B00AAOCX2E EBOK (6 page)

I shrugged. “Why? Because I said I used to get turned on by seeing a woman naked? Please, everybody does.”

“Yep, I get turned on by the sight of a naked woman all the time,” Ian agreed.

I scowled and rolled him off my lap. “I was speaking of being aroused, or at least curious, about someone of the same sex.”

Casey’s freckly nose wrinkled. “I never have.”

Ian grinned wide. “I have. In fact, Samuels, I’ve often wondered what your sweet little ass would look like bent over my bed.”

Casey looked like he had just sucked on a lemon. “Yeah… allow me to clear up the mystery. It’s flat, pasty, and firmly embossed with the words ‘Exit Only,’ thank you.”

“That had to be a painful process.” I motioned to the paper as Casey joined us on the grass. “Can I see that?”

Casey handed it over, and Ian scooted in closer to me so we could read it together. “I forgot this was coming out today,” Ian said.

“Me, too.” I found the story on page three, under the headline of MARS AND VENUS DUKE IT OUT ON THE AIRWAVES. “Ugh, that’s a horrible picture! We were supposed to look serious. Instead we look like we’re ready to tag-team someone.” The photo the staff shutterbug had taken of us standing back-to-back looked like something you’d see on a wrestling commercial, or a tacky reality show.

“Eh.” Ian shrugged and began reading. A minute later, he sneered. “Oh, that’s just great. Your quote took up half the article, while all I got was ‘In short, we’re no-nonsense advisors who are going to tell it like it is.’ What the hell? I talked to that asshole for twenty minutes.”

I frowned. “It’s short, but you were very succinct.”

“Succinct…I come out sounding like a monosyllabic asshole, while you come across as smart and fearless. Which I don’t disagree with, but still. ”

I bit my lip when he jerked away to lie on his side. I knew how much it bothered him that no one took what he did on the show seriously. He was right there, doing all the research with me, but his lighthearted spin on the more serious topics caused people to liken him to Psycho Mike, rather than Dr. Drew. His “succinct” comment had been followed by an explanation of how we weren’t going to gloss-over the truth to make our audience feel better, because coddling them wouldn’t answer questions many of them had since the onset of puberty, with no one to ask. Now why couldn’t the reporter have quoted him as saying
that
? It would have sounded a whole lot better than that clichéd statement about telling it like it is.

I folded the newspaper and put it aside. Scrambling for a topic change, I looked around. Casey’s T-shirt design was the first thing to catch my eye. “1s Turn Me On” I read.

“Yeah!” He beamed. “I think it’s going to be a huge seller.” Casey supplemented his income by designing shirts and selling them in an online marketplace.

“Why’s that?”

Casey pulled out the hem of his shirt to allow me a clearer view of the words. “Because it’s a play on binary function.”

I had no clue what that was. “Explain.”

“Okay, binary code is like a system of light switches that you turn on and off, depending on the series of ones and zeroes entered. Ones turn the switches on, zeroes turn the switches off. For example, this series of numbers in the background – 01000101 – is binary code for sixty-nine: off, on, off—”

“So it’s a programmer’s sex joke?”

Casey nodded with a proud smile. “Well, yeah, but it’s clever because there’s both a literal and figurative meaning. It’s funny, right?”

I looked into his sweet, eager face and nodded. “Sure.”

His smile dimmed. “No, it’s funny,” he insisted, “because the ones—”

I waved my hand. “No, yeah, I got it the first time.”

He still looked expectant when Amery arrived on the scene.

“I made it!” Amery declared, plopping down with a loud huff.

Casey’s expression brightened. “Help me out, Goldilocks.” He pulled out his shirt again. “So check out my shirt…”

I felt a tug on my hair and turned to find Ian’s earnest green eyes peering up into mine. “Sorry. I don’t mean to take my frustration out on you.”

I pretended to glare, then pushed a laugh through my nose and leaned forward to give him a smacking kiss on the forehead. “It’s all good, Dorkbutt. We’re cool.”

“See, Giselle, you’re a natural.” I gave the athletic brunette standing before me an encouraging smile as she finished rolling the condom down one of the demonstrators suction-cupped to our table. I plucked a selection of condoms from the generous supply of samples provided by Trojan for the festival. “Now, take some of these and use one every single time. I don’t care how many times he tells you they don’t fit. If they can stretch a condom over a two-liter bottle of Coke, then your boyfriend can stretch one over his junk.”

“Thanks.” Giselle put the condoms into the front pockets of her jeans and moved on to another table. I leaned down to take a sip of my coffee. To my side I saw Amery was helping a sweaty, red-faced girl whose arms quivered as she struggled to get the condom on the model. Amery winced and reached her hands out, as if she wanted to help the poor girl, only to pull them back. She winced again and glanced over at me. Her brown eyes showed white all around. “My God!” she mouthed, making a face of horror. Her bubbly grin popped back into place when the girl looked up, then twisted into a grimace when the condom snapped against the model in a way that would have been terribly painful if it had been attached to a living, breathing male.

At long last, the girl managed to get the condom on the demonstrator, although it looked a little worse for the wear and completely unusable.

“Yeah, that was… good.” Amery smiled as she handed the girl a pamphlet outlining the proper steps to putting on a condom. “Maybe just review this a few times.”

I sidled up to her after the girl turned away. “Wow.”

Amery gave me a traumatized look. “I know, right? That was just painful.”

I watched the girl as she walked away with her nose buried in the pamphlet. “Poor thing.”

“Her or me? Because I feel like I need a drink. Or a Xanax. I swear, my cortisol levels shot through the roof just watching that, and you know what cortisol does for weight gain.” Amery huffed and ran her hands through her long, white-blonde hair, shaking it out.

I rolled my eyes. As if Amery had to worry about weight gain. I’d once seen her eat an entire pizza by herself and not gain an ounce. And even if she did gain a pound or two – or fifteen – she’d still be one of the most beautiful girls I’d ever met in real life. I swear, she was so stinkin’ pretty it was almost uncomfortable to look at her. Unlike me, she’d been graced with a delicate, slightly upturned nose, naturally pouty lips, and had a dewy, fresh-faced complexion that screamed Hollywood starlet.

But she had no interest in the big screen, or even a small one. While she was majoring in broadcast journalism, she wanted to run things from behind the scenes, which I thought was a shame. I could totally envision her as the host of E! News or something in that vein, prancing around the red carpet in a high fashion gown, interviewing Hollywood’s A-listers.

Amery chuckled and lifted her chin to our right. “Check out Casey.”

I followed her gaze to where Casey sat under the shade of a tree a few yards away from our table. One of his very long legs was extended before him and the other was bent, but he kept adjusting the angle of it. When he finally seemed happy with the angle, he leaned his head back against the tree trunk and looked to the side. He gave a leering grin to… well, I’m not sure whom it was directed at, winked, and lifted his chin in a perfunctory nod. His brows dipped into a frown and his body sagged, but then he rolled his shoulders and repeated the entire process again, this time adding an awkward shrug.

“What is he
doing
?”

Amery’s eyes twinkled and she rubbed her pink glossed lips together. “Look at Ian,” she said in an undertone, her lips barely moving, “and
then
look at Casey.”

I made a casual turn. Ian sat on the surface of our cafeteria-style folding table, his back and head resting against a sturdy aluminum pole staked into the grass. His body position mirrored Casey’s as he flirted with some giggly freshman girls. But while Casey looked stiff and awkward, Ian’s body was relaxed, his movements fluid, his grin natural and effortless.

I looked back at Amery. “Ah, yes.” I glanced at Casey, whose hawk-like gaze studied Ian’s every move.

Amery shook her head. “You know, he’d have no problem meeting girls if he stopped trying so hard to be cool. Look at Connor.”

I perked up at the mention of Casey’s twin brother. Connor went to school up in Flagstaff, but occasionally came down to visit. Physically, Casey and Connor were about as identical as twins could be: tall, wiry bodies, with shaggy, chin-length black hair, dark brown eyes, square jaw lines, and freckles on every visible inch of their bodies. And yet, one could easily tell one brother from the other based on their personalities alone. Casey was a freakishly smart computer wiz, who was a little goofy and socially awkward. Connor, on the other hand, was a confident, laid-back snowboarder who gave off a sexy, cool-guy vibe that made girls get all doe-eyed and swoony.

Amery and I knew from experience – we’d both been sucked in upon first meeting him.

Amery released a dreamy sigh. “Connor, Connor, Connor….”

I echoed her sigh. “So close and yet, so far away.”

Our eyes met and we dissolved into laughter. Connor had become a kind of in-joke, someone we pretended to get all hot and bothered by, mainly just for shits and giggles.

Amery took a drink from her bottled water and returned her attention to Casey. She assessed him with a slightly sly smile. “I will say, though, Casey’s starting to beat Connor in the upper body area. Have you noticed how his chest and shoulders have been filling out since he started moving the computers to the new tech building?”

I hadn’t. And I was a little surprised Amery had. She rarely had anything positive to say about Casey’s physical appearance.

I was about to remark on that fact when I caught a flash of red out of the corner of my eyes. I turned to see a statuesque girl with fiery red hair walking up to Ian with purpose gleaming in her cat-like eyes. She pushed herself right in front of the freshman girls and grabbed a condom. Flashing Ian an inviting grin, she leaned down, giving him a clear view of her cleavage, and pulled a Sharpie out of her back pocket. She scribbled something down on the foil packet – presumably her number – and then put it into Ian’s hand with a prolonged look before scampering off.

I scowled.
Shameless redheaded whore.
“What the hell is wrong with these girls? I mean, Ian makes no bones about the fact that he doesn’t do relationships, and yet, they throw themselves at him like goddamn groupies. They know it’s not going anywhere.”

Amery shrugged. “They’re all secretly hoping they’ll be the one to change him.”

“They’d have better luck trying to nail Jell-o to a tree.”

Amery snickered.

“And then some are just redheaded sluts.” My sneer deepened. “She made no effort to hide what she’s after.”

Amery arched a brow at me. “Yeah, it was direct and a little skanky, but what do you have against the gingy girls?”

I paused, wondering that myself. “Nothing. They’re just really rubbing me the wrong way this week.”

***

Luna’s was my favorite restaurant in town, hands down. It had a rustic, log-cabin décor I found charming, and a casual, earthy feel that was warm and inviting. The menu, a delicious selection of bread bowls and oversized, oven-toasted sandwiches came in large portions, and they were dirt-cheap, too.

The lunch crowd was in full swing when we arrived, but luck was smiling down on us. A large group slid out of a booth as we entered, and Ian quickly snagged it.

I inhaled the mixed scents of coffee and freshly-baked bread, and sat down next to Amery. Chelsea took the outer end. She’d come to find me after SHAZ-Fest, reporting a very successful meeting with the Winter Queen selection committee. We decided to make it a group lunch to celebrate.

“Go hog wild, guys,” Amery said as Casey and Ian took their seats across from us. She opened up her menu and put it between us. “Lunch is on me.”

Casey’s eyes lit up. “Far be it from me to turn down a free meal, but what’s the occasion?”

“No occasion. Daddy just sent me a fat check for my birthday.”

Amery’s father was a big time art dealer in Manhattan. She rarely heard from him, but he always made sure his secretary paid her bills and sent her generous gifts at holidays.

“Must be nice,” Ian remarked under his breath right as a waitress with blue hair and three piercings in her nose came to take our orders.

When the waitress was gone, I frowned at Amery. “Your birthday’s in October.”

“Yep. That’s my dad,” she said in a mock-proud tone. Her smile dimmed as her gaze lowered to the menu. “Actually, yesterday was the anniversary of my mom’s death. He always has fresh flowers delivered to her grave. His secretary must have read my name on the calendar instead. Amery, Amelia; I can see how she made the mistake.”

Amery continued to study the menu, but I saw her bite her lip. I knew she was missing the mother she barely remembered; someone who might have paid attention to her, rather than using a secretary as an intermediary. Shaking it off, she looked up. “So whatever, lunch is on me.”

“Thank you,” I said.

“Yeah, thanks, I’m starving,” Ian said, drumming his hands on the table.

I rolled my eyes. “You had a scone a few hours ago.” He’d snagged the remainder of mine while I wasn’t paying attention.

“Half a scone and a bagel for breakfast, too. I’m still starving.”

I shook my head. “What are you, a bottomless pit? You better watch it, or you’re going to get fat, and then there go your bimbos.”

Ian scowled, but it quickly transformed into a diabolical grin. He dipped into his water to retrieve a piece of ice and held it up menacingly.

I shot upright in my seat. “Don’t you
dare
!”