Page 94 of Nothing to Deny
“No.” She exhaled. “Let’s forget it, this is a problem for way down the road.”
Maybe in time he’d get used to being with her. And the twins would find out the enormity of her means, Abel would too.Would his family demand he kick her to the curb just because she had money?
“It is, so no more money talk.” His embrace had loosened, so he tightened it up again, squashing her against him. “For this vacation. That’s my rule. We can talk about anything else, just not the money stuff.”
And she’d given him rules that he’d followed. It wouldn’t be fair to refuse his request. Especially when it was clear the only place this path led was to an argument. No drama.
He bowed to kiss her. The slow rhythm of his tongue was an apology and a reassurance. The issue wasn’t going to be easily resolved, but he wanted to be with her, she could taste it in the possession of his mouth.
When he lifted his head, he met her eye, almost looking for acknowledgement they were okay, that they were over it. She smiled, which was enough. The groove in his cheek warmed and he took her hand to start walking again.
“Will you tell me about your friendship with Nickson?”
“We didn’t have a friendship, nothing deep and meaningful.” Those last words were almost mocking, not her, just that men like him didn’t have those kinds of friendships. Maybe he would if he didn’t spend all his time—no, no more thinking like that. “He was a colleague.”
“So you never talk to the guys?”
“Sometimes we hang out. Once in a while there’s a function or event and we’re all there. We double date, that kind of thing. And Conrad throws parties at the office sometimes, we’d all get together, drink, laugh, play poker sometimes… Squires has a regular turnover. Sure, there are some guys who’ve been there longer than me, but a lot of the young guys drift in and out.”
As they needed money, no doubt.
“So there’s a good chance you won’t be able to appeal to his sense of morality.”
“Don’t even know if he has one, babe. What I do know is he seems pretty pissed this happened.”
“It’s not your fault; it’s not anyone’s fault. And it wouldn’t be a problem if he’d only told Kelly the truth. Holly asked…”
“Holly asked what?”
“If we knew for sure that he’d stopped, that he wasn’t seeing other women.”
“Money’s appealing, so it’s possible. ‘Specially with a wedding to pay for.”
He said that like it was no big deal the guy might be selling his body while also committing himself to a fiancée. How did that work? And just for the sake of clarity, it did matter. A lot.
Which took her head right back to her and Baer. If he thought it was no big deal, might he want to keep working when they were wedding planning? She couldn’t marry a man who had other sexual relationships, paid or not.
“Could you ask Conrad?”
“Nick’s not on Squires books right now. I double checked on that. But there are other gigs in town.”
He’d told her that before. She hadn’t known there was one male escort agency, turned out there wasn’t, there were several. People really could pay for any service they wanted. Bet Roxie, a new New Yorker, knew that. Didn’t stack up well as a native, did she?
“Because you know that changes everything,” she said. “His past? Okay. His present…” Very not okay, more so because his fiancée was ignorant to the whole deal. “They’re supposed to get married.”
And that sort of hung in the air. Without her saying it aloud, she inadvertently conveyed a message. The situationwasn’t supposed to be about them, and yet somehow it kept coming back to their relationship.
“I’ll ask around.”
“You don’t think Nickson would be honest if we asked?” As soon as the words were out, their ridiculousness clanged in her skull. She’d only met the guy a day ago, and the only thing she knew about him was his proclivity for dishonesty. “You should ask around.”
“Yeah.”
She bumped against him to get his attention just long enough to share a smile. Nothing had changed about her attraction to him, or her feelings. Yet her concern was twitchy. It wasn’t such a bad thing for relationships to hit sticky spots, but theirs was a doozy. What would Roxie do?
THIRTY
ALAN ARRIVED AFTER dinner. The distraction was enough to inflate the mood again. Her uncle spoke at length about their walk, sparing just a few comical side glances her way. He hadn’t called her out for disappearing with Baer, which she appreciated, but he hadn’t missed their impromptu departure either.
