Her Billionaires_ Boxed Set(88)

“Shit.” Dylan hadn’t known that.

“So we need to tell her.”

Dylan argued back. “Not yet. We need one night to just...be. Last week was perfect. Tonight can be more perfect.”

Mike’s skeptical look had nearly broken him. Truth be told, he just wasn’t ready to look into Laura’s sweet face and declare he was a billionaire. That Mike was, too. Oh, yeah, we lied about this one little thing...we make more money than most major movie stars do in a career. Only we make it per year. You’ll never have to worry about money again with us.

And—smack. He imagined the slap. Because it felt like one, in his gut. If roles were reversed he’d feel betrayed and pissed and all the things he imagined she had felt until last week. The roller coaster of their relationship was making everyone queasy, and taking a break was helping to settle everyone into a comfortable place where they could just proceed. That’s what he wanted more of. Not secrets and reveals and heart-felt explanations and angst-filled pleas.

And sex. He wanted sex. Letting that be secondary had been hard. Hell, he was hard. All the time now. And lavender-scented hand lotion wasn’t the best girlfriend these days, no matter how nice it smelled. It couldn’t sigh, or groan his name, or dig its fingers into his shoulders at the just perfect moment when —

Damn tight pants. That helped with one clothing decision for the evening—looser jeans.

Mike had accepted that they should wait, though his reluctance was clear. And now here they were, in her homey, pink apartment, ready to take things to the next step. The second he and Mike had entered her apartment the air had crackled with anticipation, the atmosphere a 180 degree difference from dinner at their place the week before. Laura had shifted a bit, wearing something loose and diaphanous, a little more sultry and open than last week.

They were all ready for more.

But not Mike’s level of more. Not yet. Having luscious sex with her and Mike in the next hour, spread out and spread eagle and licking and laving and loving and touching and thrusting? Sure.

Bare his soul and reveal the money and experience the unsettling feelings he still didn’t know how to cope with?

No way.

“Mmmm, what is that incredible aroma?” he nearly shouted as he came into her tiny kitchen. White tile floor, white formica counters, a cheap kitchen table and vinyl-covered chairs. Red and pink, of course. It looked like any kitchen in any apartment you’d expect a twenty-something corporate worker to live in, especially someone likely still paying off student loans.

You could fix that, a voice whispered. He quashed it.

“I’m no Italian cook,” she joked, pretending to be humble, “so I made chicken satay and pad Thai.”

“From scratch?” he and Mike said simultaneously, both with an incredulous tone.

She shrugged. “Sure. Just have to follow a recipe.”

Could they have found anyone better? She was already the whole package but add in the fact that she made her own Thai food and—wow.

“I, uh—you do like Thai food?” An alarmed look crept over her features.

“We love it,” they said.

Dylan looked at Mike. “Jinx!”

Everyone laughed. The pink shrimp Laura was throwing into the noodle dish matched, exactly, one of the stripes of pink on the dish towels. This was getting to be a bit much. He looked at her and realized she was staring at him, eyebrow cocked.

“What?”

“You keep peering around my apartment as if you were in a museum, surveying it.” Her eyes narrowed. “What’s going on?”

Shit. Caught. “It’s nice!” he said, a bit too cheery for everyone’s tastes. Mike grabbed a bottle of red wine he’d brought and began to uncork it, pretending not to pay attention to the interaction between the other two.

“Nice.” Uh, oh. There was no way to come out of this one on top, was there? He had to fess up.

“It’s really...pink.”

“Too pink?”

“Just right pink.”

Mike interrupted. “Laura, where are your wine glasses?”

She pointed to an upper cupboard. “Up there. The not pink ones,” she added dryly. Now he knew this was just a game. Two could play...

So could three. “Next time I’ll bring a rosé,” Mike muttered.

Dylan and Laura both did double takes. All three burst into laughter. “It is quite pink. Josie helped me decorate,” Laura explained, her smile so deep it made her cheeks look like apples, dimples forming and her eyes lighting up. Dylan loved that smile. Wanted to make her have it every waking moment.

And in her dreams, too.

As the guys set the table, Laura put the finishing touches on the meal, and the three dug in. “No dessert,” she announced.