“I wonder if Alex would lose his shit over something like this.” I move from my chair to the patio and sit in front of Charlene. “Sit up. I want to check those out.”

“What?”

“Sit up and show me your nipples.”

Charlene rolls her eyes, but she complies. We’ve been friends for a very long time. She trussed me up in weird fetish gear with all the leather and chains very recently when I got hitched in Vegas, so she can sure as hell show me her blinged-out nips.

She gets into a cross-legged position to match mine, and I lean in until I’m only a few inches away from her boobs. Charlene has nice boobs. They’re a lot smaller than mine, but bigger than Lily’s. And her nipples are also more nipply than mine.

“Can I look, too?” Lily asks.

“Might as well while they’re hanging out,” Charlene replies.

Lily sets down her drink and weaves her way over to us. Even half-wasted she’s way more graceful than I am.

She plunks herself down beside me, and we stare at Charlene’s boobs. “Wow. So it doesn’t hurt that much?”

“Like I said, I have a high pain tolerance.”

Lily keeps up with the questions. “Are they super sensitive afterward?”

“Well, yeah, but that’s the point.”

Sunny cups her boobs protectively. “My boobs are so sensitive these days, I can’t even imagine.”

“Yeah. I definitely wouldn’t recommend you get your nipples pierced right now.” Charlene says.

Sunny shakes her head. “I don’t really like pain. And I can’t wear earrings that aren’t solid gold because my skin reacts.”

“They can use titanium.” Charlene flicks her nipple. “That’s what I have.”

Lily slaps her muscular, super-thin thigh that doesn’t ever jiggle. “You know what, I went with Randy to see his tattoo artist yesterday, and they have a piercer there.”

“Ooooh! I think Alex gets his tattoos at the same place. What’s it called?” I ask.

“Inked Armor. Does Alex see Hayden?” Lily does that thing with her hands that’s normally reserved for when she talks about being excited to see Randy, which really means getting naked and being on the receiving end of seven million consecutive orgasms.

“Uh, no. Alex’s artist is Chris. He’s a blond guy, looks like he should be in one of those military Xbox games? Last time I was there I didn’t really pay much attention beyond the fact that they’re hot, and I could never get a tattoo because I worry I’d end up with something awful forever. Like that girl who let her boyfriend tattoo his name on her face.”

“Someone actually did that?” Sunny looks appropriately mortified.

“Horrible, right? It’s stuff like that that makes me seem sane and mostly normal.” I’ll never understand why people do such crazy things to their bodies. Although now I’m considering what Alex would think of nipple piercings. He liked it when I blinged out my beaver, maybe he’d be into blinged-out boobs, too.

“Can I lie back down now?” Charlene asks.

“Yeah. Go ahead.” I get up and go back to my chair, but Lily stays where she is.

“So, I don’t know if you all know this, but all the guys are going to get tattoos together at the end of the summer,” she announces, her eyes still on Charlene. “I think we should all go, too.”

“I remember Darren saying something about that,” Charlene muses, and Sunny nods her agreement.

“I’m not getting a tattoo,” Sunny says.

“I don’t mean to get a tattoo. Well, I’m getting one—”

“You’re getting a tattoo?” Sunny’s voice is all squeaky.

Lily nods. “Yeah. Randy’s artist, Hayden, is drawing something up. Sweet Lord, that man is intense, and seriously hot.”

“All the guys in there are,” I say.

“Right?” Lily fans her face. “Hayden’s all angsty and broody, and he’s got two full sleeves. He looks like a model. And the other guys, they’re just as hot. Honestly, I was never big into tattoos before Randy, but now…”

“Are there pictures of these guys?” Charlene interrupts.

“I don’t know. Maybe? Let me check.” Lily pops up and runs across the patio to get her phone. She punches a bunch of buttons and frowns while she scrolls. “A lot of the images are sample designs and custom pieces… Oh! Wait—this is Hayden!”

She flips the phone around and shows Sunny the picture before she shows us.

Now, I’m not really a full-sleeve tattoo kind of girl, but I get Lily’s appreciation for Randy’s body art, because he’s a nice-looking guy with a nice arm and cool designs on it. I check out the picture on Lily’s phone. I’m pretty sure the hottie taking up her screen is the guy I got a brief glimpse of before Chris took Alex and me into the private room the one time I was there. From what I recall, and can confirm from this tiny little phone picture, he’s a panty incinerator.

Charlene grabs the phone to get a closer look. “He can’t really be that hot in real life.”

“Oh, he’s even hotter. Seriously, doesn’t he look like he should be on the cover of magazines?” Lily says.

“Or inside them naked?” Charlene adds.

“I think Miller is better looking than that guy,” Sunny says.

“Yeah, but you have an unusual affinity for yetis, so that’s not really a surprise.” Buck is blond, like Sunny, so all the hair on his arms and legs mostly blends in. There’s still a lot of it, but he trims routinely. When I was a teenager I used to come into the bathroom to find body hair tumbleweeds all over the place. It was gross.

“You have to admit this guy is hot, though.” Lily points to her phone. “You just need to meet him. I can’t explain it. He’s intense. Like, more intense than Randy, if that’s even possible.”

“Did you act like this when you were there with Randy?”

“Act like what?”

“Like you’re about to have heart palpitations and a case of the vapors.” Not that I blame her. I mean, the guy is smoking, even if he is kind of wiry. He reminds me of the emo guys in high school that I used to be a little afraid of. But not actually afraid, more like I was never going to be cool enough to hang out with them.