The Hunter

Jackpot.

“Taking your coffee with milk is like going down on a woman with a condom on your tongue. The Italians would exile you for less,” I murmured, eyes still closed, my lips against this girl’s skin.

“Thanks for the imagery,” Vaughn Spencer, my other good friend, quipped flatly.

“Pay no heed to me, old sport.” My available hand patted the flesh behind me, curling the other chick’s leg over my waist. Where are my condoms? Why were Knight and Vaughn offering me coffee and conversation instead of a rubber? They should be fired and replaced with wingmen who’d actually help me score. Not that I had any trouble in that department. “Just throw me a rubber before you leave, will ya?”

“Give your cock a timeout and wake the fuck up.” A muddy boot found its way to the side of my head, threatening to squash my skull.

Vaughn, AKA the devil on my shoulder.

On anyone’s shoulder, really.

I had a love-hate relationship with the motherfucker.

Love, because he was, after all, one of my best friends.

Hate, because he was, despite the abovementioned title, a cunt of gargantuan proportions.

My eyes popped open. The rest of my body signaled my brain that this orgy might die prematurely. Grains of sand and dirt from his boot dusted my temple. I felt my nostrils flaring, my pulse spiking up.

The girl in front of me, Alice, grinned sleepily as she curved her back, plastering her breasts to my chest encouragingly. Shit. I was still fingering her. It was hard not to when she made all those delicious noises. I removed my hand from her pussy reluctantly. The girl behind me, at least, had the decency to stop humping my leg like a guinea pig that had just discovered its genitals.

“Get your filthy-ass boot away from my face,” I hissed through clenched teeth, “before I snap your spine and use it as a scarf.”

Both Vaughn and I knew this was an idle threat. My manicured hands weren’t big on violence. In fact, I wouldn’t hurt an ant if it killed my entire immediate family. I mean, I would be mad. Livid. And I’d sue for emotional distress, for sure. But get my hands dirty? Nah.

It wasn’t fear of fighting that stopped me but the sheer indolence that came with my aristocratic upbringing. As the son of Gerald Fitzpatrick, owner and CEO of Royal Pipelines, the biggest oil and gas company in the United States, I rarely needed to rise to the level of taking care of my own shit. The Fitzpatrick family was the fourth richest in the entire US of A, and that made me a lazy, self-entitled asswipe.

“You and another dudebro tag-teamed five chicks yesterday.” Vaughn kept his foot on my temple.

This violent act was probably the highlight of his week. Why he couldn’t find the simple joys of life in booze, women, and overpriced clothes from aging rappers was beyond me. He made everything seem so fucking complicated.

“I did?” My eyebrows shot to my forehead, genuine surprise tinged with pride filling my chest. “Are the Guinness people on their way here? Will they bring actual Guinness? I find stout to be far superior to lager.”

“Smash his skull. He deserves it,” Knight groaned above my head.

That was rich coming from him. He had a history with booze that could rival Lord Byron and Benjamin Franklin at an all-you-can-drink Koh Samui bar. Now that he had a girlfriend, I worried that if they were ever to conceive, she’d give birth to a bottle of tequila and two tickets to Coachella.

“I also answer to God and Damn, Hunter You’re So Big,” I mumbled, briefly considering a quick nap under Vaughn’s boot.

Hey, it wasn’t like he’d shifted any real weight onto it.

The two girls unglued themselves from me. They were now making background noise, picking up their clothes, getting dressed. I checked my surroundings for the first time since opening my eyes. I was in Vaughn’s living room, judging by the plush, crème upholstery, dripping chandeliers, and 8k-a-piece brass lamps.

The carpet felt sticky, and the blinds were torn. Daddy and Mommy Spencer would be glad to get rid of their asshole spawn, who was flying out to England for an internship soon.

“You fucked up big time.” Knight hoisted me out from under Vaughn’s boot, hurling me on the sofa and throwing a quilt over my now-impressive, raging hard-on.

He didn’t look directly at me as he spoke, like it was my fault I’d been blessed with a physique fit for constant nudity and an eight-inch dick.

“All I heard was the word fuck, and I’m definitely game for that.” I patted the table next to the couch, found a pack of cigarettes that wasn’t mine and a lighter, and lit one, puffing smoke upward. I only smoked occasionally, but couldn’t pass up the opportunity to look like an asshole when it presented itself. “Why’d you cockblock me?” I squinted, pointing the cigarette between Vaughn and Knight, who stood in front of me, hands on hips, full-fledged and shit.

“There was a leak.” Vaughn’s icicle eyes tapered with displeasure.

I waved him off with the cigarette. “That’s just a natural discharge designed to tell you the female body is ready for mating. You’d know that if you fucked women who were alive. Is this about your parents’ carpets? Because I’ll send Syllie the bill.”

Syllie—Sylvester Lewis—was my father’s right hand and COO back in Boston. He did solids for me on the reg. His job, among others, was to keep me alive and out of trouble, which meant he was basically set up for failure. I didn’t call him often, but when I did, it was because I needed to bail out of something heinous I’d gotten myself into.