Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 123058 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 615(@200wpm)___ 492(@250wpm)___ 410(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 123058 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 615(@200wpm)___ 492(@250wpm)___ 410(@300wpm)
“God, no.” When she gives me a dubious look, I laugh again, this time more easily. “No, really. It’s not that. It’s…” I take a deep breath. “I’m jealous of their sex lives.”
Jules blinks, her lips twitching. “You’re jealous that they’re having sex? Because, you gotta know, if you want sex, it’s pretty easy to get it around here.” She sweeps a slim hand in the direction of the bar. “We’re in a virtual buffet of hot singles. Great sex at the ready.”
“At the ready” is true enough. Both of us are attractive. Jules, with her sandy-brown skin, high cheekbones, and lush lips, could grace a magazine cover. She’s been drawing looks of interest the whole time we’ve been here.
As for me, I don’t know if it’s my resting bored face or the fact that I favor pencil skirt suits, sky-high heels, and sleek ponytails, but I tend to attract businesspeople. Arty types don’t seem to know what to do with me, which is fairly ironic since I spend much of my life around musicians, producers, and artists. Even so, if I want sex, I can find it easily. Great sex, however, is another story.
“Please tell me you don’t actually believe that, Ju-Ju.” I stab one of the lemons floating in my drink with a straw. “The great sex part.”
“You’ve never had great sex?” she asks, clearly on the edge of pitying me. Maybe she should.
“You have?” I counter. “I mean, truly great, blow-your-mind, ‘gotta have that again and again or you’ll die from wanting it’ sex?”
At this, Jules stares into her glass then sighs and looks back up at me. “No, damn it. Not like that. I’ve had good, but not transcendent.”
Nodding, I lean forward until we’re both half-hunched over our table. “I’ve had good sex too. But most of the time, the guy has no idea what the hell he’s doing. It’s all pump and dump. And I’m left unsatisfied.”
Her nose wrinkles. “Maybe we should be with women.”
I shake my head. “You’d think having the same equipment would give women a leg up, but I’ve had the same frustrations in that department.”
I swear I hear someone choke on their drink behind me. I want to roll my eyes. This is Manhattan, and if a dude can’t deal with overhearing a frank conversation, he’s not going to make it in this city. Besides, my sexuality isn’t something I’ll ever be ashamed of. In general, I tend to gravitate toward men, but I also think attraction is a fluid notion, and that, for me, it isn’t confined to one gender.
“Some women are just as selfish and clueless as men,” I say. “Believe me, there’s no golden ticket when it comes to finding great sex.”
Jules’s eyes go wide. “I don’t know if I should be jealous of all your experience or thankful I don’t have it, given what you’re saying.”
I find myself grinning, but it fades quickly. “Definitely don’t be jealous.”
I’m still alone and still unfulfilled. Actually, it kind of blows to realize I’ve struck out with two genders.
“I’m serious, though,” I say, frowning now. “Whatever the gender, whatever the sexual orientation, we all suffer the same pitfalls and have to weed through the same bullshit when it comes to finding happiness.”
“Well.” Jules sits back against the booth. “I guess we’re doomed, then.”
I sit back as well, letting the sounds of the bar move over me. I’m tired, and my feet are aching to be free of the heels I stuffed them into eight hours ago. Not for the first time, I consider no longer wearing them. But they are, in a very real way, defensive weapons, armor against a business that is ruthless.
My aunt Isabella, a famous fashion model, bought me my first pair of heels—black patent leather Manolo Blahnik Mary Jane pumps. She told me then that, whether we like it or not, women in the entertainment industry would always be judged by their appearance, and underestimated, compared to their male counterparts. But put on a pair of killer heels with a sleek suit and the naysayers would be too dazzled to notice you climbing over them. She’d taken me under her wing back then, taught me about fashion, poise, how to handle obnoxious assholes, how to charm people. Mercenary, but I found her lessons to be painfully true.
Over the years, I had to cover myself in a shell of icy perfection. My power is in maintaining the illusion that nothing can get to me, and I accept that as part of doing business. But some days? Some days, I want to crumble. I want…comfort, touch, release.
I should go home and crawl into bed. But I can’t shake the restless feeling swelling within me.
I catch Jules’s eye, and my shoulders slump. “I know we’re not supposed to admit this for fear it might make us sound pathetic or some other bullshit, but I’m horny. Not in a general, I-want-to-have-sex way, but in a deep, irritating, can’t-stop-thinking-about-it way. I ache, you know? As in, I go through the day actively hurting for release.”