Page 70 of A Lucky Shot

His hands had been all over those muffin tops and didn’t think they needed hiding. “The tops are the best part. I always eat those first.”

“Stop it,” she said, but he could see her own smile as she looked away.

Libby pulled a pickled asparagus out of the Caesar the server dropped off and waggled it between Josh and Stephen. “So, how long has this been going on?” she asked, parroting his question back to him. “You two lovebirds meet on set?”

“Do you want to tell the story of how we met, darling?” Stephen batted his lashes at Josh.

Josh sighed at the bottom of his drink. He almost wished he’d ordered alcohol. A double. “Nope.”

“So sweet. After all these years, he still lets me do the honours,” Stephen said, and Josh dodged the fist Stephen aimed to chuck at his chin. “I was working on a film a few years back, and we were getting hosed by one of our contractors. Josh was called in as our legal advisor.”

“Legal advisor?” Cass whipped her head around and looked at him like a pair of horns had sprouted out of his temples. “You’re …”

“A blood-sucking lawyer,” Stephen finished with a wide grin.

Fuck, Stephen loved bringing this up. “Former. I don’t practice anymore,” Josh said firmly.

Libby leaned forward with her elbows on the table. “I feel like there’s a story here.”

“It’s not that interesting.” And not that high on his list of stories to retell.

“You never mentioned this,” Cass said, an odd look on her face.

“Don’t hold it against me. Anyway, new topic.”

“Okay. How’s pimping out my best friend coming along?” Libby asked.

Fuck’s sake. Not that topic. Josh glared at her. “It’s not pimping.”

“It’s kind of pimping,” Stephen said.

“Did Cassie tell you about the baby daddy fiasco?” Libby asked innocently.

She had fucking not. “A what now?”

Stephen lit up. “There’s a baby daddy fiasco? I need to hear about this.”

“Date fourteen,” Cass sighed. “This guy had all these names tatted up his arm. It turns out he has five kids from four different mamas. My guess is that he had the names tattooed, so he didn’t forget them like some absent-parent version of Memento. I don’t know if he was specifically looking for baby mama number five, but he dropped a lot of hints on how virile he was and how many women fell over him.” Cass shuddered as she sipped her cocktail. “He licked my face at the end of the night.”

“What the fuck?” Josh jerked. The baby mama drama she’d told him. The face licking and the potential baby mama recruitment had been left out.

“Ah. This was spicy daddy,” Stephen said, nodding sagely.

Fuck that. If anyone was, he was her spicy daddy. Not that he wanted her to call him daddy. Well, maybe … He shifted in his seat. “You knew about this?” Josh directed his anger between Libby and Stephen equally. “Can we get back to the face licking?”

“No,” the trio replied in unison.

Cass gave him a bemused look. “Have you not had to deal with a weird date before?”

“Not ones where my dates were mauling me.”

“Besides,” Libby said, thumbing a bit of foam from Stephen’s moustache, “before you find your prince, you need to lick a few frogs. Or vice versa.”

“I don’t think that’s how that expression goes, but I’m willing to play along,” Stephen offered, and Libby grinned wickedly back.

“No more talk of licking,” Josh said.

Cass asked. “I can fend off a little?—”

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