“And not in the right way.” Elliot smiles.
Jameson rolls his eyes and drains his glass. “This wasn’t in the brochure.”
The table erupts into laughter, and I look around the table at my three happily married brothers. “What was in the brochure?” I ask them.
“What do you mean?” Tristan asks.
“How did you know you’d met the . . .” I pause.
“The one?” Elliot asks.
“Yeah.” I shrug. “For interest’s sake.”
“Hmm.” Jameson runs his fingers over his stubble as he thinks back. “I didn’t really know at the time. Like, there wasn’t a lightning-bolt moment when I knew, as such.”
“Yeah, me too,” Tristan agrees. “But there was something different about her.”
“Like what?” I ask, my interest piqued.
“I guess . . .” Tristan pauses. “She was like this really cool friend who was way cooler than me that I desperately wanted to fuck.”
I chuckle.
“For me it was different. I didn’t . . .” Jameson purses his lips as he thinks. “I just wanted to be near her all the time. Like, I was obsessed with her, but different obsessed.”
I frown. “What do you mean?”
“I hated going home with her not there and would avoid it at all costs.”
I listen intently. This is all news to me. I thought they’d had this primal urge to marry their women the day that they’d met them.
“I felt more at home in her tiny apartment than I did in my penthouse,” Jameson adds.
What?
“Me too,” Tristan agrees. “I missed her. When I wasn’t with her, I missed her. I found myself rushing to get home and cook her dinner and watch television on her couch . . . and suddenly, somehow, it wasn’t about sex anymore.”
“Which is helpful now that you have RFI and a useless lock on the door.” Elliot holds his glass up toward Tristan.
Tristan chuckles. “Facts.”
“So what you’re saying is your sex life is shit.” I frown.
“Not at all,” he replies. “The sex is ridiculously good, but more than that, I wanted to talk to her because she was the first person who actually listened. My life became better because she was in it.”
My heart begins to hammer.
Sounds familiar.
“I guess my biggest thing for me was”—Elliot chips in—“I didn’t want to sleep with anyone else. I lost all attraction to other women overnight.”
I feel the blood drain from my face. I haven’t had sex in two months.
It’s like the urge has completely left my body. I would rather lie on my bed and watch Hayden read than have sex with another woman. I end most days jerking off in the shower and then happily cuddling her back.
Fuck.
“What’s wrong? You look like you saw a ghost,” Tristan says.
“All good.” I fake a smile.
The conversation changes subject, and I sit still as their words of wisdom roll around in my head.
My life became better because she was in it.
I glance over to see Elliot’s gaze fixed firmly on me. He raises an eyebrow, and I snap my eyes away.
Don’t even.
“Christopher?” I hear a female voice call. I glance over to see Heidi as she approaches our table. Nicki is with her too.