Her Billionaires_ Boxed Set(83)

Josie shuddered and interrupted loudly. “No, yo mama.”

“No, yo mama!” Were they really acting like they were in seventh grade? Yeesh.

“I don’t have a mama. She died that day.”

Laura chuckled. “You wish she’d died that day, because three years later when we graduated, there she was at commencement, under the bleachers, banging the band director.”

“She likes a little pomp with her circumstance.”

“She made it clear to the whole auditorium how much she liked his wand.”

“Topic change!” Josie shouted, leaping for the coffee maker.

“Her crescendo, too, was—”

“Oh, my God, stop!”

“Oh, dear. Am I going too far?” Laura said facetiously, playing it up. “Have I crossed a decency boundary? Have I made you uncomfortable talking about sex?”

“My mother’s sex—”

“I wouldn’t want to force you to talk about anything so prurient. That would be being a bad friend, now, wouldn’t it?” Josie finally got the hint.

“Was it weird? Being with two guys like that? I mean, and not sleeping with them?”

Laura rubbed her eyes. Why was Josie getting on her last nerve lately? She was still angry with her for pouring everything out to Mike and Dylan. Why not make her walk around naked with a sign that said “Ask Me Anything”? If your best friend couldn’t keep your secrets, who could? That night at Jeddy’s had been one of the most stressful and surreal in her entire life, warlock balls and all. When she’d learned, later, what Josie had told the guys, after Dylan blurted it all out in a tiramisu-induced haze, she’d come home and nearly killed Josie.

The morning coffee routine was getting old. What wasn’t getting old, though, was this developing relationship between her and the guys. The guys. Even that was surreal and weird. Ah, hell—nothing about this threesome wasn’t bizarre, so she was getting tired of labeling it all as outside the mainstream. It just was. No getting around that. An internal argument deep within her raged on, one part telling her this was madness and a stronger, more settled part humming along nicely, ignoring the part that screamed “freak!”

Speaking of freaks, Josie was saying something through sips of java. “If you kiss one of them, do you have to kiss the other?”

“Huh?” Laura poured herself a cup. Might as well benefit from the fruits of her labor. That, and she needed the jolt. Yet another uncomfortable conversation with Josie, though she had to admit that the girl definitely helped sometimes, making her think about things she hadn’t considered. Like this?

“Does it have to be 50/50? If you sleep with one, do you have to sleep with the other? Or is it always a threesome? Is there always double, well—you know?”

Freak! “You actually sit around contemplating these things, Josie? Seriously?”

She had the decency to pinken a bit. “Who doesn’t?”

“Most of the rest of the world.” Sip. If she didn’t fill her mouth with something it would soon be full of words she’d regret saying. Please. This was devolving quickly into voyeurism. Laura was surprised by how annoyed she was becoming. Josie was always inquisitive. It was just who she was, and as aggravating as she could be at times, it had never troubled Laura this much.

Josie shot her a wary look. “I just...no, I don’t sit around dredging up embarrassing questions to ask you, Laura.” Her tone of voice conveyed hurt feelings. “But it’s natural, I think, to wonder. Most threesomes are one-night-stand kind of deals. What you have is so out of the realm of normal that it makes me think. Philosophize and stuff, about what it means for the long haul.”

Aha. And that was it. That was why this bothered Laura so much.

Because, damn it, Josie was right.

“What you’re doing, Laura, is fascinating to watch from the outside. Plus, yeah, I am demented. So sometimes my mind just...goes there. And I found myself wondering what it felt like, eating dinner with two guys, snuggling on the couch with two guys, wanting affection—but not sex—and having to, what? Pick? Kiss both? Cuddle in a sandwich?”

That made Laura laugh. “I thought it would be weird, too. It kind of was, at first. Mike made a big spectacle of making sure I knew they didn’t expect sex. I knew what he was doing. He really was just trying to be nice and to help me relax.” She let out a puff of air. “And it was good and kind and all that, but it pissed me off. I still don’t know what they were thinking, hiding the truth about their relationship from me.”

“They’re not gay.” Josie started to unpeel a banana from Laura’s fruit bowl.