Page 14 of Filthy Rich Brother's Best Friends

I’m already halfway through planning the layout when the door behind me slides open again, and Reid steps out. Shirtless, of course, with a towel slung around his neck.

He watches me as he takes a sip from a large shaker bottle that smells vaguely like vanilla death.

I wrinkle my nose. “You know you could just eat real food, right? Quinoa. Lentils. Sunflower butter. There are so many high-protein, non-toxic options.”

He shrugs. “I’d rather chug chemicals.”

“Yeah, and I’d rather not pickle my organs with mystery powder,” I say, grabbing my water bottle and taking a long sip. “But you do you.”

“You sort through the kitchen boxes yet?” he asks.

“Nope. Still holding out hope they’ll unpack themselves.”

He snorts. “Sounds about right. I swear you’d live out of a laundry basket if you could.”

“And what the hell’s wrong with that?” I ask, grinning.

He rolls his eyes and drops into one of the patio chairs. “Nice place though, right?”

“Yeah,” I say, leaning against the doorframe. “It’ll definitely do.”

Miles appears a minute later, barefoot and sipping some weird herbal tea. It smells like warm grass, citrus peel, and possibly fish oil. It’s completely foul and that’s coming from the guy who drinks spirulina smoothies on the regular.

“I ran some diagnostics on the local bandwidth,” he says. “We should be able to route simultaneous video sessions without throttling, but I want to test it with a dual upload stream later.”

I blink at him. “Cool. Also, I think there’s a bird’s nest in the garage light fixture.”

He looks up at me, then back at the tablet. “Unrelated, but duly noted.”

Reid grins. “Ahh, domestic bliss.”

“It’s not domestic,” Miles says flatly, then adds, “It’s functional.”

“Right,” Reid mutters, grabbing one of the beers from the cooler by the door. “I forgot. Emotionally constipated billionaires only conveniently cohabitate with their friends if it makes sense for their business.”

“It does make sense.”

“Of course it does.” I laugh. “But it still feels like home, even if you want to pretend it doesn’t.”

We hang out on the patio for a while, talking about nothing in particular—whether we can plant a lemon tree and actually keep it alive, whether the neighbor’s dog is part coyote, whether kombucha counts as a probiotic or just a sugar delivery system.

Eventually, I push off the railing and head back inside. There’s still stuff to unload from my car, and I told myself I’d finish today, even if it takes all night. I move through the house barefoot, sidestepping a bag of resistance bands and a half-assembled side table.

I grab the last few boxes from the trunk. I’m halfway to the front door when I hear a woman’s voice.

“You boys are moving in, huh?”

I turn. There’s a woman standing at the end of our walkway. She’s…exactly what I would expect from this swanky neighborhood. She has a drink in one hand, with her weight shifted to one hip. Her dress is some sort of frilly lace number.

“Looks that way,” I say, adjusting my grip on the boxes. “Still trying to get everything into the house.”

She smiles at me as her gaze blatantly sweeps up and down my body. There’s nothing subtle about it.

“You’re cute.”

I blink. “Thanks.” I’m really not interested in engaging.

“I’m Gigi,” she says, stepping closer. “I live next door. Just wanted to come say hi to the new neighbors.”