Brothers of Paradise Series

“What are we playing for?”

“The honor?”

I shuffle them smoothly. “We can think of something more interesting than that.”

“We can?” Ivy frowns, her gaze traveling across the lodge. Stopping on the giant bed. “We could play for who gets to sleep in the master.”

My lips twitch. “You’re sure? I’ve already ceded that, so you don’t have to put it back on the table.”

“Well, what else is there?” She nods at the cards. “Gin rummy?”

I haven’t played that in years, but I know the rules well enough. With three siblings, every type of game was played growing up.

“We’ll play for information,” I say.

“Information? You sound like a mafia boss,” she says, but she’s grinning. “I’m not sure if I have information that is worth enough to be a prize.”

“I’m absolutely positive that you do,” I say, dealing the cards. “The victor gets to ask a question.”

Her teeth dig into her lower lip. “And no deflecting? We’re both good at that.”

I hesitate only for a moment. “No deflecting.”

She rubs her hands together in anticipation, but there’s a furrow in her brow. So she has things she doesn’t want to talk about either. “I’m ready.”

Ivy wins the first round, but it’s close. She leans against the back of the couch and puts her head in her hand. “I keep thinking of what you said the other night with Baptiste. The real reason you wanted me there as a buffer… but I’m not sure if that’s a good starting question.”

I raise an eyebrow. “Are you considering giving me a softball?”

“I can be kind.” She looks down at the cards in her hands. “All right. Here’s my question-why did you decide to become a photographer? You already run a publishing company, right?”

“I’ve always wanted to write books, and to publish others. That part was a natural career choice. As for photography…” I glance past her to the wide-open lodge behind, the beautifully designed space. “A photo is like capturing a sliver of time. Of history, for all to remember. It’s telling a story. It’s… you can’t lie with a good photograph. I’m discounting all the editing and fake shit here, what I mean is just a good, pure photograph. The greatest pictures ever taken, the ones that have affected countries and nations, they were honest snapshots.”

“That’s beautiful.”

“And it’s mine, photography. No one in my family does it. I have very few friends who do, either. It’s a solitary thing.” Not to mention it’s a disappointing career choice in the eyes of my father. I’d once picked it up as a hobby for that very reason.

But it had stuck.

I shuffle the cards, my movements stiffer than usual. Ivy notices, because she cocks her head. “I thought that would be an easy question.”

“It was.” I deal the cards. Damn it, why is it difficult to talk about real things with her? I’ve done it plenty of times before, with all kinds of strangers in my travels. “Your turn to start.”

She does, and when the game is nearly over, she puts down her final card with a flourish. “I win again, Rhys. What is this? Are you deliberately throwing the game?”

I put a dramatic arm over my face. “Yes. I love being tortured with personal questions.”

“It’s your cry for help,” she says cheerily, reaching for her cards. “You know what question I’ll ask.”

“No, I really don’t. Come on. Hit me with it.”

“Why did you want me to be a buffer at dinner with your cousin?”

Ivy

“You’re really asking me that?” His voice is offended, but it’s clear he’s faking. “How painful.”

Rhys keeps his arm over his head, stretched out against the back of the couch. His shirt has ridden up, and there’s a sliver of tanned, taut stomach on display. A bit of dark hair that disappears into his pants.

I look away. I’ve never forgotten that Rhys is an attractive man. That’s an impossible thing to do, with how large his presence is. And yet the knowledge slams back into me with the force of a tidal wave.

I reach out with the cards and smack them against his knee. “You said no deflections.”

“And now you’re resorting to physical violence. It’s sad, really,” he says. “I can picture the headlines already. Charming photographer clobbered to death by jet-lagged model-vultures feasted on his body.”

“Vultures? Try hyenas.”

“Even worse.” He tucks his arm behind his head. “So you really want to know?”

“Yes.”

Rhys raises an eyebrow. “If you hadn’t been there, he would have asked me for money.”

I put my cards down. “Really?”

“Yes.” He looks up at the ceiling, a hand buried in his dark curls. Comfortable, sprawling, elegant. “Do you know anything about my family?”

I clear my throat. “I might have searched you on the internet before we set off together.”

“Right. And what did you find?” His voice makes it clear that he already knows the answer. I humor him anyway.

“Well, there was a lot. You have really… impressive family members, for one. Very successful ones.”

Rhys snorts. “Yes, and the French side of the family, my mother’s family, have tried to capitalize on that for decades.”

More questions rise up, and perhaps he sees that in my eyes, because Rhys looks away. “It’s not like we wouldn’t have helped them out in a pinch. But it’s become… greedy. My mother barely speaks to her sister, and my siblings don’t have much time for our cousins for that very reason.”

A few of Baptiste’s comments come back to me, now in an entirely new light. Rhys’s face when he paid the bill. His tone when he commented about the choice of restaurant. It makes sense, now.

“Even rich people have family problems.”

“Oh, we’re very good at them. We make it an art form.” Rhys nods lazily at the cards, a lock of hair falling down over his forehead. “Your turn to deal, Ives.”

I glare at him briefly before I begin to shuffle. There’s a lot more I want to ask.Belonging © NôvelDram/a.Org.

“I’ll win this one,” Rhys says. “I’m done being the interviewee.”

And damn him, but he does. He wins with a flourish and raises an eyebrow at me. “So, you told me that men rarely see you, they just see your beauty.”