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“Oh, Jax. I’m aware of how much you enjoy my assets.”

It's true, and my smile says it all.

Let’s get one thing straight. Rachel is not my girlfriend. We both know that, accept it. She’s not really even my fuck friend, though the girl’s got a body and knows how to use it. And she’s definitely, definitely not my friend.

We have a mutually beneficial partnership. I go play cute, dumb, pretty-boy arm candy at all her parents’ fancy snooty parties, which gets me into all of said parties with my sugar mama and gets her parents off her back. Sure, we hook up occasionally, but more importantly, nobody asks too many questions—about my line of work or her sexual preferences.

It works for both of us quite well. We both get things we need, and there’s zero risk of it going any further.

“Ready?” She tucks her arm through my elbow, so I feel the edge of rock-hard biceps honed at her kickboxing gym.

“Darling, I thought you’d never ask.” I let her lead me through her massive bedroom, down the main hall, and out into the open kitchen-living space of her sprawling Seaport Boston luxury condo. She’s in the penthouse of one of those glossy-ass new-construction high rises, so the view’s pretty incredible.

Through the literal wall of windows stretched across two sides of the room, the city unfolds beneath us in a toss of glittering colors. Past the kitchen, streets smudged with white and red lights slice bold ribbons through the dense pack of brick. Around the mid-rise condos, towering buildings creep toward the sky like it’s their mission to hold back the night with the gravity-defying force of their steel and glass.

Through the double French doors, under the sprawling balcony, the black-blue cut of the harbor tumbles below.

Breathtaking, truly. If I were a poet, or prone to poetic mental meandering, I might sit and ponder that fucking view for a bit. But I don't. We don’t. Don’t pause, don’t linger to admire it. Not ’cause it’s not spectacular, or ’cause we’ve grown so used to it we no longer see it. It’s because when we’re together, it’s not about enjoyment. Even the sex has a sense of efficiency—we have a mission, and we’re only sharing the same space to see that it’s accomplished.

I respect Rachel because she’s like me. She’s good at playing the game. And at the end of the day, we both know where our priorities—and our loyalties—lie.

If a tiger popped into existence in this hallway right now, she’d push me down to get a head start.

I like that kind of honesty.

The elevator outside her door pops us down and lets us off in the parking garage wedged below the building. We climb into her sleek black BMW Z4 without discussion; she always drives. I’m just the pretty boy playing freeloader, remember?

In reality, though, I don’t own a car. Don't own things. Things can be traced. Cell phones can be traced. Cars can be fucking traced. So, yeah. I let her drive. Even if it means I sit and fidget in the passenger seat until—

“Jax, for fuck’s sake, could you be still for more than seven seconds?” Rachel mutters as the car roars out of the garage.

“How dare you ask such ridiculous things.” I shake my head, so she knows just how egregiously she’s wronged me. The BMW surges onto a wide, two-lane roadway overhung by brick and glass apartments. We zoom over the curved roadways, only partially choked with traffic at this hour, through a tangled maze of stone and concrete and perpetual, perpetual fucking construction.

I tell you, East Coast cities are not like the gridded order of the West. I’ve lived here in Boston almost two years—Baltimore before that, good ol’ NYC before that—and I still get fucking lost on a daily basis. Another reason I don’t own a car, don’t even have a damned driver’s license.

A horn blares out somewhere near the car’s rear bumper. Ah, yes. The mating call of the Mass-hole. Yet another strike against getting behind the wheel in Boston. Rachel, however, merely inserts her middle finger out the window with the practiced ease of a person who’s been dancing to this ugly song her whole life.

“Is it weird I kind of think it’s hot?”

“Yes.” But her mouth twitches upwards in the shadow of a smile. Weird, but she’s a little into my brand of weird.

“Cool. I think it’s kinda hot.”

“I think you’re kinda weird.”

“I think you’re kinda into kinda weird.” I reach for the radio dial, turn that shit up. Rachel has a fascinating and highly specific preference for Norwegian metal, which like, okay, maybe not my top choice, but I also kind of like it just ’cause it’s different.

“Don’t touch it, Jax.” Rachel flicks at my fingers, so I sigh and rescind control. Instead, I settle back in my seat, slide my fresh deck of playing cards from my pocket. They’re brand new, haven’t been broken in yet, so they fly fast, hard, with that almost sharp cut to ’em.

“So, you think your dad’s golf buddies enjoy card tricks?”

Rachel groans. “I should have had you leave the cards at home.”

“Fine.” I sigh, but make no move to stow the deck. “I won’t woo anyone with my magic fingers.”

Rachel groans again. Heavily. “Why, exactly, did you want to go to this party?”

Want. Why do I want to go to this party? ’Cause this one’s different, and I know that. My motives are different. I just . . . am not certain what they are. And that’s fucking dangerous, isn’t it?