“Oh, yeah.” Seven hadn’t forgotten, exactly. More like he’d just put it out of his mind. “This is low-key your fault.”
Mal blinked at him. “When I had lunch with him last week, he wouldn’t stop grilling me about you.”
“Why didn’t you say anything to me?” Nico asked, looking hurt.
Mal shrugged again.
“What’d he ask?” Nico pressed. “Be specific.”
Mal heaved a sigh, closing his eyes for a long moment before saying, “‘How is he? Is he eating? Is he sleeping? Is he getting to school okay? Did he say anything about me? Does it seem like he hates me? Is he dating anyone?’”
Why would Enzo be grilling Mal about Seven? What did he want from him? Besides the obvious.
“What did you say?” Seven asked, feeling like someone had kicked him in the solar plexus.
“That I barely know you?” Mal answered.
“Oh, right…” Seven muttered, deflating.
Ever gave him a sympathetic look and pet his head like he was a cat.
“Why didn’t you accept his offer?” Mal asked suddenly.
There was no judgment in his voice. There was no anything, really. It was like Mal was just satisfying his own morbid curiosity. Or maybe Enzo had asked him that, too.
“Why didn’t I agree to let him put me through college in exchange for being at his beck and call?” Seven asked, like the answer was obvious.
Wasn’t it?
“You did say the sex was, like, life-changing,” Shiloh reminded him. “Mind-blowing sex and not having to work some lame part-time job sounds like a pretty good deal.” When Levi hooked a brow at his boyfriend, he hastily added, “For you, I mean…obviously.”
“I’m sure that’s not what I said,” Seven grumbled, rolling his eyes.
“No, that’s exactly what you said,” Levi countered. “You were drunk on Jericho’s couch during movie night and very proudly told all of us that he’d made you come so hard you could now…what was it?”
“Speak Italian,” Ever answered, giggling.
“That’s right.”
“Damn, nobody has ever made me come so hard I learned another language,” Nico muttered. “That would have been handy for my language credit.”
“Is that why you can speak Russian now, Ever?” Shiloh teased.
Ever blinked at him, expression guileless. “No, I take classes twice a week.”
Levi and Nico snorted.
“Even so,” Seven said, dragging the attention back to himself. “That doesn’t mean I want to be his paid whore.”
Mal shrugged for a third time, looking bored. “If I had to be a whore, paid is better than not paid…right?” He looked at Nico for confirmation. “Law school’s expensive.”
Nico flushed. “Why are you asking me? Are you calling me a whore?”
Mal’s eyes went wide, and he shook his head rapidly, his cheeks flushing. “What? No? I?—”
Nico was the only person who could pull that reaction from Shiloh’s brother.
“I mean, if the stiletto fits,” Levi muttered, pulling a face at his best friend.
