Chapter Twenty
Griffin
I’m ten minutes early for dinner at my favorite steakhouse in downtown L.A. with my brothers Grant, Huxley and Sebastian. Noah said he might join us, but he’s as unreliable as his muse, whom he blames for an inability to finish his first novel. I told him if I were that undisciplined I’d have published zero papers, but he said rather haughtily that creativity is different from “rearranging numbers” and can’t be rushed.
It’s tempting to do a research paper on prolific authors. Isaac Asimov put out over five hundred books during his seventy-two-year life. Alexandre Dumas’s published works add up to about a hundred thousand pages…all in longhand.
Shoving it in Noah’s face and watching him struggle to come up with an excuse would be quite the entertainment.
The hostess, in a neatly pressed white shirt and black slacks, smiles, lines crinkling in the corners of her eyes. My brothers and I are regulars, and she makes sure to let us know she appreciates our patronage.
“You’re the first to arrive tonight,” she says, and then she takes me to our favorite table in the back. It has enough privacy to carry on a conversation about pretty much anything, including our mothers’ sperm donor. There’s no other way to describe Ted Lasker, especially given that he fathered all seven of us in a span of four months when his vasectomy failed. He was apparently incredulous such a thing could happen—to him. In his mind, things like that happen to other people, “other” meaning those who are unfortunate enough not to be rich or famous.
I’m sure it was a seismic shock to find out that biology is an impartial bitch who doesn’t care about his tax bracket. Or how many hit movies he’s produced. Or how many young, nubile things want to screw him for a chance to break out.
The hostess places five dinner menus and two drink menus on the table. I ask for two fingers of scotch, straight, and it appears almost immediately.
Nursing it, I sit back and relax. The place smells of aged meat, grilled to perfection, and freshly baked bread and butter. For a restaurant that’s supposed to specialize in steak, they have bread that puts most bakeries in the city to shame, always served warm with a salted butter that makes a gluten overdose irresistible.
Tonight there’s also live music—a pianist playing jazz on a white baby grand. It reminds me of New Orleans. Not the migraine-inducing part with my mom, but the hot-as-hell part later on.
I wonder what Purple Girl is doing. Is she thinking about me? And I wonder why thinking about her is also making me think of Sierra. They’re nothing alike. Purple Girl was non-drama and normal. Sierra is all about drama. And most definitely abnormal.
Perhaps it’s because my libido overheated with both women. But that isn’t enough of a commonality.
My phone pings, and I pull it out.
–Dad: Did you see my last text?
Joey, I saw.
–Dad: Because it shows you read them, but you aren’t responding. I’m wondering if the app is broken.
The app is working fine. I’m not responding because I don’t want to waste my time. Time is money—
The memory of Sierra handing me a few bills interrupts my thoughts—the feel of her soft skin against mine as she placed the money in my palm. A combination of annoyance and discomfiture stirs. It isn’t so irritating that I want to go to the gym and work out, but it is making itself known, an emotional splinter working its way deep into my mind.
I still can’t figure out what possessed me to involve myself in her post-divorce spat with Todd. Granted, he’s as gross as a piece of gum stuck to the bottom of your shoe. But as a rule, I remove drama from my life as much as possible.
For whatever reason, I just didn’t want that asshole saying terrible things about her, including how she is in bed. Frigid, my ass. A woman who works at a company with a cock clock as though there’s nothing wrong with the scenery isn’t frigid. It’s more likely Todd has a tiny dick or doesn’t know what to do with what God gave him. Or both.
I pull up the browser on my phone and look up Silicone Dream. I should’ve done this before going to the company, but I went on what Charles said about it being a high-tech firm. That lying prude. The only thing “high tech” about the company is the Bluetooth remotes on their more advanced vibrators.
I thumb through the company’s mission statement.
To provide products that make intimate moments between consenting adults more intense and pleasurable.
Well, well, well. Talk about a highfalutin mission. But then, Dad says a lot of bullshit about how he creates his movies to bring joy to people, when he’s really doing it for money and ego.
The section on the history of the company shows all the products it’s launched. Strap-ons seem to be their top—
“Well, well, well. Learn something new about your brothers every day.” Huxley leans over me and points to the screen. “Is ‘passion mauve’ your favorite color?”
I sigh. I should’ve known he was looking at my screen from the cologne he likes so much, but it’s hard to smell him over the food in the restaurant. Also, he has eagle eyes and doesn’t need to be right behind me to see. He should’ve been an air force pilot rather than an ad executive, assuming he could fold that tall body into a fighter jet cockpit.
Dark-haired and squared-jawed, like all of us, Huxley likes to wear expensive bespoke suits. He says they project power and authority, which help him guide confused and uncertain clients. I say he likes them because they make him look like a boss, nothing else.
“No wonder he’s so uptight,” Grant adds with a laugh, coming up from behind Huxley. Grant works in venture capital with Emmett, and they’ve made a fortune off GrantEm Capital. My investments with some of the companies they funded are what added all those liberating zeros to my portfolio. Actually, all of us have made fortunes investing with Grant and Emmett.