“He came with the house.”
“This house is fuckin’ amazing. I would kill to live in a place like this. You own a house like this?”
“My family owns several. Even bigger and badder. In Florida, where the beaches are much warmer. Northern California beaches aren’t like real beaches. They’re fucking freezing most of the time.”
She twirls a finger into his hair. “You own houses in Hawaii, too? That would be my beach of choice.”
“Yeah, we’ve got a place on Maui.” Eric nods toward Tony. “How many places does your family own?”
Tony gives a small grin. “Is that some kind of proxy for dick size?”
I can’t help but chuckle and end up coughing on my drink, which is actually quite tasty.
“Drin
k it slow,” Tony tells me. “You can’t taste it, but there’s a lot of alcohol in a Long Island Iced Tea.”
“I’m telling you, you’ll thank me later,” Eric says as he rubs Sierra’s lower back. “So you really a model?”
Sierra nods and nestles farther against him.
“My last girlfriend was a lingerie model. Super high maintenance. Always on a different diet. Drove me fuckin’ crazy with it. I couldn’t eat a burger without her talking about carbs and shit.”
“I love hamburgers.”
He had a few of his buttons undone on his shirt, and she swirled a finger in the opening where his chest hairs were visible.
“Yeah? What else do you love?”
They seem to have forgotten Tony and I were still there. I take another sip of my drink.
After a long minute, he reaches for the box on the coffee table and offers me a cigar. “Would you like one?”
I shake my head. Although North Carolina is known for its tobacco, I’m not a smoker.
“Mind if I smoke?”
I do, but I’m just a guest. Maybe not even that. I’m a purchase. So I shake my head and watch him light the end of a cigar.
Eric looks up. “If you like cigars, I’ll send you a box of Arturo Fuente. See how you like ’em. They’re Florida-based.”
Sierra slides her hand under his shirt, drawing his attention. I clear my throat. It’s clear she and Eric are going to be getting it on. How in the world do I start with Tony? Should I try to get it over with sooner rather than later? Is he expecting I’ll make the first move?
I study how his middle finger curves under the cigar, and how his forefinger rests over the top of it to keep it in place. He has masculine hands, I decide. But there’s a certain grace to the way he holds the cigar.
Maybe I should try to get to know him a little better? Get him to like me? Then again, he chose me so quickly out of all the women, he can’t not like me, right?
“Is Virginia your real name?” he asks after a silence that seems to last forever but doesn’t seem to bother him.
“Yes,” I reply, not sure if it’s a good sign or not that he’s asking me questions.
“What’s your last name?”
I consider giving a fake name, but he could easily access the hotel payroll to get my full name, birthdate, and social.
“Mayhew. Actually, it’s Mayhew-Porter. Mayhew’s my biological mother’s name. Porter is my adoptive family’s name.”
“You have an accent.”