One With You: Chapter 10
Gideon and Eva prepare for their separate bachelor/ette parties. Meanwhile, Angus will be heading to Austin to look more into this “Eva’s mom is not Eva’s mom???” thing by doing some digging on Lauren Kittrie. Much more importantly, Gideon’s sister Ireland is taking care of the puppy.
Angus’s Lauren research makes him totally disappear from this chapter, obviously, because another minor character who barely shows up in this story whose name I also have to remember is just what One With You needed. But you know what doesn’t disappear from this chapter? Another fucking page about how great Gideon and Eva’s sex life is.
Eva would let me have her anywhere, but she frequently seduced me while we were en route to somewhere. Having previously been restricted to having sex only in the hotel, she’d rocked my world by inciting me to make love to her in cars and planes, as well as my home and various places of business.
Does “and various places of business” sound like even Gideon’s getting bored with this concept? It sounds less sensual and more so legalese, like when a fast food commercial clarifies “at participating locations only”, which is maybe not the mood this line about Eva’s libido was supposed to capture.
Gideon’s lawyer/BFF Arash shows up at Gideon’s office to provide our obligatory update of all the subplots about Gideon’s enemies who are barely even in these books:
- We learn that “Anne Lucas’s assault complaint is going away”. Boy, it’s a good thing nothing in these books ever have lasting consequences. Then we’d have to keep track of a plot!
- Gideon’s brother Christopher is pulling together resources to buy out the record label from under Gideon. I can’t even remember the last time we saw Christopher, so I can’t say we need to care about this one either.
Arash provides such a good summary that Gideon realizes he might be best man material.
Only a few short weeks ago it would have been a no-brainer to have Arnoldo stand with me.
It was? I’m still only like 20% sure who Arnoldo is.
Part of me hoped [Arnoldo] still would. Arash was also a good choice. […] This weekend should make the choice between the two men clear.
Oh my fucking god, you guys, it’s basically The Bachelorette right now. Right down to the dudes with no personality who are completely impossible to tell apart that we’re supposed to care about the choice between!
Gideon and Eva pack for their respective weekends.
“You usually wear dark colors,” she pointed out.
“Too hot for that where we’re going.”
“You’re too hot.”
Ok, let’s just move on past this. Because we kind of get it. It’s book five. They’re thirsty as shit for each other. We got it.
In the ride to the airport, Gideon is suddenly struck with how much it will hurt Eva when he has to break the news to her of whatever her mom’s false/stolen identity secret turns out to be. This doesn’t last long, because there’s more half-assed love dialogue to get through:
“You saw the dress I wore when we got married the first time!” […]
“It was only a dress when I saw it,” I soothed. “It wasn’t a wedding dress until you wore it.”
“Oh.”
“Oh.” The emotions in this book, y’all.
There’s also a blowjob scene in the limo. It’s… not unlike what we’re used to. It sounds intense in a weird way:
I jerked hard when she pulled me in with easy suction
And sounds weird in a “that definitely sounds like something else” way:
She hummed a protest and fisted me
And contains Gideon saying something creepy as all fucking get out:
“I’ll be riding your perfect cunt, Eva. My cum is going to be deep inside you while you spend the weekend away from me.”
The chapter cuts ahead to the beach, where Gideon reveals to his friends (or at least reveals to Manuel, whom I also have no fucking clue who he is) that he and Eva actually got married a month ago. The dialogue is so bad that even Sylvia Day has to point out that it’s not her best work:
He shook his head. “I can’t see it. Marriage, I mean, not you and Eva. How does it not get old?”
“Being happy never gets old.”
“Isn’t variety the spice of life or some shit?” he asked, in some sort of half-assed philosophical mood.
To be fair, it’s totally ok to have a character who has views like this and is also sort of an idiot about it. Tension makes for good stories! Except I have no fucking clue who Manuel is, and all the men in these books are toxic scumbags, so this isn’t “tension makes for good stories” so much as it is “ok cool more of this then”.
It wouldn’t be Crossfire without a brand new, totally shoehorned-in conflict popping up out of nowhere every two or three chapters, so… fuck it: how about some paparazzi, like, take some pictures of Gideon’s bachelor party? And it “goes viral”?
“Looks like a good time, cabrón. With two very hot babes.” […]
“I want to know who took that picture.” Who knew I was in Brazil? Who followed me into a club one night, into a private VIP area, and taken pictures? […] The worst fears of [Eva’s] fantasies were captured in living color in that photo.
You might be thinking something like, “Wait, was this even in the book? Did we just skip over a part of the bachelor party that would later have greater significance? Didn’t anyone notice that it’s super weird to just show up at this moment and go, ‘Hey, a thing totally happened earlier but we didn’t go over it but IT MATTERS NOW!’ Right?” You would be right.
The chapter ends with Gideon frantically calling Eva, but Eva isn’t picking up her phone. Aw snap! I bet this will be completely resolved and forgotten about in another chapter or two, just like Anne Luca’s lawsuit! Remember that? I don’t.