It didn't take long before Natalia’s fork clattered onto the plate in front of her. “Frankie saw my whole rack, didn’t he?”
“Likely,” I admitted. Leave it up to her to break the ice. “And what a rack it is.”
She shook her head, smiling. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you.”
“No, don’t you dare,” I said. “You don’t need to apologize to me, or to anyone. It’s no one else’s business. I’m sorry, we just—when you didn’t hear the fire alarm—”
“Mateo pulled that shit out of his ceiling when the battery started dying.”
“Completely valid.”
The corner of her mouth twitched upward. “We’ve been keeping the whole cam thing between us for obvious reasons. I just don’t want you to think I was afraid of your reaction, because I totally wasn’t, Phee. I knew you’d be a rockstar about it.”
“It was just—shocking,” I told her. “Old Saint Dick’s…dick was all up in my face.”
She cackled. “Was it as big as Frankie’s?”
“Isn’t it a conflict of interest to talk about your boyfriend’s best friend’s dick?”
“You’ve seen my guy’s, your guy has seen mine. We should all just stand naked in a room together and get it over with.”
“That sounds like an orgy.”
Nat took a sip of her drink and pondered something. “How comfortable are you in front of a camera?”
“I love you, but absolutely not.” I snorted. “With my luck, my vagina would get plastered all over Pine Ridge by the parent-teacher association and they’d protest outside my house with pitchforks. My siblings already pretend I don’t exist. Imagine if that became my legacy.”
She frowned. “Worth a shot.”
“You guys look like you have it all in the bag without us,” I joked. “I’m sorry we found out the way we did, but I’m selfishly glad I know.”
“I am too.” She let out a deep breath. “Having no one to talk to about it is exhausting. I feel like I’m tiptoeing around constantly.”
Nat was one of four in a strict, traditional family. Every sister had their father wrapped around their finger, but there wasn’t a doubt in my mind that neither Nat, Camilla, Isabella or Mia would want to deal with the cardiac arrest Mr. Russo would experience knowing one of his daughters was selling sex.
“What is it like?” I asked around a spoon of yogurt. “Since when?”
“I was so sick of working in that bank every day. I just wanted to be in control of my own money and time. I needed freedom. This ass is too perfect to be sitting on it all day.”
“Understandable.”
“I was doing it on my own for a little while before I met Matty. Just some solo stuff, live camming, photos. When we started dating I didn’t tell him, and I stopped performing because I was head over heels and I didn’t want to jeopardize it. But then I was back to the same shit job, and I wasn’t happy anymore. Mateo noticed.”
“As any good man would.” I refilled both our empty drink flutes with the pitcher.
“So I just fucking told him.” She shrugged. “I said, I love you but I hate my job, and before you I was making a lot of money doing the cam thing. I knew it wasn’t for everyone but it was for me—and I wanted him to love all of me.”
“Obviously I know the ending of this fairy tale.”
“He made me quit the bank the next day," she said. “Everything has always been so easy with Mateo. I knew right then it was him or nothing. That’s my lifer.”
My heart swelled. “Now you’re gonna make me cry.” I sighed, swiping under my eyes. “You and your money-making titties are making me cry.”
We used to lay in bed and manifest having the kind of relationship Nat was in now. Through hook-ups, break-ups, dating a different guy every semester of college, planning our weddings on corkboards when we got snowed into our dorms that one freak October at CSU.
I was so happy for her.
Guilt twinged in my gut, however. Because no matter how elated and excited I was, a piece of me still burned with jealousy. Wondering if I would ever feel that all-encompassing, ride-or-die kind of love.
“Mateo was just the cameraman at first, but then he got a little possessive.” She laughed. “People really responded to the two of us together, and that little bit of wild in our relationship keeps it fun. Plus, now we’re swimming in it.”
“So the boys don’t actually do cyber security?”
“Oh, no, that’s legit. Matty has our network so wired that if anyone tried to find us they’d be looking in a rainforest in Southeast Asia.”
“You two are like the dream team.”
Natalia winked. “God, I would kill to be a fly on the wall for his conversation with Frankie.”
There was no coming back from walking in on our friends engaged in Christmas-themed coitus. We might have been able to recover after the cookie debacle, but I was fairly positive Frankie’s blue balls had turned to snowballs, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the type of person who would pay to watch the Clauses do it doggy style.
“What I can tell you for sure is that seeing his roommate half-naked in a Santa suit sucked every last ounce of libido from his body.”
“Were you fucking?” Her eyes widened.
“Not yet.”
“You fucking slut.”
“Hey!” I tossed a polenta fry at her. “You know what he asked me? To be friends with benefits while I’m here.”
“You’re saying this like it was Frankie’s bright idea, when, hello!” She pointed at her face. “I was the first person to tell you to take advantage of the hassle-free dick.”
Natalia was about the furthest thing from coy, and her voice carried through the dining area like an echo. I glanced around and met the shocked glances in our direction with a shy, apologetic smile.
“I was worried it would get too messy,” I reminded her. “I don’t have the emotional bandwidth to be let down in both Colorado and Coconut Creek. This is a vacation.”
“But you’re gonna do it.”
I hid my embarrassment. “Yeah.”
“You fucking slut,” she repeated with a jovial smile.
How Frankie managed to convince me so quickly probably had something to do with the fact that I couldn’t look him in the eyes without wanting to melt into them. I was crazy to think I’d make it three weeks without crumbling.
Less than one.
I was not the face of unwavering stances. Trying to convince myself not to sleep with him after he got me off in the Atlantic was like convincing myself not to color code all my lesson plans. AKA, not happening.
I wanted Frankie to make me come again. Kill me for it.
“We laid some ground rules. No confusion, no questions, and no attachment.”
Natalia bit down on the edge of her straw and regarded me across the table. I’d seen that look before. Her “sounds like trouble” look. One I didn’t entirely disagree with, but was choosing to ignore for purely selfish reasons.
“Listen, I don’t know too many details,” Nat said somberly. “But I know his ex screwed him up, and he hasn’t dated anyone since. I don’t think the guy’s so much as gotten a blowjob since.”