“Yeah, you do. You just got paid. Bet me.”
The look on his face when he remembers the money is priceless. “Okay. I guess.”
* * *
After some hugging and another hand job, we head down to the gym, where Roly waits, his grin of the shit-eating variety.
“Don’t say it.”
“I’m not saying nothing.” Jake looks over at me and Elijah, says a small curse to himself, and hands Roly a fiver.
“So glad that my love life is bet-worthy.”
Roly curses and hands Jake back the five.
“Do I want to know?”
Roly punches my shoulder, annoyed. “I was trying to bet on your sex life; Jake was betting on your love life. Jackass.”
Before dealing with Adrian, I lean between my two good friends. “Hey, this is weird, but Elijah doesn’t… he thinks that I’m like way out of his league, looks-wise.”
Jake and Roly look at each other and laugh. “Dude, you and I look a lot alike, and yeah, we’re pretty fucking hot, but that guy… fuck, he’s out of everyone’s league.”
Jake looks over at Elijah—a little too long, if you ask me—and nods in agreement. “He’s beautiful, man. Guy that beautiful doesn’t know it, that’s some parental shit right there.”
I grind my teeth. “That mother of his is some piece of work. No wonder… okay. Going to work on that next.”
Okay, look, this next part is gonna make me look like a real asshole, but I know that Adrian has a crush on me, and he is currently leaned up against the front counter, looking over at Jake with a mixture of fear and arousal. Probably a reasonable response.
I walk right up to the twerp and shake his hand. He looks surprised but goes with it, assuming it means something good.
“So, yeah, Nick. I wanted to see if there was any way—”
“I’m going to go ahead and stop you there. I never want to see you on my property again, but I did want to properly thank you. If you’d just done your fucking job, I’d have never met my boyfriend,” I say, pointing to Elijah. “So, thank you. Now get the fuck out.”
He stutters and looks generally dumbfounded, then turns to the door, cursing under his breath.
“Oh, one more thing.”
“What?” Oof, he’s mad. Good.
“Who’s better-looking—me or Elijah?” I wrap an arm around Elijah in a half hug and grin.
“What kind of fucking question is that? He’s so pretty, I have no idea what the fuck he’s doing working here instead of, I dunno, being a runway model in Paris. You’re just, like, the hottest dad in the neighborhood.”
I lean over and whisper into Elijah’s ear, “You owe me five bucks.”
His blush is nearly crimson, and Adrian shoots us both middle fingers as he backs out the door, running into Jean-Pierre.
Huh.
Jake has a look on his face that would peel paint. In a voice I’ve never heard him use, Jake looks Adrian dead in the eye and says, “Don’t forget what we talked about. I don’t ever want to see you here again. Ever. You fuck with this place or the people who come here, and it will not end well for you.”
Adrian immediately drops his hands and fucks off to wherever he’s going. He doesn’t run, exactly, but he’s not sticking around, either.Heh.
Jean-Pierre searches Jake’s face. “What did I miss? Do I need to go after that guy?”
Jake pulls on a serene smile and aims it at Jean-Pierre. “He won’t be a problem here anymore.”
