship. He showed me his playroom after our first date so I could realize what he expected out of our sex life. I said hell no, and told him my thoughts on Elena. He talked with his shrink, Dr. Flynn, told his parents, and now he's seen the light," I told my best friend.
"And what's this about her selling you to other women or some shit?" Kate pressed. She was naturally inquisitive, which had drawn her to journalism, an excuse to be nosy.
"I broke off my contract with Elena, but I still thought I could only function within a BDSM relationship. I didn't want to go headhunting for potential Subs myself, so Elena 'generously' offered to find girls just my type for me," Christian explained dully.
"I get you're hot, but I wouldn't pay $10 large just to have sex with you for a few months," Kate said, still missing a few of the dots.
Christian hung his head in shame. "Elena helped me write the contract I used with all 15 subs she found me. There were quite a few perks for each woman if she agreed to be my living sex doll every weekend. A personal trainer, dietician, expense account, car, medical coverage, the works. Even for the ones who only lasted a few weeks, they probably got their money's worth from all the gifts I gave them because Elena convinced me it was just good business."
"Sounds like she had quite the operation going," Kate mused, looking down at the food she'd been picking at. Most of us didn't have much of an appetite, I hope Gretchen didn't take it personally.
"She's a businesswoman, she owns and runs the most successful salon chain in Seattle. No reason she can't be as entrepreneurial when it comes to her personal life and the crimes inherent," Christian growled.
I grabbed Christian's hand. "Christian, I hate to ask this… but do you know if she took pictures? Production and ownership of child pornography are both federal felonies. She could be looking at 2 years for each image. And if God forbid she shared them online…"
"Stop, I'm going to be sick again," Christian begged. "I remember posing for her. I felt fucking flattered that she wanted to take pics of me naked to enjoy in private. And for all I know she was selling them to some 400 lb. creep in Minnesota!"
"The FBI will be involved now", Carrick said after a long sip of his drink. "If the forensics team finds proof she posted child porn online, that makes this a federal case. The internet, by definition, crosses state lines."
"The fucking FBI? Is that our life now? We're going to be interviewed by suits about Elena and what she did to Christian?!" Elliot demanded.
"Everyone calm down," I said softly but firmly. "She got caught, that's the important part. They'll hold her and charge her, they'll set an unpayable sum for bail assuming they don't just remand her as a flight risk. If she's got any sense she'll sing like a bird and get a slightly reduced sentence that will still see her behind bars until she needs dentures. If she pleads not guilty and makes a media circus out of this, you'll weather through and come out the other side. Don't let her win, she's already lost."
"Fair point well made, Miss Steele," Christian said in the wake of that. He squeezed my hand so tight.
Grace nodded and looked down at her food. "Well, let's not let Gretchen's hard work go to waste."
We forced ourselves to eat at least half the food, and declined dessert when Gretchen came to take the plates. We adjourned to the parlor, and us 3 couples got comfortable on the furniture with fresh drinks.
"Fuck, how are we going to tell all this to Mia?" Elliot groaned after a long drink of whiskey.
"Next Sunday. Let her be blissfully ignorant for a couple days as she moves back in. Then we'll sit her down after dinner and let her know what happened to me," Christian answered. I was pleased that he didn't really mean "what I did," like he would have a week ago. He was moving so fast, and in the right direction for once.
"How could I let this happen?" Grace asked herself. "I thought we were friends. And she was a fucking pedophile the whole time."
"Wolves in sheep's clothing are very convincing, it's a survival reflex," I assured her. "And you believe the best of people, which is NOT a bad thing. But bad people like Elena can and will take advantage of it."
"If I'd just seen the signs…" Grace said, still blaming herself.
Christian set his jaw. "Then she'd never have suckered me in, and I never would have learned self-control. I would have stayed a problem child, getting into fights, flunking out of school, maybe even gotten into drugs and ended up overdosing like my birth mother. For better or worse, a big part of the man I am today is down to her influence. I'll work with Flynn on cutting out the bad and toxic parts, but she DID help me, at least a little."
"Chris, she trained you like a dog! She rewarded you with sex and punished you with whips and chains and shit!" Elliot exploded.
"And the skills she taught me have come in very useful with running GEH," Christian said back calmly. "I'm not saying I'm grateful she did what she did, or that it wasn't wrong. But the world isn't black and white. She can be a monster and still have had a positive effect on our lives in some way."
"Christian is right, you have to take the bitter with the sweet. This is a complex situation, which had complex consequences. Elena may have ruined Christian's life, but she may also have saved it. God only knows what would have happened if she never touched Christian. It's all in the past, anyway. Rather than waste energy on 'what could have been', we should focus on 'what will be'," Carrick spoke up, and I saw that while Grace was the heart of the family, Carrick was undeniably the head of the household, the man in charge.
We discussed how the Greys would handle the whole Elena thing for a couple hours, steadily drinking the whole while. Finally, Grace put her foot down. "Most of us have work in the morning. We're all going to bed. Christian, Elliot, I don't want you driving this late when you've been drinking. Use your old rooms, and your girlfriends are welcome to join you. There's been enough heartache and pain for one night. On the whole, I consider this a good day. We got to meet Kate, hear Anastasia play, and Lincoln was arrested. That's my takeaway. Good night, dears."
We got up and went to our rooms. Christian let me into his room and just pulled me into another hug. I hugged him back.
"Never had a girl in here before. I keep doing 'firsts' with you," Christian mused after a solid 5 minutes of embracing, pulling back so I could move.
"Maybe you'll do your 'lasts' with me too," I said, only to regret it. That implied a whole lot that was way too soon. For God's sake, tomorrow was the 2-week anniversary of our first meeting!
But Christian just grinned. "Maybe," he nodded.
We moved past the moment and got undressed for bed. I slipped under the covers and felt Christian slide in behind me. We wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me back against him. Even with our height difference, I seemed to fit perfectly against him.
"Nighty-night, angel," he whispered in my ear.
"Nighty-night, Fifty," I whispered back.
"Is that my new pet name?" he chuckled.
"One for all your moods. And all the ones I wouldn't trade for the world," I said honestly.
He squeezed me close and we drifted off to sleep. 'Is this what love feels like?' I heard him wonder.
I didn't have an answer. I just knew I cared for Christian more than I cared for anyone else in the world now, even Ray.