“Fine, but I go first.”

“Why, of course. I am a gentleman after all.”

“Hmm,” I grunted. He was a gentleman in some respects, but I wasn’t going to agree with him. He already seemed to have a big enough ego as it was. I would hate to contribute to it getting any bigger. Especially since I thought turning him down for sex had brought him down a peg or two. I would have hated to reverse any long-term good I’d done for women across Vegas. Although, I wasn’t so sure that all my hard work wouldn’t be evaporated at the first bimbo who bounced her cleavage his way.

Like a stranger, I looked at my house with fresh eyes. It was just a rental, so it wasn’t anything that I would want for myself, but seeing as how I was never really there, I hadn’t put much thought into the mostly sterile walls and dated tiles covering the living room floor.

Vegas homes are odd. The home was built in the 90s but was the equivalent of an 80s home anywhere else in the nation. A hexagonal light hung from the ceiling in faux crystal and gold above the front door. The fan above my head had blades of untreated pine covered with a light collection of dust bunnies, with a white dome of filtered light that usually shed little more light than a candelabra. On the wall behind the couch and just to the inside of the front door was a large painting I found at Homegoods that reminded me of the beach and summers spent at the lake with my family. The painting was abstract with swishes of blue and green, beige, and specks of red. If you looked hard enough, it almost looked like a creek surrounded by cattails and a field of poppies not far off in the distance.

I had already found my first “I Spy” object, but the purpose of the game was to not reveal the source. I’d spent one too many family road trips with an annoying little brother in the seat beside me. I found the only way to keep him busy was to play games—I Spy being the easiest one to play in a car going forty miles an hour and a small window to guess before the object could disappear into the rolling heat dancing above the paved road. Needless to say, I was a pro at this game.

“I spy something…brown.”

He spoke around a sly smile, containing the reason for his amusement, “I see how you want to play this.” Joel looked around the room, presumably taking in every piece of brown that could be found in over a dozen items littered about the room.

“Which one is your goal? To get me naked or get me drunk?”

His eyebrow lifted when he realized I wasn’t touching that question with a ten-foot pole. “A woman with secrets. I like my women with a bit of mystery.”

“Well I guess it doesn’t matter in my case because I’m not your woman.”

“That’s open to interpretation because there’s still a pair of panties in there that would disagree with that statement.”

“Don’t flatter yourself. Look, are you playing or not?”

“So eager, pretty bird.” He shook his head, laughingly.

“I’m going to guess…” he looked at the media table holding the TV. It’s the largest bit of brown in the room and the most obvious, “the chair in the dining room.”

I don’t know how he guessed right, especially since I purposely avoided looking at the chairs for any real length of time. There was no giveaway in how long I looked at it, and I made sure to spend an equal amount of attention on all the other furniture around me.

“How did you know?” I asked sincerely.

“Uh-uh. I’m not telling, and I believe you owe me something.”

He looked me up and down, his eyes already peeling off the clothes he wanted removed first. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of seeing me naked so quickly. Pace yourself.

“Bottle.”

I held my hand out to take the bottle resting against his thigh where he tossed it after he sat down. This is going to be a long game if I have to sit through what could be another hour of that smug smile. I’ll just have to use that as incentive not to lose. I could see he was the type of winner who liked to gloat, and I didn’t want to give him the satisfaction.

I took a swig from the bottle. The pungent liquid filled my mouth and splashed the outside of my lips, running down my chin while I threw back the contents burning my insides. My teeth couldn’t scratch off the bitter film still clinging to the top of my tongue, no matter how much I tried scraping the alcohol away. Holding the bottle by the neck, I set it down with a firm thud onto the wood of my coffee table, dead-center between where we both sat.

“My turn.”

In the darkness of the room, Joel’s eyes still sparkled like sun-soaked gems, filled with the excitement of a child. Five minutes before, I may not have wanted to play with him, but it wasn’t like there was anything better to do, and maybe in his real life he didn’t have anyone to play something as simple as I Spy with. Granted, we were both adults, and I couldn’t say that I’d played the game in fifteen years. If he wants to play, we’ll play.

“I spy something blue.” He stared into my eyes so intensely that if I had blue eyes I would be sure that he was referring to the color of my irises. Instead, I know there are only two things in the room that contain the color blue—the throw pillow to his left is a chevron pattern with varying shades of white, gray, and blue.

“The painting.” I gave Joel my poker-face as I took my best guess.

“Nope.” He gave a subtle shake of his head, the smug smile spreading wider—stretched so thin that it looked like the creases of his mouth would touch his ears if he kept that up.

“You’re lying.”

“I swear,” he said, holding up his hand like he was a good little Boy Scout. I wasn’t falling for it. That smile wasn’t made from being nice and honest; that smile didn’t come from good little boys. “It’s the movie case on the far right. In there.” He nodded his head to the media console with the glass panes showing a few cases of movies lined up.

“So, you’re not a liar. You’re a cheater. There’s no way you can see that small writing from where you’re sitting. Not with the lights out, you can’t.”

“I have 20/20 vision, the better to see you with, my dear. Now, what’ll it be? You finally taking something off? Or you taking the loser’s route again?”

The sight of me taking my top off shut him up like the sound of a gong ringing out into the silence. I thought he had choked on his tongue for how quiet he got. It was the first time since I’d met him that he had nothing to say—no off-handed remarks or witty one-liners—nothing. The silence was beautiful, and for the first time in a long time, I found a smug smile on my own face.

The game continued on, and at the first opportunity Joel got down to his jeans, while I was down to my bra and no underwear—for which I had to strategically cross my legs for coverage—and a fifth of the bottle taking up residence in my stomach.

I lost again and before I could pick up the bottle, Joel’s hands reached out to grab me, stilling the fingers still twined around the neck of the whiskey.

“I say we raise the stakes. I don’t want you getting piss-drunk, and chances are you’re too modest to completely strip down. Plus, that kind of means I won, right? How about we change the loser’s choice?”

“Wha-what new stakes?” I was sure I slurred a little, but I didn’t have time to sound out the way “stakes” sounded before Joel answered me.

“How about every time one of us wins, they can forfeit stripping and drinking for a kiss from the other player.”

“You’re saying this like…like there’re other people…other people playing. You’re just trying to kiss me. I see you.” My finger swayed, drawing what looked to be lazy figure eights in the air as I pointed to him now sitting only a couple feet from me.

“You’re close. When did you get so close?”

“You didn’t answer me.”

“About the kiss? You just want to taste me.”