Chapter 18: Key To Her Undoing
The smell of fresh varnish was a taunt. Jade stared at the repaired door frame, her knuckles still stinging from where she’d slammed her fist against the pristine wood. It was flawless, as if Dex’s shoulder had never shattered the old one. As if last night had never happened.
The silence of the apartment was a physical weight. It pressed in, highlighted by the distant, muffled thrum of the city two floors below. Her body was a catalogue of aches. A deep soreness between her thighs, a tender bruise on her hip, the phantom scrape of stubble on the inside of her thighs. She walked to the kitchen island, her bare feet cold on the polished concrete. The espresso machine was clean. The art books were stacked neatly. Everything was in its place.
Except for the single black key on the counter.
And the note next to it.
Her heart did a slow, hard roll in her chest. The paper was from her own sketchpad, torn raggedly from the top corner. The handwriting was unmistakable: a chaotic, slanted scrawl.
-For when you want us to come home. -C it read, beside a hastily drawn winking smiley face.
The winking face seemed to pulse on the paper, a stupid, charming accusation. She snatched her phone, her thumb jabbing Addison’s name before her mind could dissuade her.
“You’re alive,” Addison answered, her voice a blend of relief and poorly concealed excitement. “I’ve been pacing for, like, twelve hours. Start talking.”
“YES I AM ALIVE,” Jade snapped, the words brittle. She squeezed her eyes shut, picturing Addison’s wide-eyed concern. “What do you want to know? Addison wants to know if I fucked them both.”
The silence on the line was absolute, then a sharp, inhaled breath. “Well,” Addison finally said, her voice carefully neutral. “Did you?”
Jade opened her eyes. She stared at the black key, its metal catching the morning light. A laugh escaped her, hollow and surprising even herself. It held no joy, only a stunned recognition. “Yes.” The admission hung in the quiet loft, vast and irreversible. “Sort of. Not exactly.”
“Sort of?” Addison’s curiosity punctured her attempt at control. “Jade. Elaborate.”
“I can’t.” Jade’s throat tightened. She traced the winking smiley face with her fingertip, the paper rough under her touch. The memory was a physical shock—Dex’s possessive thrusts, Cole’s mouth, the overwhelming surrender. “It wasn’t… a threesome. It was sequential.” She felt her face flush hot. “God, that sounds clinical.”
“It sounds complicated,” Addison corrected, her tone shifting from gossip to genuine concern. “And intense. Are you okay? Like, actually?”
Jade looked at her reflection in the dark television screen. A stranger with wild hair and a raw, new look in her eyes stared back. “I don’t know.” Her voice was small. “They left a key.”
“A key?”
“To their place, I assume. It was sitting here with a note from Cole.” Jade picked it up. It was cold, heavy. “A ‘come home’ note. With a wink.”
Addison whistled softly. “The audacity is sort of breathtaking.” A pause. “Are you going to use it?”
Jade’s fingers closed around the key. The metal bit into her palm. The soreness between her legs pulsed a low, agreeing thrum. She thought of Dex’s silhouette in her doorway last night, of Cole waiting somewhere nearby. A dangerous warmth spread through her chest.
“I don’t know,” she repeated, but the words felt like a lie even as she said them.
She looked from the key to the note, the wink seeming to mock her tangled feelings.
“Don’t lie,” Addison said, her voice suddenly breaking into a rich, delighted laugh. “God, you finally did it! I mean, yikes on the context, but also… hell yes!”
“Hell yes?” Jade repeated, incredulous.
“After years of those beige, emotionally-stunted aquatic vertebrates you used to date–that sculptor who only talked about his kombucha, the accountant who folded his socks before sex–you finally landed actual, primal men.” Addison’s excitement was a palpable vibration through the phone. “Men who leave keys and wink. Men who, from what I saw, could probably bench-press a car. I’m proud of you.”
Jade’s protest died in her throat.
A laugh bubbled up, startling her–a real one, tinged with shock and a strange, burgeoning pride. Addison wasn’t judging; she was celebrating. The approval was a warm, unexpected balm on her raw nerves. She paced to the window, the city sprawling beneath her like a circuit board.
“They’re cavemen, Addison.”
“Exactly! You’re swimming with sharks now, not trout. So what are you going to do with that key?” Addison asked, the question hanging in the electric silence.
“Nothing.” Jade said. “ I have to get the art gallery ready for viewing. I’m going to work.”