I laughed. “Think about it? Who else is ever going to jump into this crazy scheme of yours? And, by the way, the clock is ticking. We’re already in the first week of November. Tick tock, Charlie.”
He shook his head once again. “Eddie, gimme a shot of Jack, would ya?”
Eddie poured him a shot and he downed it in one single gulp.
I touched his arm. “Listen, Charlie, marriage is huge. We’ll have to shack up for two years and you’re basically keeping me hostage. We’ll naturally bicker about the chores, money, and you leaving the toilet seat up. If I’m gonna have to deal with that for twenty-four long months, I deserve to be fairly compensated. Fifty percent of the misery equals fifty percent of the profits.”
“Oh, you’ll be well-compensated. I’m very well endowed.” He leaned closer and winked, glancing down at his groin.
I followed his gaze without meaning to and coughed to clear my throat and buy myself some time to find the words I needed. “That brings us to a very important point. No sex allowed.”
He sat there wearing a shocked expression. “Huh? For two whole years? But I’m so madly attracted to you, and—”
“Don’t make me take you down to the pet shelter and have Lisa neuter you. If I can do it, so can you.”
His gaze narrowed. “So let me get this straight. You want a million dollars, no sex, and you want me neutered too?”
“No, I don’t want you clipped. Just the first two things you mentioned.”
He leaned against the low back of the barstool. “A cool million and no sex?”
I nodded and he groaned.
“Think about it.”
He leaned closer and whispered into my ear. “Fine. You drive a hard bargain.”
r />
I smiled as he gave in.
“I’ll give you the million. It’s all yours, but you can’t leave me dying in a desert. A man needs water. I’ll die. I’ll fucking die, just...wither away. You can’t expect me to live with the most beautiful woman on the planet and never touch you. Is this your way of punishing me for all my bad-boy ways?”
“Don’t be so dramatic. It’s just best for us to stay friends, without getting emotionally involved. You have to admit, you get hit on more than a whack-a-mole at a fair.”
He slammed back another shot. “Now you’re comparing me to a carnival game?”
“You know what I mean! I can’t handle you flirting with women and sleeping with them practically in my face. The last thing I want is for either of us to end up with hurt feelings.” Or me for that matter because I knew in the end I’d be the one walking away with a broken heart.
“But you’ll have a million bucks!”
I sighed. “Listen, money isn’t everything.”
“True, but it’ll sure help out my life immensely. And yours too.”
“I don’t want us to lose our friendship over a fake marriage,” I said quietly. “No amount of dead presidents is worth that, Charlie. You do understand that, right?”
He shook his head and turned back around to stare at our reflections in the mirror behind the bar. “I appreciate you’re doing me a huge favor by marrying me,” he said slowly, “but you can’t take sex off the table. You have no idea what you’ll be missing out on...and it’s actually great on the table, by the way.”
I titled my beer bottle back and forth before scooting around on my stool to face him fully. “Hmm. I’ll tell ya what. Try and convince me over the next week or two to convince me to put sex back on the table.”
He smacked his open palm on the bar with a grin. “Challenge accepted.”
“Well, in that case, what’s first on the agenda?”
“To show you that this connection between us simply can’t be ignored.”
“I’m not denying that there’s something brewing between us. I’m just saying we both need to not act on it, for the sake of our marriage.”