The Club

by Lauren Rowe

  “I am acting natural—”

  “No, you’re not.”

  “Yes, I am. If I weren’t looking at him, now that would be totally unnatural.”

  “What’s he doing?” I’m shoving my nose so far into my menu I can’t see a thing—not even the items on the menu.

  “He’s sitting at the bar.” She pauses. “He’s ordering a drink.” A long pause. “A beer.” Another pause. “He’s looking around.” A long pause. “Drinking his beer.” Another pause. “More looking around.”

  My heart is in my throat. My pulse is in my ears. My stomach is in knots. “Is it safe for me to look?”

  “Yeah, he’s not looking over here.”

  I peek over the top of my menu. “Oh.” It’s all I can manage—and it’s a “maybe I made a huge mistake by blowing him off” kind of “oh.” A “maybe I shouldn’t have said there’s no upside to him” kind of “oh.” An “oh hell maybe it’s worth getting my heart smashed into a thousand pieces to get a piece of that” kind of “oh.” He’s gorgeous.

  His head starts to swivel in our direction, and I cover my face again.

  “Sarah,” Kat chastises me. “He doesn’t know what you look like. Why are you covering your face?”

  My hands are shaking as they hold the menu. Just that one glimpse of him was enough to send me into some kind of hormone-induced seizure.

  “He’s looking over here,” Kat announces flatly.

  I peek at her on the far side of my menu again. Her face is turned toward the bar. She’s smirking at him.

  “Don’t look over at him!” I command. “Please. At the very least, don’t smile at him. When you smile at a man, he comes over to talk to you. Every time. Kat, please,” I whisper with urgency.

  “And remind me why don’t we want him to come over here again?” she asks between her smiling teeth.

  “Because I’d have a nervous breakdown,” I say, my voice cracking with anxiety. I think it’s an accurate statement. I’d surely have a nervous breakdown or some other life-altering medical crisis, if Jonas Faraday waltzed over here at all, but especially if he came to flirt with Kat.

  “Okay, okay, I’ll stop,” Kat says, apparently sensing my sincere anxiety. “Oh, hey, he’s looking the other away again.”

  I peek at him over the edge of my menu. He’s looking around the bar again, obviously waiting for a parade of purples to show up. The whole situation makes my flesh crawl. But what did I expect? For him to cancel his club membership and declare, “I don’t care about The Club! I just want My Beautiful Intake Agent!”—for a woman he’s never met or even spoken to on the phone? Talk about Lifetime-Hallmark-Valentine’s Day brainwashing. What was I hoping for—some kind of meaningful human connection thanks to a little email-sex? Ha! I really am exactly the kind of woman who made him want to join The Club in the first place.

  “What’s he doing now?” I whisper, afraid to look.

  “I don’t know. A group of people just stood in my line of sight.”

  “Damn.” A minute passes. “View still obstructed?”

  “No. Would you just put that down already? Anyone looking at you would think you’re deranged or something. Who takes this long to decide on a simple food order?”

  I sigh. I’m being ridiculous. Life is short. I’m in the same air space as the scrumptious, if arrogant, Jonas Faraday. When will I ever get this chance again? I’m acting like a scared child—something I thought I’d given up for good a long time ago. “You know what? You’re right. I should just go over there and talk to him like an adult.”

  “There you go—put your big girl panties on.” Kat’s beaming at me.

  I put the menu down on the table. “I mean, even if I crash and burn, at least I’ll never wonder ‘what if.’”

  “Exactly.”

  I gaze over at Jonas, resolving myself to just go talk to him.

  I gasp. Oh crap. He’s talking to a stunning brunette—and even from here, I can see the purple bracelet around her wrist. I grab the menu again and hurriedly raise it up, just below my eyes. Miss Purple smiles at him and licks her lips. Oh wow, she’s really coming on strong—and she’s smokin’ hot, too. Even though Jonas’ head is turned away from me, there’s no doubt in my mind his eyes are bugging out with unfettered lust right now. She’s frickin’ spectacular—and clearly ready to jump his bones.

  I want to scream. Or throw up. Actually, more than anything, I just want to cry. And, honestly, I’m confused. Why on earth did this gorgeous woman join The Club? What is she hoping to gain? Is she a gold digger? Is she looking for a husband? What? Because I don’t believe for a second she’s here to find serial sex partners with no strings attached. A woman like that could have any man she’d ever want. So why on earth was she matched to Jonas, a guy who wants to give her nothing but an orgasm and a polite farewell?

  What’s going on here? And why isn’t Jonas wondering the same thing?

  Out of nowhere, while I’m still peeking over my menu at Jonas and that woman at the bar, Jonas turns almost completely around and looks directly at me. My eyes are hard slits. Bastard. His eyes go wide. So do mine. Shit.

  I quickly glance away and raise my menu to cover my entire face. I feel like I’ve just been caught in the act—the act of what, I’m not entirely sure. I’m seized with a sudden panic. Does he know who I am? No, that’s a silly thought. And yet, for a split second there, I swear I thought I saw recognition in his eyes. But that’s impossible. He can’t recognize me—he’s never seen me before. The man couldn’t pick me out of a line-up (other than a line-up of left boobs).

  I quickly peek again, but he’s turned back to her, buying her a drink. Of course, he is. I could puke. Sure, Sarah, there was recognition in his eyes—so much so, he immediately decided to buy his new purple friend a drink. I’m such an idiot. Anger and embarrassment and humiliation flood into me all at once. And jealousy, too. Let’s not forget jealousy.

  “Let’s go,” I bark at Kat, leaping up from my seat. Without waiting for Kat’s reply, I bolt to the front door like the place is on fire. In a flash, I’m flying up the sidewalk, away from the bar, as fast as my legs will carry me, the sound of Kat’s high heels clacking on the cement behind me.

  I can’t believe I almost said hello to him in there. That would have been an awkward moment at best and a mortifying catastrophe at worst. I can’t believe I got so wrapped up in the ridiculous fantasy of our little forbidden whatever-it-was (I was about to call it a romance, but obviously, that’s the last thing it was). I can’t believe I touched myself and said his name, that I wanted to have sex with him so much it physically pained me, that I researched him online for seven hours straight, a good six hours more than necessary for my intake report—when I should have been reading the next three cases for my contracts homework. Oh good God, I can’t believe I sent him a picture of my boob! I’ve never done anything like that in my life. What the hell is wrong with me? And most of all, I can’t believe I let my heart ache for the sadness in his eyes—a sadness I stupidly thought I could fix. A sadness I wanted to fix.

  I was a fool.

  I reach my car, panting. I bend over, catching my breath. After half a minute, Kat reaches me, equally out of breath.

  “Wooh!” she breathes.

  “Sorry,” I choke out.

  “I understand.” She grimaces. “Ouch.” I’m pretty sure she’s referring to what we just witnessed in the bar, not her sprint up the sidewalk in heels.

  My chest is heaving. “Ouch,” I agree.

  A minute passes. “I knew he was a man-whore,” I say, “but seeing him in action like that . . .” I let out a shaky breath. “If that’s the kind of woman I’m up against, I never stood a chance, anyway.”

  Kat shoots me a commiserating frowny face.

  My shoulders slump. “I don’t know why he has this hold on me.” Tears are threatening my eyes, but I suppress them. “I keep pushing him away from me, telling him to leave me alone—and then I’m crushed when it works.�
� I roll my eyes at myself. “I’m a mess.”

  Kat wraps me into a hug, and I put my cheek on her shoulder. “If he wants to chase tail for the rest of his life rather than have the most incredible girl in the entire world, then he just doesn’t deserve you, anyway,” she whispers.

  Chapter 9

  Jonas

  I’m grateful to be showering alone right now. I usually like showering with a woman right after I’ve fucked her. But not tonight. Sex with Stacy was ... unfulfilling. No, actually, it was bordering on repulsive, if I’m being totally honest. I can’t believe I just used the word repulsive to describe sex with a woman who looks like Stacy. But there you go.

  The woman has an incredible body—tight and lean with curves in all the right places—and soft skin and thick hair and the bluest eyes I’ve ever seen. And yet, I wasn’t into it from minute one. I definitely wasn’t enthused to go down on her, so I don’t for the life of me know why I did it anyway. Force of habit I guess. Convincing myself I was “back,” maybe. Perhaps I thought I could fool myself into enjoying it, if I just gave it the ol’ college try. But it was a huge miscalculation on my part. The minute my tongue hit her cunt, my stomach jerked, if you can believe it, like I was tasting rancid milk or something.

  But Stacy didn’t seem to notice me practically gagging down there. Nope, the minute my tongue hit her bull’s-eye, she moaned and groaned and did all the right things—writhing and pleading and howling and begging—like I’d flipped some magic switch on her. She ramped up so fast and so hard, in fact, I actually rolled my eyes and pulled away from her, staring. It was all I could do not to yell up to her face, “Really, Stacy?”

  I didn’t say that, of course—I am a gentleman, after all—but I did stop licking her right then and gape at her in total disbelief. And the minute I stopped, do you know what she did? She whimpered and begged me to slam her with my cock like she’d never been so turned on in her life. It was almost funny. Even I knew I hadn’t done a goddamned thing yet, and there she was, following the blueprint I’d given in my application, to the letter. Un-fucking-believable. But it’s hard to resist a hot woman begging you to fuck her, even if she is a fucking liar. So, I did. I fucked her, though I’m not proud of myself for doing it.

  When I entered her, which I did kind of roughly, to be honest, my only thought was getting myself off, as opposed to bringing her any form of pleasure. And guess what? Shocker! I was no sooner inside her than she came like a Mack truck—or so it seemed. (Or, as Sarah would say, she allegedly came like a Mack truck). And you know what I was thinking during her alleged orgasm? I was thinking, “Give me a fucking break.” That’s not the greatest thing in the world to be thinking while a woman squirms under you in apparent rapture. In fact, it’s pretty fucking gross.

  And that’s when I thought, rather distinctly, “I want Sarah.” And the minute I started thinking “I want Sarah” while my dick was pounding into Stacy, I felt so disgusted with myself, so physically repelled, so depressed, so fucking lonely, I wanted to pull out and not even bother coming at all. But that’s not what I did. No, being the high caliber individual that I am, I did quite the opposite. I closed my eyes and forged ahead, imagining my cock was inside Sarah—Sarah with the olive skin and perfect breast and the hard nipple I’d give anything to twirl around in my tongue. Sarah with the bullshit-o-meter like no one I’ve ever met before. Sarah who’s never come before, and who decided to trust me with that delicate pearl of truth. Sarah who knows I’m an asshole but touched herself and said my name, anyway. Yep. I closed me eyes and let my mind construct a blurry image of Sarah—a kind of amalgam of Sarah and Menu Girl fused together, and I fucked the shit out of Stacy.

  Thinking about Sarah made me pump into Stacy even harder. As I slammed into Stacy—as she groaned and writhed under me—I told myself Sarah couldn’t stay away from me, even though she deleted her email account, even though she wrote me that fucking handwritten note. With each thrust, I told myself Sarah had looked me up on the check-in app, that she’d figured out I’d be at that bar, that she couldn’t stop thinking about me, aching for me—that she wanted me as much as I wanted her. I imagined everything went differently at The Pine Box—that Sarah was Menu Girl, and that I went straight over to the corner instead of buying Stacy a drink, that I went right over to her and took the menu out of her hands and said, “You’re coming home with me right now.” As my naked skin moved against Stacy’s soft, fair skin, over and over, I imagined the rapture of feeling Menu Girl’s smooth, olive skin rubbing against mine. I imagined Menu Girl’s sweat was mingling with mine, that her long, dark hair was unfurled on my white pillowcase, that her slender hands were clutching my back, her fingernails digging into me, the silver band on her thumb scraping against my skin.

  All of that pretending worked for me, and I was right the verge of coming, right on the verge of shouting Sarah’s name—but then Stacy moaned and whispered in my ear. “You’re amazing,” she said, and I was instantly jolted back to reality. I opened my eyes and saw Stacy’s blue eyes staring back at me, not Menu Girl’s big brown eyes.

  That’s when I remembered Sarah didn’t want me.

  That’s when I remembered Sarah didn’t think I was worthy of her.

  That’s when I remembered Sarah didn’t see an upside to me.

  And that’s when I got pissed.

  I started fucking Stacy without mercy. I’m not proud of it—in fact, I’m so disgusted with myself, I feel almost physically ill about it—but I fucked Stacy so hard after her “you’re amazing” bullshit comment, and with such animosity, I can’t imagine she experienced anything but unadulterated humiliation, maybe even pain.

  Though, of course, she pretended to like it.

  Because she’s a fucking liar.

  “That was incredible,” Stacy said after I finally came and collapsed on top of her in an angry, sweaty heap. I pulled back and looked into her face, ready to apologize—to beg her forgiveness—and she smiled at me. It was a smile that didn’t reach her eyes—her very, very blue eyes—and it felt like a punch in the gut. I pulled out of her and yanked off my condom. I couldn’t muster a return smile or any kind of reply to her hollow compliment. I certainly didn’t feel like apologizing to her for fucking her so hard anymore. I knew I’d just sold my soul to the devil—for two hundred-fifty thousand dollars, to be exact—and I hated myself for it.

  “I’m gonna hop in the shower,” I mumbled, hoping Stacy would get the hint.

  And guess what? She did. Without batting an eyelash. Of course, she did. Good ol’ Stacy. I shouldn’t have been surprised, since she’s an android programmed to make my every fucking fantasy a reality. Well, an android programmed to make what I thought was my every fucking fantasy into a reality. As it turns out, what I wanted—what I thought I wanted—doesn’t exist.

  “Yeah, you go ahead,” she said cheerfully, gathering up her clothes. “I’ve got to get going, anyway.” Wow, big surprise. Right on cue. “Thanks for everything, though. You’re amazing. Maybe I’ll see you around.” Without another word, she threw on her clothes and waltzed out the door, just like that. No request for my phone number. No hints about Radiohead coming to town the following week and, hey, they just happen to be her favorite band. No hopeful expression in her eyes. Not even a request for my Club identification number so we could check-in with each other again. Just in and out. Fuck and duck. Hit it and quit it. Exactly what I said I wanted in my application. But, ah, wasn’t the second half of my “sexual preferences” that I didn’t want to feel like an asshole afterwards? So why do I feel like the biggest asshole who ever lived right now? Actually, I feel like more of an asshole right now in this very moment than I’ve felt in my entire adult life.

  I lather my body with shower gel, practically scrubbing my skin to get Stacy off me. I close my eyes and let the hot water pelt me in the face for a moment, and then I open my mouth and let the searing water flood my mouth, trying desperately to cleanse my tongue. Before getting into the shower
, I brushed my teeth and tongue for, like, seven minutes, but I still can’t get the sour taste of Stacy’s cunt out of my mouth. Just the thought of my tongue touching her makes me shudder. What the fuck was I thinking?

  I don’t want Stacy.

  Or Marissa. Or Caitlyn. Or Julie. Or Samantha or Emily or Maddie or Kristin or Lauren or Rachel or Bethanney or Natalie or Darcy or Michelle or Charlotte or Grace or Katie or Shannon or Juliana or Tiffany or Andrea or Melanie or Hannah.

  My chest constricts. The truth is dawning on me as the hot water pelts me.

  I want Sarah.

  But Sarah doesn’t want me.

  I lost my mind momentarily, she said, but I’ve regained control of myself.

  I’m what happened when she had an aberrant lapse in good judgment? I’m what happened when she let her guard down for once in her repressed life? I’m the bad guy who forced her to acknowledge and claim her deepest, most honest desires, instead of chasing bullshit rainbows like everyone else tells her to do? She’s regained her control now, huh? Well, lucky for her. Who knows what could have happened if she’d deigned to meet me—if she had lowered herself to giving me a fucking chance rather than unilaterally deciding I wasn’t worth her time.

  Fuck.

  I lean my hands against the marble in the shower and let the hot water slide down my naked back. My head is spinning. She thinks I’m unworthy of her.

  When it comes to you, she said, there’s just too much downside, and not enough upside.

  I grab the shampoo and massage a drop into my hair.

  Thanks to that application, she knows better than anyone—literally, anyone—just what a cocky-bastard-asshole-son-of-a-bitch motherfucker I really am.

  If I were willing to lie to you, like everyone else apparently does—like you want everyone to do, despite what you delude yourself into thinking you want—things might have been different. Her words sting like razors slicing my chest. Before Sarah, I fooled everyone else. Even myself. But not her. She knows the truth. Enjoy your membership, she said. I’m sure you’ll get exactly what you want out of it. My wish for you, however, is that, someday, you’ll realize what you want and what you need are two very different things. Shit. I don’t know what the hell I need. But I sure as hell know what I want.