Darker Water (14 page)

I wasn’t sure what to say. Part of me
couldn’t wait to meet the woman who raised him, but another part
flashed back to all the other times I’d met a guy’s parents.
Meeting a guy’s family signified a big step in a relationship. The
kind of relationship Carson and I didn’t have.

“Stop thinking, Lane.”

“I wasn’t. I haven’t done that since I was
fourteen.”

“Liar. Renee is probably a lot different than
anyone you’ve ever met, but she’s still human.” He cocked his head.
“I think.”

“You call your mother Renee?”

“I call her a lot of things, but Renee’s the
only polite one. I’m asking you along because I’ll need an excuse
to leave early. So when I kick you under the table, pretend you’re
going to throw up and run out of the restaurant. I’ll have to skip
dessert to go help you, of course, because I’m your considerate gay
friend.” Not even Carson could say that without laughing. “No
pressure, though. Especially when you compare it to the pressure
I’m putting on you to sleep with me.”

“Especially that.”

“Oh shit. When you don’t make a choice, the
choice is made for you. Hey, Renee,” he said over my shoulder.
“This is my friend Lane. I invited her to lunch.”

I turned around and saw Mrs. Bennett. Tall,
fifty-something, expensive-looking, gorgeous.

“It’s Laney, actually.” I liked Carson being
the only one to shorten it. “Nice to meet you.” I started to say
that Carson had told me all about her, but I had a feeling she
would know I was lying.

“What a pleasure. Carson so rarely introduces
me to his
friends
.”

Friends. A simple word that can mean so many
things. What Carson calls a friend is a sexual partner. What Renee
calls a friend is obviously a girlfriend. And what I call a friend
is...a friend.

“Of course I don’t mind Laney joining us for
lunch,” Renee said, smiling politely.

I immediately noticed the discrepancy between
what Carson had said and what Renee had—he hadn’t asked permission
to bring me along, and we all knew it. I shook Renee’s hand,
feeling the hard press of metal rings against my palm. One quick
look at the multitude of sparkles on every one of the woman’s
fingers blinded me.

“I need to talk to a few people before we
go,” Carson said. “Lane, wanna help?”

Renee took my arm. “I need someone to keep me
company, honey.” She looked at me. “I rarely get up to Northern
California these days, so I’m afraid I don’t know many people.”

“You know everyone, Renee.”

“Not anyone who matters. Laney and I will be
fine. Go finish up what you have to. We’ll wait here.”

Carson tightened his jaw. “No, I—”

“We’ll be fine,” I said. Nothing could
possibly be more uncomfortable than the three of us standing here
staring at each other. “Besides, I need a chance to ask your mom
for pictures of your awkward and embarrassing teen years. I’m dying
to see those.”

“You sure?” He shook his head in warning.

I nodded, not sure at all.

“I’ll hurry.”

“So,” Renee started, “have you and Carson
been dating long?” Wow, she’d timed that perfectly. Carson must
have been about three seconds out of earshot.

“We’re not dating.”

“Why not?”

“Um...because neither of us is interested in
dating right now.” Geez, that sounded awful. And it was the truth,
which meant it was also the wrong thing to say to his mother. “I’m
gay.”

“Oh. Oh, I’m sorry—I didn’t mean to pry. I
just worry he’s too busy to find someone.”

“I wouldn’t worry. He’s not in a rush to
settle down.”

“That’s usually the time love finds you,
isn’t it?”

“Is it? I wouldn’t know.” I immediately
jumped into the monotony of small talk—exactly the kind of thing I
hate, but
anything
was better than discussing Carson’s love
life.

He came back a few minutes later, slightly
winded, as if he’d been running from person to person, shaking
hands and thanking them before moving to the next. “The Windhams
and the Curtises are meeting us at the restaurant.”

“I’d thought…” Renee looked disappointed for
a second before shaking it off and smiling. “I’ll let the
restaurant know.”

As soon as she reached into her bag, Carson
grabbed my hand and pulled me away. “We’ll see you there.”

I had to power-walk to keep up with him.
“Does she have a car?”

“And driver. She’ll be fine. So, on a scale
of one to wanting to stab yourself in the eye, how terrible was
it?”

“I’ve met worse. She wanted to know if you
were dating anyone.”

“And you said…?”

“That you were happy being single, and that
I’m gay.”

“Shit, you stole my excuse! What am I going
to tell her now?”

“We can both be gay.” I followed him to his
car, having taken the bus to get there this morning. Before we
left, he gave me one more chance to back out, but I didn’t take it.
His mother wasn’t evil and seemed to genuinely care about her son.
I wanted to know why Carson didn’t reciprocate those feelings.

“Your mom seemed so...”

“Whatever the next word you pick is, it’ll
probably be wrong.” His tone had its normal depth and ease, but
each word was clipped, as if he was struggling to control them.
“Renee knows how to play a crowd. She’s graceful, well educated,
and great with everyone she isn’t attracted or related to.”

“Why don’t you like her?” I asked.

He took a deep breath. “It’s a long,
complicated, bummer of a story, but the short version is she made
some really bad choices while I was growing up, and she’s still
making them.” His hands tightened on the wheel as he spoke. “It’s
hard to watch someone do that to themselves, and it was even harder
to live through it as a kid.”

I wanted to know what kind of choices he was
talking about. But Carson was the most open book I’d ever know—if
he didn’t offer information, he didn’t
want
to offer
information, so I wouldn’t ask. Yet.

I felt Lane’s stress-level jump as soon as we
pulled up to the valet.

“I should’ve opted out,” she said. “This
place is
really
nice, and I’m basically wearing sweats.”

“You could take them off,” I said, smirking.
“You look fine. Great, in fact.” I took the ticket from the valet
and waited for her to come around the car.

“I have five dollars and my bus pass tucked
into my bra,” she whispered when she was next to me. “Do you think
that will get me more than a glass of water?”

“Don’t talk about what you have in your bra,
Lane. Pulling off being your gay best friend is going to be a lot
tougher if I keep staring at your breasts and adjusting my
hard-on.” I slipped my arm around her waist as we went inside,
staying close enough to whisper in her ear. “By the way, I’m
buying, so feel free to order some bread to go with that
water.”

“Good thing you’re my gay best friend and not
someone who’s trying to get in my pants. Because bread wouldn’t pop
open the first button.”

“Good thing your pants don’t have buttons
then.”

I loved it when she tried to hide her smile
by putting her lip between her teeth. Could watch her do that all
day. But unfortunately, today was not that day. Today I’d be lucky
if could walk out of here without biting my own tongue off.

As soon as I saw the Windhams in the lobby, I
put on my work-mask, one of the only useful skills Renee had taught
me. They were longtime friends of the family. Longtime friends who
were nice enough people to believe Renee was equally nice. Plus,
they had good-sized pockets and were big supporters of the
foundation.

“You got here fast.” I shook hands with
Michael and introduced him and Nina to Lane, who’d never looked
more uncomfortable. She was fidgeting and angling her body to hide
what she was wearing. She had no idea that she’d be the most
beautiful thing in the place even if she was wearing a tablecloth.
We sat down and ordered drinks while we waited for Renee and the
Curtises.

As I watched Lane struggle through the small
talk, I felt a tinge of regret for bringing her. It was a
completely selfish thing to do—use her as a buffer between Renee
and me. But she could have refused and she hadn’t. She needed to
learn how to say what she wanted instead of pretending she was fine
with every decision someone else made for her.

Fate and frogs—the two things she liked to
think existed, maybe even
needed
to think existed. Not as if
I didn’t have my own pathetic issues with both of those things.
What she called fate, I called heredity—nature and nurture. I
couldn’t actually beat it, but I could manipulate it. Like pointing
a gun at someone: You can hope and pray it won’t fire as much as
you want, but if you keep your finger on the trigger, chances are
it’s going to go off eventually.

So as long as I kept my finger and all my
other parts away from the trigger, I could enjoy her. I was fine
with being a frog. I just didn’t want to be the poisonous kind.
Because to hurt the woman sitting next to me—her hands gripping the
fabric of her pants, her lips stuck in the fakest looking smile I’d
ever seen—to hurt her would mean I’d lost. I wasn’t ready to say
goodbye to her, for a bunch of reasons—some good, others idiotic.
But it wasn’t really a choice at this point.

Why was I doing this to myself? Every time we
kissed or she did her “yes” look, it got worse. She was the one who
was supposed to be working through shit. Not me. I was just
supposed to be around to fuck. Damn, I hoped that happened
soon.

Instead, it had turned into a test of both
our limits. A long test with only one right answer.

I leaned towards her, peeling her fingers off
her pants and whispering, “It’ll be okay. Whenever you want to
leave, squeeze”—I couldn’t help myself—“my cock.”

She gasped and looked at me with a
horror-filled but slightly amused expression. What was it about her
that made me want to tease her so mercilessly? She could take it,
for one. I wanted to make sure she remembered how badly I wanted
her, for two.

“Do you play golf, Michael?” she asked
Windham. “Because Carson absolutely
loves
golf, but he never
has anyone to play with.” And she could throw it right back at me,
for three. “Right?” She looked at me so innocently. Only the subtle
curl of her mouth gave her away.

“I would never have pegged you for a golf
lover, Carson,” Michael said. “I’d love to meet you for a game
sometime. You don’t play, Laney?”

“With Carson? No, I don’t play with him. In
fact, most of the time he just plays with himself.” She took a sip
of water to hide her smile.

“Don’t think there won’t be repercussions for
that,” I mumbled.

All enjoyment disappeared when Renee and the
Curtises came in. I was almost fast enough to hold out one of the
chairs on the opposite side of the table for Renee, so she’d be as
far from me as possible. But the Curtises were quicker, and I ended
up holding out the chair next to my own for Renee.

When she ordered a bottle of champagne, I
instantly tasted bile and knew something really bad was about to
happen. Under the table, Lane put her hand on my thigh and, without
saying a word, asked me if I was okay.

No. No, I wasn’t. I could fake it for a
little while, but I was never okay around Renee. Every time I saw
her, the last thirteen years suddenly disappeared and I was just a
clueless, terrified kid looking up at my beautiful mother, afraid
of asking her why.

“Carson,” Lane whispered, her lips barely
moving, “what’s wrong?” She’d probably seen me tense, just like
anyone else at the table who’d been looking at me would have. My
mother definitely saw. And my mother definitely did nothing, which
didn’t surprise me at all.

I took a deep breath, focusing on making it
through lunch, knowing that once it was over, I wouldn’t have to
see her for another year.

When the other people at the table asked what
was going on, Renee smiled, giggling like someone thirty years
younger.

“What’s the big secret, Renee?” Michael
asked.

I’d never been more tempted. Fuck, I’d
love
to tell everyone what Renee’s big secret was. Fucking
love it. In my head, I could actually hear my voice say the words,
watching Windham’s jaw drop, his wife’s eyes widen. Gasps and
whispers, my mother’s hurried list of denials.

So tempting. And such a bad idea.

“What’s the champagne for, Mother?” I used
the title for the donors’ benefit, not because she’d ever done
anything to deserve it.

“I’ll tell you when it gets here.” For two of
the longest minutes of my life, I waited. Once everyone had a glass
of champagne in their hand, Renee blew out a breath, smiled, and
held up her glass. “I thought it was fitting to announce this on a
day that celebrates my late husband’s legacy.”

Fuck. This was going to be bad. When I downed
my champagne, all eyes turned towards me. “Oh, I thought you were
done.” I refilled my glass. “Sorry, Mother. Please continue.”

“When Carson started the Bennett Foundation,
I wasn’t sure it was the right decision. But it has turned into
something I’m very proud of him for.” She looked at me lovingly and
I felt the eyes of everyone at the table again, but this time they
were probably thinking what an amazing relationship she and I
shared. Envied it even.

All I could think about was how she’d reacted
when I told her what I was going to do with my half of Dad’s estate
that he’d split between my brother and me. Six years after he
croaked, as soon as I turned eighteen, I’d used every penny to
start and fund the foundation. The look on Renee’s face was
something I should’ve taken a picture of.

She’d been horrified. Initially it was
because, after putting up with the man for over two decades, the
asshole had only left her a
small
fortune, the entirety of
which she went through in the first couple years. And then that I
had “blown it all” on something for people outside our family…?
That was inexcusable. She was so pissed, she couldn’t bring even
herself to speak to me. It was probably the best year of my whole
fucking life.