Five Men, One Tent, Her Parents

I canceled the wedding photos, and everything booked around them.

I'd rather eat the deposits than go through with any of it.

“Yes,” I told the studio over the phone. “I understand the deposit isn't refundable. I don't need the package anymore.”

On my tablet, the private drone-group chat kept scrolling.

They were close to meeting up now, and the mood in there was so openly suggestive it was practically coming through the screen.

The group admin asked Alyssa whether she wasn't getting married soon.

Alyssa sent a voice message, drawing every word out.

“Marriage just wipes out everything that came before it, right?

“I can be as wild as I want and my husband will never know. After the wedding I'll be the perfect little homemaker.

“He should count himself lucky. It's not like I slept my way across the city before he met me. He got a bargain.”

My chest tightened.

The admin's profile picture was of the man himself: bleached blond hair, leaning against a small sports car.

His name in the group was Tyler Quinn.

He answered in a low, teasing rasp.

“Alyssa, there's something underneath that.

“We don't have much in this group except men.

“You're the only woman in here. Want to make the camping trip a little crazy?”

My breathing went shallow. Something closed around my heart and squeezed.

Even after I'd given up on her, some pathetic part of me still wanted Alyssa to turn him down. For me.

“Sure.”

One word. That was all she sent.

And my mind supplied the coy little smile that went with it, whether I wanted it or not.

I lit a cigarette. It was harsh and it burned.

It still didn't come close to how I felt.

I couldn't work it out.

Had I not been good enough to her?

My parents treated her like their own daughter. If they ever heard I'd upset her, I was the one told to apologize.

I made a little over eight thousand a month.

Three thousand of it went to her, every month, like clockwork.

With the hours she actually kept — in late, out early — she barely covered her own gas.

The car was mine too. I bought it.

Spotless in public, reckless in private, with a marriage underneath her as the safety net.

Then the front door opened, and Alyssa was home.

“Oh, you didn't go to your parents' place?

“Good, that saves me a phone call. Work's sending me out of town, last minute.

“Nobody said how long. Three days, at a guess. Don't worry about me.”

She lied without a flicker, and the anger I'd been sitting on nearly came up my throat.

I made fists and watched her load clothes into her suitcase.

Alyssa sniffed. Her eyebrows drew together.

She put down the shirt in her hands, followed the smell out to the balcony, and fanned the air with distaste.

“Jason, have you been smoking in here?

“Since when do you smoke? I've told you I can't stand the smell!”

I made a sound in my throat and gave her a cold smile.

“You've never run into a man who smokes? Do you get on their case too?”

Her head tilted. The patience left her face all at once, and she looked me up and down.

“I'm talking about you. Why are you dragging strangers into it?

“You're going to be my husband, so of course I get a say. Some stranger can smoke himself into the ground and it's nothing to do with me.

“Where is this even coming from? Is this because I skipped dinner with your parents?”

Alyssa took my hand. Her voice went soft.

“Don't be upset. Once we're married, seeing them is the most natural thing in the world.

“I have my own career to think about. My client is in a hurry!

“Can you please just make things easier for me?”

I looked at that pouting, put-upon face, and every other time she'd dropped the blame in my lap came back at once.

The anger came straight up out of me.

I gathered her things and dumped them by the front door.

“If you're going, don't come back. You think I'm an idiot?

“I asked one of your coworkers. You can't handle the basics of your own job, and they're sending you to entertain clients?

“That's not a business trip. That's sleeping with somebody for a signature.”

Her face flooded red under it. Her lips shook, and her eyes went everywhere but my face.

“You're yelling at me!

“You are unbelievably controlling. How could you go behind my back and contact my coworker?”

I wasn't going to coddle her.

“Get out. The apartment is mine.

“The card on my account gets canceled today.

“And the seventy-five thousand I lent your parents for their down payment? You've got one week to get it back to me, or we do this through lawyers.

“We're done. Go wherever you like.”