Page 23 of The Triangle

But Christine was there to keep me in check. Christine filled up all the empty spaces Alec left behind and yeah, even back then I knew a day of reckoning would come eventually, but I was busy. When he was gone, I was glad he was gone.

But the way shit ended… that still sits bad with me.

The feelings I have for him now are nothing at all like the forgettable bad taste he left behind when the whole operation fell apart.

The feelings I have for him now are real.

Men are just like that, I guess. When we’re ragey teenagers all pumped up with new testosterone our anger is tempered by ignorance. Twenty-eight is different. At twenty-eight those hormones have pretty much evened out, the body has filled itself in, you know who you are, what you’re capable of, and that anger is dangerous.

What I feel for Alec right now isn’t some desire for revenge. It’s not even jealousy that he had Christine for God knows how long and I never knew about it.

It’s rage. It’s hate. It’s that gut-wrenching feeling of betrayal that makes you sick because you didn’t even know you were betrayed until the whole shit-show was over.

He’s got all the money. But that’s not why I hate him. I’ve got all the money now too.

He’s got the looks, and the suits, and the fuckin’ houses and the cars. But that’s not why I hate him either. If I wanted suits and summer houses, I could make it rain.

He’s got Christine. Not physically, of course. But he’s weaseled his way back into her life. She did this job for him. She got hurt because of him. She has some misplaced sense of loyalty, or nostalgia, or whatever.

He got a hold of a stick and poked her until all the pretty spilled out. He only ever wanted to ruin her. Turn her into what he thought she should be.

And that’s not something I’ll ever let him do again. Never again.

So do I feel guilty for setting the asshole up and handing him over to Brasil so Christine and I can skip town and start a new life? The life we were meant to have?

Fuck. No.

There’s a moment when I’m climbing the stairs up to my apartment in the garage when I feel like I made a mistake. That leaving Christine alone was a mistake. That when I pull open the door and step inside she’s gonna be gone. No trace left behind just like last time.

But she’s there. Sitting on my couch, wearing my t-shirt, dark hair still damp, legs all tucked up underneath her the way she always liked to sit because her small body doesn’t quite fit on the furniture the way a large man’s does.

And she’s holding the box with the triangle etched on the top.

I can’t see it, but I know what she’s looking at.

Her eyes meet mine as I kick the door closed and toss my keys on the little dining table. “You didn’t sell it?” she asks.

I take off my jacket, hang it on the back of a chair, and say, “Not mine to sell. And uh… how do you know what it is if you can’t remember anything?”

She turns the box around so I can see the diamond. Holds it up like an offering. “I remember this. I remember this day.”

I suck in a breath of air and nod. “Remember anything else?”

She shakes her head. “No. Not really.”

I grunt. “Well, that sucks. And it figures.”

“Why does it figure?”

“Because, Christine. You and I have been partners since you were ten years old. Like fourteen fuckin’ years. And the only thing you can remember is the day we let fuckin’ Alec in?”

“In what?”

I grunt and shrug again. Louder. More deliberate this time. “Into us.”

She just stares at me.

“Us,” I repeat. “Me and you were a team. A damn fuckin’ good one too. And then his rich, punk-boy ass comes along. And he charms us both. And he’s got everything we want but don’t have. And we just let him…” Poke the pretty right out of us, I don’t say. “In,” I finish.