“Last night, before having thehottestsex in my life, we all went to Brothers Grimm for drinks. I told you, right?” Yes, I know, and if Richie the Intern wasn’t so blinded by your hotness, he wouldn’t have made me spill my coffee all over my clothes yesterday and I would have gone and beaver blocked you from your perfect night.
“He brought a really nice friend. Maybe we could set you up with him so we could double date?”
I wave my phone at her and offer my most sincere smile. “I have my Adventures in Tinderland to get to, so maybe after that.” Or after I throw myself off the roof of this building.
God, I want to tell her what I’m going through. We have such a wonderful friendship, and looking at this and what it’s doing to my insides at the moment, I’m afraid of what I will eventually feel. I don’t want to resent Julia for just being Julia, the one who is beyond beautiful and just got to Nate first. If I told her, what would she do? As my friend, would she break things off with Nate? But then what? How would our friendship be then? It’s not worth it.
She’s drawing heart-shaped doodles on her notepad. “Nathaniel Cross. Does Mrs. Julia Cross sound good?”
“Um, sounds perfect,” I grumble, swiping left on Tinder to everyone.
Chapter 5
It’s Thursday night. I worked from home this morning, which is code for I had a spa day. Manicure, pedicure, massage, and waxed as bald as a baby’s bottom.
Welcome to the Adventures in Tinderland, I’m your host Jane Nash.
I take a quick video and a few snapshots of the restaurant I’m sitting in and the date that’s walking toward me. The captions read:The epic saga of The One Night Stand begins in 3, 2, 1 #HeLooksDifferentThanHisProfilePicture #LikeHeHadHair
“Wow,” he says when he reaches the table where we agreed to meet. “Aren’t you…cute.”
Aren’t you…bald…and possibly ten years older than you promised?I slap a smile on my face so wide it actually hurts. “Well, thank you. I guess.”
And over a candlelit table at this shitty chain restaurant with its cheery, perky wait staff, I explain the article to him. He does what any other man in the universe would do: yanks my chair closer to his and jams his tongue down my throat. Jonathan Theodore Titan Gaster Junior is his name, “But everyone just calls me Jon-boy,” he says.
Jon-boy. I repeat it in my head a few times.
There is no way in Hades I’m calling a grown-assed man anything that ends withboy. Not without laughing hysterically in his face, anyway.
After reclaiming my tongue, Jon…boy asks the waitress for the check, snapping his fingers wildly in the poor girl’s face.
I sip at my drink and choke as I swallow. “But we didn’t even order dinner…”
“Let’s get right to this article you have to write. It’ll save time and money and you’ll get your research done. It seems fair.”
I pull up the camera on my phone and snap a picture of the check when the waitress places it on the table:First rule of a one-night stand: Never begin with it being a one-night stand. Especially if you’re hungry. #CheapAssDate #NotEvenAnAppetizer #ProtitutesGetPaidMore
The waitress offers me an uneasy smile when he throws down just enough money for our drinks and hurries for the door. I record a live feed of the back of his shiny head rushing toward the exit, his hands waving me on.
“Hold on, Jon, wait,” I say as he tugs me down the street quickly. My legs can’t keep up with his, and just to match his pace, I’m jogging alongside him.
“Jon-boy,” he corrects me, pulling me close to wrap his arms around my shoulders. His lips collide into mine again and my back presses against the outside wall of a building down the street of the restaurant. His tongue is insane, pushing into my mouth like he’s trying to touch my tonsils.
I lean away.
“I live just down the block,” he whispers, dragging his hands across my backside and squeezing a handful of my bottom.
It actually makes me feel a bitwanton.Maybe a little bit like Julia. Maybe I should try and push myself outside my comfort zone and just go with it. I’ve never done anything like this before. It’s shameless and dirty. Julia does this stuff all the time—wellpre-Nate and his quintuplet Ohs. She says hooking up with random guys is today’s reality.
It’s just never really been mine.
Jon’s hands lift up and pinch lightly at my nipples. The sensation makes me kiss him back; giving in fully to the deplorable dirty things I suddenly want to have done to me. He could take me up against this wall right now and we could be done with it. I’d never have to see him again—just this once taking what I need—and walking away without any care. I suddenly feel powerful.
I bite my lip as he grabs onto my hand and pulls me farther down the street. There’s a big old Victorian house at the end. A beautiful wraparound porch hangs off the front, but that’s all I see because his hands yank down the cups of my bra and his lips and tongue are sliding down my neck.
We’re at a side door of the house and my shoulders shove up against it as something rock hard just under his zipper rocks into me. Somewhere inside the house, a dog yaps continuously.
His hands fumble with the keys. His fingers are shaky, he’s out of breath, and it’s arousing that it’s because of me. I’m doing this to his body.
