Page 84 of The Boss

“Isn’t it wonderful that we can spend time together with our women like this?”

I almost combust. I may have a lot of respect for Presley, but the way she talks about our fellow females is not one of those realms. Her mouth is usually much bigger than the feet she shoves into it. “It’s certainly something,” I say.

“Seriously, Jules, I understand how you feel now. I may be falling in love with Cher.”

They haven’t been gone from dinner for five fucking minutes and Presley is already torturing me with this shit.

“I never said that I was in love with Alessa,” I remind her. “Not like that.”

“Yeah, yeah, and I don’t have at least five strip clubs around here. Or is it six? Shit, I can’t remember.”

“Cher knows about them, right?” The last woman my business partner “seriously” dated had no idea what she was getting intowhen it came to Presley’s lust for, well, lust. She puts me to shame sometimes.

Presley shrugs. “Know what I love about her? Nothing fazes her. We’re talking about going exclusive now, but when we were having our fling, we both saw other people on the side. Didn’t bother her in the least.”

I find that hard to imagine. Lots of women imply that they don’t care if people like us continue to see others – and, of course, I mean sexually – when we’re nothing more than an affair. Usually, the jealousy on their end explodes sooner than any jealousy on ours.

Alessa is the first woman I’ve ever been with who inspires that level of jealousy in me.

She returns with a solemn face. At first, I assume she’s feeling ill because of our dinner.

Then? A pair of underwear lands in the middle of the table. The only person to not express immediate shock is Cher, who hides her smirk behind her long fingers.

“The fuck is this?”

I’ve never seen Alessa like this before. She’s so…

…Angry.

“Whoa.” Presley sits up so quickly that I think she’s going to give herself motion sickness. “Did you get those from my office?”

It takes a few minutes for it to sink in. This is the pair of underwear my sweet Alessa had been wearing when I first seduced her.

The pair I tossed to Presley and told her to get rid of. Someone had not upheld her end of the bargain.

“What the fuck, Julianna!”

“Lessa, I can explain…”

“So it’s true? I was a bet?”

“Where the hell did you hear something stupid like that?” I look to Presley, and I’m not sure if it’s with burning anger orrighteous indignation. Why the hell not both! “What the fuck are you telling people?”

No. It wasn’t Presley. She can be dumb, but she’s notthatdumb.

No… it washer, wasn’t it? The woman on the brink of uproarious laughter from the scene she’s caused.

My instincts are correct, as usual. And right now, my instincts are shouting at me that this is bad. Very fucking bad.

“I haven’t said a damn thing!” Presley thinks that’s her defense. “Bigger question is what the hell she was doing snooping around my office!”

“They were lying out in the open!”

I glare at Cher again. This has her smell all over it. This is, after all, the same woman who was slipping cute notes to her girlfriend for the past few months.

“So, it’s true?” Alessa takes a step back from the table. A breeze rustles the table above us. Napkins fly off into the distance. Wine glasses almost spill. Nobody at the table cares. “I was a bet? What? Did you bet that I was some slut?”

“No, honey,” Cher says with an unappreciated laugh, “they were betting that you were easy. There’s a difference.”

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