“What’s the problem, again?”
Liam studied his hand, already forgetting what they were playing. “She really wants to be a Butterfly again. She says it’s fine, but I can tell. She won’t stop bringing it up. And I don’t think she’s told them she’s not available this time.”
Benson glared at Liam over his cards. “I’ve made it clear to her that I don’t like that.”
“Me, too. And I’ve backed you up that you wouldn’t like it.”
“But she’s still thinking about it?”
“I don’t think she’ll go behind our backs or anything.” Or, at least, Liam certainly hoped that. “But I don’t think it’s just money, Ben. She got validation from it. And she wants more.”
Benson grunted as he played a card. “She’s gottwomen inside of her any given day, and she wantsmore?”
“Yeah, she sounds like you when we’re in the sex club.”
“Oh, fuck off.”
He said that, yet Benson was already distracted by two men making out in the corner behind Liam.Uh-huh.It helped that both were his type.Me. I’m his type.Among men, anyway. Liam rolled up the sleeves of his sweater as he began to sweat. Was it always warm in this place?
“We’ve gotta figure something out,” Liam said, reclaiming Benson’s attention. “Assuming we’re going all-in with her.”
“I thought we were.”
“Are we?”
He meant arewe,as inyou and me, Ben.Liam and Benson were still dancing around about being officially back together,with Liam hesitant to throw himself back in Benson’s orbit and Benson probably scared as hell about fucking it all up again.We’re both older. We both know ourselves better.Liam hoped that was enough. Especially if he were going to sacrifice a part of his stupid heart again.
“What? You want a ring on your finger already? You and I are taking things slow.”
Yes, they had been over this. They had agreed on this. But between Benson wanting Eden to move in with him that summer and Eden wanting to spend that same summer spreading her pussy all over the place, they might have aproblem.“You’d think we could figure this out,” Liam said. “We all basically want the same thing in the end.” Right. It was his turn to play. “I haven’t told her, but I’ve planned about five different freak nights for her at the clubs. Any club.”
“I’m sure you have. But we’re doing my idea first.”
“We’ll flip a coin.”
“Whoever wins this match gets to launch their idea on Eden first.”
“But before we get that far, we need to make sure our lady is happy. Remember Libby?”
“The one who wanted a baby? Your answer to that was to marry her and put one in her.”
“Only because you couldn’t.”
“I could marry her.” Benson played a card. “Just not the baby part, thank God.”
“Worked out in the end. I don’t want a five-year-old.”
“Indeed. Cramps one’s style.”
“Oh, and remember Violet? Wanted desperately to live in Chicago to be near her family.”
“As I recall, you were going to set up base there so you two would have a place together, and we’d fly back and forth until Drew was out of school.”
“Pain in the ass that would have been, but we would have done it because we loved her.”
“Uh-huh.”
Liam played whatever card was at the top of his hand. “This is different. We’ve never had a girlfriend who wanted to be a sex worker.”
