He twisted to her, wrapping an arm around her and leaning up to get in her face.

“I’ll buy you a laptop for your birthday.”

She lifted her head off the couch an inch. “That’s not going to help me sell the furniture now. Dad’s paying for that unit. He has two boxes in there. We can put the boxes in the garage and he can save that money.”

“An early birthday present.”

She rolled her eyes and dropped her head back.

He knew that wouldn’t go over.

Still.

“Butterfly, you made a date with Elvira to return eight thousand dollars’ worth of clothes and shoes and two of the outfits in that mix would look spectacular on you and cost nowhere near eight thousand dollars. You got money in the bank but you won’t splurge. Thank Christ you didn’t feel the same about the panties and bras. But none of that costs as much as a laptop and you still didn’t keep it. So with that, I gotta ask, when’re you gonna lay out the cake to buy a laptop that in this day and age you need?”

She lifted her head up another inch. “After I put the bedroom furniture in the front yard, tape signs up around the neighborhood, and sit out there all day waiting for someone who’ll happen by and pay me what I’m asking, making it so I don’t have to take a hit to the savings I like having to buy a laptop.”

“That’s one way to go. But how much do you want outta that shit?”

“It all cost nearly six thousand dollars, it’s seen nearly no use, and is less than three years old, so I was hoping maybe five hundred dollars.”

He sat back, still turned to her and she came up.

“Six thousand dollars?” he asked.

“His mother picked it,” she mumbled. “It includes mattresses, which are expensive, and the furniture wasn’t exactly Ikea.” Her eyes slid away. “She might break into hives if she went to Ikea. Though the maze bit scares me, I love the bottom floor where all the gadgets are.”