“Okay, okay, your turn.  Hit me with your best shot.”

“Only one appropriate prize comes to mind.  You’re going to owe me a dick pic.”

He hooted with laughter, spilling me out of his lap and onto the couch, and standing up.  “You don’t have to ask me twice.”  His hands went to his fly.

I slapped his arm.  “I’m not finished.  Not just any dick pic.  I’m going to text you, it could happen at any time, and no matter when it does happen, you have to run somewhere private, take a dick pic, and send it to me.”

“That’s evil.  What if I’m in the middle of a show?”  He sat down again, pulling me back onto his lap.

“This will count for both of my wins, both of my prizes, so even if you’re in the middle of a show, you have to do it.  You’ll get a ten-minute window.  And your face has to be in the photo.  And there has to be something in the picture to timestamp it.”

“You are one diabolical woman, but I suppose I have to do it.  You were a good sport about that song.”

His finger was tilting my chin up again, his warm smiling eyes making their mark on me.  Again.  I wished he would stop doing both.  One was distracting, the other riveting.

More weapons in his endless arsenal.

“What am I going to do with you?” I asked him, voice breathless, lungs breathless.

He took the air right out of me.  And the fight.

“It boggles the mind,” he said with a smile, though his hoarse voice contradicted the playful line.

He ran his nose along my jaw, breathing on me.  “We’re friends, right?  This is going well, don’t you think?”

The man was demented.  “By what criteria are we judging it?  If going well means we’ve both lost our ever-loving minds, then yes, I guess it’s going well?!  If we’re basing it on us being just friends, we’re failing epically.”

He pulled back from me and grinned, just looking tickled by my answer, the stubborn man.  “Don’t be so salty.  We’re getting along great, and we’re having so much fun.  Tell me you didn’t miss this.  I dare you.”

That I couldn’t do, unless I became a much better liar in the next five seconds, and as for the dare, psh, I wasn’t falling for it.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

We ate bacon wrapped jalapeño poppers, and then, because he harassed me into doing it, I gave him a tour of my house.

I’d forgotten that I’d let the neighbor’s orange tabby in earlier, but I remembered as I was showing him my small home office, and we found him, passed out on his back, sleeping under my desk.

Tristan, who loved all cuddly creatures, went for him with a smile, picking up the cat, and stroking it without even seeming to disturb the animals limp sleep.  Magic hands and all that.

He looked up at me, cat cradled in his arms like a baby.  “What’s its name?”

My mind went blank.  It was over all the time, but I just called it kitty, and thought of it as the orange tabby.

I improvised.  “I call him Ginger, on account of the orange hair.”

He laughed, and sent me an odd look.  “Um, Danika, this cat is a girl.  How on earth do you not know that you have a girl cat?”

I chewed my lip, not wanting to tell him.  It was embarrassing, but oh well.  “It’s the neighbor’s cat.  I just let it hang out here when I’m around.”

He set Ginger down, laughing so hard that he stayed doubled over.  “Oh my God!  You stole your neighbor’s cat?”

I was defensive.  “Borrowed.  And she has, like, thirty cats.  I doubt she even misses her.  I travel too much to get any of my own pets.”

He just kept laughing.

After a while, I was laughing with him.  Even I could see that it was funny as hell, and that was with the joke at my expense.

“See, this is why it’s handy to have a man,” he finally said, moving to sprawl out in the chair behind my desk.  He looked ridiculous in it, it was so small, and he was the opposite.  In fact, the whole room suddenly looked as small as a closet, with his larger than life presence dominating it.

“I’m not following,” I said wryly.

“Well, I’ll just throw this out there.  Crazy cat lady next door is single, right?”

I nodded.  “What, you think the cats scared all the men off?

“She’s not single because she has thirty cats.  The one happened after the other, I guarantee it.  And if she had a man, he would have stopped the crazy cat train after, like, four, five tops.  So you see, men can be handy to have around.”  He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively, sending me into peals of helpless laughter.

“That’s an interesting way to look at it,” I gasped.  “Are you getting at something in particular?”

“Yes.  You should let me live with you.  I know you love pets, and I’ll stifle the crazy cat urges before they even start.  And I cook.”

I shook my head at him, still smiling, as I backed out of the room.  “You’re impossible,” I called out to him, as I moved down the hall, towards the next stop in the tour.

I didn’t even have to look, I could feel his presence behind me.

My mouth twisted as I showed him my room.  I hadn’t cleaned it, hadn’t made my bed.  I wasn’t messy, but it was messy tonight, due to all of the wardrobe changes and the mast***ation session.