My Gigolo (3 page)

Settling back on the park bench despite the cold seeping through his sweats, he prepared for the worst. “Please do.”

“My sister is lovely and intelligent and fun. She really is. But somewhere along the way, she picked up the idea never to get married or even get involved in a relationship. That’s fine, I guess. To each their own.”

The woman paused, and he caught himself drumming his fingers on the bench’s back, wondering when she would get to the point. The situation had not improved. Usually when a family member described another family member as lovely and intelligent and fun, they meant fat and geeky and self-deprecating.

“The real problem is that she also doesn’t believe in casual sex. Won’t even consider it.”

Before he could stop himself, he jerked forward and blurted, “Really?”

“Yes, really.” If her tone was any indication, this sister shared his astonishment. “So she hasn’t, you know,
been with
anyone since her last serious relationship four years ago. She’s almost twenty-eight, Mr. Savage, and she refuses to let me or her friends set her up. She turned down three dates and one honest-to-God proposition last month alone. It just isn’t healthy.”

He agreed wholeheartedly, but he hesitated just the same. “No, it isn’t entirely healthy, miss, but I’m not a dating service. You
do
know what you’re contracting me for, right?”

She huffed something between a sigh and a grunt. “I didn’t fall off the hay truck yesterday, buddy. I want you to go down there and try to boink some sense into her.”

He couldn’t help it. He laughed, long and hard.

Luckily, the woman laughed with him. “I cannot believe I’m having this conversation with a man I’m planning to pay to seduce my little sister.”

Somewhere between surprise and laughter, he decided to give this odd proposition a try. He was just intrigued enough to make it worth the drive. “What do you hope to get from this?”

A long pause, so long that he wondered if she would answer. “I don’t know, really. It just kinda hit me, and she acted so astonished that I guess I want to shock her.”

“Wait, she knows?”

The blush crept back into her words, coloring them a deeper tone. “Well, not exactly. I said it just kind of as a joke. She doesn’t know that I’m actually, you know, doing it.”

“Fair enough, I guess. Do you think it’ll make her think twice about casual sex, if not dating?” The question popped out before he could stop it.

“Probably not. She’s smart, which means she’s also stubborn.” A sister’s rueful affection lurked in her voice. “Besides, she actually has good, practical reasons not to go for just any guy who offers. She’s not a virgin, but she’s no prude, either. She just doesn’t want kids or a disea—”

He could almost see her biting her lip in the sudden silence and regretting the word she’d started to blurt. “Don’t worry about that, lady. I’m as clean as a baby’s butt.”

She laughed, clearly relieved. “I don’t know if that’s good or not. I have two kids, and I’ve seen my share of babies’ butts that I’d gladly turn the hose on.”

Another laugh escaped him. If this woman’s sister were even half as fun, tumbling her would be all sorts of entertaining.

“All right, then. You have a deal. I do charge by the hour, but I’m a nice guy, so I give discounts for clustered hours. A hundred dollars for the first and eighty for each thereafter. I’ll take you up on the offer of a hotel if I can’t drive back here that night for some reason. Add probably fifty bucks for gas there and back and we’ll consider it done.”

A long pause.

“Miss?”

“I’m calculating. I can do an hour and gas if you want a hotel room. I can’t imagine a decent room being under forty dollars, even in a smaller city like Joplin. But if you don’t need a room, I can cover two hours and gas.”

She sounded hesitant. He abruptly wondered if she were on a budget. She’d said she was married with kids, after all. How hard would it be to squeeze out an extra almost three hundred dollars for a kid sister’s birthday present? He didn’t imagine that this kind of thing came up often.

Sighing, he wondered why he’d gotten into this business if he were always going to be such a nice guy. If he didn’t watch it, he’d be handing out freebies.

“Look, I’ll take two-fifty and give her two hours she’ll never forget. If I don’t drive back, the hotel will be on my own dime. It’s my decision to drive back or not.”

“You know, you’re a pretty decent guy.”

“I try. Do we have a deal?”

“I think we do. How do I pay you?”

“Do you have cash?”

“Oh, yeah.”

He smiled at her tone. “Good. Just put it in a blank envelope and leave it with Regina. She’ll see that I get it. Can I get some directions to your sister’s house? I’ve only been to Joplin once. It’s no Kansas City, but it’s a little bigger than a one-horse town.”

“I’ll lead you right to her door.”

“Great. And miss?”

“Yeah?”

“What’s her name?”

The woman chuckled. “Well, that’s kind of a funny story.”

Grinning, he settled back against the bench, preparing for the worst.

February

How had her office friends talked her into catering her own birthday party?

Trying to scowl, Gabe tipped half a cup of shredded coconut into the bowl. Cheryl had demanded her famous peanut butter bonbons. Worse, the accounting pool lobbied for the infamous walnut chocolate chip cookies, and the lawyers posited that no one could buy a cake better than she could make herself.

God, she loved baking.

She put the butter and peanut butter on the stove to melt together, and her doorbell chimed. Frowning, she wondered who on earth would drop by on a baking Saturday without calling first. Everyone who mattered knew better.

A salesman? Great. Just what she needed, a lengthy sales pitch for something she didn’t need while her butter mix scalded on the bottom of the pan. Sighing, she turned off the flame and hoped the interrupted melting didn’t do anything weird to the recipe.

Brushing at the powdered sugar dusting her old T-shirt, she crossed her dining and living rooms and bit back her annoyance. It wasn’t some salesman’s fault that he was interrupting. Well, it was, but the poor guy probably hadn’t intentionally picked the absolute worst time to grace her porch.

Thus, when she opened the front door and saw a winsomely handsome, tall man in jeans, hiking boots, and a flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up, she didn’t quite know what to say. What on earth could this guy be selling? Tick repellant? Camping gear? In February?

“Happy birthday, Gabe. Your sister sent me.”

She blinked. Part of her mind recognized that the man seemed fairly well-spoken with a pleasantly rough, low voice and that he somehow knew her name. The rest couldn’t seem to tell if he was speaking English or some strange pidgin, beyond the greeting.

“Can I come in?”

She forced her mouth to work when she recognized actual words. “Um…no?”

His soft smile didn’t diminish. “It’ll be hard to give you her full money’s worth from the porch.”

She blinked again, feeling her face scrunch into a confused frown. The expression probably wasn’t terribly attractive, but she couldn’t help it. “Money’s worth? What is it?” She crossed her arms, eyeing him up and down. “Why would my sister send you? To deliver it? Why didn’t she just bring it herself? Is it heavy or something?”

The pleasant smile widened into something that made her want to back a step away.

“I’m not delivering a present, Gabe. I
am
your present.”

There was that pidgin again. It was so close to English. Trying to make it fit understood syllables gave her a mild headache.

“So…my sister…bought me a man?”

His not-smile deepened, his green eyes darkening. He tilted his head forward just enough to look at her through his eyelashes. “Rented is more like it.”

She could almost make it out. He almost made sense. One more exchange and she’d know exactly what he was talking about.

“Come again?”

“I’m your escort for the evening.”

“What, are you taking me someplace?”

He laughed. It was a pleasant laugh that almost coaxed an answering one from her, but she was still too flummoxed to respond properly.

“I hope to take you in several places. On some, too. Maybe even under some.”

She really needed an interpreter. “I’m not usually stupid, sir, but you’ll have to excuse me when I say that I have no idea what the hell you’re talking about.”

“I’ll make this really simple, Gabe.” He leaned closer and placed a hand on her doorjamb, looking at her very intently through the storm door. “Your sister hired you a male prostitute, just like she promised.”

Her jaw dropped.

She was cuter than he’d expected from her sister’s “lovely and intelligent and fun” description. Not lovely, exactly, or even pretty, but definitely cute. She looked more used to laughing than to mouth-gaping.

Dark brown hair a little longer than chin-length curled every which way, giving her features an almost fey cast. Her face was plain but pleasant—straight nose, brown eyes that studied him with something like shock, nice lips, slightly pointed chin. Average.

She might be more than cute if she wore something else, something more form-fitting. The white-dusted, faded T-shirt hung straight to her thighs, hiding any curves she might have. The straight-legged, baggy jeans didn’t help, either. Definitely thin. Maybe too much so, but that hardly mattered in his line of work.

“She. Did.
Not
.”

Ah, she finally got her mouth closed enough to work right. Good for her.

“Indeed she did.”

“Oh, no.” Now that she had her words back, she seemed determined to use them all at once. “She wouldn’t. She wouldn’t even know how to begin. Plus, you don’t look like a gigolo. No leather, no chains, no thong. Huh-uh. I don’t buy it.” She cocked one hip and crossed her arms. “She might have sent you here to punk me, but that’s as far as I’ll believe.”

He had never figured out why first-timers were so set on that stripper/sadomasochist idea of escorting. Not everyone was into whips and bondage. He certainly wasn’t.

“Mike suggested that my best chance of even getting in the door was to look like anyone else and be honest up front.”

She blinked slowly, deliberately. She’d done that a couple of times, now that he thought about it. It was kind of cute.

“Actually, that does sound like her. And you know her name. And mine.”

She bit at her lower lip, her teeth a flash of white against the pale pink of the plump flesh. He loved it when a woman bit her lip. Something about it went straight to his groin.

“But I just can’t believe she actually did it. Is this a joke?”

Smiling and putting a little interest into the expression, he pulled his cell phone from his jeans pocket and flipped it open. Mike’s number was the last one he’d called, luckily. He’d lost his way after getting off the main highway and needed directions. He pressed send and offered the little doubter the phone.

Her eyes wary, she opened the storm door just wide enough to take it, then jerked her hand back inside and pulled the door shut again. He wanted to laugh, but something told him she wasn’t in the mood. Reading women’s whims wasn’t easy by any stretch, but he’d made a career out of it, and his instincts usually served him well.

She put the phone to her ear, and her eyes popped wide open. “Sis?” She sounded incredulous, almost faint. “Yeah, he’s on the porch. No…no, I don’t already have one.”

He did laugh then. It didn’t take a psychic to guess the other side of the conversation. But her incredulity immediately turned to irritation, so he obligingly turned and stepped away from the door. He stood at the edge of her sprawling, covered porch and eyed the winter-dead yard. She didn’t exactly live outside of town, but neither was she situated in the heart of it. She had neighbors, but the closest was a comfortable distance away.

Nicely tended yard; nothing fancy. No difficult landscaping, though it was hard to tell under all the brown February grass. Huge, old trees—oaks, perhaps?—dotted the lawn and shaded the house. The house itself was average-sized and looked to be two stories high. White siding with charcoal shutters and good windows. A godawfully ugly porch swing that looked pretty comfortable, once he got past the color. Green, maybe? Did they make a green that shade? Had it mutated as it faded?

The storm door swung open and he turned, his right eyebrow raised in question. She didn’t look pleased, but neither did she look angry.

“I guess you’d better come in.”

Mike had bought her a gigolo for her birthday.

Crazy? Yes. Unthinkable? Darn near. Impossible? Obviously not. After all, one stood in her kitchen, leaning casually against her sink with his hands in his jeans pockets, looking for all the world like any other handsome guy on the street. No pun intended.

“Just so everything’s clear, I cannot imagine actually having sex with you.”

His mouth twisted into a pout. An adorable pout, actually, though she had no doubt he knew exactly how good he looked with his lip pooched out.

“You don’t even know me, Gabe.”

She rolled her eyes, unswayed by his easy charm. “Exactly. I
don’t
know you. I don’t even know your name.”

“Blade Savage, at your service.”

A snort snuck past her attempt at civility. “Uh-huh.”

He grinned, the expression devastatingly attractive, but again, she doubted that he was unaware of its effect.

“Look, it’s nothing to do with you personally. You look like a nice enough guy, and you must have said something right to get past my sister, who’s no one’s fool.” Pausing, she grumbled under her breath. “Usually.”

His grin twitched, those deep green eyes lighting up, the skin at the corners crinkling. She hurried on before he could say anything to make her laugh. Laughter had always been her kryptonite where men were concerned.

“I don’t know what she was thinking, but I don’t have sex with strangers. Hell, I don’t even have sex with people I know.”