I closed my eyes, loving the idea of Brian being my man, smiled, and probably did it looking all doped up on something but I didn’t care, then I looked at him with that same smile and said, “I’ll answer to anything you wanna call me. Just don’t call me late for dinner.”

Brian stared at me, face serious through several blinks, then breaking into his own slow smile and laughing quietly through a shake of his head.

“Jesus. How long you been wanting to use that, babe?” he asked, arms squeezing me. “Honest.”

“Forever,” I confessed, laughing a little. “But I swear, no one ever set me up for it. It’s torture having a joke cued up and never being able to use it.”

“It’s a really bad joke.”

My eyes narrowed.

“It is not,” I argued. “It’s hilarious. You totally laughed.”

“I was laughing at you for using it, nut.”

“Don’t call me nut. I’m your girl.” I tilted my head. “Or Wild or babe.”

“Nut,” he added.

Eyes narrowing again, I leaned in close to whisper, “You might not know this, but over the past month I’ve thought a lot about sucking you off, Brian.”

His brows lifted in interest.

Knowing I had his attention, I continued on just as quietly.

“And I’d love to make that a reality, maybe even later on tonight, but you should know, I can go from wanting to suck you off to not wanting to suck you off in a second if you keep calling me nut. There are women out there who aren’t into that, the sucking-off part, and I don’t think you want me to become one of those women.”

I was feeling powerful in my speech. My chest was even puffed out a little.

Too bad I forgot how badly I wanted to suck Brian off, that being something else I’d dreamed about frequently, and the urge to see it through being something Brian was apparently well aware of, giving the triumphant little gleam flickering in his eyes as he stared back.

It was possible he was a mind reader and was watching me work out this predicament in my head.

It was also quite possible I’d spilled the beans on this dream of mine one night when we’d been getting each other off over the phone and I was so far gone, I’d shared my deepest darkest desires with him.

Brian smiled, licked his full, soft lips, then uttered, “Only way you’re keeping that sweet mouth off my dick is if I keep you off it, babe. We both know you’re hard up for it.”

My shoulders slumped in defeat.

Damn. He knew.

“But I’ll drop the nut,” he continued. “Doesn’t have the same ring to it as the other shit I call you.”

My chest puffed out a little again.

“Thank you,” I said. “I appreciate your sensitivity on this matter.”

He smiled bigger.

“Anytime.”

A door shutting at my back had me craning my neck to see behind me.

Tori was coming from the direction of Nate’s office with Nate on her tail, her eyes finding me and filling with approval once she took in whose lap I was sitting on.

She headed in our direction, smiling at Shay, who was avoiding the kitchen window and hanging out at the bar instead, filling salt and pepper shakers by the looks of it.

Nate was headed for the coffeemaker behind the bar, it appeared. He wasn’t looking my way yet.

Probably not best for your boss to see you canoodling with patrons the way Brian and I were canoodling. His hand was currently squeezing my ass and his other was settled between my legs, holding firm to the inside of my thigh.

I really didn’t want to move.

I also really liked having a job, and I needed this one considering the awful luck I was having finding an x-ray position locally.

Before I could be spotted and possibly fired, I slid off Brian’s lap and stood, spun around to face the booth, smoothed out the tiny apron I was wearing, then pulled out my ticket book and clicked open my pen.

“Good afternoon, sir. My name is Sydney and I’ll be your waitress today. Our specials are lobster linguini and the smokehouse burger. They are both super yummy. I eat them all the time.”

I smiled pleasantly and professionally at Brian, who was leaning back casually in the booth with one hand resting on the table.

He grinned beautifully.

I fought off the urge to molest him with my lips and fingers.

“Afternoon, kids,” Tori greeted, stepping up beside me.

She smiled at Brian and wrapped her arm around my waist.

“Potential, you had my best girl floating on cloud nine this morning. I kinda love you for that.”

I love you, too, I thought, so loudly I swore the words broke out through my ears and floated around me in little hope-filled bubbles where he could read them.

Brian looked to me and kept his eyes on my face. It appeared the words hadn’t slipped free.

I breathed a little easier and continued loving him quietly.

Tori gave me a squeeze. I turned to look at her.

“Schedule is up. Nate has you off on Tuesday, then on Sunday. He said depending on Kali, he might not need you on Saturday but to be prepared. She might not have a sitter that day.”

“Okay,” I replied, smiling.

That meant I could possibly have two days off in a row but I wouldn’t count on that. Normally if Kali wasn’t sure about a sitter, it meant she wouldn’t have one.

“You working with me any of those days?” I asked, sounding hopeful.

Tori nodded.

“All but Thursday. I’m on Tuesday.”

“Cool,” I replied.

Tori smiled, opened her mouth, and began echoing back a “cool,” but lost it when her eyes lifted and focused in on something behind me, then narrowed to tiny slits of fury at the same time as her mouth snapped shut and her lips curled in distaste.

Her “cool” came out sounding more like “crud.”

I turned my head and saw Jamie standing behind me.

Crud indeed.

His hair was damp and salt-water messy, and he was wearing tinted aviators.

Indoors.

Idiot.

I was still mad at him for screwing up his chances with Tori, especially after finding out exactly what happened this morning.

She walked in on him engaged in a threesome.

I almost threw up in my mouth hearing that. And even though I wanted to root for the best friend of my boy, I was having a hard time seeing any good side of Jamie to root for now that I knew he passed up an opportunity with my best friend to have a foursome.

Anyone who passed up spending any time with Tori was an idiot in my book. She was the best.

Jamie removed his sunglasses and tucked them in the front of his light gray tee, which I supposed was acceptable timing to remove sunglasses after entering a building, but I wasn’t admitting that, considering what I now knew, and went ahead thinking he was stupid for wearing them inside.

“Sunshine,” he greeted me, barely looking at me before he found Tori at my back. His hand lifted in question. “What the hell, Legs? You turn invisible or something last night? I looked all over for you.”

I turned to look at Tori.

She still had her eyes narrowed, but now had her hands on her hips and was leaning her weight on her right foot, looking sassy.

“Well, I’m not sure why you thought I’d be up some girl’s snatch, since that seemed to be the only place you were lookin’,” she tipped forward and hissed quietly, respectful of patrons but still delivering her cut with venom.