The Setup Read online

  The Set Up

  A Bro Code Novel

  by Rachel Van Dyken

  Copyright © 2019 RACHEL VAN DYKEN

  This is a work of fiction. Names, places, characters, and events are fictitious in every regard. Any similarities to actual events and persons, living or dead, are purely coincidental. Any trademarks, service marks, product names, or named features are assumed to be the property of their respective owners, and are used only for reference. There is no implied endorsement if any of these terms are used. Except for review purposes, the reproduction of this book in whole or part, electronically or mechanically, constitutes a copyright violation.

  THE SETUP

  Copyright © 2019 RACHEL VAN DYKEN

  ISBN: 978-1-946061-39-3

  Cover Art by Jena Brignola

  Editing by Kay Springsteen Tate & Jill Sava

  Formatting by Jill Sava, Love Affair With Fiction

  Table of Contents

  Front Matter

  Dedication

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Want More Pleasure Ponies?

  Want More Wingmen Inc?

  Acknowledgments

  About The Author

  Also By Rachel Van Dyken

  Thank you to Jill, the real Jilly, the notorious JILLIAN in this book for letting me use you as inspiration.

  We always knew Finn would have a spitfire for a match!

  Prologue

  Finn

  Senior Prom 2015

  Not the best way to spend prom—but also not the worst. It’s not like I locked myself in the bathroom on purpose—she’d just been so aggressive. I had several red nail marks down my chest like I was some sort of animal, and she wanted to play tag with her claws.

  My dick did not feel turned on in the slightest over the possession my date showed—if anything, I wanted to just get it over with, so I wasn’t going into college a virgin still.

  “Get yourself together,” I muttered to myself in the mirror. My white tux was rumpled, my bowtie long gone. “She’s hot, just do it already.”

  “Everything okay in there?” Evie’s voice was so not helping me get an erection.

  I was going to need to do something about the fact that I couldn’t get it up for fear that she’d chop it off with her hand, by accident—it wasn’t like she was the smartest out of all the girls I could have chosen for the deed.

  “Just a minute,” I said through clenched teeth. I just needed to stare at her tits, and I’d be back in business—or we’d be back in business.

  I pointed down at my semi. “Don’t let me down.”

  My phone started buzzing in my pocket. Annoyed, I pulled it out and went straight to panic mode. My sister.

  She never called. Only texted. Our joke was that someone better either be in prison or half-dead to interrupt with something so mundane as a phone call.

  “What’s wrong?” I barked into the phone.

  She was sobbing. “Mom didn’t come home tonight. Dad left for Vegas. They got in this huge fight about cheating, and I’m just so sick of it. I hate it.”

  My heart shattered in my chest.

  Dumb, that I thought I could escape my parents for just one night and have fun like most guys did during prom.

  I was practically raising my sister.

  It was us against the world.

  Thankfully, we had a bunch of crazy cousins and one insane aunt who owned Titus Enterprises—and reigned like the queen over her stocks.

  “I’m on my way, Tatum. Pack a bag, we’ll go stay with Aunt Nadine again.”

  “Sh-she won’t mind?”

  I grinned into the phone. “Nadine? Last time we spent the night she told us she was going to lock us inside and send someone to pack our shit.”

  “Yeah.” Tatum sounded happier already. “Sometimes, I wonder how our parents can even be part of the Titus family. Everyone’s normal but them.”

  “Remember, Dad’s always been the black sheep. He married for position, not love. Now look at him.”

  Shit, look at me. Was I doing the same thing? Just trying to get sex over with because it was on the high school checklist.

  “I’ll see you soon,” I said after some silence.

  And when I hung up the phone and unlocked the door to the hotel bathroom only to see Evie spread out on the bed completely naked. I felt nothing but sick over the fact that I was going to make the same mistake my dad did, create checklists and spreadsheets and then say I’m only successful when all the boxes are filled.

  Bullshit.

  “Evie, I gotta run, family emergency.”

  She bolted up from the bed and covered herself with one of the pillows. Her honey-blonde hair was still pinned in an updo, and her spray tan looked about one romp away from turning the sheets orange. “Are you serious?”

  “Yeah, sorry.” I leaned over and kissed her on the forehead. “For what it’s worth, you are absolutely beautiful.”

  She grinned up at me. “You’re a good guy, Finn.”

  “That’s what they say.” I tried to keep it lighthearted. God, I was so tired of being told I was a good guy.

  So tired of having to follow the rules because my parents didn’t know how.

  “Thanks.” I grabbed my keys and left.

  Eighteen and still a virgin.

  There were worse things to focus on.

  Like how the hell I was going to leave Tatum in my parents’ clutches when I went to college the following year.

  Chapter One

  Finn

  4 Years Later

  Wingmen Inc Headquarters Downtown Seattle

  “Took you long enough.” My best friend Leo grinned then threw one of his blue stress balls at my face—more like chucked it—I caught it with my right hand and threw it aggressively at his family jewels and received a middle finger in response as he shoved away from his desk, his chair rolling him toward the safety of the window.

  Home.

  I was finally home.

  All four of us, Knox, Leo, Slater, and I were finally where we belonged, working in downtown Seattle at Wingmen Inc, one of the world’s premier matchmaking services and apps.

  We’d spent four years on the UW campus doing nothing but helping people with breakups, showing them how to ask for what they deserved in a relationship, practicing Reiki, touching—but not prostituting ourselves out—all with the end goal of this, a chic office downtown, stock options, a 401K, and more money than anyone should have at twenty-two soon to be twenty-three. Not only was I a trust fund kid, but I’d been one of the first kid YouTubers before my parents forced me to hand my channel over to someone else because of privacy issues.

  That, along with my inheritance, was nice, don’t get me wrong, but I preferred to stay busy. I have my aunt Nadine to blame for that since it was her blood sweat and tears that made Titus Enterprises what it was today.

  Hell, I think she cried when I told her I was going to be working for the matchmaking company instead of heading to their Portland offices.

  With a sigh, I sat down in Leo’s office and grinned. “Corner office, huh?”

  “I have floor-to-ceiling windows, and I can
see the Puget Sound from here, so yeah, I’m happy. You’re on the same floor but two doors down, and the last of us.”

  “The last?” I repeated. Somehow it felt like a bad omen. It didn’t help that rain pelted against his window furiously or that a crack of thunder chose that moment to make itself known.

  I’d been walking around with a sense of foreboding ever since checking in with HR that morning and getting sent up to the VP floor. I shook it off and glared at my friend.

  “Growing a beard?” I offered.

  His green eyes narrowed, and then he started throwing the stress ball in the air, a plot-worthy grin spread across his face.

  I didn’t like that grin. It was terrifying, actually, like he was planning something, and I was going to end up on the sad end of that plan, naked, drunk, or possibly both.

  “Just in time.” He waved toward the door.

  Knox and Slater waltzed in, same grins on their stupid faces. All of us were tall, Knox had blond hair and a perpetual man bun, Leo’s hair was like mine, a bit darker with shots of blond, and Slater, well Slater was the shortest coming in at five-ten, but his skin was darker, compliments of his French heritage, giving him a complexion girls had gone wild over in college. His caramel hair was combed to the side, and he looked so damn happy I wanted to punch him.

  “What’s going on?” I crossed my arms and tried to look unaffected. “Isn’t it almost time for the Monday morning meeting? And why the hell are all of you grinning at me like that?”

  “You’re the last one, man.” Knox shrugged. “All of us are either married or about to get engaged,” he shot a look to Slater.

  I groaned. “Please stop reminding me that he sees my sister naked.”

  “Daily,” Leo just had to point out.

  Slater waved as if I needed another reminder that he was standing right in front of me.

  “Damn it, I don’t want details!” I jumped to my feet. “And you bet your ass you’ll be asking for permission from me, or I’m throwing you off the building!”

  “Bro.” Slater looked relaxed, not panicked like I wanted him to be, probably because he knew my love for him ran deep like a brother, which was unfortunate when I was trying to scare him shitless. “I’ll ask. I’m still ring hunting.”

  I perked up. “You didn’t like the last one?”

  “It was too big, she’d hate it,” he pointed out.

  I softened up a bit. “You at least know her well.”

  “Oh, he knows her.” Knox laughed.

  “No more.” I pointed at him and then looked around the room at my best friends. “And I may be the last single guy, but I’m fine. I’m happy. I have a job… was thinking about getting a goldfish—all is well in my world.”

  “First off…” Oh good, Knox was counting. He held up one finger, alarm bells rang in my head. “You’ll kill the goldfish and feel guilty, and real men don’t start off with a goldfish from the fair. They get a medium-sized dog and call it Buster—”

  “He’s not wrong.” Slater coughed.

  I shot him a glare while Knox continued. He held up two fingers. “Secondly, you need companionship now that the gang’s all broken up—”

  “He means the Pleasure Ponies,” Leo said loud enough for the entire floor to hear. Just what I needed, our old campus nickname following me to the breakroom where all the single ladies would ask if it really was true that we made a girl orgasm by chewing our Lucky Charms a certain way.

  Not true, by the way.

  Or at least, not, er… accurate.

  I digress. It was a fresh start.

  So why did I feel so anxious?

  “And three?” I asked.

  “Three is, you’re the only VP that can do it.”

  “Do what?” I asked.

  Ian, the owner of Wingmen Inc., poked his blond head into our office. “Are we gossiping, or are we working? Meeting time, or I’m not sharing the donuts.”

  I’ve never seen Slater run so fast.

  Knox followed.

  And that was how I found myself at my first staff meeting, completely blindsided by what Knox didn’t finish explaining.

  Chapter Two

  Jillian

  It was impossible not to notice the new VP. Then again, ever since Knox made his way onto the VP floor, the offices had been filled with nothing but gossip. Leo soon followed, then Slater, and now the last man standing.

  He hadn’t even looked at me when he waltzed from the elevator toward Leo’s office. Granted, he’d visited a lot over the past year, and every time he made a beeline toward his friends. Never once did he offer a polite hello or even a smile. It was like he was trying to be incognito—imagine that, Finn Titus thinking he could just sneak his six-foot-three frame onto the exact floor of the building that everyone called the Pleasure Presidents’ Floor.

  All the new VP’s were young.

  Attractive.

  But in a relationship.

  So, it should come as no surprise that when the only single one came to work on his first day, there was a perpetual perfume cloud in elevators one through six—all the elevators that led to the top floors.

  Skirts were shorter.

  Makeup a bit darker.

  But I refused to change anything. If he couldn’t appreciate plain old Jillian, then he didn’t deserve Friday night makeup Jillian.

  Not that she’d come out in a while.

  The dating scene was bleak for a single woman in her twenties. Most guys were either career-driven and focused or more interested in playing Fortnite.

  I sighed and grabbed my tablet in one hand, and balanced my cold brew in the other. My black tuxedo jacket clung tight to my body while my black high waisted pencil skirt wrapped around my wide hips. I always chose tighter clothes for work not because I wanted to show off the curves but because I looked ridiculous in clothes that weren’t fitted. I would give anything to be one of those girls who could toss on a big sweatshirt and over the knee boots and look like a willow blowing in the breeze.

  But not me. I looked like a bowling ball that forgot her pants.

  I blew my brown hair away from my face with a huff and counted the steps toward the boardroom.

  My red high heels clicked against the marble floor.

  Click, clack, click—

  The glass door shut right in my face once I reached it.

  I gritted my teeth.

  I guessed I could knock with my head and gain everyone’s attention…

  Instead, I stood there like an idiot and made painfully awkward eye contact with Lex, one of the owners, until he got up and opened the door for me.

  “Sorry, Jilly.” He winked.

  I could almost forgive him for calling me Jilly with a wink like that. Damn, that man knew how to make a woman forget her name.

  Lucky for me, he was married, which meant I didn’t titter like the rest of the females.

  “No problem, I just didn’t want to sacrifice my coffee in order to get in.” I grinned.

  He gave an easy laugh. “You and your coffee. I bet it’s replaced all the blood in your body at this point.”

  “One can only hope.” I fluttered my eyelashes and took my seat toward the back of the room, where I would continue to take notes and sip my coffee while the VPs had their usual Monday meeting.

  The door opened one last time.

  Ian walked in with Slater on his heels, looking gorgeous in a smart black suit that made his eyes pop. I cleared my throat as Leo followed and then Finn.

  Finn.

  I’d tried not to look directly at him when he’d walked by my desk this morning. He didn’t make eye contact with anyone, but he seemed hell-bent on visiting Leo.

  I imagined he was nervous on his first day.

  Besides, he had no idea how many women wanted to trap him into marriage—as if that was even possible, Wingmen Inc. had a very strict company dating policy, which made sense, all things considered.

  We were a matchmaking company. Our job was to help others
not use our powers for evil and help ourselves, though, as employees, we were able to use any of the Wingmen resources—just not with each other.

  Finn moved around the room and finally sat two chairs away from me, his long elegant fingers grabbed a pen, and I managed not to drool when he clicked it.

  So far, I wasn’t doing so hot, but at least I wasn’t panting.

  His strong jaw flinched a bit as he looked up at Ian and Lex, they were damn heroes to single people everywhere—unless that single person was someone hopeless like me.

  I shook away the bad thoughts.

  And glanced at Finn again.

  He was lean, gorgeous, with blue eyes and a full mouth that looked like it knew its way around a woman’s body.

  I shivered.

  “You okay?” Lex mouthed to me, gaining the attention of Slater and Knox, who gave me knowing smiles.

  Ugh, I forgot how much those two liked their jobs.

  I mean, they really liked matching people up.

  I glared at both of them and shook my head slowly, which only encouraged them more.

  They were hopeless assholes.

  But they were my hopeless assholes, and they brought me coffee—two on bank holidays.

  So, in my eyes—perfect, except for the arrogant asshole tendencies that seemed to leak through at times.

  “All right.” Ian stood and smiled at the room. “It’s no secret that we’re ready to launch the Couple Creator App.”

  A small whoop went up in the room.

  Lex started passing out a spreadsheet. “Early numbers are showing an enormous interest. Our beta testers were so damn excited over the possibilities that they had us going viral on twitter before our soft launch. Stocks have already split—again—but one of our beta testers noticed a few glitches that I hadn’t realized would be a problem. Because of that, I want to do one more beta test before our launch at the end of the month.”

  I typed out the notes and tried not to let nerves get to me, another test? Thirty days before launch? We’d never done that before.

  “What sort of glitches?” I found myself asking out loud.

  Damn it. Me and my mouth.

  Lex grinned over at me. “Great question, Jilly. They said that when they went into the app to create their perfect boyfriend, it didn’t take into account personality flaws.”