face Brayden. “Addison,” Brayden said quietly, his voice
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authoritative and persuasive, “what’s the first thing Father taught us?”
Addison’s eyes flickered and he looked away, the
muscles in his jaw tightening. “Never let the surface ripple,”
he muttered grudgingly.
Brayden nodded silently.
Addison inhaled deeply and then exhaled once more,
giving Brayden another frown before turning away. “Let me
know as soon as they leave,” he demanded before turning
and stalking back down the pathway.
Brayden watched him walk away, worrying about why
his brother was so twitchy, and then turned back to see the detectives just finishing up with Daniel. Daniel caught his eye and gave him a questioning tilt of his head. Brayden
merely shrugged and shook his head in answer.
This would all be over soon, he told himself. No need to
worry. No need at all.
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II
“WHAT the hell is wrong with you today?” Micah demanded
as Addison sat staring morosely at the glass top of the coffee table. When Addison didn’t answer, Micah sat down in the
chair opposite him and examined him closely.
He looked worn out and irritated. Addison always
tended to look worn out when he spent too much time at the
club, but he rarely looked irritated. Addison was an
easygoing guy, even when he wasn’t high on this or that. To see him so out of sorts and moody made Micah worry more
than he usually did.
They were sitting in Micah’s little studio apartment that
was situated just steps from the Miracle Mile in downtown
Coral Gables. The place screamed beach bum—or more
accurately, swamp rat—from the rattan furniture to the
ceramic tile floor to the bamboo window coverings. The
yellow, orange, and red surfboard hanging on the wall over
the couch and the strings of green and blue alligator-shaped tiki lights that illuminated the small balcony were the only splashes of color in the place. Everything else was sand-toned.
It suited Micah just fine. He had been to Addison’s
bungalow on the beach. He had seen the sumptuous leather
and heavy wood furnishings and the stainless steel and
marble kitchen and the gated entrance and the expensive
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teak deck furniture. He wondered what it would be like to
live like that, and it never failed to amaze him when Addison insisted that they come to Micah’s place whenever they were together. It was as if Addison desperately wanted to taste
what normal life might be like.
At least that was what Micah hoped. He didn’t want to
think that Addison might be ashamed of being seen with a
swamp rat like him. Coral Gables was a small, rich
community. They could smell the salt on you when you
walked past. And Micah had learned that the more money
some people had, the meaner they got. It was easy to be
shunned if you didn’t stay in the main-stream with all the
other brightly colored fishies. Micah didn’t think that was the case, though. Not with Addison. Addison had never cared what anyone thought of him.
With Addison Satterwight, what you saw was usually
what you got.
From the little Micah knew of Addison’s life, he had
been seeking normality since he was old enough to think for himself. He had tried to break from his family, a family that was one of the oldest in Miami; one that had founded the
Country Club of Coral Gables—the oldest country club in
Miami-Dade—in 1923 and had lived like kings on the coasts
and canals of Florida for literally centuries. That pedigree alone could get Addison anything he wanted.
Addison and Brayden’s father, Reginald Bainbridge, had
been a bit of a cad. He had married five times, divorced four times, been widowed once, and seen many mistresses and
girlfriends in between. He had never made any secret of the fact that he liked to roam. Brayden was fond of joking that 26
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he probably had siblings everywhere and that every time he
saw a pair of brown eyes like his and Addison’s, he wondered if he might be related.
Addison, Micah had observed, never found the joke
funny. He was an entirely different animal from Brayden or
his father. He had taken his late mother’s maiden name
when he turned 18 and then promptly disappeared into the
world for four years. His multi-million-dollar trust fund had remained untouched the day he turned twenty-one, the day
he could legally access it.
He had returned to Coral Gables at twenty-three with
the intention, it was said, of signing over his share of the inheritance to his brother. The rumor was that Brayden had
managed to convince him not to do it and then guilt him into the family business by claiming that he and his father could not run the club on their own and needed Addison’s help.
Many suspected that Brayden had simply been desperately
trying to save Addison from himself, hoping to ground him
and keep him from dissolving into the world. It was
commendable, if it was true. Brayden had given up several
million dollars of trust-fund money that his brother had
been trying to give him just to keep him close and safe.
Addison had calmed over the years, appearing to accept
his role in the club’s business and in what was left of his wealthy family, but Micah knew that the man was still too
wild for his brother’s taste. His father had tried to keep him under his thumb, but Addison had always managed to elude
the old man’s attempts.
Most of what Micah knew of the family, though, was
simply a compilation of rumors. He had yet to make up his
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own opinion of either brother, even though he and Addison
had become considerably closer in the past few months.
“Sonny,” he whispered as he watched the other man.
Addison didn’t outwardly respond to him. “Do you want to go out?” he asked, his tone of voice quiet and careful. “We could go dancing,” he offered half-heartedly.
Addison’s eyes moved slowly to meet Micah’s. Micah
cocked his head, waiting for a response. Finally, Addison
gave a barely discernible shake of his head in answer.
“Do you want to go to your place?” Micah ventured as he
sat forward and rested his elbows on his knees. “I could
drive you home; you could take some valium maybe, relax a
little?”
“Micah,” Addison muttered with a frown as he closed his
eyes in apparent exhaustion.
“Well! It’s been a rough week,” Micah insisted with a
defensive shrug. He knew Addison wasn’t shocked by his
suggestion. Coral Gables wasn’t very different from the rest of the Miami-Dade area. The drugs were just more expensive
and dramatically colored. And Addison had definitely seen
more daring venues than his current one.
“I don’t want to be seen over there right now,” Addison
muttered as he put his face in his hands.
Micah pursed his lips and watched him silently. “You
want me to ca
ll you a cab?” he finally offered neutrally. “You don’t have to be seen with me.”
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Addison’s head snapped up, and he glowered at Micah
with a mixture of anger and hurt. “Where the hell did that
come from?” he asked in a wounded voice.
Micah shrugged and shook his head.
“If I were embarrassed of my friends, I’d have different
friends,” Addison informed him coldly, standing up and
crossing his arms defiantly.
“Sit down,” Micah sighed, looking up at Addison with a
small smile. “You know the only reason you’re here is
because I’m the only one who’s not afraid to smack you
around, and you like it.” He laughed.
Addison huffed and flopped back down, holding his face
in his hands once more.
“Now,” Micah muttered, “you want to tell me what’s
gotten up your craw?” he inquired.
Addison was still for a moment. Then he peered through
his fingers at Micah, his normally soft brown eyes now dark and unreadable. “Two detectives came to the club today,” he told Micah softly. “They said they thought Father had been
murdered.”
“What?” Micah breathed in shock. Addison merely
nodded and dropped his hands into his lap, looking down at
them distantly. “But… why do they think that? How would
they know? Do they have suspects?”
“They said they suspect someone at the club. Maybe
even one of the members,” Addison murmured as his brow
furrowed. He looked back up at Micah and fixed him with an
eerily emotionless stare. “They’re going to be looking for
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motive,” he pointed out softly. “I can’t think of a motive
better than instant inheritance, can you?”
Micah blinked at the man and swallowed with difficulty.
“Your father was a bastard, Sonny,” he whispered suddenly,
leaning forward and meeting Addison’s eyes determinedly.
“Plenty of people would have wanted to kill him. You
certainly won’t be the first on their list.”
“Maybe not,” Addison sighed. “But I’ll be on it, all the
same.”
Micah bit his lip and looked down at Addison’s hands.
He reached out slowly and slid his fingers around one of
Addison’s and then looked up at him uncertainly. Addison
was watching him with an unreadable expression.
“What can I do?” Micah asked him in a low whisper.
Addison cocked his head, looking into Micah’s eyes and
then down at their hands. He moved his hand until he was
grasping Micah’s, and he looked back up at Micah with a
small smile. “You’re doing it,” he said softly.
He tugged at Micah’s hand gently, and Micah stood and
stepped around the coffee table to sit beside him. Addison
waited until he was settled, and then he curled up beside
him and rested his head in Micah’s lap. Micah froze, looking down at him in consternation. Addison was never the type to hide his affections, but he wasn’t exactly what Micah would call a cuddler, either.
He rested his hand carefully on Addison’s shoulder,
patting him worriedly.
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“You take a lot of shit because of me,” Addison observed
as he stared out the balcony doors at the sickly yellow
streetlights that filtered through the haze of humidity in the night.
Micah immediately shook his head, even though
Addison wouldn’t see it. He ran the fingers of his other hand through Addison’s hair, curling a lock around his index
finger absently. “Not really,” he responded in a low voice.
“Liar,” Addison accused affectionately.
“Coke fiend,” Micah returned easily.
Addison chuckled softly.
They sat in silence for a long time, the noise from the
street outside the open balcony doors the only thing
impinging upon the comfort of their companionship.
BRAYDEN sat in his father’s office—his office—and stared at the thick oak door without really seeing it. Addison had
disappeared promptly at eight p.m., leaving Brayden alone to deal with the night owls. He didn’t blame Addison, though.
The kid wasn’t even supposed to work on Mondays; he had
every right to go running off to wherever tonight and take
some time to himself.
Brayden didn’t blame his little brother for leaving. He
did, however, need to know where he was disappearing to.
Addison had a tendency to end up in strange beds with
strange people on his good nights. On his bad nights,
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Brayden usually found him in the morning, stoned out of his mind and sitting on the beach in front of the club, staring at the ocean.
Brayden sighed and turned his thoughts back to the
night. The morning could wait.
The club closed its doors at ten, and it locked them at
midnight. But there was a lounge in the basement of the
club, a lounge covered with dark wood paneling and worn
leather and well-polished brass. It was a lounge that you
could only get to by opening a door hidden in the intricate molding of the club’s main entryway and following a winding staircase down into a swirl of Cuban cigar smoke and the
smell of Louis XIII Black Pearl cognac. Only the wealthiest of members frequented it or even knew of it, the sons and
grandsons of the club’s first members, playing hands of
poker that would have paid the year’s salary for most of the club’s employees. And those were the men who you just
didn’t say the words “last call” to.
They tipped their servers well, though, and Brayden
trusted the people who worked in the downstairs lounge to
take care of them and be discreet. He wouldn’t be needed
down there unless someone specifically requested to see
him. He was free to lock himself in his father’s office— his office—and hide.
A soft knock on the door drew Brayden from his reverie.
“Come in,” he called softly. He leaned back and rubbed at his eyes, making the leather of the expensive executive’s chair creak comfortably. He rocked forward again in surprise when Daniel Grace stuck his head into the room. “Daniel,”
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Brayden greeted in a slightly stunned voice. “It’s late,” he observed, feeling stupid as soon as the words were out.
“I’m just finishing up,” the man murmured in his oddly
soft, gruff voice as he stepped into the room. “I’m sorry to bother you,” he started.
Brayden was already shaking his head. “You’re not,” he
assured Daniel with a wave of his hand. In fact, it was
almost a relief to have a distraction from his worries. “What can I do for you?”
“I was on my way home and saw this sitting on the front
step of the club,” Daniel explained as he held up a manila
envelope and stepped closer almost hesitantly. “It has your name on it,” he murmured as he handed the envelope over
the top of the antique desk.
Brayden looked from Daniel to the envelope, examining
it discreetly to make certain it was still sealed. Daniel stood wit
h his arm outstretched as Brayden stared at the envelope, and finally he wavered slightly, the envelope shaking in his hand as he pulled back uncertainly. Brayden looked back up
at him and finally leaned forward in the chair and took the envelope.
“I didn’t open it,” Daniel assured him softly, backing
away and nodding his head as Brayden looked back up at
him carefully.
“Thank you, Daniel,” Brayden murmured as he held the
envelope carefully in his hand. He didn’t look down at it or even turn it over to examine it. He knew where it had come
from. He stood and met Daniel’s eyes. “I’ll show you out,” he murmured.
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Daniel opened his mouth to protest, but then he seemed
to sense that it wasn’t for his benefit that Brayden had
offered. He pressed his lips tightly together and nodded,
sliding his hands into his pockets as he turned on his heels and let Brayden open the heavy oak door for him.
They walked silently through the halls and down the
stairs, Brayden walking with his head down and Daniel
giving him the occasional uncertain glance.
“How have you been doing?” Daniel finally asked him in
a low voice just as they reached the ornate wooden entrance doors of the club.
Brayden looked over at him as he opened one of the
doors. “Better than I thought I would be. A little undue
stress, but I’m handling it,” he answered honestly.
“Sonny?” Daniel asked with a frown.
Brayden nodded and pressed his lips together into a
thin line. “He’s holding up okay,” he answered, though his
tone of voice said he was uncertain.
Daniel nodded and looked out into the parking lot.
“Well,” he said with a small sigh. “If you need me,” he offered vaguely.
Brayden nodded and thanked him, and Daniel headed
out into the warm night without another word.
Brayden stood in the entryway to the club as he
watched Daniel walk down the cobblestone drive toward the
employees’ lot. He pulled the front door closed, locked it, and then walked over to the security pad to punch in his code.
He stood there staring at the keypad for a long time, the