The elevator let out a discreet bing. Nick stepped off, not bothering to look up from texting on his cell phone as he strolled into the foyer. “Yo, bro, gotta do something about that new door dude. The dipshit wanted to play a game of twenty questions and who-the-fuck-its.” Nick’s thumbs rapid-fired over the phone screen. “Asshole,” he muttered under his breath.

“He’s doing his job, Nick.” Hudson slid Allie’s coat over her shoulders at the same time she tugged her hair free from the collar. “And quit putting so much effort into looking like shit,” he added after getting a better look at his kid brother. Forget about the long overdue haircut, the clothes he favored needed to bypass a thrift shop and head straight to an incinerator.

“Like your sorry ass looks any . . .” Nick looked up and halted midsentence as Allie breezed past him toward the elevator.

“Hi Nick, bye Nick.” She glanced over her shoulder at Hudson. “Don’t decorate that tree without me.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Hudson said with a dry exhale. “Let me walk you out.” He strode past a stymied Nick. “Not a word from you, feel me?”

“Ah, shit, bro, you make it too easy.” Nick shoved his phone into the pocket of way overwashed jeans with holes splitting the knees.

Hudson stopped in front of Allie as she wrapped the cashmere scarf around her neck. He could feel his brother’s eyes on them. “Don’t you have a fridge to raid or something?” he asked him.

The smart-ass grin on Nick’s face as he strolled out of the room would have pissed Hudson off if he weren’t so fucking glad to see him smile. udson poff of her werenmt so fucking lgald to see him smil

Still, he waited until Nick was in the kitchen making himself at home before launching a last-ditch effort.

“I can’t strengthen my case on why you should stay here?” He popped a button on her coat, and just as she finished doing it up, he’d freed another.

Allie laughed. “Quit.” She batted his hand away and made quick work refastening the button. “I told you, I’m not intruding on ‘boy’s night.’”

“You won’t be. This place has three floors, for Christ’s sake. Watch a movie in the theater or . . .” Hudson’s lips curved into a sinful grin. “Lounge in my bed naked, waiting for me. Whatever you want. Though I prefer the latter.”

“I’ll be fine. Besides, it will give you a chance to miss me.”

“I’ve spent a lifetime missing you.” He dropped a kiss on her lips.

She smiled. “Then you’ll survive one more night.”

“Max is driving you and will wait at your brownstone until morning.”

“Hudson, that’s not necessary.”

“It’s non-negotiable, Alessandra. If you’re leaving my place, he’s going with you. Here.” Hudson handed her a key card with carte blanche access.

Allie raised a brow.

“This way you won’t have to call up tomorrow. Of course, if you wanted to come by later, I certainly wouldn’t object.”

“Ah, settin’ up a booty call,” Nick said as he cut through the foyer. He had a bag of Doritos in one hand and a box of Swedish fish in the other.

“Shut up, Nick.” Hudson glared in his direction, but Nick was already bounding up the stairs two at a time.

“Oh, I can tell tonight is going to be one for the books,” Allie said. As she backed into the elevator a slow smile curved her lips. “But who knows, maybe I’ll surprise you with a wake-up call.”

Hudson groaned and pushed a hand through his hair. The look she gave him made his cock twitch, but when the doors hushed closed the ache he felt whenever she left set up shop in his chest. His brother better fucking appreciate this, he thought as he turned on his heel and stalked up the stairs.

“Well, well, well, how the mighty have fallen,” Nick said the moment Hudson walked into the game room. He’d already stripped his jacket off and flung it on the leather chesterfield. “That’s a new development. Finally relocated your balls and called her, huh?”

Hudson cut his brother a sharp look. “Don’t start, Nick.” God help him, tonight was going to be an eternity without her, not to mention painful if his brother kept up this shit.

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Nick shook his head, a shit-eating grin on his face and a not-letting-this-go gleam in his eye. “You’re even more pussywhipped than you were back in the day.”

“Zip it, Nick.”

“Come on, bro, lighten up.” He laughed. “You’re like the pussy whisperer. You usually got them lined up.”

Hudson came to a halt. “Don’t push me on this. She’s just . . .” He thought about Allie and all her quirks. That it took her ten minutes to order a damn coffee, the way she had fifty questions lined up after he said a single sentence, and how the only way to shut her up was to kiss her senseless.

“She’s just what, got you by the balls?”

“The heart, man. The fucking heart.” He exhaled and cocked a slight grin. “I love her.”

“Hey, sorry for poppin’ shit. But that’s what little brothers do, ya know?”

“Yeah, I know. Now can I school your punk ass in a game of pool?”

“As if.” Nick flopped over the back of the couch and stretched out on the tufted leather. “I think I missed this room most of all.”

Hudson chuckled. “This is what you missed the most?” The game room was a dark, luxurious space that kept in time with the era of the building, but with a modern spin. The place had it all: poker and pool tables, flat screens and surround sound, couches to comfortably seat ten, a fireplace to take the chill off or to set the mood, a bar with every conceivable liquor, beer, or beverage of choice, and of course, the infamous dart board. Nick always said the only thing missing was a peanut warmer and permission to toss his shells on the floor. But after thirty days locked up with nothing but basic cable and institutional food, Hudson wouldn’t have thought the game room topped Nick’s list.

“Shit, yeah. Your house is Disneyland for adults. And not Anaheim Disney, but frickin’ Orlando Disney.”

Hudson smirked. He and Allie had certainly turned the room into their own Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, rattling a few chains, so to speak.

“Then there’s your ‘Black Book,’ which is Magic Mountain. You know they have an app for that? A stripper pole would make it heaven, icing on the cake.”

“Not a chance in hell.” Hudson hit the switch to the Art Deco Tiffany chandelier spotlighting the table’s red baize.

Nick sat up and dragged a hand through his hair. Damn, the two of them were more alike than he’d ever admit. “Ah, come on. Don’t go soft on me. You’re like, shit, I don’t know, the god of Penthouse.”

“Playboy.” Hudson corrected. “The place was the headquarters of Playboy. And I excel at never being soft.”

“TMI.” Nick collected the balls from the pockets and racked them up. He gave them a quick one-two rollup and back and they clacked together. “My bad.” He hung the triangle back on its designated hook. “Dudes in rehab were like, when can I come over and kiss the wood Hefner walked on? You could charge admission.”

Hudson grabbed a couple of cues off the wall. “Admission and stripper poles, huh? Any other plans you have for my apartment?”

“Nah, that about covers it. And apartments are rinky-dink in the size department. This is a penthouse. An apartment is what I live in.”

“Wouldn’t know it with how much time you’re parking your ass over here.” Hudson tossed a cue to Nick, who caught the stick in midair.

“I like being here.”

“Go ahead and break.” Hudson walked over to the fridge behind the bar and gripped the cool steel handle. “Something to drink?” Fuck, the question was as ritualistic as brushing your teeth in the morning. He looked through the glass into the fully stocked stainless box. He was an asshole, he thought, for not cleaning the thing out. “Shit.” His hand dropped, and he did a one-eighty to face his brother. “I’m sorry, Nick.”

“Look, I’m cool.” Nick chalked up his cue. “Old habits die hard, huh?”