Tyler laughed. “Niall texted a few hours ago, so I know payment will be here any minute.”
Lee shook his head. “Payment? That’s what you’re calling it?”
The mountains loomed behind them. The snow kept falling. Whoever was driving the girl here would have to navigate winding icy roads. The conditions weren’t ideal.
“Niall lost,” Tyler explained. “I don’t know why you’re so pissed at me.”
Lee’s blue eyes fired. “Because the payment is a girl. You bet an actual woman for us? And I don’t like that she’s coming here.”
Tyler grinned like a wolf. “I sure did. And she’s fucking gorgeous.”
“Like that makes this any better.”
“Want to see her picture again? Might help you commit to how real this is. How much you’re going to have her.”
Lee groaned, “I don’t need her picture. This is unorthodox. Even for you.”
“Relax.” Tyler patted the leather sofa. “She’s our guest.”
“An unwilling guest,” he reminded his friend. “I doubt she had a say in this entire thing.”
“Two months with us and I think that has the possibility to change.”
“We don’t even know her. What if she’s like Niall? Have you thought about that? She could be the scum of the Earth like him.”
“Stop being so damn pessimistic. I don’t like this Grizzly Adams side of you.”
“It’s called being realistic. You don’t know what the fallout from this is going to be. You think I’ve gone all wild man, but you’re reckless. Just because we’re out of the city doesn’t mean your actions don’t have consequences.”
Tyler shrugged. “Details.”
“While I’m trying to keep our empire going, you’re thinking with your cock as usual.” Lee swirled the bourbon in his glass and inhaled half of it. It burned going down. But he needed it to cope with what his best friend had done.
“Our empire needs an empress. Don’t you think?”
Lee pressed his elbows into his knees. It was hard to deny what Tyler said. The company didn’t run as smoothly when they were spinning in bachelor purgatory. They needed a woman. They thrived when they had one.
It had been too long since they had shared a bed.
But did that still apply out here? Would a woman complete the seclusion? Did he need a girl to fully immerse himself in his primal side? Was she the missing piece?
“We’ve never done it this way.” Lee looked up.
“Doesn’t mean, it’s not the right way.” Tyler was confident there was nothing wrong with his bet. Nothing to regret. Collecting his debt from Niall McIntosh was the only right thing to do as far as he was concerned.
“There was nothing else of Niall’s you wanted? Nothing at all?” Lee pressed him. The fact that a woman was getting ready to be delivered to the cabin wasn’t something he could picture.
Tyler scoffed. “Would you suggest I take one of his burned out warehouses or one of his taxi fleets? Maybe you’d suggest the taverns.” He shook his head. “He doesn’t have anything I want. Except this.” He waggled his eyebrows. “She’s flawless. You’ll see.”
“Then who let him in the game if he doesn’t have anything to gamble with? You should have known better than to let a loser like Niall McIntosh into a game with those kind of stakes. He didn’t have anything valuable from the start, Tyler.”
Tyler drank the rest of the bourbon in his glass. “He does. He has her. As far as I’m concerned she’s all the payment I need for sixty days.”
“This is fucking unbelievable. Sixty days with someone who is a stranger.”
Tyler laughed. He was always the risk-taker. Lee knew StarCon Global wouldn’t be where it was if his friend hadn’t been willing to try the adventurous deals. Make decisions no one else would touch. But it didn’t end with business decisions. Tyler let everything bleed over into his personal life. He seemed to like it best when his two worlds collided. That meant it melted into one, for Lee too.
Lee hated he had to the rational one. The one who kept his head down. The one who constantly brought his friend back on track.