“Nothing. There’s no game.” Freddy lifted his menu. “You’ve picked an excellent restaurant, Dawn. Are you a foodie?”
She didn’t glance his way and seared me with her gaze. “What do you mean let the games begin?”
Damn you. I like you more and more. You’re smart and assertive.
I lifted my wine glass and gently twirled the amber rose liquid around the rim, making sure it never spilled, but simply shaded the glass with color. “I don’t know if I should tell you about my brother’s and my game. It may be unfair for one of us.”
“Hmmm.” Her smile never wavered or left. “Does your game involve me?”
“No.” Freddy was a bundle of nerves across from me. I could’ve wagered a million that sweat would appear if the conversation continued on its present path.
Again, she didn’t turn to him. “Does your game involve me?”
“Yes.” I held her gaze.
“Interesting.” She sipped from her glass of white wine. “Am I the prize or the means to get it?”
That question rattled me. I tip toed further into this verbal word play, making sure I formed each sentence well enough to not get trapped by her. “You’re sort of both.”
“Both?” Her smile widened. “I would love to hear more about this.”
I didn’t check Freddy’s face. I could already sense the angry glares coming from his way. If I could die from just a look, I would’ve been dead right there.
You never said we couldn’t tell the women, dear brother. Let’s see if you can win her if she knows the truth. Let’s put us both on equal footing this time.
“So should we order first or are you going to tell me all about this game that I’m soon to be a part of?” She opened up her menu and browsed over the entrees.
“How much do you want to know?” I smirked.
“As much as possible, without messing up either of your teams. There are teams right?” She glanced up over the top of her menu.
“Well, just us three are involved, but yeah. It’s sort of team Freddy and team Max.”
She returned her attention back to the menu. “Are there team jerseys?”
I laughed. “No.”
“Cheerleaders?” She winked. “Maybe even mascots?”
I risked a glance at Freddy. He was now chugging his wine down.
Oh yeah. I knocked him off his game for sure.
“No one else, but us three,” I assured her.
Freddy cleared his throat. “Let’s talk about this restaurant. You have divine taste, Dawn. I mean you—”
“Nope. I want to talk about the game.” She closed the menu. “Plus, I know what entrée I’m going to order. Have you two picked?”
“You already know what you’re ordering?” He raised his brown eyebrows. “But you’ve just sat down.”
“I’ve been dreaming of eating at this place since I moved down here. They have three signature dishes. I’m choosing my most favorite.”
“Why not choose all three?”
“Because I’m only one person.”
“No. Order all three for the table,” I interrupted. “Then we can do it family style and sample from them all.”
“Is that what you’re used to, sharing?” She centered those endearing eyes on me. Earlier on the beach, she claimed they were just gray. I knew color. They didn’t own just one, they held on to them all. Even as I stared into her pupils, the irises changed, swirling into a light shade of blue and then darkening to green. I bet they broadcasted her emotions like two mood rings, altering with each spurt of happiness or rage.
What color will they be when I thrust inside of you?
“Are you going to answer my question or just stare?” she asked.
“We don’t share women. We just compete for their attention,” I said.
“Maybe compete is too strong of a word.” Freddy finished his whole glass.
“It’s not too strong of a word, if you both consider getting women, a game,” she countered. “Do you? Are women a game to you, Freddy?”
The way his name curled off her tongue made me envious. I wasn’t too big of a man to admit it. In an effort to get the spotlight back on me, I said, “What we do is pick a woman that we both find attractive and see who can get her to fall in love with us first.”
“I’m going to need another glass of wine,” Freddy muttered as he placed his empty one down. I chuckled to myself. What would he do now? He had to be himself, that very fact would shove him over the edge. I wasn’t sure if Freddy even knew who he was.
You might as well just give me the two hundred thousand dollars now and save us both some time.
“Okay, so one of you get the poor woman to fall in love?” She twisted her lips to the side. “How do you even define the win? How do you know she’s in love with you or your brother?”
“By the person she decides to have sex with.”
She laughed. It came out bubbly and rose high over the table. She must’ve realized it because she covered her mouth with both of her hands, but still the giggles escaped. “I’m so sorry, but I just think that’s not a good way to test out if a woman loves either one of you or not. Sex just says who she’d rather sleep with. And still that’s not a good measure. Whoever she messes around with first, just says that one of you didn’t put your foot in your mouth on that given moment when she was hot and ready.”
I had nothing else to say.
“Wait a minute, I don’t think you understand what my brother is trying to say.” Freddy waved his hand. “We court these women together and after a while, she picks one of us.”
“Just to sleep with, but how do you know it’s not for another reason?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he argued. “She’s picked and that’s enough.”
“It obviously matters if you both keep doing this a lot.” She glanced at me. “And you two do this a lot don’t you?”
“We do it enough,” I replied.
“What are you two really trying to discover?” She rested her elbows on the table and peered at us like a teacher wondering about two naughty pupils. “This game means a lot to you both, since you do it all the time—”
“No one said all the time,” Freddy interrupted.
“I bet you do this as much as you can,” she guessed. “What else do you have to do? You don’t work. Are women the means behind telling you your worth or just a source of entertainment in your restless world?”
Damn.
Unease plopped down to my gut. Now it was my turn to chug my wine.
“Go ahead and answer that question, Max,” Freddy said, “since you’re the wise guy that decided to let it all spill. Why do we do this?”
I tapped my foot in a crazy staccato rhythm that made the table shake. “It’s fun.”
“Do you break any of their hearts?” She leaned her head to the side. “How far does this game of yours go?”
Freddy tilted her way with a neutral expression masking his real emotions. “You’re pretty smart, Dawn. What do you think?”
“I think that some of the girls you hustle with love are probably gold diggers anyway and may be used to rich guys and their twisted mental hobbies. However, I bet there are a bunch of women in this world that you two hurt pretty bad. How do you feel realizing that you may have broken some hearts with your. . .fun?”