lust.”
His eyes widened. “Jenny, I never knew. You always seemed so…so…”
She covered her ears. “If you say sexless, I’ll scream.”
He removed her hands from her ears. “I was going to say shy, inhibited.” He paused. “Don’t you ever get tired of not going after what you want? If this VP is so hot, then why don’t you just bed him and get it over with?” He shrugged. “If your job isn’t really yours, then I don’t see the problem.” He raised an eyebrow. “Unless you’re saving yourself for Prince Charming. You’re not a virgin, are you?”
She glowered at him and pulled her hands from his. “It’s really none of your business, but no.”
“Must not have been a great experience based on your expression,” he taunted.
“It was more than once,” she said, then stopped herself. She’d made love with two men and neither experience in bed had rocked her world. “Besides, this situation isn’t that easy. This man is going out with a beauty pageant winner.”
Chad’s eyes rounded as he spooned servings of creole and rice onto plates. “A beauty pageant winner,” he echoed. “I wonder what kind of plastic surgery she’s had.”
Jenny laughed despite herself. “Maybe none. Maybe she’s just naturally beautiful.”
“Honey, natural and beautiful rarely go together in the same sentence.”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not beauty pageant material.”
Chad took a seat. “Well, not looking like that you aren’t.”
Affronted, she pursed her lips. “What do you mean, not looking like this? This skirt is above my knees and the sweater is fitted. This is office sexy,” she told him.
“If you’re my mother,” he muttered, and took a bite. He immediately fanned his mouth. “Oooh, too hot.”
“You went overboard with the seasoning.”
“Stop fussing and get me some bread.”
Jenny grabbed the fresh loaf from the counter and pinched off a large piece. Chad immediately put the bread in his mouth and chewed it. “Thanks,” he said, and added more rice to the creole. “That’s not office sexy. Your skirt should be shorter, although it doesn’t have to be skintight. I like the idea of one that flips a little as you walk. You need to show more cleavage.”
“I don’t have a lot of cleavage.”
“Then create it.” He shook a piece of bread at her. “If men can create cleavage, then women can, too. And you need to wear sexier shoes.”
“Not if I’m on my feet all day.”
“I thought the objective was to get off your feet and into VP boy’s bed,” he retorted without batting an eye. “And you need to lose the red glasses and do something different with your hair.”
“I like my red glasses,” she said, touching the lenses, comforted by the fact that she’d worn them for six years and successfully irritated the living daylights out of her sister with the glasses.
“They’re not seductive. They’re weird.”
“Well, maybe I’m weird.”
“You don’t need to advertise the fact if you want to bonk VP boy.”
“That’s a crass way of putting it.”
He shot her a sideways glance. “Would you like to be Mrs. VP?”
Jenny felt the back of her neck itch and gave an involuntary shudder. Marc would be a demanding husband. A woman would have to build her world and schedule around his, and since he was type A to the core, he would probably be a pain in the butt to live with. “That would be a nightmare,” she confessed.
“But you find him attractive.”
Ohhhhh, yeah. She nodded. “Everything that makes him unappealing as a husband makes him irresistible as a lover. He’s got this whole power thing going on and he’s got a great body. His lips are sort of full, but a little hard at the same time. He’s intense in a passionate kind of way. It makes you wonder how he would be if he cut loose and—” She broke off and cleared her throat, self-conscious.
Chad studied her for a long moment. “I’ve never seen your hormones in full throttle before. Pity,” he added. “This could be fun, but I don’t think you’re enough of a risk taker.” He patted her hand. “I’ll get you a good vibrator for Christmas.”
SO THE FOLLOWING DAY Jenny bought a new pair of heels, Bellagio, of course. Even with her employee discount, she flinched at the cost. The weekend after her shoe purchase, she brooded over Chad’s advice. Her fantasies about Marc Waterson had always seemed like harmless fun until now. She’d never spoken to him except over the phone. The man couldn’t even remember her name. Was she really such a wuss that she wouldn’t go after him? It wasn’t as if she wanted to marry him. She just wanted to borrow him. She just wanted his undivided attention and lust for once. She was twenty-six. Wasn’t she due at least one hot affair in her life? This was starting to feel way overdue.
She lunched and shopped with her friend Liz at Lennox Mall. Liz had been a cocktail waitress at the same club where Jenny worked, but Liz had parlayed the job into an introduction, affair, engagement and marriage to a very wealthy older man named Frank Colburn.
“And then I told him I wasn’t ready to be a golf widow at age twenty-five.”
“So where are you going next?” Jenny asked, because she’d heard a similar story from Liz before.
Liz smiled. “The French Riviera. I’ve always wanted to go. After this trip, I can either mark it off my list or add it to my revisit list.”
Liz was big on lists. “What about your degree?”
Liz was blond and cute with big blue eyes that worked like calculators and big boobs that made men forget their names. “I’m working on that, too. Two classes this fall. I have no idea how long this will last with Frank. Marrying him was like winning the lottery.”
“Does it bother you that you don’t have any romantic feelings for him at all?”
“Only at certain times, and those are rare. I care a great deal for Frank. I remind him to take his medication and to go for his doctor appointments. I even set up dinners to include his children. But you gotta remember, Jenny. I was raised in a single-wide. Frank is my ticket to financial security.”
“But don’t you miss having some kind of passion for him?”
Liz paused and sighed. “I have a different kind of passion for Frank. It’s a passion of gratitude for changing my life. If you’re talking about sex, well, I’ve had some really hot lovers. And I imagine that someday in the future I will again.”
Jenny sipped her soda and thought about how different she was from Liz. Sometimes Liz’s callous attitude to her marriage made Jenny cringe. Other times, she admired the woman’s practical approach.
“You’ve been quiet too long,” Liz said. “This is when you’re thinking I’m a she-devil going straight to hell.”
Jenny laughed and shook her head. “No, I just wish my conscience wasn’t so noisy.”
Liz patted her hand. “Your conscience is part of your charm, and I wouldn’t want you to lose it.” She smiled. “But couldn’t you just stuff it in the hall closet every now and then? Like, remember that guy you had a crush on and you wouldn’t go after him because that other flaky waitress couldn’t get over him?”
“It would have felt mean to flaunt it in her face.”
“And remember that guy who offered to take you to the Super Bowl?”
“He was married,” Jenny