{ LIVING THE POGUE LIFE }

{17}

"Pope," John B tried to reason with him whilst simultaneously focusing on the road, "We're not technically stealing the drone."

"Yeah," Brie agreed, leaning her back against JJ's chest as she sat between his legs. "We're just borrowing it."

"Humans are the only animal who can't tell fantasy from reality," Pope countered.

JJ scoffed. Trust Pope to get philosophical on them as always.

"What?" John B asked, "You just come up with that?"

"Actually Albert Bernstein came up with it," Brie corrected him, holding up her finger. "Although I think the moral is pretty irrelevant here."

JJ smirked, mildly impressed. He loved that she was so smart. She was always fast to catch onto Pope's nerdy comments and took the time to explain things to JJ without making him feel completely useless, which he appreciated.

"It applies to this whole treasure hunting thing," Pope argued, "So which is it? Fantasy or reality?"

"Reality," Brie said defensively, sitting up to face him. "We have so much evidence on the whereabouts of the Royal Merchant that it would be catastrophically stupid not to search for the gold."

"Exactly," JJ agreed, snaking his arm further around Brie's shoulders and bringing her back down, "Why are you being so weird, Pope?"

"Its a fantasy, but possible reality," Kiara added. "We can't just ignore all of the evidence."

"Reality," John B agreed with them.

"Virtual reality," JJ corrected. Pope only sighed at them, clearly outnumbered in his argument.

Brie and Kiara shared an excited smile and JJ decided that they had earned a celebratory joint. As began rolling one, Brie gave him a flirtatious wink, making his stomach flip.

JJ returned with wink with a smirk as he licked the paper and smoothed it down. Brie's smile faltered a little and he chuckled lowly. He loved that he could get that sort of reaction from her.

He raised the blunt to his mouth and held it between his lips as he sparked the lighter. Before he could even light it, Pope snatched the joint from him.

"Keep the signal clear," Pope warned him.

Brie grabbed the blunt back from Pope's hand and then took the lighter from JJ, sparking the end. She took a deep breath and blew the smoke out at Pope's face, making him cough.

He scowled at her, but JJ knew that it was almost impossible for any of them to stay mad at Brie for long. Especially Pope. No matter what facts he came out with, he could never win an argument against Brie. She always won.

"You keep the signal clear," she told him, "We'll get high enough to do the dangerous tasks that no one else wants to do."

JJ grinned mischievously. This girl knew exactly what his style was.

"Okay, no one's doing anything dangerous," Kiara reminded her as she jumped out of the van.

"You're damn right, baby," JJ pointed a finger gun at Brie whilst taking a hit for himself, "You know what your problem is, Pope?"

"You," Pope snapped.

"No," JJ huffed, "It's that you need to relax, man. You're always so tense! Here take a hit of this. It's the good stuff."

"I'm not too tense," Pope defended, turning away from JJ's offer.

"You kind of are," Brie smirked as she took a last breath of the joint before handing it back to JJ and climbing out after Kiara.