Sam had brown hair, gray eyes, and tan skin. He was tall, broad, and had that ragged, hunky look that made women lose their pants and senses.

“Dude, my wife is knocked up. Too late for you to second-guess what we’re doing in our spare time. By the way, the abdomen pain she had this week turned out to be gas, thanks for asking,” Hunter tutted.

Was I seriously listening to a fart report from Sailor now?

“Not every single conversation must circle back to the fact your wife is pregnant,” I reminded him.

“Prove it.”

Sam jerked his thumb toward Hunter.

“You realize I will kill your brother at some point, right?” he asked me.

“Won’t hold it against you.” I spat the cigar out to an ashtray. “But wait until after he reveals his cards.”

“Speaking of marital bliss,” Devon swirled his Johnnie Walker Blue Label in its tubmler, “I believe our host has some marvelous news to share.”

“Aww, you finally opened an account on OkCupid?” Hunter clasped his hands together, cooing. “Our parents have been riding his ass for being lonelier than a satanist in a Youth for Jesus convention for a while now.”

“It’ll be a cold day in hell when Cillian Fitzpatrick says I do,” Sam drawled.

“Better bring a warm coat, mate.” Devon smirked.

“Hell’s not ready for me yet. And Cillian likes variety too much to settle for one pussy.” Sam speared Devon with a deadly glare.

“Women are like pancakes. They all taste the same,” I agreed.

Sam flashed his teeth. “I fucking love pancakes.”

The man had bedded everyone in town.

Everyone other than my sister.

It didn’t take an astrophysicist to figure out Aisling was stupidly in love with Brennan. Whenever she was in the room with her sister-in-law’s brother, she all but drooled on his lap. The minute I’d realized her lapse in judgment, I’d hired Brennan on retainer. I didn’t have too much work for him back when we started our professional relationship, but having him on my payroll ensured he wasn’t going to touch Ash.

Brennan was an honorable man in his own backward, lethal way.

I cracked my knuckles, my eyes firmly on my cards. I had two pairs. I would bet both my nuts Hunter’s cards had alphabet letters and drawings of animals at best. For an Irishman, luck wasn’t on his side.

“I’m engaged.” I dropped the bomb.

Sam choked on his cigarette, the inch-long ash dangling from it falling onto the table. Hunter cackled. Devon gave me a curt nod of approval.

Me? I felt nothing.

Numbness was a notion I was familiar with, knew how to manage, and did not stir me off course.

Hunter slapped his thigh, his cards raining down on the floor as he laughed his ass off. He fell from his chair, holding his stomach.

“Engaged!” he bellowed, dragging himself up back to his seat. “Who’s the unlucky woman? Your blowup doll?”

“Her name is Minka Gomes.”

“You named your blowup doll Minka?” My brother wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, downing a bottle of water. “I thought you’d go for something more stripper-y. Like Lola or Candy.”

“I don’t recall running a background check on her.” Sam pinned me with a glare. These days, I had him dig up dirt on everyone I met, from business partners to shoeshiners.

“Just because you haven’t heard of her doesn’t mean she’s not in existence,” I bit out. Admittedly, it was hard to explain how I’d ended up engaged to a complete stranger.

Minka was pleasant enough when I stopped by her house with a marriage offer earlier today. Devon prepped her for our meeting. She said she was happy to sign all the necessary paperwork and asked for two clauses to be added during our negotiations. She wanted a cabin in Aspen, and an annual trip to Fashion Week in a European city of her choice, along with a healthy shopping budget. I was content to grant both her wishes.

She was beautiful, polite, and obnoxiously eager to please.

She also stirred absolutely nothing in me.

“Please explain to me how you went from corrupting Europe’s finest princesses to getting engaged to some random local chick.” Hunter scrubbed his chin.

My brother, like the rest of my family, thought I’d spent my time romancing EU’s finest royals. That was a story I spoon-fed my family to protect them from the truth. I did brush shoulders with duchesses and daughters of earls, socially climbing my way from another rich American man to the kind of person who knew everyone worth knowing on the continent.

But I’d never touched them.

I’d never touched a woman I hadn’t paid for, if I was being honest.

Which I wasn’t, with anyone.

Anyone but Persephone.

Even two days later, I still wasn’t sure what made me tell her about my preference to pay for sex. I deliberately left out the part where the women I’d seen weren’t prostitutes, per se. Waited to see the revulsion on her innocent face. But she was too occupied with mentally beating me with her purse for ridiculing her feelings to let the small details register.

Paying for sex was my way to give conventional relationships the middle finger. I’d taken care of the women I’d seen, both in bed and out of it, but I’d never offered them more than a good time. Dates, presents, phone calls, feelings—those were off the table.

My partners came with a detailed list of dos and don’ts, and the only thing they expected from our encounters was a large tip, a complimentary orgasm from yours truly.

My first time with a working girl was at age fourteen.

My father had visited me at Evon, not long after Andrew Arrowsmith unearthed my secret.

We held a private dinner at London’s Savoy. I wore a long-sleeved shirt even though it was summer to hide the cigarette burns and bite marks. Athair asked me how many girls I’d slept with, spooning Royal Beluga on a small toast. I curled my index finger to my thumb, making a zero sign. I didn’t think much of it. Not only did I attend an all-boy school but I also had bigger fish to fry than getting my dick wet.

Gerald Fitzpatrick choked on his caviar. The next day, he decided to rectify my dire situation by hurling my skinny ass onto a plane and taking me on a trip to Norway, where he was scheduled to visit one of Royal Pipelines’ oil drilling rigs.

Maja, the Norwegian woman who relieved me of my celibate status, was in her early thirties, about a head taller than teenage me, and comically confused when I nearly threw up in her lap. I didn’t want to lose my virginity. Not at age fourteen, not to a stranger, and definitely not in a high-end brothel on a side street in Oslo. But doing things to appease my father wasn’t a strange concept for me.

It was just another Tuesday in the Fitzpatrick household where Athair dangled the kingdom’s keys in front of me to get what he wanted.

Don’t slouch.

Don’t curse.

Do not misspell a word, fall off a horse, display less than pristine table manners, or look your father in the eye.

And so, I’d put on a condom and paid my dues.

When I’d gotten out of the room, Athair clapped my back, and said, “This, mo òrga, is the only thing women are good for. Opening their legs and taking orders. You’d be wise to remember that. Try to upgrade your mistresses often, never get attached to any of them, and when the time to settle down comes, make sure you find someone manageable. Someone who wouldn’t ask for too much.”