Page 59 of Brewing Temptation

“So, how do we sell it?”

His smirk turned cocky as hell, and fuck me, it was gorgeous. He really was the perfect male specimen. “You afraid to sell the role, McShane?”

“No,” I balked, shaking my head.

“Worried a little hand-holding or a kiss in public will dissolve your prim little panties?”

God, yes.“No, you perv. Jesus, Jameson, do you have a sex addiction or something? Seems to be all you can think about.”

“What red-blooded man doesn’t? What else? You worried if you stay here you’ll fall in love with me?”

“In your dreams.”Yesyesyes.Lord knew my willpower was pathetically lacking when it came to humans of the penis-wielding variety. Especially when everything about them spelled red freaking flag.

“Then this will work. He’ll get pissed off and fly home with his tail between his legs. Why the hell do you always have to argue with me?”

Groaning, needing to dissolve the fantasies of that man and that obnoxious mouth on my eager skin running rampant in my mind, I bit back, “Because it’s certainly more fun than agreeing with you.”

That smirk grew until it teetered dangerously close to the cliff of Rhodes-grin-worthy. “Hmm, touché, Skittles.”

“Guys, everything looks good outside!” One of the brothers’ voices bellowed down the hallway, effectively ending our play. They all sounded eerily similar. “All the cameras are still working. Checked with your security system, and it's all reporting data.”Ahh, there it was—Axel’s voice crept closer and when he popped into the room, he was peeling orange gloves off his hands with Maverick in his usual place behind him.

“Same with Rhyett’s,” Maverick added, grinning goofily as he flashed me a wink. “Charlie and Bells’ guys know the story.”

“Yo!”

Axel turned as Broderick’s voice reverberated off the entry hallway. This was like attempting to calm a panic attack in Grand Central Station.

“In the living room,” Jameson said back. Broderick loped in a second later, dropping a backpack off one shoulder and duffle bag off the other. What in the hell kind of town built the kind of camaraderie where a man asked for help with some random woman with literally no notice, and two striking men would materialize by the end of the day?

“Where am I?”

“Den,” Jameson said simply, but Broderick collapsed into the armchair beside the couch with a whoosh.

“It’s been a day.”

“Get your ass handed to you by teenagers again?” Jameson said with a smirk.

“They are relentless, I swear to god.”

Axel laughed, shaking his head and stuffing the gloves in his back pocket. “I’m gonna throw on a pot of coffee before we get out of here.” Becausetheyhad to leave. My stomach turned uneasily at the idea of the four remaining men I knew in this town being unreachable at sea. The family banked on this season above all the others combined and couldn’t afford to lose an entire set—a day already detrimental enough.

“Hell, yes,” Broderick said, allowing his head to loll on the couch, then hopping up and following Axel into the kitchen.

“Just a bunch of kids,” Mav grumbled out one side of his mouth as he followed them before he started humming a tune. Jameson stared after them for a long while before looking back to me.

“You good?”

“Yeah. This is one big, grand overreaction, truth be told.”

His scowl said he had an abundance of arguments dying to escape. “Better to be safe than sorry.”

“Yeah,” I agreed quietly. “I guess so.”

He nodded, not saying anything for a long beat before wordlessly rising and heading towards the kitchen, where he seemed to walk into an invisible wall. A long-suffering sigh leaked from Jameson’s lungs with all the enthusiasm of a tire around a nail. He looked over his shoulder and slowly, pointedly, turned around. Haunted blues locked on me.

“Hey, Noel?”

“Yes?”

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