Page 24 of The Arrangement (Executive Suite Secrets #3)

ROME ASHbrIDGE

Date number four took me by surprise. Liam asked me over to his town house apartment for dinner but wouldn’t give me any details beyond that. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. The first two dates he’d cooked up had been interesting. This one felt…familiar in an odd way.

My wariness must have shown on my face because Liam rolled his eyes at me when he opened his door.

“Get in here. This isn’t some ambush,” Liam ordered, waving me inside.

“Maybe I wouldn’t be so worried about an ambush if you weren’t so moody,” I countered. Not to mention, I was worried he might be pissed that I’d almost kissed him outside of Music Hall.

Liam snorted and shut the door. “If I was moody, it’s only because I have to deal with your crazy ass.”

“Here,” I said, thrusting a bottle of red wine into his hands after he hung my coat in the hall closet.

“You wouldn’t tell me what was on the menu, so I took a shot in the dark.

It’s from this little vineyard in the south of France.

One of my favorites.” Cabernet Sauvignon seemed like a safe choice, but I didn’t know if Liam liked wine.

Was I coming off as too pretentious? Probably.

Liam likely thought that I was even more of an asshole than usual.

“This looks nice, but it might be too fancy for what I’ve got planned.

” He led the way down the hall past a cozy living room stuffed with bookcases and one big TV to a smallish kitchen.

On the center island covered in blue tile was pizza crust stretched across a cooking stone.

“I thought we’d make our own pizza and play video games.

I’ve dusted off my PS2, GameCube, and Xbox.

Madden and Gran Turismo 4 are cued up. I’m prepared to kick your ass at both games tonight. ”

My heart did this crazy flip-flop in my chest, and for a second, I couldn’t even breathe. Liam had planned this night out like one of our fucking childhood sleepovers. Pizza and video games until we collapsed.

“Seriously? You have never beaten me at Madden !”

“Whatever. I will dominate your ass tonight. After I beat you on the PS2, I’ll pull out my PS5 and beat you on the newest Madden . You will be crushed tonight!”

“Oh, the smack talk is real.” I cackled. “I hope you can back it up.”

“You’ll see. I’ll destroy you.” If he kept up with video games, there was a damn good chance he was going to annihilate me tonight.

I played here and there, but nowhere near as intensely as I had as a kid.

In my late teens, I’d discovered boobs and dicks that didn’t belong to me.

It had kind of overtaken my gaming time.

“Let’s get this pizza in the oven, and we can figure out what to play first. Can you spread the sauce evenly across the dough? I’m going to grab the toppings out of the fridge.”

“Sure.” After rolling the sleeves of my navy blue collared shirt up to my elbows and washing my hands, I carefully ladled the rich, dark red sauce onto the dough. It smelled delicious. The perfect mix of oregano and garlic with the tomatoes. “Did you make the sauce from scratch?”

“No. Didn’t have time. But I made the dough this morning so it would have all day to prove and rise properly.” As he spoke, he pulled out a dozen bowls filled with all the usual pizza toppings and a few original ones. “I’ve got a mozzarella-and-provolone blend for the cheese. I hope that’s okay.”

“God, Liam. You don’t have to try so hard.”

Liam shut the fridge door and gave me a look. “Says the man who brought me a bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon from a vineyard he actually visited in the south of France.”

“Ouch.” He pretended to flinch, but he was right. “Okay. No more being try-hards. We’re the same guys who devoured that Chef Boyardee pizza your mom made with the slices of hot dog on top.”

Liam shuddered as he joined me at the island. “There’s no way that was real cheese included in the box.”

“It didn’t have to be real cheese. They just had to call it pizza, and we would devour it like starved wolves.”

“True.” Liam stood opposite me, checking my work.

“Okay. I figure you can have the half closest to you, and I’ll take the other half.

I’ve got the usuals—pepperoni, spicy Italian sausage, bacon, green peppers, mushrooms, banana peppers—but I’ve also got some leftover slices of rib eye steak and baby spinach if you’re feeling special. ”

With a nod, we dove in, grabbing handfuls of shredded cheese to sprinkle over our sides before moving on to the toppings.

“How was your Thanksgiving?” Liam inquired.

“Good. Declan has an amazing chef on staff, and Sebastian’s chef sent all these desserts. Parker let Joy feed herself mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes. It was everywhere. In her hair. Up her nose. I get why they have one of those giant plastic tarps to put under her high chair now.”

“How old is she?”

“Nine months, I think. Cute as a bug.”

“You didn’t see any family?”

“I video chatted with my parents that morning,” I replied as I sprinkled on some slices of green peppers.

“They’re in Brussels. Later that night, I called Sydney, and we talked for a while.

She spent the day with her husband’s family, so she was grateful she didn’t have to do both sides of the family for the holiday.

What about you? Did you see your family? ”

“Nah, I decided to stay here.” Liam paused and licked his lips, seeming to debate about whether to say more.

“My dad passed away a few years ago. Heart attack. My younger brothers live close to my mom, so they all got together for Thanksgiving. I texted with my brothers and had a brief call with my mom.”

A grunt left me. I’d totally forgotten about Todd and Louis. They’d been annoyances when we’d hung out at Liam’s house. Louis was six years younger than Liam and had always tried to tag along. Todd was three years younger and had his own friends to play with.

“I’m sorry to hear about your dad.”

Liam lifted one shoulder. “It was sad, but we were never close.”

His words weren’t that surprising. Liam’s dad had always struck me as being cold and distant toward his family, as if he hadn’t wanted to be bothered by his kids and wife.

They were just achievements on a list he’d checked off and then moved on.

I had to wonder, though, if Liam’s relationship with his father had gotten worse after that stupid kiss incident.

All the same, I didn’t like the idea of him being alone on Thanksgiving. Especially since this was his first holiday in the city.

“I wish I’d known. I would have dragged you with me to Declan’s. There was way too much food. More than enough to include you.”

“Thanks, but unnecessary. It was my first Thanksgiving with no need to rush around. Kind of nice. Plus, a friend from work is having me over on Sunday for a Friendsgiving.”

“Cool. Cool.” I stepped back and inspected my half of the pizza. It was a cheese-covered, pepperoni, green pepper, mushroom, and bacon masterpiece. His half didn’t seem too different from my own. He’d gone with banana peppers instead of green peppers and steak slices instead of bacon.

“Done?” he asked as he wiped his hands on a dish towel.

“Yep. Looks delicious.”

I slid the pizza into the oven, because I was closest to the appliance, while he opened the bottle of wine to breathe. Beers would have been a smarter choice, but I suspected the wine would still be tasty with the rich red sauce.

With dinner cooking, we moved to the living room, where we ran several races on Gran Turismo and Need for Speed.

The nostalgia was so thick in the room I half expected to look up to see a twelve-year-old Liam sitting next to me.

This had been our weekends, our summers, our after-school exploits.

Pizza, junk food, video games, riding bikes, and just being reckless terrors any way we could.

He had been my best friend. The one constant in my life at a time when my parents were always busy with travel and work.

And, of course, I’d had no interest in being anywhere near my extended family, which strangely consisted of way too many female cousins.

The evening flew by. The timer went off for the pizza. We loaded up plates and glasses of wine before heading in for more video games. He kicked my ass at Madden . I beat him at Gran Turismo, but he beat me at Need for Speed .

“Okay, I think this night needs an upgrade.” Liam wiped his hands and went to a bookshelf that was all video games.

This man wasn’t a gamer. He was a collector.

He had games and systems from the early nineties all the way to the present.

With a wicked smirk, he held up a narrow, slim box, wringing a deep groan out of me.

“No! You’re trying to start a fight.”

“I’m not. We’re adults now. I feel like we can play this without throwing controllers.”

Even as he put Mario Kart into the new Nintendo Switch, I had my doubts about our ability to remain mature.

Out of all the racing games, it was the least realistic but the most fun.

We always argued over who got to be Wario, and we stuck by the agreement that the person who lost the race had to be Princess Peach in the next round.

We lasted two races.

“Of course! You still cheat with the blue turtle shell!” I shouted as the bastard knocked me out of first place right before the finish line. I threw my hands up in the air but didn’t toss the controller against the wall like I wanted to.

“And you’re the only idiot I know who claims it’s cheating,” Liam sneered.

“It is cheating!”

“It’s not cheating. The game includes it as a power-up. Just like fireballs and red mushrooms.”

“But you save it for the very end!”

Liam huffed. “That’s called playing smart. You’re a sore loser.”