Seven Books for Seven Lovers

by Molly Harper, Stephanie Haefner, Liora Blake, Gabra Zackman, Andrea Laurence, Colette Auclair

“I love you, you complete pain in the ass. Just let me do this. You’re making a big goddam deal about something that shouldn’t be one. So, if you could get off your high horse for a couple of hours, that would be great.”

  “Hold on. Are we fighting?”

  He sighs. “I guess. I’m a little bit turned on with all the yelling, which will hopefully lead to make-up sex, which probably means we’re fighting.”

  Hmmm, make-up sex with Trevor. I’m suddenly interested in what form that takes. Rough, teach-me-a-lesson kind of approach? Maybe more of a sorry I was a presumptuous douche, how do you like my head between your legs thing?

  “Fine. What’s the budget?”

  “Budget?”

  “Yes. How much can I spend?”

  “No budget, just get whatever you want. My card doesn’t have a limit.”

  “Give. Me. A. Number.”

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake. I don’t know. How about fifty?”

  “What am I going to buy at Barneys for fifty dollars?”

  “Oh, now it’s not enough? Make up your mind, Mosely. And I didn’t mean fifty dollars, I meant fifty grand.”

  I bang my head against the wall in the hallway. The old biddies are probably reporting me to security right now as a homeless crazy person.

  “What would I do with fifty thousand dollars in clothes? You’re not even being reasonable. Who does that? Where would I even put that much stuff?”

  “In our closet. You see how much space I need.”

  Trevor’s house has a walk-in closet the size of my kitchen. What’s hilarious is that he uses approximately one-tenth of the space. The rest is just bare hanging rods and empty cedar shelves covered in dust. The same goes for the bathroom, where there are two vanities, each the length of a pool table. All he has in there is deodorant, some cologne he rarely wears, plus his toothbrush and toothpaste. That’s it. I’ve never quite figured out what he spends his money on. There’s the overpriced car, but just the one, instead of a fleet. Beyond that, he doesn’t seem to care much about electronics, gaudy jewelry, or expensive toys. Apparently, the mountain bike crap was his only vice until he met me and started buying up Montana ranch land and financing unreasonable shopping sprees.

  “Fine. I’ll spend as much money as I can in the next four hours. Sounds great.”

  “I don’t give a shit now. Do whatever you want. Go to Walmart instead—the fifty bucks should do just fine there. I’m sure that’s exactly where Kellan wants to go crazy.”

  “Don’t be mad, Daddy Warbucks.”

  “Stop calling me that. Do you think you could do one fucking thing for me?”

  “Maybe.”

  “I want the dress you get to wear tonight to be for me. Hot, sexy as hell, and easy access. Got it?”

  “Anything more specific?”

  “Tell Kellan, he’ll figure it out. He seems to be able to dress you like every one of my filthiest fantasies in the flesh.”

  A shiver runs over me and I consider how long I have to wait to make up with him properly. After I hang up, I try hard not to feel like I’m being bought somehow, reminding myself it’s different because he loves me. Even when Kellan announces loudly to the room that I look like an apology orgasm is in my future, I try to hold my head high.

  Four hours later, I’m slumped in a chair in some kind of VIP (which I’m now convinced stands for “very important prostitute”) section of Barneys, surrounded by a bevy of bags and boxes. All I want at this moment is a tall glass of iced water with lemon, two ibuprofen, a bed, and to sleep for days. How do brainless twit women do this all day? Trying on clothes is exhausting, mentally and physically.

  Don’t get me wrong, it’s entertaining for the first hour or so. When sales clerks and managers figure out that you’re about to drop some serious cash, a treasure trove of things comes your way. There are snacks, champagne, espresso, and an endless supply of insincere compliments. While I know it is impossible for everything to look “spectacular” and “totally amazing” on me, that’s what they kept saying over and over and over.

  Luckily, I had Kellan to tell me with unflinching honesty what was good and bad. There were a few times he covered his eyes with his hands and shouted, “Off! Take it off now!” when I toddled out of the dressing room. One was a strange orange silk romper with a gold sash tie and the other a cotton-candy-pink pair of wide-leg pants with giant red buttons. I was educated on what the term “editorial” means in the world of fashion. It means that no sane person should attempt to wear it out of the house, because it only looks good on pin-thin models as tall as gazelles who slouch in a way that makes them look cool. The rest of us just look like dangerously dehydrated kooks.

  We didn’t spend fifty thousand. Not even close. I can’t imagine how long it would take to do that. Except when Kellan fingered a few couture dresses that would have blown the budget pretty quickly, looking at me with pitifully large eyes and telling me to try just one, that I wouldn’t regret what it feels like to wear a dress like this. I drew the line and wouldn’t consent even to try them on. Where in Crowell would I wear a seven-thousand-dollar dress that barely covers my ass? The post office? The feed store? My bare legs would stick uncomfortably to the pleather booths at Deaton’s Café, that’s for sure.

  After sending Kellan on his way, I stretch out to wait for Trevor, who I texted a few minutes ago with an SOS to come pick me up before I drift into some kind of fugue state. A few of the helpful concierge types keep checking on me, asking if I need anything or if they should call a car service for me. As politely as possible, I tell them my ride will be here any minute. Maybe it’s because I keep saying “my ride” that they keep looking at me funny. I’m sure most of their fancy clientele doesn’t wait for their “ride” to come get them. They drift into limos, Bentleys, or hovercrafts that vaporize into thin air.

  Dropping my head back to rest on the chair, I hope if my eyes are closed the next time they wander by, no one will want to disturb me. Before I can really drift off into the nap I so desperately need, I sense Trevor over me. I can smell him, all his clean skin and him, whatever it is that makes my mouth water and my skin flush.

  “Are you alive, Mosely?”

  “Barely.”

  With his arms outright against either side of the chair, he leans down and kisses each of my eyelids.

  “Looks like you bought the place out. I can’t believe fifty bucks bought all this.”

  Opening my eyes, his cute face is still hovering near mine so I dart my lips up to give him a tiny kiss.

  “Au contraire, Daddy Warbucks, we spent significantly more than fifty dollars. I hope you plan to put in some serious overtime down on the docks because you’re going to need a solid paycheck to cover all this.”

  “If you call me Daddy Warbucks one more time, I will leave your ass here. Good luck fitting all this shit in a cab.”

  My eyes go wide and I whisper to him desperately. “Please don’t. I hate it here.”

  He smiles and lays a serious kiss on me before straightening up to grab some of the bags. Peering into them quizzically, he keeps picking up more when he realizes how light they all are.

  “Can’t be much in these, they’re light.”

  “Oh no, they just like to put every single little thing in a separate bag. With the exception of this one.” I shove the bag sitting on the floor right next to me with my foot. “This one has lingerie in it, so they went ahead and filled it up.”

  He raises his eyebrows and grins. “Anything interesting in that one?”

  Leaning down to pick it up, I make a show of opening it up and studying its contents. “A few obscenely expensive push-up bras and some very tiny panties. What else, what else?” I furrow my brow and then look up at him innocently. “What about a red lace corset with a matching garter belt and black fishnet thigh-highs? Would that qualify as ‘interesting’ to you? Kellan seemed to think you might appreciate the sheer quality of the lace.”

  “Are you totally sure he’s gay? The
fucking guy seems to be in my head, seeing every little dirty daydream I’ve ever had about you.”

  “I’m quite positive he’s completely uninterested in any kind of sex involving women. He’s just a complete savant about clothes. For any situation, naughty or otherwise.”

  Trevor looks at me and jerks his head toward the door. “I suggest we go home and you can show me everything you purchased. Beginning with that bag in your hand. We’re done fighting, right? Now we can move on to the making-up part?”

  Pulling my lips together into a sly smile, I drop my chin and gesture to a garment bag lying amongst the rest of my haul. “If you think the corset sounds interesting, you’re going to love the dress I have for tonight.”

  He’s pushing the door open with his back to load the bags into the SUV and he stumbles over his feet trying to crane his head back to me. I laugh and shake my head, loving that I just threw him off his über-cool game for one second.

  24

  We have dinner reservations at some sushi place I apparently should have heard of, but haven’t. Evidently, it’s well-known by the locals, plus the paparazzi and the tourists who cram in to see if they can catch celebrities shoving twenty dollars’ worth of sea urchin into their mouths and knocking back sake like it’s water.

  After I slink into the unbelievably tight, low-cut, supershort tank dress that Kellan insisted would be perfect for tonight, we’re lucky to make it to the restaurant anyway. The dress is pure white and simple, just a thin knit fabric that wraps every single curve on my body, leaving nowhere to hide. When I tried to tell Kellan that girls like me aren’t proper enough to wear white, he brushed off my claims and explained that a white dress like this is the equivalent of catnip to men. Something about virginal white makes their temporal lobes go bonkers. Leave it to Kellan to know how the male brain processes fashion and sex. Even if it’s all bullshit, it sounds like the Gospel when he lays it on me.

  Trevor hollers down the hall that he’s going to start the car just as I finish flipping my hair around and puckering my lips in the mirror while applying another layer of lip gloss. I clasp a silver choker around my neck and take one final look in the mirror.

  When I pull the front door closed behind me, I can see him in the car, staring at the radio console, on which he has probably already flipped through a million stations in the last five minutes, grumbling about nothing good being on the air anymore. As I start down the walkway, he looks up and stops whatever he’s doing. I hear the engine shut off and he leaps out of the car, slamming the door behind him. Reaching me, he puts his hands around my waist and shoves his hips into me, forcing me to start to walk backward toward the house.

  “Back in the house. Now. I’m going to have to fuck you before dinner in that dress.”

  I shove his hands off and make a quick move around him to jog down the walkway to the car.

  “No way. I didn’t just spend an hour getting ready so that you could get me all mussed up. You are totally going to buy me dinner before I put out.”

  I’ve already made it to the passenger door when I turn to see him standing helplessly on the walkway where I left him. He pulls his hands to the top of his head and shouts over to me.

  “Don’t fucking run like that in those heels and that dress! Your tight little body bouncing like that makes it worse!”

  Ambling slowly over to me, he opens my door and gestures for me to get in with a resigned look on his face. I slide into the seat and cross my legs. He leans in and runs his index finger down my arm.

  “Are you wearing some of that new lingerie under there? Maybe the little G-string? Or that bra that’s basically see-through?”

  “Nope.”

  “What are you wearing under it?”

  I smooth my hands over the fabric and stare out the windshield. “Just me.”

  Trevor groans and shoves my door shut with a thud. When he walks around the car in front of me, I watch him run his hands over his head and heave a sigh. Inside, he starts the car then gripes about whether appetizers will be enough to satisfy me, so we can get to satisfying him.

  There are distinct advantages and one glaring disadvantage to the private dining room he arranged at the restaurant. In the pro column, there are no Jack and Jill tourist types to gawk at us while we eat. They gawked enough when we walked in, so who knows how long it would have taken just one of them to summon the courage to come over for an autograph or a picture. The food is delicious, especially given that I think raw fish of any sort is probably better suited to being in a white Styrofoam cooler that you can buy at the Quik Stop on the way to the lake, right next to the little plastic tub of night crawlers and a sixer of cheap Rainier beer.

  Solidly in the con column? Trevor. He looks too good in the soft dim light; his eyes are bright, and the little gold flecks in them are teasing me. He keeps using his hands to eat, instead of the chopsticks, which means he sometimes sucks the tips of his fingers just a little. Then he feeds me some pieces with his fingers, drawing close to my lips and getting this dirty sultry look on his face while he does it. He’s laughing, smiling, and generally being wonderful, which makes me drunk like the sake is one hundred proof.

  Then there’s the touching. Nothing overtly sexual, just drawing his fingers down my arm, sweeping my hair back over my shoulder, holding my hand and then massaging the palm gently with his thumb. I want to drag him somewhere and go completely nuts—the kitchen, the bathroom, the alley, or maybe under the table. Despite how he was when we left the house, he seems utterly self-possessed at the moment and now I’m the one left pouting and frustrated.

  When we finally finish and wait for the server to return with his credit card, I lean over and kiss him, long and hot. He pulls his hand into my hair just as the server returns and clears his throat before laying down the receipt and scurrying away. I drop my head to Trevor’s shoulder as he signs the ticket and puts everything back in his wallet. Pulling me out of the private room, he stops just before we start to leave the restaurant.

  “There are probably photographers out there. Are you OK with that?”

  I shrug and turn up one corner of my mouth. “Only one way to find out, right?”

  “Just ignore whatever they say and don’t let go of my hand. We can’t avoid this part forever.”

  He kisses me gently and takes my hand. Shoving open the door into the darkness, we encounter a handful of photographers outside. Probably ten of them, but the glare of all their flashbulbs at once is jarring. It’s not like what I’ve seen on TV, with a bunch of yelling, but they are saying his name and asking us to look one direction or another. Even beyond all of that, I can hear one voice specifically.

  “Katherine! Katherine, over here!” I turn at the sound, the name only my mother calls me. When I find the body attached to the voice, I recognize him immediately. Geraldo.

  He’s smirking at me, a vile, dangerous smile that I suspect maggots might crawl out of if his lips parted from his teeth. I furrow my forehead at him and then shake it off because anyone might assume that Kate is short for Katherine. Which, in my case, it is. As we make our way farther down the sidewalk, I think I can hear his voice again. This time I swear he’s calling me by the old name. Katherine Stark.

  I turn again and Geraldo is gone. Perhaps I just can’t see him. Maybe I’m hearing things. That has to be it. Over all of the noise, the cacophony of voices, I must have been hearing things. Feeling Trevor behind me, gently pressing me into the car, I give my head a quick shake and let the door close behind me so that the car is silent. I stare out the door glass and half expect Geraldo to pop up and scare the crap out of me.

  When Trevor gets in, he takes a quick look at me before grabbing my hand and kissing the back of it.

  “You OK? You did good; you didn’t flinch.”

  I nod and smile. Before I can let it get to me anymore, I cross my legs and lean over to kiss him, letting my hand drift onto his lap. He grabs my head to pull me closer and the movement pushes my dress up my thi
ghs as my body cranes over to him. As he starts the car, I roll back into the passenger seat and feel how indecently high my dress is. With the combination of those kisses, the sake, and how sensual he was at dinner, I can’t wait out the fifteen minutes it will take us to get home.

  Reaching over to him, I pull his hand into my mine and place it on my knee. Instinctually, he starts to rub my knee and then moves his hand up my leg. I uncross my legs when we arrive at a red light and Trevor looks over at me.

  “I can’t drive and touch you at the same time, baby. You’re too distracting.”

  “OK.” I slide his hand off my leg and spread my knees a little more. With one hand, I start to move my fingers up the inside of my thigh, slithering down in the seat just enough that my dress is barely covering me.

  “Don’t do that.” His eyes dart quickly between the road and where my hand is.

  “What?” Slipping my hand between my legs, I can barely contain the sensations running through me. We hit another red light and when he brakes, it’s not very smoothly.

  “Don’t touch yourself.” When he says this, he skims his thumb over my cheek, then down my neck.

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s too dark. If you’re going to do that, I want to be able to see it. I want to see how wet you get, how you tease your lips open, how you use your fingers.”

  The light turns green and the impatient jerk behind us, who probably doesn’t have a wanton woman in the passenger seat fondling herself, starts to tap his horn. Trevor grumbles and starts to pull away.

  “You said you couldn’t touch me and drive. That’s perfectly understandable. Safety first, right?” I start to rub a little more aggressively, feeling the slick wetness building and a tight clenching in my belly, stimulated by how I can hear Trevor breathing out heavy groans. “I’ve been wet all night. I can’t wait.”

  “Join the fucking club. I’ve been half hard since you walked out the door in that dress.” I groan out from his words and then let out a small series of panting gasps. “Don’t come, Kate. I want that part. Tease yourself all you want, just don’t come.”