The Josh and Kat Trilogy: A Bundle of Books 1-3

by Lauren Rowe

  There’s a long beat.

  “I really am a sick fuck, Kat,” I say simply. “I know I am. After what happened to my mom, I have no business incorporating bondage into my sexual fantasies. That’s just sick. Emma was right. There’s something deeply wrong with me. And telling a girl who’d been raped about it and asking her to try it with me to help me was also deeply fucked up. But what she didn’t get was I was all about saving the girl, you understand? That’s what gets me off. I just want to be the savior.” I’ve got a lump in my throat. “Just once.”

  Kat nods.

  I exhale. There’s a goddamned lump in my throat that won’t go away. “It’s still sick, though,” I say, pushing through my emotion. “Not to mention obvious and stupid.” I swallow hard and the lump recedes. “It’s some sort of twisted... I dunno. I guess I don’t have the best imagination.” I take a deep breath. “And, shit, I guess I should tell you something else, as long as I’m telling you the whole truth.” I exhale and roll my eyes. “You might as well know just how obvious and stupid and deeply disturbed I really am.”

  Kat’s sitting on the edge of her seat, her blue eyes fixed on me without blinking.

  “My mom was blonde,” I say. “Just like you. Just like Emma. Just like all the girls in my Sick Fuck folder. And she was gorgeous, too. Everyone always said she looked just like Grace Kelly.”

  Kat grabs my hand. “I figured.”

  “You did?”

  She nods. “What did your dad look like?”

  “Like me, pretty much. I have his dark hair.” I squeeze her hand, grateful for her reassuring touch. “I look like my dad and Jonas looks like my mom.”

  Kat chuckles. “But you and your brother look so much alike, other than your hair.”

  “No, Jonas is the one who looks like my mom, and I’m the one who looks like my dad. My dad always said so. Maybe that’s why my dad could never even stand to look at Jonas.”

  She blanches.

  There’s a long beat.

  “If Jonas looks like your mom, then you do, too, Josh,” she says softly. “Just with darker hair. You two look so much alike.”

  I shrug.

  Kat strokes my arm with her free hand. “So. Okay. Fine. You’re a sick fuck, Josh. Your mom made an indelible impression on you. You’re obviously deeply traumatized by what happened to her. And you probably feel all kinds of guilt—totally misplaced, by the way—that Jonas was there and you weren’t.”

  “But, Kat. It’s pretty fucked up that all I wanna do is fuck beautiful blondes and my mom was a beautiful blonde. Emma thought that was really sick.”

  “Fuck Emma. You were seven when she died. Where else were you gonna get your idea of female beauty other than from your mom—especially if she happened to look like Grace Kelly? Growing up, that standard of beauty must have gotten reinforced for you everywhere you looked. Magazines, movies. It’s everywhere.”

  I stare at her for a long minute, not saying anything. I’m too blown away to speak. I’ve never had a conversation even resembling this one before. Not even with my childhood therapists.

  “Josh, the bottom line for me is that the stuff you wrote in your application turned me on.” She squeezes my hand. “Look, I totally get what you’re saying—and I agree you’ve obviously got some deep-seated issues that have influenced your sexual fantasies—you’ve definitely got some sort of complex relating to what happened to your mom and you’re searching for some sort of therapeutic release, some sort of... what’s that word?” She snaps her fingers and scrunches her face.

  “Catharsis?” I offer.

  “Yes. Catharsis. Exactly. As an adult, you’re using sex as some sort of catharsis or redemption or whatever. Okay, I get it. But so what? We’re all perverts in one way or another, if we’re being honest—it’s just that people are so rarely honest when it comes to what they like behind closed doors. Well, I say let the doctors figure out your diagnosis if ever you’re in danger of harming someone or yourself—but until then, who cares? All I know is that you make me soak my panties every time I’m near you and when I read your application, I started dripping down my thighs.”

  My breath catches in my throat. “Oh,” I manage to say, but it’s all I can muster.

  The subtlest of smirks dances on her lips. “All I know is that whatever you did to those women in The Club, I’m turned on by the idea of you doing it to me, too, exactly the way you did it to them.” The smirk she’s been suppressing takes over her mouth. “I want you to pretend I’m one of the women in The Club and show me exactly what you like, without treating me any differently than you treated them.” She lowers her voice to barely above a whisper. “I want you to treat me like your high-priced whore.”

  I’m rock hard right now.

  Her eyes are blazing. “Actually, that happens to be one of my top fantasies.”

  My heart is absolutely racing. I swallow hard. “Well, but...” I sputter. “Kat, as it turns out, the women in The Club actually were paid hookers. I didn’t know it at the time, of course, but in retrospect, there’s a very good reason they were all so ‘uncannily compatible’ with me and eager to please.”

  She makes a face like I’m saying something nonsensical.

  “So,” I say, feeling the need to explain myself further, “unlike them, you might have, you know... limits.”

  Her eyes darken. “Don’t piss on me. Don’t crap on me. Don’t hurt me. That’s it.”

  She’s taken my breath away. “I have no interest in doing any of those things,” I say.

  “Other than those three things, do whatever you want to me,” she says. “Literally.” Her eyes flicker. “In fact, I want you to.”

  I have never been more attracted to a woman than I am right this very minute. I clear my throat. “Please tell me you’re not fucking with me right now.”

  “I’m not fucking with you,” she says, heat rising in her cheeks. “I often fantasize I’m a high-end call-girl. It’s what I imagined when I gave you that blowjob in the shower.” She licks her lips. “I can’t begin to tell you how much that turns me on.”

  My dick physically hurts, it’s so hard.

  “That’s why I came when you did—because I was fantasizing I’d just given you your money’s worth.”

  “Oh.”

  “So I guess I’m a sick fuck, too,” she says. “Is that okay with you?”

  I nod. “That’s very okay with me.”

  “Good. Then let’s just agree once and for all we don’t give a shit if we’re sick fucks. If we are, then so what. Fuck Emma. She’s a bitch.” Her eyes blaze. “Yeah, I said it. Fuck her. And fuck anyone else who has a problem with what turns us on. We’re not screwing goats, right? We’re gonna screw each other—and maybe one woman-to-be-named later, too.” She snickers. “Fuck anyone who makes you feel ashamed of what you like, Josh, including Emma the Bitch.”

  I feel like I’ve entered an alternate universe. A fucking awesome alternate universe.

  Kat smiles broadly and touches my face gently. “We’ll fulfill each other’s fantasies, right down the line. It’ll be the honesty-game, sexual edition.” She skims her fingertip over my lips. “Are you in?”

  “I’m so fucking in.”

  She drops her hands from my face. “I should warn you, though, most of my sexual fantasies are gonna require you to role-play. You’re gonna have to be all-in—assume your part.”

  “No problem.”

  “And if we’re really gonna do this, then I wanna go big or go home.”

  “That’s my motto.”

  “I thought YOLO was your motto.”

  “I have several.”

  “It’s not the particular sex act that gets me going, it’s the scene—the scenario. I don’t care what you wanna do to me, as long as you set the right scene for me and let me lose myself.”

  My heart is racing. “Good to know. Name it, we’ll do it. I’ll make it happen for you exactly like you want it.”

  “But, wait. Think about
it before you commit. Getting the scene the way I fantasize about it might take some planning on your part—and I can’t be the one who arranges stuff. It has to happen to me, you know?—as if it’s real. That’s what’s gonna let me lose myself completely. It’s like The Wizard of Oz. I wanna see the giant, talking head of Oz the whole time—I don’t wanna see the man behind the curtain.”

  I grin. “Babe, I’ve got this. Tell me all your fantasies, in detail, just like you told me the others, and I’ll make ’em all come true, to the letter. I’ll be your own personal Make-A-Wish Foundation.”

  She smiles broadly. “My own personal Josh Faraday Club,” she corrects.

  I wink at her. “Yours truly.”

  “Oh my God, I’m so excited.” She wiggles in her seat. “When would we do this fantasy-exchange thing?”

  “As soon as humanly possible,” I say, my cock straining.

  Her eyes are absolutely smoldering. “I wish we could start right now.”

  “Well, yeah, but unfortunately we gotta save the world first.”

  She snaps her fingers. “Damn it. Saving the world always gets in the way of acting out mini-pornos.”

  I laugh. “I tell you what. Right after we’re done saving the world, we’ll get started on our fantasy-fulfillment extravaganza that very night—right here in Vegas. We’ll take a couple days to decompress, just you and me, before we have to return to our real lives for a bit. How ’bout we do my fantasies first here in Vegas and then we’ll conquer yours the first chance we get in L.A.—because it sounds like yours are gonna take some advance planning.”

  “Sounds good,” she says. “Better than good.”

  I breathe deeply, my body electrified. This woman’s a dream come true.

  “So let’s talk about the whole watching-me-with-another-woman fantasy,” she says. “Who’s she gonna be? How are we gonna find her?”

  “She can be anyone you want, as long as she’s clean. Look in my sick fuck folder if you want. I’m sure Henn could track any of those ladies down.”

  She makes a face. “I deleted that folder.”

  “Oh, baby, my computer backs up daily. It’s in The Cloud.”

  She rolls her eyes.

  I laugh.

  “No wonder you didn’t get mad at me. And here I thought you were so Zen.” She shrugs. “Well, I don’t wanna do it with one of those girls. I want someone new.”

  “That’s fine.”

  She looks on edge.

  I cup her face in my hand. “Hey, if you’re not into it, we don’t have to do that one. I mean, if this were real life, I never would have told you about that whole thing in the first place.”

  “What do you mean ‘if this were real life’? This isn’t real life?”

  I’m stumped. Of course, this isn’t real life. This is Las Vegas. This is saving the world. This is fantasy-fulfillment. “I meant, if we were, you know, dating like usual. If you hadn’t read my application. Due to the circumstances, you know stuff about me no other woman ever has.”

  There’s an awkward silence.

  “We don’t have to do the thing with another woman. Seriously,” I say.

  She sighs. “Josh, I want to do it. I wanna pretend I’m just a girl in The Club and that you’ve paid to do whatever you did with all those girls, exactly the way you did it.” She pauses. “Wait, no. Not exactly. I don’t want you to touch the other woman. Not a pinky.”

  “I know. We already agreed to that. I wouldn’t even want to touch the other girl, honestly. Not if I was with you. That’d be like macking down on canned Spaghetti O’s when I’ve got a plate of homemade pasta right in front of me.” I touch the slight cleft in her chin. “A pretty dumb thing to do.”

  Her cheeks flush. “But it’s still gonna turn you on? Even though you’ve already done it with all those girls?”

  “Honestly, I was pretty done with the whole thing after my month in The Club—it gets kinda old after you’ve done it a couple times, especially when you don’t give a shit about either woman. But the thought of doing it with you.” I shudder with arousal at the very thought. I stroke her hair for a moment. “I’ve never gotten to do it with someone I’m...” I stop myself from saying anything more. I bite my lip and drop my hand from her hair. Shit.

  “Someone you’re what?” she asks, her interest obviously piqued. She tilts her head.

  “Someone I’m...” I stop again. Nope. I really shouldn’t say that to her.

  “What?”

  There’s a long beat.

  “What were you gonna say, Josh?” she asks. She weaves her fingers into mine. “Tell me.”

  I clear my throat. “I’ve never gotten to do it with someone I’m really attracted to beyond the physical,” I say softly.

  She smirks. “That’s really sweet. Thank you. But it’s not what you were about to say.”

  I pause. I can’t say what I was gonna say. It’s too much too soon.

  “Someone what?” she prompts. “Come on. We’re still playing the honesty-game, aren’t we?”

  “I’ve never gotten to do it with someone I’m in a relationship with,” I say evenly.

  There’s a long silence.

  Shit.

  Fuck.

  She’s just staring at me, not saying anything, her hand interwoven in mine.

  What am I doing? What am I saying? Why isn’t she saying anything?

  I pull my hand out of hers and run it through my hair. Goddammit. I should have just said “someone I’m dating.” That would have been a safer bet. But are Kat and I even dating? I don’t know what the fuck we’re doing. This whole time in Vegas together has been so bizarre and concentrated and amazing—I can’t make heads or tails of what we’d call what we’re doing in real life.

  Kat sighs and sets her jaw, apparently coming to some sort of decision.

  “I think we should be exclusive,” she says definitively.

  My heart physically stops beating for a second. Holy fucking shit.

  “At least during this fantasy-exchange thing,” she adds quickly.

  My stomach bursts with butterflies. My cheeks burst into flames. “Yeah, good idea,” I say quickly. “I think so, too.”

  Her face is on fire. “Because I like not using condoms with you,” she continues. “I like feeling you inside me with nothing between us. But I’m only willing to continue that way if we’re exclusive.”

  “I agree.” Now my heart is racing. Holy shit. My chest physically hurts. “Shit, I don’t wanna go back to condoms, ever, as long as I live.” Oh shit. What am I saying? What did I just imply?

  “Good.” Her cheeks flush. “Condoms are hereby banished. Gone.” She clears her throat. “For as long as you want.” She takes a deep breath. “You know, at least during the time while we’re”—she takes another deep gulp of air—“doing our fantasy thing.” She makes a weird face.

  I nod, my heart still racing like a runaway train. “Agreed.”

  “Good,” she says. “Yep. Done. Exclusive.”

  “Yep. We’re officially exclusive as of right now. You and me.”

  She grins. “Okay. Good.”

  “Great.”

  “I’m all yours.”

  My entire body jolts at the sound of those three words. I’m all yours, she just said to me. Holy hot fucking damn, I’ve got to sit down.

  “Okay,” she says, almost to herself. She exhales loudly. “Cool.”

  “Cool,” I say.

  We sit and stare at each other, smiling, neither of us speaking.

  I feel like my IQ just went down fifty points. My brain isn’t functioning.

  What exactly did we just agree to? She suggested being exclusive just for purposes of our little fantasy-fulfillment exchange. Does that mean we’re not in an actual relationship—that we’re some kind of exclusive fuck buddies? Because it sure feels like this girl’s a helluva lot more than my fuck buddy. Fuck, I should ask her for clarification. But I’m not sure I wanna hear her answer.

  I clear
my throat. “So when are you gonna have your period? We should plan your trip to L.A. around that.”

  She grins. “I’m not. I take extended birth control pills. No period. I’ve got a year’s worth of pills and I’m only two months in.”

  I smile broadly. “Excellent.”

  “So no break in our perverted activities will be required for the foreseeable future. Well, at least not on account of my period, anyway. Stuff like work and life will surely get in the way—and the fact that we don’t live in the same city ought to throw a wrench in things, for sure.”

  “Why? It’s less than a two-hour flight from Seattle to L.A. I can get a hard-on at ten and, if I charter a flight for you, you’ll be at my house, sucking it by twelve thirty.”

  She bursts out laughing. “You’re so gross.”

  “That’s not gross. That’s romantic.”

  She laughs. “You’d charter a flight just to get a blowjob?”

  “I can’t think of a better reason to charter a flight. Especially if the blowjob was gonna be from you. Damn.”

  She laughs again. “Well, okay, but what about work? Don’t you have a company to run or something? Now that I think about it, how come you never seem to have to work?”

  “Well, actually, I’m kinda between jobs at the moment. Not officially, but...” I lean in close to her and touch her golden hair. “Jonas and I are about to start a new business together. We haven’t made a public announcement yet, so this is actually confidential, but we’re both leaving Faraday & Sons to start something new.”