Just for Fun by Erin Nicholas

here in a private jet.”
    A low whistle of appreciation came from one of his friends.
    “Sounds great,” Kevin said. “Not sure I see a problem.”
    “I’m starting to feel like I like her. Like I’d be okay with doing this again.” There, he’d admitted it.
    “That’s a bad thing?” Kevin asked.
    Dooley scowled even though his best friend couldn’t see it. Kevin knew what Dooley’s world was like. He should get this even more than the others.
    “Yes. I can’t afford this chick,” he finally said. Which was completely true. Emotionally and financially.
    Morgan liked expensive things. She fit right in here. She was not a beer-and-pizza girl, a Sunday-football-tailgate girl, a demo-derby girl. In his life, there would always be guys gathered around the TV on the sofa and in her way.
    It would never work.
    “But you’re Julia ,” Ben said. “ She’s Richard Gere. Maybe she doesn’t need you to afford her.”
    “Yeah, man,” Mac said. “She’ll afford you.”
    It sounded good. It might be true. He could get used to that. But… “I want a couch I can put my feet on. I don’t want to have to wear a tie to dinner. I want to have carpet I can spill things on.”
    “What are you, five?” Ben asked. “Grown-ups sometimes have to wear a tie and shouldn’t be spilling things.”
    “Really?” Dooley said. “Then why did I have to rent a carpet steamer after the last time you all came over to watch a game?”
    No one answered him.
    “In relationships you compromise,” Kevin finally said. “You might have to dress up sometimes, but then she’ll dress down sometimes.”
    Dooley shook his head but even as he did he could imagine Morgan in a pair of sexy cut-off sweat pants and a T-shirt with no bra, curling her feet up under her on the couch next to him as they shared popcorn.
    Dumb.
    “I don’t want a relationship ,” Dooley said to the one guy on the phone besides him who didn’t have one. “Tell me how stupid it is to even think about that this fast.”
    Total silence met his comment. He sighed.
    Every one of the guys on the other end had fallen hard and fast for a woman. Three of the four were now married to those women.
    Which meant they were no good to him.
    “All I can tell you,” Sam finally said, “is get her straight to bed and then out the door. Don’t talk to her. Don’t get to know her. Don’t have fun with her outside of those sheets. That’s when you’re going to be sunk.”
    There were murmurs of agreement from the other men.
    “If you just want sex, keep it just sex,” Mac added. “Stay busy otherwise. You’re basically living together. That gets nice and comfortable real quick.”
    “Maybe you shouldn’t do anything,” Kevin interjected. “Maybe you should just come home if you’re so sure you don’t want to be with her.” There was the good Christian boy they’d all come to know.
    “I can’t leave.” In spite of his temptation to plead illness earlier. “For one, we came on a private jet so I don’t have a return ticket.” Of course he could get one. “Two, I can’t leave her to deal with her ex. Can I?” The truth was, being told he had to stay because it was the right thing to do would feel a lot better than knowing he was staying because he was concerned…and jealous. And because he just wanted to.
    “It’s because you care,” Sam said. “Man, you’re already getting attached.”
    “I care about the Jacuzzi tub and the prime rib on the menu tonight and the fifteen-hundred-thread-count sheets,” he insisted.
    “How do you even know what a thread count is?” Mac asked in the background.
    “Vivian!” Sam exclaimed. “Her name in Pretty Woman was Vivian.”
    Dooley rubbed his forehead again.
    “If you think you only like her because of the fancy stuff she can buy,” Ben said, “then you need to prove you’re right.”
    Dooley straightened. Ben was easily the smartest one of the bunch.
    “By doing the opposite of what Sam said,” Ben