It was dim and grainy, looking rough compared to the videos they’d made with the camera. He watched their two bodies, but more than that, he watched their mouths forming thoughts he couldn’t hear. Words only for them. And he watched Sam’s face as Bern went down on her, those eyes riveted to him, never once acknowledging their audience. The few snatches of dirty talk he did catch weren’t for his ears. They were lovers’ words, not actors’, more tender than they’d shared in his presence, more intimate. And when they fucked, Mike’s heart hurt, because he knew he had no place in it.

Anger moved through him, rushing and rising like a rough sea. But in time, what rose to its surface wasn’t hatred or betrayal but sadness. Guilt. Shame, to not have seen this coming. He felt like a fool to have never guessed that the very thing that got him off could wind up manifesting for real.

He’d let his wife sleep with another man, knowing full well how she worked – that sex was emotional for her. That she’d never be able to sleep with a guy she didn’t feel something for. Now that something had germinated and grown into an altogether different entity. One he had no part in. I planted that seed and walked away. I don’t get to be so fucking shocked to find that it’s put out roots and vines.

I’m a goddamn fucking fool.

On-screen, they came. Together. “Don’t stop, don’t stop.” Those words had been Mike’s alone… until now. He watched Sam stroking Bern’s back, knowing exactly what those hands felt like, doing exactly that. It jabbed a fresh barb in Mike’s heart, and not the kind that spurred his arousal. His fantasies were one thing, and this was another. This was real.

And it was all his fault.

“Fuck.”

In the video, Bern asked Sam, “You okay?”

“No, I’m not sure I am.”

“You thinking about your cousin?”

“No. I’m thinking about Mike.”

Her arm loomed large in the shot a second before the screen went black. Mike blinked at it. Stoically quit the media player. Dragged the file back to the trash can and emptied its contents permanently. Shut the computer.

He couldn’t say when, but Samira had crept back downstairs – he looked up to find her at the threshold to the hall, face as pale as he’d ever seen it.

“Tell me this,” Mike said evenly. “Do you love him?”

She stood a little straighter, holding his gaze squarely. “Not the way I love you.”

“But in some kind of way.”

Her lips pursed. “I’m not sure, honestly. I feel something. Something that scares me.”

“You and me both.” He stood, checked his pocket for his keys.

Fear transformed her face, widened her eyes. “Are you going out?”

“You know exactly where I’m going.”

“Mike, don’t. Let’s talk about it first. Give it time to sink in.”

But Mike was programmed, personally and professionally, to default to action when he felt threatened. He needed to talk, yes, but not with Sam.

“Don’t do this while you’re angry, please.”

About to pass her, he paused, their bodies nearly chest to chest. “I’m not angry,” he lied. “But I can’t breathe until I know what it is he feels for you.”

And if that man gave Mike an answer he wasn’t prepared to hear, he’d skin the bastard alive.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

For easily the fiftieth time that day, Bern felt a phantom text buzz in his back pocket. He switched Molly’s leash to his other hand and fished out his phone, hoping to see Sam’s name in his messages. But no. Nothing at all. The not-knowing was torture. Not knowing how she was doing, not knowing if she’d told Mike what had happened – and if she had, not knowing how the guy felt about it. His stomach was in knots, anxiety like he hadn’t felt in ages. In years.

At the end of the day, Bern really didn’t know Mike Heyer that well at all; didn’t know his temper, or how he might be with Sam, if she told him what had happened. If she didn’t contact Bern by dinnertime, he resolved to call, to make sure she was okay. Just because a man was in law enforcement didn’t mean he was some bastion of right and wrong… especially not when things got as personal as they had.

Molly was panting, and the day was shaping up to be a hot one, the sun harsh overhead. But all Bern felt was cold.

He couldn’t stand the thought of Sam facing the brunt of the man’s anger, not when last night had been his own fault, if anything. He’d shown up. He’d let things turn sexual, while Sam had been too mixed up and vulnerable to be making emotional decisions. He’d said those dangerous things to her while they’d had sex, and pretty much told her, I want there to be things that are just between us. I want there to be an “us.” So grossly over the line, in hindsight, when he’d known the rules all along. But lust was more hazardous to common sense than alcohol —

He stopped short as his house came into sight. Sitting on his front stoop was Mike Heyer.

The dog whined, unhappy to have been choked.

“Sorry, Mol.”

Bern didn’t know where this was going, and he couldn’t guess his own odds if things got physical. He lifted weights, but that was as much for vanity as anything else, whereas Mike probably had training in some kind of defensive combat.

He passed the guy’s car, then his own truck, and called out a neutral “Hey.”

Mike stood. Bern halted a few paces from him. Molly’s ears drew back; she no doubt felt the tension. He stooped to rub her neck. “Chill.” Looking up at Mike he asked, “You here to talk?”

A curt nod answered him.

“Inside?” Obviously – the whole of Carrick didn’t need to be in on this. When Mike nodded again, Bern edged past him up the porch steps and unlocked the front door. “Just lemme feed my dog.”

He filled Molly’s bowl and closed her in the kitchen, then met Mike back in the front, in the den.

“You want a drink or anything?” Bern asked.

“No.”

Goddamn, this guy was tough to read.

“Okay. Let’s just talk, then.” He nodded to the couch and was a little surprised when Mike sat. Bern took a seat opposite him on the edge of his recliner.

“Sam told me what happened.”

Bern nodded. “She made it sound like she would. That was never in question, whether she thought you should know —”

“I don’t need you to defend my wife’s character, okay? I know her better than you ever will.”

Bern sat back, annoyed and chastised at once. How old was this guy? Forty, tops. Yet Bern felt like some scolded teenager, busted for denting Dad’s car. “Understood.”

“You have feelings for my wife?” Mike demanded.

Bern took a slow breath, unsure what the best move was here. He’d never been a great liar, though. In time, he nodded. “Yeah.”

“Tell me.”

“I like her. A lot. If circumstances were different, I’d want to date her.”

“You think you had a chance with her? At getting her to leave me for you?”

Bern shook his head. He’d not expected that would happen… though in truth he had entertained idle, wishful, selfish thoughts that somehow, it might.

“I was in this for exactly what you guys said you were after,” Bern said. “Sex. Fun. In Sam’s and my defense, I don’t think most decent people could do what we have been, for as long as we have been, and not feel something.”

He’d half expected for Mike to cut him off there, tell him to fuck himself for trying to defend Sam again, but the man just nodded, real slow and stoic.

Bern went on cautiously. “You guys went into this with a lot more at stake than I did, right out of the gate. Everything you feel – and I’m not pretending like I know what you feel, obviously. But all of that, plus however Sam felt about it. Nervous, I think. Hopeful. Plus the trust everybody had to extend to even go for it, myself included. The attraction.” He laughed softly. “I mean, this wasn’t one of us selling the other a used stereo. This wasn’t some blind date, either. This was a fucking experiment, one that could’ve gone crazy wrong. But I don’t think it has.” He paused, inviting Mike to interrupt. When he didn’t, Bern went on. “I think we did a pretty fucking awesome job, all three of us. If the worst thing that happened is that me and Sam wound up with feelings for each other… I mean, shouldn’t we? I know you don’t want her sleeping with somebody who sees her as nothing more than a body.”