“What would the wrong idea be?”
Maxi knew that she was being baited but that didn’t stop her from biting. Hook, line and sinker. “That you and I had a sleepover.”
“We both slept, together, overnight.” His voice grew deeper with each word he spoke. “What would you call it?”
Sitting back in her chair she crossed her arms. “I would call it me falling asleep and you being too nice to wake me up.”
He opened his mouth to respond at the same time his phone buzzed.
“Go ahead.” Maxi motioned to his phone when he didn’t pick it up. “I know that babysitting me is getting in the way of your active social life. I don’t want one of your lady friends to send out a search party for you.”
Billy grinned. “Lady friends?”
“Your hookups, booty calls, flavors of the day, side chicks—”
“I think you have to have a main chick for there to be a side chick.” His golden eyes danced with amusement.
When she saw his reaction she immediately regretted going down this road with him. “Whatever, you know what I mean.”
She’d spent years avoiding getting into a discussion with Billy about his personal life. Mainly because hearing him talk about women was like a punch in her gut. Why she’d thought that now, when she was feeling her most vulnerable, her most raw was a good time to venture into the choppy waters of his dating pool was anyone’s guess.
“Do you want a soda?” Maxi stood and headed to the kitchen, hoping that she could steer this conversation into safer territories.
“No, I’m good.”
She grabbed herself a Dr. Pepper.
“You don’t have to worry about any search parties, I’m not seeing anyone right now.”
She was glad she hadn’t taken a drink yet because if she had chances were she would have choked or done a spit take. Or both.
With a pretty healthy dose of sarcasm she answered, “Sure you aren’t.”
“I’m not.” His tone was as serious as the look in his eyes.
Anyone who knew Billy knew that he loved women and they loved him. He was never short on female companionship. They also knew that he didn’t lie. Ever. Needless to say her mind was having a difficult time with the contradictions his statement posed.
He held out his phone towards her. “See for yourself.”
She wasn’t exactly sure what he was offering. “What?”
“Look through my phone.”
This had to be a trick, right?
His phone would be locked or have some scary picture on it. He couldn’t actually want her to go through his personal messages…could he? Her legs decided not to wait for her brain to answer those questions and they began moving of their own accord.
She snagged his phone. There was no prank pic and it was open to his text messages. A quick scan revealed several girls who appeared to be naked or nearly naked.
“These are personal.” She tried to hand the phone back to him, but he didn’t take it. His stare held a challenge in it and she had no idea why he was doing this. For some reason that irritated the crap out of her. “Who just gives someone their phone to go through?”
“Someone with nothing to hide,” he answered simply.
Touché.
Even though it felt all kinds of wrong to do it, she sat down on the couch and started going through his messages. She rationalized her behavior by telling herself that she may never get another chance to look behind the curtain that was Billy’s personal life.
What she found there was surprising, but not in the way she’d expected.