Read Online Naughty Bits Part II: The Training Session by Joey W. Hill - Free Book Online

spending power.
    Stop.
What was she doing?
    She closed the book abruptly, set it back on the shelf. “Will you follow me back to your friends?”
    His brow creased, puzzled, but he nodded, following her back to Sam and Chris, who were teasing one another, pointing out the outfit choices. Cop, vampire, clown . . .
    “You’d be sooooo irresistible with a red-rubber-ball nose.” Sam rolled her eyes. “Like you need help looking like a clown.” She reached out to Geoff, taking his hand and drawing him closer. Madison suspected she’d seen his speculative look at her casual touch on Chris’s arm, and was balancing it by touching him, trying to send them both a message.
This isn’t a competition, you idiots. I want
both
of you.
“You’ll have to help us choose, Geoff,” she complained. “I can’t get Chris to be serious.”
    “I have a suggestion,” Madison said. Glancing at Geoff’s face, she took her cue from his conflicted expression and hoped she wasn’t losing her mind. “Sam has opened a door that I suspect you all have thought about, but maybe not in as much detail as she has.”
    “Sam, overthinking things? With her OCD personality? Not a chance.” Chris said it with a straight face, earning a shove from Geoff and a mock scowl from the young woman.
    Madison chuckled. “Men aren’t great at asking directions, so someone has to be willing to get out of the car and ask before things get too frustrating.” She gestured around the store. “I’m not going anywhere. Why don’t you all go down the street to the sandwich shop? They have great breakfast bagels and outdoor seating, and it’s a lovely place to relax and chat. You can talk about it. Talk about what each of you really wants.”
    As she met their eyes in turn, she realized they were listening to her as if she knew what she was talking about. More amazingly, she felt as though she did.
    Nothing more dangerous than a little knowledge
, she reminded herself dryly, and tried to rein it back, keep it in safe parameters. “I think Sam knows what she wants, but she’s afraid of losing or offending either of you by saying it. I also think Geoff knows what he wants, but he’s not sure how both of you feel about it. And Chris . . .” She turned her gaze to him, thought of Troy, and couldn’t help smiling. “You’re the easygoing one of the group. You’ll be the one who boils it down to what it is, keeps them both from overthinking it.”
    He grinned at that, but he had a thoughtful look of his own. With her serious talking points, he’d realized more was happening here than awkward doublespeak and playful costume choices.
    “So go talk about it. Go home and play with the idea, play with each other. And then come back to me when you’re ready.”
    “You’re not going to sell us anything?” Sam’s brow furrowed. “We’re interested in—”
    “No, she’s not going to sell us anything.” Geoff cut in, met Madison’s gaze. “Not right now. But later.”
    “Yes, later.” She put her hand on Sam’s arm. “I could load you up with several hundred dollars’ worth of merchandise. But you’d take it home, play with it, then set it aside like a gimmick, vaguely unsatisfied, because you played with the wrapping, not the present. Not what lies beneath the surface. Figure that part out, then you can come back and decide how you want to wrap up the gift.”
    Sam considered that, then nodded. Impulsively, she covered Madison’s hand, squeezed it. “I’m so glad I followed my intuition and came back here. I don’t know about your sister, but you seem exactly as my friend described her to me.”
    The words lanced her heart, painful but not necessarily wrong or bad. “I learned a lot about this kind of thing from her.”
I just have to open myself to listen. And please God, let Alice be guiding me now so I don’t run these three nice people down the wrong path and ruin their lives.
    “When you come back, if you come back, I’ll be