Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 128417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 514(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128417 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 642(@200wpm)___ 514(@250wpm)___ 428(@300wpm)
“So now you’re slut-shaming me?”
“No. I’m the last person in the world who would ever slut-shame anyone.”
“You do realize the whole point of your application to me was to make me feel safe enough to reveal my inner-most perverted thoughts to you? You’re supposed to be luring me into emotional intimacy, Kat.”
“Oh crap. That’s right. Shoot. I should have warned you: I suck at emotional intimacy. I’m working on it, though, I swear.”
“You’re never gonna break down my walls now,” Josh says playfully.
“Damn. Oh well.” I audibly shrug and he laughs. “So who took all these photos? Was it you?”
“Nope.”
“No? Oh, I thought you were gonna say yes. Did you take some of them?”
“So we’re playing a game of Perverted Twenty Questions, are we?”
“Yeah. Isn’t it fun?”
“No.”
“Come on. I’ve still got nineteen questions to go.”
“Nineteen? Ha! More like ten. And that’s generous.”
“Okay ten. Did you personally take any of these photos?”
He exhales loudly. “Just one.”
“Oh, now that’s an interesting answer. Not what I expected. I thought it’d be all or nothing.” I suddenly remember Sarah saying Oksana photographs every girl in The Club. “By George, I think I’ve got it,” I say. “Are these the women you slept with in The Club?”
Josh sighs loudly. “Correct. All but two of them.”
“Well, now I’m confused again. You mean all but two of these women were in The Club—or there are two Clubbers missing from this folder?”
“Your mind is a scary place, Kat. You’re like Henn but in a totally different context. You’re a man-hacker.”
I laugh. “Thank you. Now answer the question, please.”
He exhales audibly. “Every woman from The Club is there—plus there are two non-Clubbers in the folder, too.”
“Ah. Interesting. Two bonus-women from real life. This just gets more and more intriguing. Which ones are the non-Clubbers and why’d you put them in the folder with all the Clubbers?”
“Aren’t you out of questions yet?”
“Nope.” I pause. “I’ve still got eight to go.”
He scoffs.
“You personally took one of the non-Clubbers’ photos—not both of them?”
“Correct.”
“Hmm. So that means one of the non-Clubbers sent you her photo?”
“Correct. You’re now officially out of questions.”
“No way. I’ve still got at least eight left.”
“Eight? You started with ten and you’ve asked like fifty.”
“I’ve been asking sub-questions to questions, Josh—sub-questions don’t count as full questions.”
He grumbles.
“So, come on, which one of these pretty ladies was the one non-Clubber you personally photographed? And why’d you put her in the Sick Fuck folder with all the others?”
He pauses. “No comment.”
“Aw, come on.”
“You’ve got my application. That’s what I promised you—nothing more. Perverted Twenty Questions is now officially over.”
“Aw. Not fair.”
“It’s totally fair—and if not, then too bad. Life isn’t fair.”
“Just tell me why you have all these photos and then I’ll drop it. I promise.”
Josh exhales. “Okay, Madame Terrorist. Fine.” He mutters something to himself under his breath. “I requested a specific type of girl in my application, and so The Club emailed me photos of women they’d selected for me to make sure they were exactly what I wanted. And at the end of my membership-month, I didn’t know what the fuck to do with all the photos so I put them into a folder.”
“And labeled it ‘Sick Fuck.’”
He doesn’t reply.
“And you didn’t have any inkling these women were hookers before Jonas told you?”
Josh pauses. “I was pretty specific about what I wanted in my application, so I figured The Club likely made some kind of special arrangement to deliver on my wishes—but I didn’t know for sure. Just because a woman is willing to meet a rich guy in a hotel room and fulfill his sick-fuck-fantasies doesn’t necessarily make her a hooker, does it?”
I consider that bit of logic. “No,” I finally say. “Not necessarily. Especially when he looks like you.”
“Thank you. But, honestly, I really didn’t care one way or the other if the women were being paid on the side—I just didn’t wanna know about it. All I was trying to do was escape reality for a month—I wasn’t looking for some sort of deep soul connection.”
“So you asked for blondes?”
“Kat,” he says softly. “You’ve got my application. Just read it. No more questions.”
The earnest tone of his voice has thrown me. I thought we were bantering, and now, suddenly, he seems totally sincere. “Okay. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
I wait a beat. “But can I ask one more teeny tiny itty bitty question? In the name of emotional intimacy?”
He chuckles despite himself. “What?” he asks.
“Thank you. Wow, we’re killing the emotional intimacy thing, Josh. We’re emotionally intimate beasts.”
He chuckles again. “This isn’t emotional intimacy, Kat—this is just plain torture.”
“I’m almost positive they’re one and the same thing,” I say. “Though I can’t be sure.”
He laughs a full laugh, which I take as a good sign. “Okay, Madame Interrogator, what’s your last question?”
“Do you typically only sleep with blondes—or just in The Club? And is it sex with blondes that makes you a sick fuck?”