Page 100 of Holiday Home 3
“You don’t have a favorite?” he asked.
“I might, but I don’t plan to vote any. For this part of things, I’m your sexy, unbiased travel agent. Wherever you all want to go, that’s where we’ll head.”
Liam snorted. She was precisely one of those things, and he fully anticipated her biases to slide in via texts and suggestions over the coming weeks. He couldn’t say he’d mind if they did. He knew next to nothing about exotic vacationing. His parents had always preferred winter vacations, like skiing in Colorado, over visiting beaches in the summer. That was soon to change, and Avril Knight was again responsible.
“I’ll come pick your brain on the options later,” he promised.
She tossed him a thumbs-up. “I’ll be here.”
He and Anna meandered as a pair throughout the rest of the room for the next half-hour. With Anna’s help, they each found a few things to spend their points on. His opinion was called on a few times, and not just by Anna, when clothes, jewelry, and the like were tried on. Much to his surprise, even Victoria asked him to weigh in on a few outfits she was considering. She even took the one that he’d said was his favorite, and butterflies whirred in his gut for minutes afterward.
By the time they were all done making their selections, he’d managed to whittle down his now-understood-to-be-obscene number of points from two hundred and fifty to a little more than half that amount. Chief among his gifts, he had obtainedfour laptops, three of which he’d be giving to friends back at Perrymont, several nice outfits, during which he’d been the one asking for opinions, and one of the spa resort packages, which he intended to give to his parents—right after he figured out a plausible story about how he'd won them. He also took the watch, though that was more due to Avril’s insistence than anything else.
“It’s a Rolex Daytona, this year’s model, and you’re taking it,” she’d ordered, practically shoving the glass container it was safely protected by into his hands.
It’d cost him forty-five points. It wasn’t until he searched for it on his phone the next day that he realized that it was a fucking hundred-thousand-dollar watch. Avril never allowed him to return it to her.
The last thing he obtained were four front-row tickets for an upcoming Lakers game, which he knew his roommate would salivate over when he saw them. There’d also need to be a story for that one, though maybe the “truth” would suffice.
“My girlfriend’s roommate is crazy rich and generous.”
Most of them had been making trips to and from their cars for a while, transporting espresso machines, hair dryers, and other obtained prizes. As those trips finished, it became a matter of worrying about what was left behind. While Liam was the least informed of everyone when it came to most of the real-world prices involved with the gifts littering the room, even he knew they were leaving behind tens of thousands of dollars of stuff in an unlockable room. Should they cart out the clothing and store it inside Anna’s SUV? Gather up all the appliances and bring them back to Avril and Anna’s apartment?
“It’ll get handled tomorrow,” Avril said, dismissing their worries with a wave of her hand. Gripping the markers in one hand, she carried the whiteboard under the same arm as shegravitated toward the door. It almost seemed comical thatthosewere what she was focused on protecting.
“Even if it wasallstolen by then, it’d barely even be a blip to her,” Victoria let him know, patting him on the shoulder. “Trust what she’s saying.”
At least Tess also looked a little queasy, leaving so much wealth unguarded. However, the women who knew Avril best obeyed her suggestion, which put the majority on her side. Liam swallowed his unease and let Avril file them out. From there, she at least shut the door.
“Victoria, you’re not good to drive,” the redhead astutely pointed out once they were all in the hall.
“No, I’m not,” she agreed.
“Do you want to see if Liam will give you a drive home, or would you like to stay over with me and Anna?”
“I would like to avoid too many trips tomorrow, so I’d prefer the latter. I’ll drive myself home in the morning.”
“Great!” Avril’s gaze slid like a breeze to him and Tess. “How about you two? Heading home, staying over?”
As the option of a sleepover had never been floated until just now, Liam hadn’t been entertaining it. Throughout the night, he’d believed he’d be taking Victoria and Tess home. The sudden change of plans left him suffering to find his voice.
“It’s late enough that, so long as you’rebothokay with it, I wouldn’t mind spending the night,” Tess said. “I can help clean up here tomorrow, too. We’ve left our glasses in the other room, and I recall you saying we could take home some of your surplus liquor.”
“That I did,” Avril reconfirmed.
“I’m okay with it,” Anna said. Along with everyone else, she turned her attention toward him. “Everyone is welcome to stay.”
Driving home in the cold and the dark after a long party didn’t sound all that great to him, either. On the otherhand, sleeping over in an apartment filled to the brim with gorgeous women sounded like a recipe for excitementanddisappointment.
No way anything’s happening tonight,he told his body.But the company will definitely be nice enough.
“I’d be glad to stay over, too,” he said, smiling.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
First Ever
Obviously, the living room couch would be where he rested his head for the night. Meanwhile, the four women had each paired off with a sleeping partner, though not in any configuration he might have expected. Once they’d piled into the warm apartment, having first piled into Anna’s SUV for the ride over, Avril had offered Tess, not Victoria, one-half of her bed. The other option he might have expected would have been for Anna and Avril to buddy up for the night.