"I never thought of it that way," I admitted, resting my cheek on his broad, hard pectoral.

"Regardless of jealousy or our pasts, how we feel about any of it...there's nothing we can do about it, is there? We're here, and what happened, happened. We each have the right to our feelings, to be upset or angry or jealous. But the real question is, what are we going to do about it? Will it change our present together? Our future? Does knowing how I chose which women to engage in s.e.x with before I met you change how you feel about me right now?" He brushed his hand down my back, smoothing and scratching over my shirt.

I shook my head against his chest. "No, it doesn't."

"Good." He was silent for a moment, and then tilted my chin up so I had to look at him. "And to be totally honest, I sold the...f.u.c.kpad...as you called it, precisely because I didn't want to be anywhere with you that I'd been with anyone else. I want us to make new memories together, in a place that's totally ours."

"That makes me feel a bit better," I said. "I do have one potentially stupid question."

"What's that, love?" He sounded resigned, and slightly amused.

"You never felt anything for any of them?"

He was quiet for a moment. "Hmmm. That's not what I thought you were going to ask."

"What were you expecting?"

He hesitated. "A number."

"I don't think I want to know the number."

"Probably not," he agreed.

I didn't even like that answer, as vague as it was.

"No, I never felt anything for any of them. I didn't let myself. I...I didn't let them get close to me, see the real me, and I didn't try to get to know them. I didn't want to."

"Did it ever backfire, the proposal? The contractual casualness of it?"

"Yes. More than once. If they got clingy, started asking too many questions, demanding things that smacked of intimacy, if they got too personal, I'd send them home. That happened...not frequently, but more than I liked. I suppose it was inevitable. This is going to make me sound like an a.s.s, but I'm going to say it anyway: if you present women with the un.o.btainable, a mysterious man, however unapproachable, however cold or distant, however clearly he may make his intentions, there will always be those who try to...get him. Change him. Make him hers. Someone will always think she's different." There was truth in his words, and in his preface to the statement.

"And me?" I asked.

"You didn't try, Kyrie. You tried not to. You were you; you played by the rules and just tried to get through it with your own heart intact. But...you were different from the beginning. It was always different between us. I tried to convince myself otherwise, but it was in vain." He tilted my face up again. Kissed me slowly, gently. "Can we be done rehashing the past, Kyrie? Please? I don't like to think of that any more than you do. That's not why were here; we're here for the future-our future together. Let's just focus on that, all right?"

I nodded, reached up and clung to his neck. "I like that plan."

"Me too."

5.

LAYLA, THE NOPE-FISH.

I found Layla by the pool, lying in a lounge chair, clad in a neon-orange bikini that would have fit in a Tic-Tac box with room to spare. G.o.d, I loved her, but she dressed like a s.k.a.n.k sometimes. She had huge round bug-eye Audrey Hepburn shades on her face and her hair pulled up in a sloppy knot.

I had a gla.s.s of sweet white wine in each hand, and I extended one to her as I took the lounge chair beside her.

She accepted it, took a sip. "If you gotta be exiled from everything you know...this is the way to do it."

"Right? Roth has amazing taste."

"This place is awesome. I could hang out here for a minute." She still wasn't looking at me.

"Layla."

"I'm enjoying the sunshine and this really tasty wine. I don't want to get into it."

"Dude."

She swiveled her head on the chair back. "Don't 'dude' me, Key. It's fine. I'm fine. Everything's fine."

"I'm a woman too, Layla. You can't fool me with the 'it's fine' bulls.h.i.t."

She laughed at that. "Okay, well then...whatever. It's not fine, but I still don't want to f.u.c.king get into it. We're cool, I just need a minute to figure my s.h.i.t out."

"We're not cool. I have no clue what's going on with you." I grabbed her bottle of sunscreen lotion and squirted a dollop into my palm, spreading it onto my arms. "We can't be keeping things from each other, hon. We're all either of us has, right now."

"You've got Roth," she said, pushing her sungla.s.ses higher onto her nose.

"And so do you. We're a family, Layla."

"f.u.c.k that. You and him are a family. You and me are a family. But he's just your fiance to me. We're sort of friends, I guess, but I'll never be close to him. Not that I don't like him, because I do. He's great. He's supercool. But he's not my f.u.c.king family." She spat the last word with something approaching actual hate.

"Whoa, Layla. What the h.e.l.l?"

"Don't worry about it. Just...forget it." She set her wine gla.s.s down and stood up, tugged the bottom of her bikini down and the top up, and then stalked away, storming through the kitchen and out toward the beach.

I followed her, of course. She was a good thirty feet away by the time I made it through the house and down to the beach. She strode angrily through the lapping surf, bare feet leaving fading footprints in the wet sand. I jogged after her, caught up, grabbed her arm and spun her around.

"Layla. What the f.u.c.k is wrong with you? What did I do?"

She jerked away. "You wouldn't understand."

"I'm your best friend! What wouldn't I understand?"

She backed away, shaking her head. "Me! Why I'm mad! Everything! Anything! Pick one, b.i.t.c.h, they're all true." The term we threw back and forth at each other in a joking, loving way for once didn't feel very joking or loving.

Tears p.r.i.c.ked my eyes. "Layla...what...? I-I don't get it."

"No s.h.i.t. You're so caught up in you, in f.u.c.king Roth, in whatever the h.e.l.l we're even running from that you don't even know what's going on with me. We've been best friends for so long, but you sure don't understand how throwing around the idea of family would be hard for me?"

I shook my head. "I know being away from home is hard-"

She laughed bitterly. "See, that's exactly what I mean. Home? You think f.u.c.king Pontiac was home? And family? You can honestly throw that word at me?"

"I'm so lost, Layla. Talk to me."

She turned away and walked deeper into the water, till it was up to her knees. I went in as well and stood beside her.

She twisted a flyaway curl between a finger and thumb. "What do you know about my family, Kyrie? My real family, I mean. The one I was born in to."

I shrugged. "I had the impression that it wasn't...bad, just that they weren't really...I don't know-caring. Loving." I blinked, thinking hard. "I-I guess I don't know much more than that."

She sniffled, and I realized she was fighting tears. "You think it's an accident you don't know more than that? Jesus, Kyrie. I mean, I love you like h.e.l.l, girl, but you are so clueless sometimes. Like, just...clueless. You can only see what's going on with you, most of the time."

That made me angry, and I opened my mouth to say something in response, but then...I thought about it.

And she was right.

I knew little about her because I'd never bothered to find out. Granted, she was p.r.i.c.kly and defensive and refused to talk about herself or her past or much of anything personal, but then...I'd never pushed. And Layla...when she knew something was going on with me, she'd turn tenacious, refusing to back down or shut up or give up until I'd spilled it all. And I always did, and she was always there for me.

"s.h.i.t. Layla, I-"

"We've been friends for over five years, Key. I know a lot about you. I accept it all, and I love you. And granted, the s.h.i.t you've been through over the last two, two and a half years, ever since that douchebag Mr. Edwards propositioned you and then you got that check...it's been crazy. Totally crazy. Everything with Roth and finding out about your dad and then getting whisked away by mister s.e.xy billionaire and living all over the world, and then Roth getting s.n.a.t.c.hed and whatever else...I don't blame you for not following up on little old me."

I was crying now. "I'm a s.h.i.tty friend."

She just laughed. "Yeah, but you're my s.h.i.tty friend. And you've made up for it. You brought me here to be with you on your...your f.u.c.king aquatic skysc.r.a.per. I get that it's for my safety...intellectually, I get it. But I guess I still sort of resent being yanked out of my life, you know? But there's a lot about me you don't understand."

"So help me understand," I said. "I want to understand."

Layla just shook her head. "It's not that easy. I can't just...unburden myself. There are layers and layers of s.h.i.t."

"For real, though, Layla. You can't jump all over me like you have been and not explain, not give me a chance to understand what the f.u.c.k is going on."

Layla walked out of the surf and sat down in the dry sand, letting the water lap at her legs, and I sat beside her. She stared out at the water for a long time, and then started talking, her voice low, soft, hesitant. "So, I may not have told you the whole truth about me. I let you think my childhood was just...average-s.h.i.tty, I guess. Like, I think you probably have the impression I grew up with both parents, and that it was fine, just not...great."

I shrugged. "Yeah, basically. Average-s.h.i.tty sounds about right."

She shook her head, the loose bun of her hair coming loose. "It wasn't average-s.h.i.tty, Key. Not even close. It was...super mega awful s.h.i.tty, like whoa s.h.i.tty."

"How?"

"In any way it could be," she said, with a bitter laugh. "Momma never really said so right out loud in so many words, but I'm pretty sure I'm a rape-baby. She always seemed to...resent me, I guess. She didn't beat me or nothing, but she...sometimes I felt like she hated me. Like she couldn't even bear to look at me. I mean, maybe my father was just a colossal d.i.c.k and I remind her of him. It could be that. G.o.d knows I'm nothing like her, that's for d.a.m.n sure. My mom, she's this tiny, skinny, quiet little Italian woman. She's an immigrant, actually. Came over when she was...twelve or thirteen, I think. I'm like her in that neither of us likes to talk about ourselves. So I don't know much about her past. She came over with her folks, I think, but I never met them, so I don't know if they died or she ran away, or they moved back to Italy. I just don't know. She had no education. Spoke really poor English. She was a hard worker, though. Gotta give her that. I'm like her in that way too, I guess. She had me, didn't abort me. Maybe she couldn't afford to, I don't know. But she kept me, and I was always fed, always had clothes to wear. Hand-me-downs and s.h.i.t from Value Village or whatever, Salvation Army, but I wasn't naked or hungry."

I traced an abstract pattern in the sand. "I sense a 'but' coming."

She laughed again. "You got that right. Things weren't too bad until I was...eight? Nine? It was just me and Mom, doing what we had to do, getting by. And then she met Mario. Yeah, legit, his name was Mario, and he was old school New York Italian, hair slicked back, shiny shoes and windbreakers, like something from f.u.c.king Goodfellas. I hated Mario. But he took care of Mom, and I think he loved her, in his own sort of way. They never got married, but they were together for a long time. He knocked her up, and suddenly I had this little half-brother who they both seemed to like a whole h.e.l.l of a lot better than me. And again, I gotta say Mario never did anything bad to me. Never beat me or molested me or anything. But once the baby arrived it was as if I was not even there. They just focused on Vic. Like he was all that mattered. By nine years old, I was basically on my own. Got myself to school, took care of my own lunches, got myself home. Got myself dinner and breakfast usually, too, because Mom and Mario would take Vic and leave, go to breakfast, go to dinner, go away somewhere for the weekend and just leave me to fend for myself. They just didn't care. I took care of myself, no big deal." She dug her heels into the wet sand, pausing for breath. "Here comes the other 'but'. Only, it's more of an 'and then...'"

"s.h.i.t."

She nodded. "Yeah. Vic got leukemia when I was seventeen. Mom and Mario...they just checked out. When Vic got sick, it was...it happened so fast. Like, one day he was fine, the next he was in the pediatric oncology ward, bald, tubes in his nose...and then he was dead. Like, within months. He didn't stand a chance, the little s.h.i.t." She sniffled. "He was a good kid. Weird and gumpy and annoying, but sweet. I liked him. He'd come in to my room while I was doing homework and just pester me for hours. 'Layla what's this, and why that, and what are you doing, and do you have a boyfriend...'" She shrugged, and I saw a tear drop from her face to the sand. "I was messed up when he died, and Mom was just...wrecked. It ruined her. Mario too. They just...checked out. Stopped caring. Mom started drinking, Mario was gone all the time, started coming home hammered, smelling like the strip club, they started fighting. It got nasty. That last year of high school was just raw, unmitigated h.e.l.l. I was on my own for real by then. I'd been working since I was fourteen. Had my own car by the time I got my license. I was still living with them because they refused to emanc.i.p.ate me. I tried when I was sixteen, and they were just like 'f.u.c.k you, no.'"

"Layla, Jesus."

She shrugged. "It is what it is. So then-yeah, it's not over yet-then Mario gets drunk at the strip club one night and tries to drive home, slams his Cadillac into the back end of a semi, kills himself and injures two others. Mom was a f.u.c.king mess, of course, so I had to set up the funeral for a stepfather who barely spoke to me, a stepfather who when I asked for a ride to the doctor so I could get birth control at fourteen was like 'take the bus, you little s.l.u.t', and kept drinking. That was fun. So anyway, a few weeks after the funeral, Mom took a bottle of Ambien with a bottle of One-Fifty-One. Easy way out, I guess. I found her. I got home from graduation to this G.o.dawful smell. So then-hip-hip-hooray! I got to arrange yet another funeral, the third in less than six months, because guess who took care of Vic's funeral when Mom and Mario were too wasted to do it themselves?" She sucked in a deep breath and held it, let it out with a shudder, shook her head as if to clear away the memories. "So, yeah. There you go. Layla's s.h.i.tty Upbringing, the abridged version."

"That was the abridged version?" I asked.

She laughed, a low chuckle rife with dark humor. "You don't raise yourself in the worst part of Highland Park as a mixed-race girl without getting into some s.h.i.t, Key."

"G.o.dd.a.m.n, Layla." I felt like I should say something understanding or supportive or compa.s.sionate, but I just...had nothing.

"You don't want to know any of that s.h.i.t, though, and I don't want to talk about it. I made it, and that's all that counts. I made it out. I graduated high school, got a scholarship to Wayne State, f.u.c.king did something with my life. Sort of." She glanced at me. "None of that really has anything to do with you, though. Except that before I joined you on the big yacht I was a couple semesters away from getting my degree. I had an internship set up at a law firm. I was gonna be a paralegal. I finally had an end in sight to the whole poor college girl thing. I had a plan. And then you...you, with one f.u.c.king phone call, you f.u.c.ked all that up. You brought me on your stupid boat, and now I don't know what I'm going to do. You and Roth are so in love it's disgusting, we're always in the middle of nowhere, thousands of miles from anyone who speaks English, and we're in f.u.c.king hiding so I can't even hit up a bar and find a d.i.c.k to ride."

"I'm sorry, Layla. I wish I knew what else to say."

"I'm lonely, Kyrie. I'm so lonely my p.u.s.s.y has cobwebs. You and Roth are this perfect couple, which only makes it that much harder for me. I mean, I'd seriously just started to really get over being depressed about Eric. And then you have the gall to talk to me about family. To act like you and your rich, gorgeous, perfect boyfriend are my family. Like your f.u.c.king butler is my family. G.o.d. It makes me so mad, and you don't even get it. I don't have a family. I never have. It's always been just me. But I love you, you're my sister from another mister, and that won't ever change. I've got your back and I always will. Always, no matter what. You are the closest thing to family I got, but you were gone a long time, Key. You left me. You vanished with your rich boyfriend and left me to fend for myself. When Eric left me-"

"Hang on second, now. You said you broke up with him when I called you about coming with us."

She shrugged. "Yeah, well, I lied. He broke up with me and asked me to move out. Said he wasn't really 'feeling it' anymore." She curled the index and middle fingers of both hands to make air quotes. "He wasn't feeling it anymore. What the f.u.c.k does that even mean? Three G.o.dd.a.m.n years, and you just stop feeling it? He kicked me out. I came back from work one day and he'd packed all my clothes, all my s.h.i.t for me."

"Are you kidding me?"

Layla shook her head, digging her heel into the sand furiously now, making the hole bigger and bigger. "I wish. So I left. I put my s.h.i.t in the back of my piece of s.h.i.t '91 Silverado and left. And I didn't have anywhere to go, Kyrie. You were gone. I was just about broke, and I'm not exactly the type to call and hit you up for cash, you know?"

"Where did you go?" I asked, not wanting to know the answer.

"NOWHERE!" She shouted. "I was f.u.c.king homeless for a month and a half! I lived in my truck and took showers at the YMCA. When you called me to come with you, the ink on my brand-new lease was still wet. If you'd called literally two weeks before, a month before things would have been different...but you didn't. You just whirled back into my life like a G.o.dd.a.m.ned tornado and whisked me off to Neverland or Oz or whatever the f.u.c.k. And now you want me to help you plan a wedding. And for who? Who's gonna be there? Your mom? Cal? When was the last time you talked to Cal? What about Roth's parents? Does he even have parents? And what the h.e.l.l do I know about weddings, Kyrie? Since when am I into girly touchy-feely s.h.i.t like weddings and flowers and bridesmaids dresses? Jesus. I love you, but wake the f.u.c.k up! I don't belong in your life. Not this life. Just let me go back to Detroit and live my s.h.i.tty life. I'll find a s.h.i.tty boyfriend and work a s.h.i.tty job, eventually I'll probably get knocked up and have a s.h.i.tty kid. I'm okay with taking my chances with this Vito or whoever he is. If he wants to roll up to the 'D' and come for me, let him. I'll kick his a.s.s. I'm from Detroit, motherf.u.c.ker, I will f.u.c.k him up. You don't even know."

I didn't know what to say. This was all coming from left field. How had I known Layla for over five years and not known any of this? She'd been homeless while I was floating around the world with Roth? I could have helped her. I could have done something. I could have- I broke down into tears.

Layla, of course, wrapped her arms around me and pulled me against her, and we both fell back into the sand. "Oh quit your blubbering, you little sissy. I'll stay for your wedding and then I'll have Harris fly me home. I bet I can get a job and an apartment in a few weeks."

"Layla, you can't leave. You don't understand. Vitaly isn't the kind of man you just 'take your chances with.' You don't 'kick his a.s.s.' He won't just...it won't be a drive-by or something. It'll be someone showing up at your house with a drill and some duct tape, and they'll torture you for weeks just to p.i.s.s Roth off, and then they'll kill you once they've had their fun. Which will probably include a lot of rape, just because they're monsters like that."

"So, tell me: your dear sweet billionaire fiance knows these guys...how?"

"That's a long story, and it's not mine to tell. Let's just say his background is even more colorful than yours."

"Gotcha. Well, all I know is that I can't live like this anymore. I just can't. I'm sorry. I just can't do this much longer."

"I'm not joking about what they'll do, Layla. Roth and Harris are working on a plan to fix things. Just be patient a little longer-"

"Kyrie. I'm going crazy. You want to have Roth buy me a new ident.i.ty? Fine. Relocate me to Atlanta or New Mexico, or Tokyo or something. Fine. But I live to have my own life, Kyrie. I have to."

I sighed in defeat. I knew Layla well enough to know she wouldn't budge on this. I may not have known the details of her past, but I was realizing I did know her. I knew her moods and I knew the shape of her walls and the color and taste and texture of her soul. I knew her. She was my best friend, and a life that had long ago become normal for me-traveling constantly, not working a real job-just wasn't possible for her. She would end up resenting me even more than she already did. And I could beg her all I wanted, refuse to let her go home, and she would do what she had to do anyway. When Layla made up her mind, no force on Earth could sway her.

"I'll talk to Harris and Roth. We'll figure something out. Get a security detail on you, or something."

She laughed uproariously at that. "Can you even hear yourself? Talking about getting me a security detail like you're the f.u.c.king president or some s.h.i.t. G.o.d, you're funny. You've changed, girlfriend."