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“I’m going to leave now.” I stood and grabbed my purse from the armchair. “I’ll call you.”
“Cakes aren’t the only things that need to be moist!”
I slammed the door to her house behind me before I had to hear any more of her terrible, cringe-worthy sexual innuendos.
And absolutely none of those would be mentioned in my conversation with Mason.
CHAPTER NINE – LAUREN
“Sorry I’m late.” Mason slid into the booth opposite me. “I couldn’t get away until now.”
“It’s fine.” I smiled at him across the table. He looked unfairly hot to say that he had a big swipe of dirt across his right cheek and dust dotting his hair and his stubble.
Maybe that was why he looked so hot. He already had rugged good looks—he wouldn’t be out of place as a lumberjack in a checkered shirt, cutting wood. The dust and dirt on him just…fit.
“Did you order already?” He grabbed the menu from the holder and scanned it.
“No, I waited for you.” I smiled. “Busy day?”
“If only roofs built themselves.” He returned the smile. “Are you ready to order?”
I nodded, and he flagged down a server. I ordered the hot dog and he ordered the wings—color me surprised—and she wrote that down with a promise to return quickly with our drinks.
“Shall we cut to the chase, then?” I didn’t want to be here any longer than necessary.
“Let’s.” He smirked.
I ignored it. “If we’re going to do this, there really does have to be ground rules. It’s not going to be easy to pretend we’re actually seeing each other.”
“We did a pretty good job last week.”
“For an hour, Mason. Besides, that was to spite your ex, not convince your mother I’m falling in love with you.”
“Point taken.” He paused as my shake and his coffee were laid on the table. When the server left, he continued, “How do we start with this? Do you have a pad and paper to write down the rules?”
“No. I’m not that anal.” I rolled my eyes. “But we do need to agree on the boundaries, and I think the first one should be that we don’t get physical.”
“How physical are we talking?”
“Hand holding and hugging are on the table. Everything else is off.”
His dark eyebrows shot up. “That’s it? I can’t kiss your cheek or the side of your head? I mean, I understand taking blow jobs off the table—I can’t say I’m a fan of it—but cheek-kissing? Come on.”
“Blow jobs were never on the table,” I replied. “In fact, blow jobs are so far under the table it’d make your dick shrivel up if it knew just how far.”
“I thought this was a negotiation.”
“I’m trying to convince your mother I’m your girlfriend, not your penis.”
“Hey, it’d be reciprocated.”
“You’d have a hard time giving me a blow-job unless you’re into some kinky shit.”
He leveled me with a hard stare. “You are hard work, Lauren.”
“I know.” I smiled, tilting my head to the side. “I will negotiate to cheek-kissing and other non-sexual forms of kissing.”
“There are non-sexual forms of kissing?”
“Have you ever seen someone kiss someone else’s toes? The only toes that should be kissed belong to babies.”
“Some people like that.”
“Do you find toe-kissing sexy?”
Mason paused. “Can’t say I’ve ever kissed a woman’s toes. Here, give me your foot.”
I tucked them right under my seat. “You’re insane.”
“I know.” He winked. “Okay, physical affection is non-sexual kissing, hand-holding, and hugging. I think we’re agreed there. Are we sticking to the ‘met on an app’ thing we had before?”
I nodded. “I think we should keep it as simple as possible. It’s casual, not serious, and we’re still getting to know each other.”
“Not a lie,” he pointed out.
“The best lies skirt the truth. How long have we been seeing each other?”
“Less than a month.”
“Smart. Makes it believable when I play the demon and dump you because your family is full-on.”
He waggled a finger at me. “And makes me the demon when you tell your family the same thing.”
“Exactly. Now you’re getting it.” I grinned. “Okay, other important information about each other. What do we need to clear up?”
Our food was brought out just then. We both assured the server that we didn’t need anything else and got back to our conversation between mouthfuls of food.
“I don’t know. Random facts about each other?” Mason suggested. “Do you have a crazy ex I should watch out for?”
“Nope. I do have a raging asshole of a cat, though.”
“Good to know. I have a raging asshole of an elderly next-door neighbor.”
“Thankfully, I don’t have one of those.”
“Yeah, well, if you ever come to my apartment, don’t be offended when she threatens to shoot a “floozy” for knocking too many times on my door.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Do you have many women banging down your door?”
“Two weeks ago, she accused the UPS woman of sleeping with me. So, no, but it doesn’t bother her. She still thinks every woman at my door is part of some sort of harem.”
