“She’s different from our other women,” Christian said.
“She’s not our woman, Christian. She’s attracted to both of us and we’re both attracted to her. Always, always, though, we know what we’re looking to get out of the situation and so does the woman we hook up with. Everything about Bayli is a total one-eighty for us. A complete crapshoot. Does she even know what we’re looking for? Did you give her any clue? And for that matter … is she a woman we just separately have? Or is she a woman we could jointly have?”
“Rory, slow down, man. You’re upset about the two of you hitting a glitch. Don’t stress so much. No, I haven’t alluded to anything with her. But she didn’t have any reservations letting me know there was chemistry between the two of you.”
Rory shoved a hand through his hair. “We were open about the fact that I knew she’d slept with you Saturday night. Neither of us was fazed.”
“And none of us are hiding anything.” Christian had always contended that Rory was the one to have the initial strong responses to the women they might want to share. In this instance, Christian had been the one to make that very first connection. But he seriously doubted that Bayli would have had sex with Rory just for the sake of having sex. Especially after sleeping with Christian the night before. There had to be a deeper meaning to it all.
He fully believed she was into both of them. And it was mutual on their end. So now they just needed to find some common ground. The show offered a perfect platform for that.
He told Rory, “Let me talk to her. See what’s really up. We both could have come on a bit too strong.”
“She thinks she’s some sort of inside joke between us. That she’s naïve and we’re viewing her as a small-town girl.”
“What exactly did you say to her?”
“I might have asked her if she was a virgin before you.…”
Christian’s lids squeezed tight. Then flew open. He polished off his second drink, snatched up the envelope Lily had delivered, and thrust it in Rory’s face. “You are the one who knows when we’ve found a woman we’ll both enjoy. And you never, ever fuck it up. So the fact that this one has you so turned around speaks volumes.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Christian whirled around and stalked toward the entryway, calling out, “I’m moving our dinner with Bayli to Thursday. Ought to give you enough time to get your bearings, lover boy.” He pushed open the door and stepped into the late-summer sunlight, already plotting his next move with Bayli Styles.
* * *
“What flavors do you have?”
Bayli stared at the girl before her, all blond and perky and staring at the large chalkboard propped on an easel that declared in bold font the day’s gelato selections.
But this was nothing new for Bayli, so she politely read, “‘Mango, pineapple, chocolate-vanilla swirl, and tiramisu.’”
“Hmm.” The girl’s lips pressed together. “And that’s all?”
“That’s all.”
There was a line forming behind the girl dragging her feet to commit to a flavor. Luckily, Ken Brooks was there to relieve Bayli at the end of her shift, so he jumped in to start helping the others. The blonde still couldn’t make up her mind.
“Would you like to try some samples?” Bayli offered.
“No. I’m just … not really sure I’m going to like gelato. It’s not really ice cream, right?”
“It’s Italian ice cream.” Bayli started to explain the difference, but then someone called out the girl’s name and her attention span disintegrated into a vapor trail and she wandered off while Bayli was in mid-sentence.
She stared at the blonde’s retreating back and then shrugged. It wasn’t the craziest thing to happen to Bayli while serving gelato in Central Park.
She turned to the back portion of the makeshift “shoppe” that was fully transportable and came equipped with a vibrantly colored umbrella, removed her apron, folded it, and stuffed it into a cubbyhole before grabbing her purse and slipping the strap across her body.
“Perfect timing,” came a deep, familiar voice from behind her. “Looks like you’re done for the day.”
Bayli’s nipples instantly puckered beneath her bra and the lime-green T-shirt that was pulled tight and knotted at her lower back, exposing a bit of skin between the hem and the waist of her faded low-rise jeans. Her hair was piled on top of her head in a messy updo that left long, wavy strands cascading along her temples.
She slid on her gold-rimmed aviator sunglasses and turned to face Christian. Instantly losing her breath at the sight of him, wearing black suit pants and a crisp white shirt, the sleeves rolled up to reveal his strong, sinewy forearms. He’d obviously left his cuff links, tie, and jacket in his car. His limo?
With a shake of her head, she tried not to fixate on the class difference between them. She’d gone off on Rory because he’d made her feel inferior, and she regretted it today. She knew that hadn’t been his intention. And Bayli usually wasn’t so sensitive. In fact, she was normally quite comfortable in her own skin. What Phillip and Colin had reiterated last night was the absolute truth: Bayli had done whatever was necessary to survive when growing up and taking care of her mother. She was proud of that.
The reason she’d been so off-kilter following her explosive encounter with Rory, however, had more to do with being thrust into both his and Christian’s world without having a solid understanding of what her purpose in it was. She wasn’t quite sure where the sexual relationships were going, because they were intense and significant to her—but was Bayli just another notch on their bedposts? And really, was that even a question to ponder after she’d once again botched it so badly with Rory?