Black Lies(68)

“We’re both intelligent adults, Layana. Don’t play stupid.” His voice is harder than I’ve ever heard it, yet quiet. He isn’t a yeller. I swallow.

“Okay. Yes, in part this is about him. Just… bear with me for a minute. I’m getting there.”

“I’ve been waiting for you to tell me. Waiting for you to explain what on Earth I am not providing for you.” I can hear the threads of hurt in his voice. Small. Easily missed, yet in the structure of Brant’s voice I hear them as loudly as if he is screaming.

“It’s not what you think. I—”

“How long has it been? Five months? Longer? I suspected before, but didn’t know for sure until we lived together.” He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees, his eyes intent on mine. Analyzing. Searching for truth among so many old lies.

“Two years.”

That hurts. I see the flinch in his features. The swallow in his throat, the moisture that comes to the edges of his eyes. He drops his head to his hands. “Is this why you won’t marry me?”

“Not in the way you think.” I hadn’t intended on my relationship with Lee to be the catalyst that started this conversation, but I move on. Let it open the door wider.

“Do you love him?”

I lean closer, hold Brant’s hands and force his eyes to mine. “I love you. Everything about this has been about you.”

He pulls his hands away. “Stop talking in f*cking riddles, Lana, and tell me why.”

“I need you to look at me. I need you to listen.”

He does. He stops talking, he looks me in the eyes, and he focuses. Loses his ego, loses his hurt, and focuses on my words. Does what Brant was built to do. Analyze and interpret.

I give up the quest for the perfect words and dive in.

“His name is Lee. I met him in Mission Bay. He does odd landscaping jobs out there for cash. He was dating another girl for a large part of last year. I’ve been sleeping with him off and on for two years. I used to do it at my house, now I do it in the guesthouse. Lee is not his real name, it’s an identity that he’s adopted.” I swallow, then go in for the kill. “Brant, his real identity… it’s you. He’s a personality your brain created, an identity that you adopt at times. Mostly during times of stress. You have a condition called dissociative identity disorder. It’s what used to be called multiple personality disorder. I haven’t been cheating on you. The other man… it’s you. It’s just a different side of you, one who has his own personality.”

His expression doesn’t change when I stop talking. He just stares into my eyes and listens to silence. Blinks a few times, long intervals between. “I’m thinking,” he finally says. “Trying to decide if you are lying or if you sincerely believe what you just told me.”

“I’m not lying.”

His eyes hold mine. Studies them. Moves slightly as a process occurs behind them. “I believe that you mean what you’re telling me,” he says slowly. “That doesn’t mean you aren’t insane.”

I smile slightly. “I’m not insane.”

“One of us is. I’d much rather it be you.” My smile drops.

“You’re not insane.”

“I’m absent-minded, I’m not living separate lives.”

“I’ve been f*cking your other personality for two years. You are.”

“Do you love him?” The question, when repeated a second time, has entirely different tones.

“Yes.” I blink, tears suddenly present, the wealth of my emotion at an all time high. It isn’t fair to love a man in two different ways. One way is hard enough.

“More than me?”

“No.”

“You are mistaken.” A stubborn stick to his jaw.

“Jillian is the one who told me.” A gamble, but those words are the ones that truly get his attention. He turns back to me.

“What?”

I move to the ground before him and kneel, my hands on his knees. “In Belize. The weekend you were going to first propose. I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn’t find you. I went downstairs… and saw you in the bar. But you weren’t yourself. You didn’t recognize me. Introduced yourself as someone else—”

I stop, his form rising above me, stepping to the side, his hand roughly pushing me aside. Like Lee, not like Brant. I choke back the rest of my sentence.