Devil In The Waters // Book 9 // Chapter 8

Past Rumble’s leering profile, Josh could see Kimmy in a familiar outfit: a silky black tank top, thin spaghetti straps over her shoulders.

Rumble said, “This is the same girl? Shit, yeah, it is. Letting her hair down. ”

Glenn scooted to Rumble’s other shoulder to get a look at a different picture of Josh’s hot wife. Josh knew the outfit, but not where the picture had been taken.

Rumble stated the thing that was obvious but should not have been said aloud: “You can see her little fucking nip-nips.”

Yes, Kimmy had not worn a bra that night, and her nipples were sometimes visible through the fabric.

Devlin said, “Don’t you fucking dare swipe through my photos.”

Glenn chuckled then looked behind Rumble’s simian back, saying to Josh, “She’s beautiful, man.”

“Thanks,” Josh said, low and sullen, his guts squirming like a nest of poisonous snakes. What would those other photos show?

Rumble passed Devlin’s phone back to him. “Where was this?”

“My hotel room.”

While Josh grimaced and squirmed, Rumble scoffed with hilarious disbelief that Devlin would say it in front of the woman’s husband. “Whoah, holy shit, man.”

“Fuck off, it’s not like that,” Devlin said and laughed, tucking his phone inside his pocket. “Kimmy drove me home after dinner. Dinner with all three of us. We were all in Cayman together.”

“Oh, fuck—the cottage?” Glenn said it like he was personally familiar with the place and a lot of nefarious hijinks had occurred there.

But the question remained: so what if she drove you home—why would you take her picture? How did that come about? And why was Kimmy gone so long that night? He’d waited in the hot tub forever for her return.

Maybe if he’d read the time stamp on Devlin’s photo of her . . .

What? What would it tell him? Probably something he didn’t want to know.

Rumble swigged his beer and said, “That girl did not go to Dalton.”

“Yeah, she did,” Devlin said, amused. And now he retrieved his phone from the pocket where he’d just hidden it. He swiped the screen, looking for something, finding it after a moment and passing the phone back to Rumble. “There. That’s at Dalton.”

Rumble chuckled at the photo. A picture from Kimmy’s Facebook. Devlin was Kimmy’s friend on Facebook. No big deal, right? The picture showed Amy with an oversized sweatshirt, the collar falling over one shoulder, her crimson hair in long tangles, making a sexy face for the camera. Kimmy was next to her, long black hair, face twisted into a strange grimace of hilarity. Practically an ugly picture. She was laughing so hard her eyes were black dashes and she showed her teeth with braces. She also wore a sweatshirt, this one pale pink, a buttoned shirt underneath. She was skinny and fragile and perfect. His heart ached for those simpler times.

Though that wasn’t even true. Even back then, their relationship had been strange and temporary; fleeting at times. They’d kissed, and she’d traveled afterwards, and when she returned from Taiwan, the spark seemed quashed.

“That’s her?”

“That’s Kimmy Chang,” Devlin said.

Rumble batted the screen with the backs of his fingers with a declaration of clarity. “Now it makes sense. Now it makes sense.” He tapped his fat index finger on Amy’s face. “Amy I fucking remember. This one I don’t. But that’s how you got her, right?” He faced Josh with his beer-blurred eyes, menacing but good-natured for now, demanding the appropriate response from Josh, but leaving it up to Josh to decide what wouldn’t anger him. Devlin took his phone back, and again Josh wondered what secrets that device would reveal to him.

Josh said, “What do you mean?”

Rumble wavered, blinking, eyes wet and narrow. In that long moment, Josh could imagine having offended him in some unforeseen way and Johnny hauling off and punching him. But Johnny didn’t punch him, instead saying, “That’s how you got her, bro. Right? Fuck, now I see it. No way you’d get that girl now.” Somehow, it wasn’t intended to be a provocative insult. Johnny said it like it was a matter of fact, plain as day.

But it left Josh bashed and wounded, wondering why he’d ever agreed to come out tonight with Devlin Stone. What had he wanted from this? To play in what he would consider “the big leagues?” With a bunch of fucking assholes. Well, Glenn was all right. Devlin brought Johnny Rumble on purpose just to fuck with him. Arranged this whole conversation. Pretend you don’t remember her and you want to see a picture, then I’m going to show you one where she was alone with me in my hotel room. And Rumble said, “Did you fuck her?” And Devlin looked at Rumble like he was crazy. “Of course I fucked her.”

Devlin hooked an arm around Josh’s neck and hugged him close, the two of them side by side, Devlin leaning nearer to Rumble, saying, “He didn’t get her in high school, dip-shit.”

Rumble laughed and held up his hands like the insult was uncalled for. “What the fuck?” He looked at Glenn like he couldn’t believe Devlin would call him a dip-shit for nothing.

Devlin squeezed Josh’s neck like he was a good buddy, snatched his phone from Rumble and sat back again, looking at high-school Kimmy and smiling before putting the phone in his pocket.

Rumble looked at Josh now, amused and not angry, shaking his head and shrugging his shoulders like he didn’t see what the big deal was. “Hey, it’s not an insult, it’s a fucking compliment, buddy.” Then to Glenn: “This guy should be in finance, get a client in on the ground floor, turn you into a billionaire in ten years.”

Josh muttered, “We met up again at university.”

The door to their private room opened a crack, hallway light spilling in. Someone still held the door handle, an unseen woman, pausing to talk with the security guy standing out front. Johnny scooted forward in his seat and lay back, his hands frantically working down his zipper as quick as he could. Just as Josh looked over to see what he was doing, Rumble hauled out a bloated pound of flaccid cock meat waggling in his grip.

Glenn scowled and hissed, “For fuck’s sake,” looking away.

Rumble had pulled his cock out of the fly of his boxers, now let it dangle free from them, but zipped up his pants again. He manhandled his thing through his trousers, getting it into position, laying it sideways so you could see it under the fabric. He caught Josh looking and the disgust on Josh’s face. But instead of being angered, he laughed like he enjoyed being gross, and elbowed Josh. “That’s how you get a lap dance the right way.” He bit his lower lip and held the ass of an imaginary woman sitting in his lap ass-first, wagging his hips and humping his cock-bulge into the air, giving the imaginary woman a ride.

The door opened further as the stripper came in, and now Rumble muttered, “Better be that Asian.”

It was.

***

In the Uber on their way home, Kimmy asked Hyun if she wanted to stay over.

“At your place?”

“Yeah. Meyer has Sophie till Monday, Josh is staying in the city. He’ll be home in the morning. Why don’t we all do brunch together?”

She watched Hyun’s face go through the range of polite responses saying why she wouldn’t, but could see a gleam in her eye and a slight raise to one corner of her mouth, knowing Hyun couldn’t wait to say yes.

While Hyun pretended to vacillate, Kimmy said, “Are you doing anything tomorrow?”

Hyun said, “No . . .” in a long, draggy way, still resisting the urge to jump in with both feet.

“Come on,” Kimmy said, swaying to shoulder-bump Hyun. “It’s not even late. We can watch TV, eat some junk food, talk a little more . . .”

Hyun bobbed her head a little, smiling now. “Yeah. Yeah, that might be good.”

***

Hyun hesitated coming out of the bathroom, lurking in the dark, shy and sheepish.

Kimmy, sitting on the couch in the family room, said down the dark hall, “Do they fit?”

From the dark bathroom: “Yeah.” Hyun’s knee clicked in the quiet of the hall, stepping out now from the bathroom and padding down the hall with her hands tucked up the insides of the borrowed sweatshirt’s sleeves.

As she came into the family room, Kimmy asked her, “Comfy?”

“Oh, yeah,” Hyun agreed, nodding, letting her host know she appreciated pajamas to sleep in. Hyun wore a purple hoodie, Veritas et Utilitas written on the front, Western Law in puffy letters on the sleeve.

She’d loaned Hyun an old sweatshirt and a pair of pajama shorts, fresh from the laundry. She said, “That sweatshirt was the comfiest I had. I pulled a lot of all-nighters in that.”

Hyun held the hem and pulled it down a little lower. Kimmy had bought it in Size Large specifically for it to be roomy and comfy. Hyun said, “Studying?”

“That’s all I did in Law School. Josh was working, I was out in London. What else was I going to do?” Though, even if Josh had moved to London to stay with her, studying all night was still what she would have done.

Hyun came closer and sat on the couch, drawing her bare feet up and sitting cross-legged like Kimmy was. The TV was on, the Netflix menu showing, a huge ceramic bowl of extra-buttery popcorn on the table and two glasses of white wine.

Now Kimmy said, “What do you want to watch? Rom-com, horror, comedy . . .?”

“Something funny’s good.” Hyun reached for her glass and took a timid sip.

While Kimmy cycled through the viewing options on Netflix, she said, “One good thing about getting a house is having a little more space. We lost our guest room when I turned it into my studio.”

“You don’t make any baskets anymore?”

Kimmy shook her head no, still searching for a comedy she hadn’t seen. “I want you to take my bed, and I’ll sleep out here on the couch.”

Hyun set her wineglass down, saying, “Oh, no way, Kimmy, no way. I’m not kicking you out of your bed.”

“I don’t mind the couch, Hyun. It’s a comfortable couch.”

“Then I’ll take the couch.”

Kimmy found a movie she hadn’t seen, “Everything Must Go.” She said, “Have you seen this? It’s got Will Ferrell.”

Hyun shook her head no, that she hadn’t seen the movie. “Let me take the couch, Kimmy.”

Kimmy chuckled and turned her head to Hyun. She looked sweet and innocent and adorable, her brows knitted with worry about who would sleep where, and hoping she wasn’t an imposition. Kimmy cocked her head. “I can’t sleep with you out here on the couch when it should be me, Hyun.”

She smiled a little, sweeping her hand on the couch seat. “I thought you said it was a comfortable couch.”

“It is, it is. . . . Hey, Josh isn’t here. It’s a big bed.” She shrugged and made a funny face, like there was an obvious answer both of them hadn’t seen yet. “Why don’t we just watch TV in the bedroom, sleepover style?”