Now he laughed again. “I’m sorry. I just tend to get on the defensive.”
“That’s okay. I tend to get on the clueless. So we’re even.”
He let out a long breath. “So, a new fake boyfriend, huh?”
“If you mean new client, then yes. But I’m not pretending anything with this guy.”
“What do you mean?”
I just realised how that must have sounded. “No, no, no. I mean, I don’t have to pretend to be with him or anything like that. I don’t have to get to know him, or touch him, or even hang out with him.”
“Oh.”
“Would it bother you if I did?” I asked. I knew the answer to that already. It clearly did bother him. “It’s normally what I do. It’s how I met you! So you knew what I did for a job, Andrew.”
“I know,” he replied quietly. “And I’m trying not to have an issue with it, but the idea of you spending time with another guy, the way we did…”
“Yeah, but I don’t spend time with them like we did. I don’t normally do half of what we did with any other client. I told you, you were different. From day one, things were different with you.”
“I know,” he said again. “I’m allowed to feel a little jealous. I mean, would you prefer me to not tell you how something makes me feel?”
“No, I don’t want you to censor anything.”
“I know it’s your job, Spencer, and I don’t have an issue with what you do. I just… will you have to kiss him?”
“No, I won’t. It’s a weird case. He doesn’t want me to pretend to be his boyfriend. But I can’t promise that another case down the track won’t require me to hold some guy’s hand, or dance with him in a bar or something like that.”
Again with the silence, but this needed saying. I shouldn’t change what I did for a living just because I had a boyfriend. Should I?
“Can I ask you something?” His voice was kinda quiet.
“Sure.”
“If I had to, as part of my job, go out this weekend to a bar and kiss some guy to secure a deal with a production company, would that bother you?”
I pictured him, all smiles at another guy and kissing him, pretend or not, and my stomach twisted. Would it bother me?
Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Hell yes, it would.
“No.”
He laughed. “You can’t lie.”
“Okay, it totally would. The thought of another guy kissing you bothers me.” I groaned and dug the heel of my left hand into my eye. “I have a vivid imagination, and you’d be wearing your blue and red Argyle sweater and have those little lines at your eyes when you laugh, and then you’d look at him, then he’d put his hands on you and lean in… And yes, it bothers me.”
“That was pretty detailed.”
“Like I said, I have a very healthy imagination.”
He laughed. “So I don’t have a problem with it because it’s your job. I know that. I knew it before I agreed to give this relationship a shot. But yes, it bothers me that some other guy gets to touch you. Even if it means nothing. I would never ask you to stop doing what you do, Spencer. Please tell me you understand that.”
“Sure.” The thought never crossed my mind to actually quit doing what I do. Financially, I didn’t even have to do it, but I enjoyed the people aspect of it. I loved the personal nature of the whole set up, and I loved helping people get their lives back on track.
“But it just means that if you ever do have to take some guy out on a fake date, you better make it up to me.”
Finally, I smiled. “Now, that I can do.”
“Should I be more specific?”
“Please do.”
“Well, I’m not opposed to fancy dinners.”
“Really? Food? You can make me do any one thing, and it’s take you out for dinner?”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“I was expecting something a little dirtier, to be honest. Like naked, full-body massages, or the most mind-blowing rim-job you’ve ever had.”
“Spencer!”
I laughed. “What? Believe me, if you’re gonna put in demands for me to make it up to you, that’s the kind of stuff you need to say.”
He scoffed. “Rim-jobs? Jesus, you can’t…”
“Can’t what?”
“You can’t just say stuff like that.”
“You’re blushing right now, aren’t you?”
“Not telling.”
“You so are,” I said with a laugh. “Which tells me one of two things. One, you happen to really like rim-jobs, or two, you’ve never had one. You’ve always wanted to know what it feels like, but you’ve been too afraid to ask.”
“Veto.”
I burst out laughing. “No calling veto! That rule has been taken off the table. Not that it matters, because your vetoing tells me it’s definitely the second one. You’ve never experienced another man’s mouth on your arse.”
I could hear him swallow.
“And you want to. And Andrew?”
He cleared his throat. “Yeah?”
“I’m only too happy to oblige.”