Page 125 of Knot Playing Fair 2

Byron

IT WAS NEW YEAR’S EVE, and for some reason, I was sitting at a table on the edge of a laser-and-fog-filled dance floor at an exclusive nightclub in downtown St. Louis. Why had I agreed to this again?

Oh, right. Because Mia and Luca had fluttered their eyelashes at me and said things like, “Come on, it’ll befun... youhaveto come, Byron.” And I’d folded like a wet dishrag.

Not to say I had anything against dance clubs as a concept. I didn’t. They’d been good hunting grounds for me, once upon a time. Now, however, with my damned old-man cane leaning up against the table and Emiel sitting across from me, looking vaguely overwhelmed, all I could think about was how badly I wanted three of the four people currently grinding away on the dance floor... and how fuckingterrifiedI was to do anything about it.

Emiel, too, had spent a good chunk of the time we’d been here staring wide-eyed at the pair of omegas dressed in smoking hot clubwear as they laughed and danced without a care in the world.

Intellectually, I knew I held some culpability on that front. Luca already had a closet full of clothing suitable for a night out. But a few days ago, Mia had come to me with those huge browneyes and asked where the best place to buy a dress for New Year’s Eve would be. At that point, I pretty muchhadto take her shopping so I could be sure she ended up with something that would do those gorgeous hips justice.

Everyone seemed to agree that the slinky, metallic-copper sheath dress she’d settled on was doing an admirable job.

“I like this more than I thought I would,” Emiel said, over the sound of the DJ shifting from a representative song that came out in 1991 to one that came out in 1992. The distinctive, throbbing beat of “Rhythm Is a Dancer” swelled over the sound system, and the club crowd went wild.

I waited for the cheers to die down before trying to reply.

“You should get out there and join them. As you may have noticed, there’s no requirement that the dancing begood.” In all honesty, I hadn’t meant that as a jab. I realized an instant after it came out of my mouth that it probably came across that way, regardless.

This strange, new Emiel who was apparently still in his Zen phase only shrugged.

“Maybe in a bit.” He dragged his attention away from Mia and Luca on the dance floor, eyeing me up and down. “You don’t seem happy. Is it just the leg, or something else?”

The big screen hanging from the ceiling flashed 1993 in neon letters, and the music shifted to the Pet Shop Boys.

“Why do you care?” I asked, genuinely bewildered. “I’ve treated you like shit for years.”

Emiel shrugged one brawny shoulder. “You’re just an ass. To everyone, I mean. Figured it wasn’t personal, really.”

I frowned. “Itwas, though. I resented the way you always seemed ready to dip back into gang life, while I was trying to get as far away from it as possible.”

He gave me an odd look. “Think you might’ve chosen the wrong line of work for that.”

“You know what I mean,” I snapped. “We were trying to get kidsawayfrom that life. And you were taking weekend vacations to the cage fights.”

Emiel’s eyes darted away. “Yeah,” he admitted. “Didn’t know any other way to release the pressure inside me when it got too bad. Not back then.”

A hint of guilt pricked at me, and I couldn’t decide if it was deserved or not.

Emiel met my gaze again. “Used to hate the way you’d sleep with anything that moved, when you had Luca right there, always looking like he thought he didn’t deserve to even be in the same house as us.”

The prickle of guilt became a sharp stab. I slumped back in my chair.

“I didn’t know any other way to release the pressure, either,” I muttered. “You know damn well that I’d get my ass handed to me in a cage fight.”

“I get that now,” Emiel said. “And yeah, youwould.”

On the screen, 1994 flipped over to 1995, Real McCoy giving way to La Bouche.

“Do you think this thing with the pack is going to work out?” I asked, the words out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Emiel went still, knowing exactly what ‘thing’ I was talking about.

“Dunno,” he said. “I think we’ve gotta try, though. Don’t you?”

A burst of longing grabbed me by the throat, cutting off my words.

Across from me, Emiel fiddled with his half-finished drink. He seemed to be deciding about something.

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