by Rosie Danan
She wrinkled her nose. “You’re kidding.” Something warm inside her blossomed until she realized he’d said your overalls, not you. He probably pictured them on Naomi’s lithe frame.
Josh ran his free hand through his hair, making the strands stand on end. “I’m not. Unfortunately. You’re like an untapped gold mine. Waiting for some guy . . . or girl . . . to come and discover you. To work out all your hidden layers, reveal the depths of depravity I know are in there somewhere.” He used their joined hands to chuck her on the chin. “You’re a challenge.”
Clara stared down at where their feet pointed at one another. The ridiculous idea to tilt her hips toward Josh’s, to close the scant inches between their bodies, rose to the forefront of her brain, but she swatted it away. He could joke about wanting her because he joked about wanting everyone. The sooner she stopped gobbling the crumbs of his attention, the better. Still, her throat grew dry and she wished she hadn’t left her water bottle inside. Clara licked her lips. “You think someday someone might accept that challenge?”
Josh pulled his full bottom lip between his teeth and closed his eyes. “Hell yeah.” His eyes snapped open. “I mean, theoretically. Most likely someone with a vast collection of loafers and money clips.”
Right. Someone the opposite of him. At this rate, Josh would try to set her up with his optometrist sometime next week.
“But listen, if you don’t wanna do this.” His voice had turned serious. “I’ll go in there right now and call the whole thing off.” Despite his lighthearted comments from a few moments ago, Josh’s eyes now held a tremendous amount of gravity. He brushed his thumb across her knuckles. He was a good man. A good friend, she reminded herself.
“No. I’m okay. Mind over matter, right?” Clara was an adult. She could handle some nudity. A handful of orgasms. That was the whole point of this crazy scheme, right? That if you pushed through the discomfort of social stigma you learned something that made your life exponentially better. Hell, maybe when Everett got back from his tour she’d have a whole roster of new moves in her repertoire. She’d blow his mind.
Josh’s shoulders visibly relaxed, though the heat hadn’t fully retreated from his eyes. “Exactly. Look, it gets easier. You get used to it. All the discomfort kinda fades after a few days. You realize we’re all human. We’ve all got bodies and nerve endings. Attraction and orgasms—” His gaze slipped to her throat and he swallowed. “—it’s just a biological response.”
“Right.” She brushed off a thread from his shoulder and let her hand linger. “It’s science.”
Josh’s muscles flexed under her fingers. “If it would help, I could start walking around the apartment naked as a desensitization tactic?”
“Yeah, no, I think that might kill me.”
“Well, if you change your mind you know where to find me.”
Clara rolled her eyes. “I’ll be fine.”
“Good.” Josh narrowed his eyes like he wanted to say more, like he was looking for a clue somewhere on her face.
Clara opened the door back to the studio. “I’ll go home and watch a ton of porn.”
The way Josh’s mouth dropped to the ground made the whole embarrassing ordeal worthwhile. She tapped her foot. “You coming?”
“I mean, I’m gonna try not to,” Josh muttered.
chapter eighteen
IT DIDN’T SURPRISE Josh that Clara had never visited a sex shop before. She entered the store with gigantic eyes, like she’d wandered into some kind of erotic snow globe in the middle of the Valley.
“It’s so quiet,” she whispered before wandering down the first aisle.
Josh grabbed a cart from the front of the store and followed her. “What were you expecting? A soundtrack of high-pitched moaning?” They had a lot of errands to run for the project and a limited amount of time to accomplish them.
“It looks very clean.”
Any minute now she’d pull out a magnifying glass.
The store had white walls and hardwood floors with neat hand-lettered signs marking each section. Like most boutiques opened in the last five years in Los Angeles, it resembled an artisanal coffee shop. Except instead of lattes, the chalkboard behind the counter listed flavors of organic lube.
“Did you base all your assumptions for this experience on a movie from the 1970s?”
Josh had tried desperately to avoid having Clara accompany him on this leg of the trip. He would have gone while she was tucked safely away at her day job, but the store manager who’d promised to cut him a deal on sex toys only worked on weekends.
Despite his best attempt to subtly grab his keys this morning while Clara lounged on the sofa, the jangle of metal worked like a cowbell and she’d come running, desperate for more driving practice. She’d already bamboozled him into granting her four trips behind the wheel of his car this week. After he picked her up from work, they’d spent the evenings traversing L.A.’s many neighborhoods, stopping for dinner in restaurants from Koreatown to Pasadena. Admittedly, the practice seemed to make a difference. Her driving had really improved since their first fateful trip. She could now merge with minimal hyperventilation.
Josh hadn’t figured out a way to say no to her doe eyes in nearly two months of living with her. So now, he’d have to spend the next hour suppressing a hard-on while Clara carefully examined objects and implements meant to inspire debauchery. He didn’t need the explicit stimuli to get him hard. These days, even watching Clara brush her teeth made all the blood rush to his groin.
“Do we need this?” She handed him a pair of handcuffs.
Josh ignored the way his dick jumped at the blatant excitement in her tone. “Fifty bucks? For plastic? No way. I could snap those flimsy things in my sleep.”
Clara’s breath hitched. “You could?”
Josh nodded, imagining breaking free from the ridiculous contraption to crawl across her naked body.
“Good to know.” She carefully placed the merchandise back on the shelf. “I told you not to worry so much about the budget. We’ve got plenty of money in the account.”
“It’s not about the money.” Though he had spent almost an hour last night searching for deals on bulk condoms online. “I want everything to be perfect.”
He tossed a few satin blindfolds into the cart and bit the inside of his cheek. He’d give anything to know what Clara fantasized about. If any of these accessories featured in her dreams. If he did.
He’d lain in bed last night with his hand wrapped around his cock, imagining her touching herself under those ridiculous cotton panties, pretending she wanted him the way he wanted her. Desperate, all-consuming, so hungry for him she had to stifle her whimpers with the back of her hand. If his brain worked half as hard as his dick he might have something to show for it. Josh didn’t want to tell Clara that, in addition to blue balls, he had a major case of writer’s block.
The whole project depended on his ability to craft the next Kama Sutra, and he couldn’t shake the nerves threatening to eat his intestines. Once they finished this errand, he’d have nothing left to do but actually put pen to paper. A truly terrifying prospect.
“I’m scared.” The words fell out of him like a leaky faucet.
Clara lowered the box of butt plugs she’d been studying with a furrowed brow and looked around. “Of what?”
Josh took a deep breath. “Of blowing this chance. I’ve always just shown up and pointed my dick wherever someone told me to. Now, if I fail, there’s so much more on the line. When no one expected anything from me, I couldn’t let anyone down.” He pinched the bridge of his nose. Except for my family, but that is a different story.
“Hey.” Clara handed him a novelty mug that read Fuck the Pain Away. “I’ve got complete faith in you.”
He relaxed as he watched her attempting not to giggle. At least one person found this whole process entertaining.
Josh covered his teeth with his lips and raised an eyebrow.
“Right.” Color splashed across her cheeks and she carefully replaced the box on the shelf. “Of course you can.”
She pointed at the next item that caught her eye, a set of stainless-steel Ben Wa balls. “Are those like whiskey rocks?”
Josh felt like her sexual Sherpa. The trouble was, he’d much rather have given a practical demonstration. Don’t think about readying her sweet pussy with your hand. Don’t think about her breathy gasp as you slip the cool metal inside her hot, tight body. Don’t . . . He threw up mental walls.
Trying to break through to his hormone-hijacked brain, he picked up a set to the left of her selection and placed them carefully in the cart. “They go inside you, actually. To strengthen your pelvic floor. But you can also use them to practice edging.”
“What’s edging?” Her words dripped with curiosity.
He swallowed hard, trying to keep himself in line. “It’s when your body is kept primed to arousal but release is postponed . . . or withheld.”
When she spoke, her words came out huskier than normal. “Why did you pick that set?”
Josh leaned toward her until he could breathe in the scent of her perfume. He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to collect himself. “They . . . uh . . . come with a remote.”
Somehow they’d moved until their noses were almost touching. With barely a tilt of his head, he could capture her lips. Each exaggerated rise and fall of her chest snapped another thread of his feeble control. He tore his eyes away from hers and scanned the shopping list clamped in his fist. “We’re done in this aisle.”
When Clara disappeared around the corner, he carefully adjusted his jeans.
A few minutes later, she paused in front of a row of packaging so long that Josh abandoned his search for cock rings to see what had captivated her attention. The items in question turned out to be a set of whips with Naomi posing on the packaging in a leather bustier and poisonous-looking red lipstick. He’d forgotten she had her own line.
“I didn’t realize Naomi had so much merchandise,” Clara said, tensing her shoulders. “Have you made any progress in your plans to reconcile with her?”
“I hadn’t thought about it in a while.” A bucket of ice water doused his arousal. “We’ve both been so busy.” He supposed at this point that was still his most likely future living situation. He kept forgetting that his current home came with an expiration date. That sooner or later Everett would return and kick him out.
“Have you heard from Everett lately?” She hadn’t mentioned anything, but that didn’t mean they weren’t calling and texting each other out of his earshot.
“I got a few postcards and a promotional beer koozie with the band’s name on it in the mail.” She shook her head. “I don’t know how much longer I can keep making up excuses for him when my mother calls.” Clara turned an aggressive-looking set of nipple clamps so the box faced away from her.
“What’s the deal with your mom? I didn’t realize avoiding someone who lives across the country could be so difficult.”
Clara paused in front of a rack of magazines and frowned. “She wants me to be like her. I’m supposed to find a respectable man from a good family and settle down. Pop out some babies and then run the charity of my choice.”
“Sounds boring.” Josh winced. “I mean unless that’s what you want?”
“I think part of my problem is, I spent so long trying to please her and my dad, I never gave much thought to what I wanted. And now . . .”
Josh found a sliver of hope in those last two words. “Now?”
“It doesn’t matter.” Clara flattened her skirt. “If my parents found out the truth, about my job with Jill or . . . you know, you. Oh my God. They’d die.”
Lava swam in his stomach. “So that’s a no-go on fraternizing with porn stars, then?” He shouldn’t be surprised. Had known from the second she arrived that she’d never consider him anything other than a pit stop on the way to the things she really wanted.
“Big time. Wheatons are very sensitive to optics. My mother didn’t want me to date a law clerk during undergrad because he rode a skateboard. I’m supposed to be her saving grace—the one she doesn’t have to worry about embarrassing her.”
Josh clenched his jaw. Occasionally he let himself forget where Clara came from. Right now, that willful ignorance felt fatal. “And she likes the idea of you and Everett?”
Clara leaned over and rearranged the items in the cart from the haphazard positions he’d given them. “She likes his family. Likes that she knows where he came from and how he grew up. I’m pretty sure she and Mrs. Bloom picked out our wedding china when we were in eighth grade.” Her voice took on an edge. “Nobody seems to care that Everett and I have never even kissed.”
A wicked satisfaction spread across his chest. Even if Everett Bloom got to marry her someday, Josh would always be the first man who made her come. But if Clara had the Greenwich version of an arranged marriage, what the fuck was Everett waiting for? Josh could hardly spend more than fifteen minutes with her without wanting to eat her out until he sprained his jaw. “I’m sorry, how is it possible that you’ve carried a torch for that guy since you were a teenager, but somehow you’ve never kissed?”
“Sometimes the anticipation of a kiss is better than the actual experience anyway.” Josh tracked the way she ran the hem of her dress through her fingers, exposing half an inch more of her pale thigh.
If she believed that, clearly she needed more practice. “I’m pretty sure physically kissing is better.”
“That’s because you’re accustomed to instant gratification.” Clara gave him a Cheshire cat smile as she strolled ahead of him, leaving Josh panting at her heels. “Half the pleasure in kissing is the buildup. The obsessing over the other person’s mouth. Thinking about the shape of his lips and the taste of his tongue. Imagining his hands in your hair. Or the way that he’ll hold you.” She stopped and turned toward him. “You can spend a whole night wondering if he’s ever going to pull you in unexpectedly and capture your breath in the middle of a sentence. Or lean in so slowly one morning that the wanting curls your toes and singes your fingertips.”
Josh dug his nails into his palm, hard enough to leave marks. His body didn’t care that she was describing pining for another man. He had no trouble pretending that all the hes in her sentences could be replaced with his name.
“Does he taste like cinnamon or whiskey?” Clara absently traced her bottom lip with the tip of her index finger while holding his gaze. “You imagine, over and over, in a thousand renditions, how he’ll push you up against the wall and press his entire body against yours until you’re trembling with how much you want him to take you.”
His eyes shot to the exposed brick behind her. He’d have no trouble walking her back until the rough stone pressed against her soft body before dropping his mouth to her neck as his hands shoved that flimsy cotton hem to her waist.
Clara’s eyes turned liquid as they found his lips. “Or maybe he won’t. Maybe he’ll barely brush his mouth across yours. Make you lower your chin and beg.”
Josh let out a sound, caught between a groan and a whimper.
The noise seemed to draw Clara out of her stupor. “Are you okay?”
“Yes.” The word came out in the wrong register. He tried again. “Yes. I was thinking, maybe you should write for the website.”
“Me? Really?”
He focused on keeping his eyes above her nostrils. “You’re good at channeling your emotions. All this thinking about sex but not actually having any is boiling my brain.” His cock pressed angrily against his zipper. She was right. Josh’s body didn’t understand the concept of wanting and not having. Of constant exposure to the object of
his desire with zero hope of ever crossing the finish line.
“I know what you mean. All this thinking about sexy people doing sexy things with sexy toys.” She fanned herself with her hand. “I’ve never said the word sexy so much in my life. I feel strung out.”
“I don’t know what to do.” He couldn’t do any of the things he wanted. They all involved different parts of Clara’s body. Sweat beaded on his brow as he watched her eyes grow heavy-lidded. It took everything he had to keep from dropping to his knees and pleading with her to put him out of his misery.
“It’s like having an itch you can’t quite scratch.” Her pink tongue traced her pinker bottom lip.
His jaw went slack. “Yes.” God, even her voice was starting to do it for him. Was it possible she was as turned on as he was?
“Well, I suppose you should channel all of that energy into a productive direction.” Clara hauled in hectic breaths.
He hoped “a productive direction” was code for between her thighs.
She shook her head as if to clear it. “Have you tried journaling?”
Josh’s head snapped back and he blinked stupidly. “I’m sorry. It sounded like you said journaling.”
“I did. You should use all of your erotic energy as fuel for next week’s scenes.”
“Oh. Yeah. That’s the plan.” Just because he’d never attempted to produce something academic with his sex drive before didn’t mean he would fail. The fact that he’d never written anything longer than an email wasn’t a bad sign. He’d take all of his pent-up lust, all these inexhaustible urges and he’d . . . package them. Make them neat and useful instead of messy and maddening.
When they finally made it to the checkout counter, Clara placed their purchases into designated rows for the manager.
The tall woman with a pink Mohawk totaled them up, including the promised thirty percent discount, and handed over an impressive number of bags. “If you don’t mind me asking, is all this stuff for business or pleasure?”