Page 10 of The Broker

“Oh, the guys changed their minds. They were pretty drunk and decided to head back to their suite instead. They asked me to give you this.”

Jared handed Isaac the cash and hoped that he believed his story.

Isaac stared down at the handful of bills before lifting his head to meet Jared’s gaze once again.

“That’s strange. They seemed perfectly fine when I left.”

Shrugging, Jared took a sip of his whiskey, then stared back at him. “Not sure what to tell ya. But hey, at least you made all that cash without having to swallow a dick.”

Isaac slid in next to Jared. The guy looked confused and off-kilter.

“Yeah, I guess. What about you? Did the guys pay you as well?”

“Yeah, man. Already got it safely stashed beneath my balls,” Jared joked, giving his buddy a wicked smirk.

“You’re such a dude,” Isaac chuckled, pressing his elbow into Jared’s arm.

He hated lying to Isaac, but the thought of him having sex with other men made Jared’s gut twist.

Lately, Jared had been running interference. He’d been doing what he could to get the guys to leave early. Then, to cover his tracks, Jared would make up some excuse as to why the men had suddenly changed their minds. Sometimes, the excuses were so flimsy Jared was convinced that Isaac would see right through them.

To this day, Isaac had not caught on. Feeling guilty and not wanting Isaac to miss out on any potential earnings, Jared would give Isaac all the cash he had earned that night, telling him that it came from the guys who had mysteriously left—minus a few bills for himself because, hey, he needed some cash for himself.

“Okay! Well, since the night is done for both of us, how about we head to the kitchen and see if Levi baked us any cookies,” Isaac suggested, his smile reaching from ear to ear.

Jared had managed to dodge another bullet, at least for this evening. Tomorrow would be another story.

Feeling awfully proud of himself, Jared slid out of the booth and slung his arm over Isaac’s bare shoulders. “Let’s go get you a cookie.”

Isaac chuckled beneath his arm as they made their way toward the kitchen.

Yes, this was a much better way to end an evening.

3

JARED

Staring at the food on his plate, he mentally calculated how much time he needed to spend in the gym. He had four links of sausage, three pieces of bacon, a vegetable egg white omelet, a croissant—because what self-respecting Parisian didn’t have one with breakfast—then a glass of orange juice and a black coffee on the side.

His face scrunched upward as he did the math in his head.

“Is he alright?” Gunnar, the older of the Scandinavian twins, asked, holding his fork inches from his mouth.

“Yeah, he’s just trying to figure out how many more squats he’s going to have to do today if he stuffs another sausage into his mouth,” his brother Anders, born eight minutes later, responded.

Jared’s eyes drifted over to the two brothers sitting across from him as he gave them both the finger.

The two chuckled.

“Don’t worry. You’re a beast. Eat as much as you want. I’ll go for a run with you after breakfast,” Diesel chimed in.

“Thanks, brother,” Jared nodded, turning to his tattooed-covered friend.

The man was sitting at the table shirtless, breaking Daddy M’s number one breakfast rule—or at least one of the rules that he tried to enforce but, for some reason, always seemed to get ignored.

Staring back at Jared was the creepy as fuck, demon face tattoo Diesel had drawn over his left chest muscle. The thing was creepy enough in the daylight, with its eyes seeming to follow you around as you walked. Jared could only imagine how fucking demonic that thing must look when staring at you in the dark.

No way. No thanks.

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