“Is it Samantha?” Mason asked, already sneaking toward the door.
Samantha, I had to assume, had been the girl in her underwear and nothing more drinking orange juice from the mini fridge that morning. It wasn’t like I ever bothered to learn the names of Mason’s many…friends. Why would I?
“It’s Diarmuid,” I told them and then to Diarmuid, “And he was just getting to the goddamn point.”
“Is that Mason?” Diarmuid asked, hope (what a stupid thing) in his voice. “Rian? Maybe put one of them on.”
This made me immediately suspicious, or more suspicious, I should say. I was always, as a well-earned habit, suspicious. Of everything. Of everyone.
“What do you want, Diarmuid? Like I told you, we’re busy.”
Fuck, you could practically hear the crickets in the silence of the parlour, practically hear the mould growing in the walls. I told you I didn’t lie, but as it turns out, that was a lie. Fucking deal with it.
“Right, right,” Diarmuid said. I heard him shuffling some papers on his desk. He had followed in Brian’s footsteps and had become a JLO himself. Why? I hadn’t a clue. “So, listen, I don’t want you to shoot the idea down right away, okay?”
“You’re not making a great case for whatever it is you’re talking about,” I told him, patience already waning.
Mason, curious not just about what was under a lady’s skirt (any lady’s skirt), came over to move his ear in close to mine. I shoved him away.He pouted. I gave him the middle finger.
“Look, Conor, the point is that there’s money involved,” Diarmuid said. “Remember that. Hold onto that. Money.”
“I’m not putting anything in my butt,” I grumbled as I held Mason’s nosey-ass self back with a stiff arm.
“I might,” Rian said with a contemplative shrug. He grinned and then said, “Mason definitely would.”
Mason’s tanned fingers were wriggling in my face as I tried to keep the phone away.
“Let me talk to him,” Mason whined. “Diarmuid! Diarmuid, what butt stuff? What’s the girl look like? How much is she paying me?”
I swatted at Mason. Diarmuid sighed and mumbled something I couldn’t quite make out.
“What’s that?” I asked before glaring at Rian. “Would you do something, please?”
Rian’s face was dreamlike as he said softly, “I’m thinking of a tattoo of a peach. A soft, fuzzy, peach.”
“Diarmuid,” I said through gritted teeth. “You have three seconds to say, and say clearly, what exactly it is you’re offering before I hang up.”
At that moment, Mason got distracted by a woman out front, so it was just me who got to hear Diarmuid’s proposal. Just me who got to respond.
I slammed the phone down so hard in the receiver that I thought for a moment that I had broken it. Mason jumped from the window and Rian shook his head like I’d startled him from a deep slumber.
“You hung up?” Rian asked.
“We don’t need his money,” I told them, flopping down into one of the leather tattooing chairs that had cost a fortune and hadn’t even come close to paying for themselves. “Believe me.”
Rian and Mason both started to protest, but I ignored them. Diarmuid had proposed something so wretched, so horrible, so terrible, that the two of them had no idea what good I’d done for them, what heartache I’d spared them. Diarmuid had wanted…shit, I could barely allow the thought to cross my mind without squirming in discomfort.
“Guys, guys,” I shouted, holding up my hands to calm Mason and Rian. “Relax. We don’t need that money. Not that bad at least.”
Diarmuid had suggested taking on a mentee in the Young Offenders Program in exchange for a government grant. He said he had a particular mentee in mind, but I hadn’t given him more time to go on. I’d heard all I needed to hear.
I knew what those juvie kids were like. Hell, I’d been one of them. No thank you. No fucking thank you.
Rian was standing now, his clear green-grey eyes on mine.
“Why don’t you at least let us have a say in deciding?” he said. “Deciding whatever it is.”
“Yeah,” Mason agreed, rather petulantly I thought. A pouty lip didn’t exactly go with his curly black mohawk. “We’re a team. A family.”