Unwrapped

As many times as she’d heard him—both of them—talk about cute girls, now it took on a whole new meaning. “Which store?”

What cute girl? Whose eyes do I need to scratch out?

“Lorriman’s,” he said as she dug out the rectangular navy blue box and saw the gold foil lettering for herself.

“Lorriman’s? What could you possibly have gotten there?” She pried off the lid and gasped. Arranged on a swatch of silky navy blue sat the dangling sapphire-and-diamond earrings she’d coveted from the shop window when she and Matt had gone to a movie last month. “Are you crazy?”

“Now there’s gratitude talking.” Matt bumped her with his knee, but she didn’t laugh.

“Do you know how much these cost?”

“Yep, since I signed for them.”

“You’re nuts. I can’t accept these.” She closed the box and set it aside, though she was already envisioning them on her ears. Maybe with that long black off-the-shoulder dress that—

No. She would not accept such an outrageously expensive gift from a man who wasn’t her boyfriend. It wasn’t right.

And doing what you just did with them in this bed was? Wearing a pearl everything when you did the walk of shame into the shower?

She frowned and pushed the box a little farther away.

“There’s no expectation tied to them, you know,” he said, still munching chips. “I bought them before you walked in on me and Tris, by the way.”

“You did not.”

“I did so.”

“But you’re cheap,” she tossed back, glaring at him while he ate his snack as if he wasn’t the least bit concerned.

“Which is why I can afford them.” Matt bumped her again. “Put them on. And I promise, if you keep them, the only thing I’ll expect is maybe a couple more blowjobs. But only because you’re really good at them.”

The laughter bubbled out of her throat. “You’re such a pig.”

Tristan reached for another, bigger box and laid it on her lap. “Once you open mine, you can model both for us.”

She shot him a panicked glance. God, what was next?

Suddenly opening her gifts wasn’t as much fun as it usually was. Not when she didn’t think she’d be able to reciprocate in the way they expected her to.

She tore off the bright green-and-red-striped paper on Tristan’s present and opened the box. Inside was a luxurious robe, long and fluffy and lined in something thick and plush that felt like a bearskin rug and probably hadn’t cost much less.

“Tristan,” she said softly, overcome for the second time.

“Yours is all ratty.” He shrugged and rearranged the robe until she could see the monogrammed initials over the breast.

“CB?” Catching on, she grinned. “Oh man.”

“Monogramming was free.”

He shrugged again, smiling faintly.

“This is just too much.”

“See, this is a perfect example.” Matt crunched into his chips loudly behind them. “When I give her a gift, she starts ranting. You give her a gift, and it’s cooing and wet panties.”

She turned her grin on Matt. “I didn’t coo. And my panties aren’t on, so therefore they’re not wet.”

Which was kind of remarkable, now that she thought of it. The three of them were sitting around completely in the buff as if it was the most natural thing in the world, and they’d only been lovers for a little more than twenty-four hours.