“… Yeah,” I answered, trying not to make it obvious on my face that I’d spent so much time between Aspen’s legs that he could have been charging me rent. “That’s tough.”
“Well, anyway,” he said quickly, waving a hand dismissively. “If it works for you, it works for you.”
“It works for me,” I confirmed. But the whole conversation was confusing, and had wheels turning in my head.
“If you change your mind, text me. Or bring him,” he suggested. “If you guys are into that, I mean.”
“Oh,” I said. “You mean, like…”
“Yeah,” he said, shrugging a shoulder. But his brown eyes were sparkling with amusement at my response. “Preston and Ido that sometimes, bring a third over to hook up with. I could invite him too, actually. I’m pretty sure he’s into Aspen.”
I had to bite down into the tip of my tongue to halt my immediate instinctive answer, but forced my mouth to carve into a friendly, casual smile. I wouldn’t be sharing Aspen with a single other human being on earth, especially not golden boy Preston.
“Yeah, I’ll ask,” I lied. “But I doubt it. You know how he is.”
“Totally,” Lazaro responded neutrally. “Let me know.”
BACK AT HOME, my brain played the conversation over and over until I could have recited it like a speech.
The way Aspen had casually mentioned hooking up with Lazaro at the party hadn’t made it seem like it’d been some awful relationship, or so out of the ordinary from any other hookups. But according to Lazaro, Aspen hadn’t wanted to be touched or anything. Was that… Normal for him? It couldn’t be. He’d let me jerk him off at the party and he’d barely even liked me at that point. I was pretty sure about that, anyway. It was only after that particular event that he’d slowly started actually warming up to me. Or at least, that was how it had seemed from my perspective.
I’d convinced Aspen to come over after work to spend the night in my bigger, more comfortable bed for once, and he’d be off work in a few minutes, so I didn’t have too long to wait before I could get my answers. Still, I didn’t know how he’d feel about being interrogated about former hookups. I needed to be careful with how I phrased everything.
Considering, I pushed open my bedroom door to head into the kitchen and grab a drink. To my surprise, I found Arie and Che in our living room. They’d pulled the cushions and pillows off the couch and were piling and arranging them on the giant blanket they’d spread out on the living room floor. Our coffee table had been pushed aside, out of the way. And they werewearing matching sets of pajamas. Pajamas that were kind of… Slutty. Short shorts with tight tops and white cotton socks that came up to mid-thigh. The accents on Arie’s outfit were pink, while the ones on Che’s were blue.
Blinking, I tilted my head as I tried to process the scene. It wasn’t Friday, and there was no planned hangout as far as I was aware. And also, they didn’t live or sleep here. I opened my mouth to ask if they were finally getting around to trying that idea I’d given them, since they were definitely dressed for it, but Arie cut me off.
“Can it, Caelyx. You are not invited to this sleepover. Get whatever you need and get out.”
“I pay rent here,” I reminded him. He smirked, flicking up an eyebrow.
“Don’t you mean your daddy pays rent here?”
“That word sounded very natural coming out of your mouth,” I observed. “Say it again.”
He snorted, rolling his eyes. “Why don’t you ask Aspen to say it for you?”
“Because I don’t want to get my ass kicked,” I responded, blinking my lashes at him.
“What makes you think I won’t?” He wondered, blinking right back at me. “Run along, perv.”
No less confused but convinced now I wouldn’t be getting any answers from Thing 1 or Thing 2, I sailed past them into the kitchen. Cyprian was at the counter, evidently preparing snacks for the sleepover I wasn’t invited to. And not the low effort snacks we kept around for planned hangouts like microwaved popcorn and potato chips. When I reached for the little platter of chocolate chip cookies, Cyprian pulled it out of my reach. He was wearing decidedly less slutty pajamas. Cotton sleep pants with a stripe pattern, and a tank top that showed off his defined biceps and ripped chest. Though he was happiest spending his time inthe kitchen now, I happened to know he’d trained to be a UFC fighter through his teen years, and still put in plenty of hours at the gym.
“Those are vegan,” he informed me. “They’re for Che.”
“I can’t have any?” I asked.
“They’re for Che,” he repeated.
Raising my eyebrows, I grabbed a soda from the fridge and let the door fall back closed. “You, uh… Having a little sleepover in there, chief?”
“We’re just… Hanging out before winter break starts,” he said, turning away from me to fiddle with another little platter that had chocolate-covered pretzels on it. Handmade chocolate covered pretzels! I wanted to ask him if he was blushing, but it felt too cruel, even for me. “What are you doing?” He asked, probably just to distract me.
“Just waiting for Aspen to get off work. He’s spending the night.”
“Cool,” he said. “I’m glad you guys are… You know. Together. Aspen’s great.”
“Yeah,” I replied, grinning a little. “Aspen’s great.” I knew they’d been doing gym stuff together lately, so they’d probably gotten to know each other a lot more through that. “So you and Che and Arie planned a little hangout, just the three of you?”
