He wasrich, rich.
“Actually—” He pulled the fridge door open, producing two uncapped beer bottles. “I snagged these from the cooler down at the fire.”
I winced.
Drinking with him seemed like a bad idea on more levels than I could count. However, the temptation was certainly there. A beer wouldn’t kill me, could hardly make me any stupider than I already was, running away earlier.
“Come on.” He waggled it at me. “Don’t you let loose sometimes, Mr. Director? You can’t be that much of a stick in the mud when you’re not even thirty yet.”
Ironic he was calling me that when I was currently holding his condoms hostage like some lunatic and lying about finding them altogether. Or like a jealous ex refusing to let him move on because they were still hung up on the relationship.
Holy fuck.
Was I jealous?
My hand shot out, gesturing for him to toss me the bottle.
Instead of doing so, he laughed and nodded to the couches. “Go sit.”
Responsible. Not willing to trash my property on the off chance he threw it too wide or I was shit at hand-eye coordination. He wasn’t as reckless as I thought.
Toeing off my shoes, I trudged over to his living room and let my body flop down on one of the couches. My muscles were sore from being bent over my desk all day, trying to map out an appropriate timeline for next week’s activities. The problem with having a bunch of teenagers coming onto the property was that they tended to scatter like rats when trying to be wrangled.
There was too much fun, too many things to look at, too much for them to get their hands on, for it to be a quick and easy process to get them all accounted for and assigned to their cabins. Thankfully, they were going to be at the back of the property, away from all of the adults and accidentally witnessing any lascivious activities.
The last thing I needed on my hands was the police showing up for indecent exposure to a minor.
“I’d ask if you had a long day but we did hike a trail together.” Marlow hovered the freshly uncapped beer over me, waiting until I had a solid grip around the base before letting it go. “Before you ditched me, of course.”
I sighed, sitting up straight. “I’m sorry, again, about that.”
“Hey, I get it. I’d rather be in the AC sometimes, too.”
“I’ll remember that when I’m elbow deep in tax forms.” The beer was cheap tasting when I took a healthy swig, and weirdly, it reminded me of my undergrad days.
College had been a quick two years to get my Associates Degree before taking over the business. Simply a way to prove to vendors, investors, staff,whoever, that I wasn’t going to be running this place on hopes and dreams and had an actual solid business plan on what the fuck I was doing.
“Here’s a crazy idea.” He shifted down onto the couch across from me, his legs spreading wide and catching my attention just long enough to dart my eyes down to see what he was packing between those muscled thighs of his. “Shred them.”
“You’re right. Fuck the government.”
His grin was diabolical. All dimples and mischief. It had my heart skipping a beat. “Love the sound of that. Anarchy looks good on you.”
“I’m surprised you’re not trying to sell me on some stock portfolio.”
He chuckled. “Nah. I can’t do that in good conscience. I’d actually feel bad if I lost your money.”
I slammed back another swig before saying, “You’re that bad at your job, huh.”
“Wow, really going for the jugular there, Blake.”
“Have to make up for earlier. I let you off too easily.” My head was beginning to swim, and not from the beer. What I really should’ve done was get Lydia to quiz him on the way back down to base camp and then report back to me.
Marlow struck me as the type of person to need some kind of constant pushback or else he got bored and started to create his own drama to fill the void. Keeping him contained byproxy would probably save a lot of us from running into someinterestingsituations.
He quirked a brow. “Which time? The waterfall or when I asked you to sneak me some condoms?”
“Do you always like to push people’s buttons?”
