Proving Paul's Promise

“Is she worth having?” Matt asks.

“I don’t know.” I shake my head.

“Do you want to find out?”

“I don’t know.” I drag a hand down my face.

“I never took you for being a quitter.”

I heave in a breath. “I’ve never quit anything on purpose. But this fight might be more than I want to take on.”

“Hell, you knew she had baggage. Layers. You told me you wanted to find out everything about her. Find out why she doesn’t have a family. Find out why she’s all alone in New York. Find out why she’s living in Pete’s spare room until tomorrow.”

I spin to face him. “She’s living with Pete and Reagan?” I didn’t know about that. “Why?”

He shrugs. “She had to move out of the dorm after graduation. They had an empty room. But Reagan’s parents are coming to stay for two weeks, so she’s going somewhere else.”

“Where?” I ask quickly.

He shrugs. “Does it matter?” But he’s grinning.

Fuck yeah, it matters. “Is she going to stay with one of the douchebags?”

“What douchebags?” Matt scratches his head.

“Never mind,” I say. Hope swells within me. I shouldn’t let it, but it does. I get out a piece of paper and write on it in magic marker:

ROOM FOR RENT

PRICE NEGOTIABLE

ONLY BEAUTIFUL LITTLE

BOMBSHELLS NEED APPLY

PREFERABLY ONES NAMED FRIDAY

I walk out of the back room and go to the bulletin board. I stick a thumbtack in the “advertisement” and walk away.

I hear a snicker from behind me and turn to grin at Logan.

You’re a d-o-o-f-u-s, he signs, fingerspelling the last word because there’s no sign for something so stupid.

I know, I sign back.

He looks a little worried for me, but I don’t care. I can’t get where I want to go if I don’t take a first step. Regardless of whether or not she’s pregnant, she needs a place to stay and I have two empty rooms. And she’s family, for Christ’s sake.

I’ve never wanted to eat out a member of my family, though. I scratch my head. I should probably stop thinking like that.

I whistle to myself as I walk to my office. I have some paperwork to do before my first appointment arrives. And I need to give Friday time to find my ad.

Friday

I’ve been working on a particularly tricky tat for a client, and I can’t quite get it right. I motion Logan over to take a look.

“What do you think?” I glance up at him. He pinches his lips together and shakes his head. “What?” I ask, throwing up my hands. “Use your words.”

Instead, he takes my pencil and spins the paper toward him. He draws on it for a second and then shoves it toward me. He hands my pencil back and grins.

“I hate you,” I say, when I see that he just added two lines and made my drawing perfect.

“I love you, too,” he says. He leans over quickly and kisses my forehead. I squeeze my eyes closed and let him.

He makes a noise and goes over to the bulletin board. He starts to draw little hearts around the edges of a posting. I tap his shoulder so he’ll look up. “What are you doing?”

“Adding hearts,” he says, like I should have guessed.

I tap him again so he’ll look at me. “Why are you doing that?”

He shrugs. “It needed hearts.”

“What needed hearts?” I ask. I lean closer so I can read the paper.

My own heart thuds. “It doesn’t need hearts,” I say. It needs condoms. Well, that is, if I’m not already pregnant. I look up at Logan. “He doesn’t know what he’s doing, does he?” I ask.

He squeezes my shoulder. “Go easy on him, will you?”

“Why?”

“He quit Kelly for you, Friday.” He glares at me. “Like, cold turkey. He quit her. He’s been f**king Kelly for years. And he broke things off with her.”

“How do you know all this?” I ask.

“We talk.” He gestures toward his brothers, who are all draped around the room like furniture. Really big, good-looking furniture.

“Of course, you do,” I say. I pull the thumbtack from the ad and take a deep breath.

“Go easy on him,” he says again.

“Fuck that,” I reply.

He grins and shrugs. “I can’t say I didn’t try.” He takes my shoulders and turns me toward Paul’s office. “Go Friday on his ass.” He slaps me on the butt while Pete and Sam snicker and high-five one another.

I walk to the back of the shop and knock on Paul’s office door since it’s closed. That usually means he wants to be left alone. “What?” he calls.

I open the door and stick my head in. “Do you always answer the door like that?” I ask.

“Yes,” he says. He has the phone balanced between his shoulder and his ear. “What do you want?”

“Are you on the phone?”

“On hold, Friday. What do you want?”

I slap the paper down on his desk and hold my flat palm over it. “What the f**k is this?”

He looks down at it. “That was a perfectly good invitation, until somebody f**ked it up with hearts,” he growls.

I look down at it. “I kind of like the hearts,” I admit.

“Next time, I’ll use hearts,” he says. He smiles.

“You’re looking for a roommate?” I ask. I toy with my lip piercing until his gaze lands there, and then I force myself to stop. “Since when?”