Page 10 of A Little Kissing Between Friends

“Can I get a lap dance, please? Just this once? It’s my birthday.”

“It ain’t your damn birthday, fool,” I growled, slapping his hand to make him release her.

Keeping his eyes on Jucee, Cody shot me the bird. “It’ll feel like my birthday if she gives me a dance. Hell, it’ll feel like my birthday, Christmas, and Valentine’s Day all rolled into one.”

Giggling, Jucee turned to me, her eyebrow quirked in question. Immediately, I shook my head.

“Hell naw! It’s thirty other women in here,” I exclaimed, waving a hand around the packed room. “Pick one of them and leave mine alone!”

My little brother shot me a surprised look and then tossed his head back and laughed. “Yours?! You own her now?”

Pursing my lips, I glared at him. He was tryna make it something that it wasn’t. He got that shit from his mama. Hell, and his daddy. I could—and regularly did—acknowledge how damn fine Jucee was, and how big of a heart she had, and how funny she could be, especially when she was fussing because she needed attention, but I needed her in my life like I needed my music, and I would never jeopardize that by going for anything other than what we had. That also meant fielding everybody’s insinuations that we were anything other than friends.

“You know what I mean, fool. My best friend.”

“Yeah. Sure,” he smirked. Giving Jucee wide, puppy-dog eyes, he whimpered. “You gon’ miss out on this $200 because Cyn cockblocking?”

Sucking my teeth, I dug a few bills out of my pocket, folded them, and slipped them into one of the garters strapped around Jucee’s thick-ass thigh over her glittery fishnets. It was possible that my fingers lingered on her for a couple of seconds longer than necessary, but that was just a brain fart—a momentary short in my synapses—nothing more. “There. That’s $400 to ignore this idiot.”

Cody frowned and Jucee cracked up, moving out of the circle of chairs we were in.

“Y’all are too funny.”

I shook my head. “Nah, he funny ’cause he know damn well I don’t play about you. Now, g’on somewhere ’fore I have to knock his head in for trying me.”

Laughing, Jucee shot a wink at Cody and walked off, stopping a few tables down when a group of women wearing bridal veils waved her over. One woman stood to her feet and waved a stack of hundreds as incentive. Once it was clear that she was occupied, I turned to my brother, expecting to find him sulking. To my surprise, he was studying me, a shrewd expression on his face. I frowned.

“You buggin’.”

A wide smile erupted on his face. “Nah, bruh. I’m chillin’.”

His easy demeanor was suspicious as hell. As the baby, Cody was known to hold a grudge and pout when he didn’t get his way. Narrowing my eyes, I stared a hole into his face. Noticing my gape, he cracked up.

“Since you big money tonight, go ahead and order a platter of wings. Ya boy is starvin’ like Marvin.”

“I’m big money? You the one fuckin’ up commas. I’m just tryna get like you, baby bro.” He’d recently secured a position as a senior cloud practitioner at NexTech making six figures, and this stop at Sanity was doing double duty as part of his new-job celebration.

He laughed. “Man, kill all that.”

I joined in on his laughter but went ahead and signaled to one of the servers who was walking by wearing neon-pink fishnets, hot pants with Sanity across the booty, and a low-cut, sleeveless, deep-purple body suit with Sanity across the chest area.

“Hey, Cyn,” she greeted with a smile. “What can I get for you?”

“Let me get a platter of wings.” I turned to my brother. “What flavors?”

“Pshh. Lemon pepper, of course!” Cody gave me a dumb look as if I should’ve already known the answer.

The server, who I recognized as a young woman named Nini, giggled. “One thirty-wing platter, lemon pepper flavor.” She wrote it down on a little notepad that she pulled out of her fanny pack. “You want waffle fries too?”

I nodded. “Yeah, that’ll be dope.”

Nini nodded and tucked her notepad away. “Extra blue cheese, right?”

Grinning, I nodded again. “That’s right. You know me so well, Nini.”

Even in the low lights, I could see a blush rise to Nini’s caramel cheeks as she returned my grin and pushed a lock of her blonde bob behind her ear.

“I just pay attention, is all.”