The M.I.L.F Rebate System: Every Woman I Spoil Makes Me Richer!

Liam and Darren spent the better part of the afternoon doing absolutely nothing productive — sprawled across the suite’s oversized couch, the television running some crime documentary neither of them was fully watching, the conversation drifting from nothing to nothing else with the easy rhythm of two people who didn’t need a reason to keep talking.

“This guy’s definitely guilty,” Darren said, pointing at the screen.

“They haven’t even presented evidence yet.”

“Don’t need it. Look at his face.”

“That’s not how the justice system works, Darren.”

“Should be.”

Liam laughed, shaking his head, and reached for his phone out of habit more than anything. He scrolled through a few notifications before something surfaced that made him pause.

“Huh.”

“What?”

“Got a message a while back from someone we went to school with. Totally forgot about it.”

Darren frowned, trying to place it. “Who?”

Liam said her name. Darren squinted, running it through memory and coming up mostly blank. “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“You barely went to class, Darren. I’m not surprised.”

“I went to class.”

“You went to the building, that’s not the same thing.”

Darren waved him off, unbothered, while Liam pulled up the message thread and tapped her profile to check it properly.

The screen loaded, then returned nothing.

[User not found.]

Liam stared at it, confused. “That’s weird.”

“What?”

“Her profile’s gone. Just — not there anymore.”

Darren shrugged, entirely unbothered. “Probably blocked you.”

“For what?”

“For ignoring her message, genius.”

Liam considered that for half a second before deciding he genuinely did not care enough to chase it further. He closed the thread and was about to lock his phone when Darren leaned over, eyes catching something else on the screen first.

“Hold up. Who’s this?”

Liam glanced down. “Vanessa.”

Darren studied the profile picture for a beat. “She’s a looker.”

“She’s fine.”

“You’ve got an unanswered message from her, though.” Darren raised an eyebrow. “What’s the deal with this girl?”

Liam shrugged it off, tone deliberately flat. “Nothing. Firm stuff, mostly.”

“Uh-huh.”

Liam pulled the phone back and opened his own profile instead, more to change the subject than out of any real interest, and that was when Darren spotted the actual problem.

“Bro.” Darren leaned in closer. “This is your profile?”

“Yeah.”

“One picture. From what, three years ago?”

“It’s fine.”

“It is not fine.” Darren shook his head, genuinely appalled. “You can’t leave it like this. You gotta spice it up.”

“Spice it up how? I don’t even know what I’d post.”

“That’s the problem. You’ve got no curation. No aesthetic, nothing.”

Liam frowned. “I don’t really care about aesthetics.”

“You should. This is basically the easiest way to get girls, and you’re out here running a profile that looks abandoned.” Darren shook his head slower this time, almost disappointed. “When did you become such a — I don’t even know what to call it. A sexual deviant, but with none of the marketing skills.”

“That’s insulting on multiple levels.”

“It’s accurate on multiple levels.” Darren gestured at him. “Think about it. You’ve got a good career or rather had. You’re tall. You’re not ugly, somehow, despite everything. If you’re actually serious about this path you’ve chosen, Instagram is the easiest lever you’re not pulling.”

Liam sat with that for a moment, turning it over. It wasn’t wrong, exactly. “…Maybe you’ve got a point.”

“I always have a point.”

“That is debatable.”

Darren snatched the phone before Liam could stop him, thumb already swiping through the camera roll with practiced efficiency. He landed on two photos in quick succession, holding them up for approval.

“These. Post these.”

Liam glanced at them. “Not yet.”

“Why not?”

“I’ll do it eventually. Just not now.”

Darren shrugged, unbothered by the pushback. “Your loss. Every day you wait is a day you’re not maximizing engagement.”

“You sound like a marketing seminar.”

“I contain multitudes.”

Darren was about to hand the phone back when something else on the screen caught his eye — a photo further down the thread, sent from Rachel, clearly meant to be suggestive. He froze for half a second, an expression crossing his face somewhere between surprise and outright discomfort, before quickly passing the phone back like it had burned him.

Liam glanced at the screen, saw what had stopped him, and looked up at Darren with genuine amusement. “What? You don’t like big girls?”

Darren’s face twisted slightly. “I’m good, man.”

“That wasn’t an answer.”

“Moving on.” Darren grabbed the remote and turned the volume up a notch, clearly done with that particular thread of conversation.

Liam let it go, more out of respect than anything — Darren rarely dodged a topic outright, which meant whatever discomfort that had triggered was real enough not to poke at further.

They settled back into the show for a while, the earlier energy of the conversation dissolving into easier silence. It wasn’t until Liam checked the time that he registered how far the afternoon had actually slipped away.

“Damn. Didn’t realize it was this late already.”

Darren glanced over. “You got somewhere to be?”

“Not exactly.” Liam sat up straighter, an idea forming. “Think we should swing by and grab Mateo. Bring him along for a bit.”

He didn’t say the rest out loud — that it wasn’t really about Sophia anymore, wasn’t about maintaining some careful image for her benefit. Somewhere over the last day, without fully registering when it happened, Liam had started genuinely enjoying Mateo’s company on its own terms. It felt less like an obligation tied to a relationship and more like something closer to having an actual younger brother around.

Darren, however, immediately looked uneasy. “I don’t know, man.”

“Why not?”

“You didn’t see the way Sophia looked at me last night when I dropped him off. I’m not trying to be on the receiving end of that again.”

“I’m the one asking, though.”

Darren opened his mouth to argue, then closed it again, clearly weighing the odds of actually saying no to Liam directly and coming up short.

“…Fine,” he muttered. “But if she comes at me sideways again, that’s on you.”

“Noted.”

“I mean it, Liam.”

“I heard you the first time.”

Darren grumbled something under his breath, already reaching for his shoes, while Liam pulled up Sophia’s contact and started typing out a message, already anticipating exactly how much convincing this was going to take.

–

Liam called ahead before they left the hotel, and Sophia confirmed she was home, her tone still carrying a trace of the previous night’s irritation but nothing that suggested she’d say no outright.

The drive took a couple of hours, longer than either of them wanted, but daytime traffic moved considerably easier than whatever gridlock Liam had fought through on his way to the restaurant the night before. It also helped that Azure Heights sat closer to Sophia’s place than the restaurant had — one small mercy in an otherwise long stretch of road. Liam was covered properly, hiding all the hickeys and bruises, he wasn’t going to be there for long.

“You coming up?” Liam asked as he pulled into the lot.

Darren shook his head immediately. “I’ll wait in the car.”

“You sure?”

“Positive.” Darren settled back into his seat, already reaching for his phone.

“Mateo’s the target. Not trying to walk back into Sophia’s line of fire twice in twenty-four hours.”

Liam didn’t argue. It made sense — Darren had already taken the brunt of her frustration once, and there was no reason to invite round two just for the sake of company on a two-minute walk.

He climbed out and headed for the stairs, running through the conversation in his head as he went. Sophia hadn’t been thrilled about the timing last night, that much was clear, but Liam had a decent read on her by now. Underneath the irritation, she was still a woman who’d been raising a teenager largely on her own for years, and an afternoon with someone else taking Mateo off her hands wasn’t the kind of thing she’d actually resent, whatever her tone suggested on the surface. Everyone needed a stretch of quiet to themselves eventually. She was no exception.

He reached the door and knocked.

No doorbell — just his knuckles against the wood, a habit he’d fallen into without really deciding to.

From inside, he heard Sophia’s voice, muffled through the door. “Mateo, get that, my hands are full.”

There was a pause, footsteps, and then the door swung open.

Mateo stood there, and the second his eyes landed on Liam, his face lit up before he could stop it — a full, unguarded grin breaking across his features for exactly half a second before he visibly caught himself and tried to smooth it into something more neutral, shoulders dropping into a lazy attempt at nonchalance.

Liam caught the whole thing.

“I saw that, you smiley little shit.”

Mateo’s composure cracked immediately, a laugh escaping before he could stop it. “Shut up.”

“No, seriously, that was adorable.”

“I said shut up!”

“You looked like a kid on Christmas morning.”

“I looked normal!”

“You looked like you were about to cry from excitement.”

Mateo shoved him lightly in the shoulder, still fighting a grin he clearly wasn’t winning against. “You’re the worst.”

“And yet here you are, thrilled to see me.”

From further inside the apartment, Sophia’s voice carried through, dry and unimpressed.

“I can hear both of you, you know.”

Mateo’s ears went slightly red. Liam just smiled wider, stepping past him into the apartment, already bracing for whatever conversation with Sophia came next.