The Club Read online

  That’s why, almost every time sex heads down the whole “oh let me make you come, baby” path, I wind up faking it, usually right off the bat, so he won’t wind up feeling disappointed and I won’t wind up feeling like a flaming failure. It’s not his fault I’m a ten-percenter—and it’s not mine, either. It’s just the way it is.

  But I’m sidetracked. All I’m saying is I’m not the kind of girl who’s going to get hot and bothered by some guy talking about licking a woman’s “sweet button” or “fucking her brains out” or making her “come like a freight train.” So why the heck is this guy’s application turning me on like this? Wow, I mean, I’m really, really turned on. This is a first. In my three months on the job, I’ve had all kinds of reactions to the twenty or so applications I’ve processed, but never once before now have I been close to feeling like my panties are on fire—not even when the applications are a little bit sexy or kind of sweet.

  Often, the applicants are just normal (rich) men searching for true love in an overwhelming world who are hoping The Club will curate their search. I have no problem with that. I mean, if you have a particular sexual quirk—whether it’s a foot fetish, wearing women’s lingerie, or being whipped while dressed in a bunny suit—it must be kind of difficult finding women (or, men, or both) who’ll accept, and maybe even enjoy your freaky thing, whatever it is.

  The way I see it, most of these guys are just diehard romantics who, yes, happen to have some kind of sexual peccadillo. Sometimes, I read their heartfelt confessions and yearnings and desires and I actually think, “Aw.” But I never, ever think, “Oh, pick me, Mr. Bunny Suit Guy.” Hellz no.

  In addition to the diehard romantics (as I prefer to think of them), the second largest contingency of applicants consists of globetrotting tycoons and celebrities and professional athletes who apparently want to find compatible companions wherever their global travels might take them. Again, I have no problem with this. Some of the guys in this category are pretty hot, actually, and not particularly weird or anything—some are even sexy as hell—but even the hottest globetrotter/athlete guy has never once made me want to slide my fingers into my pajama bottoms. So why now?

  The third category of applicants, the group I call “the wack jobs,” not only doesn’t turn me on, the whole lot of them makes me want to shower in Lysol. They’re the ones who, without exception, apply for a full year’s membership, apparently seeking to indulge their every depraved fantasy without the pressure of a ticking clock. These guys aren’t interested in finding true love like the diehard romantics, and they’re not looking for love despite a hectic travel schedule like the globetrotters and pro athletes. They’re simply not looking for love, period—or else they’d never pay for a full year’s membership up front.

  Who in their right mind, if they were looking for love, would commit to paying a year’s membership fee if there were even the possibility of finding someone special after only a few months? That’s the thing I hate about the wack jobs the most—that they’re motivated solely by their hedonism and demons, and not even a little bit by their hearts. They’re all diehard cynics, every last one of them, led uncontrollably to their next nameless, faceless sexual encounter by their gigantic, throbbing dicks—without even an ounce of hope or romanticism coursing through their horny veins.

  Reading the wack jobs’ sexual preferences is like driving past a horrible car wreck. Disgusting. Horrifying. Shocking. But you can’t look away. These guys are the ones who want to tie a woman up and shove steel balls up her cooch (what?) or dress a woman in a Goldie Locks costume and make her do unthinkable things with porridge (I almost quit after reading that one).

  My least favorite wack job so far was a guy who wanted a secret gay life on the down low, concealed from his wife and four kids, even though he was a politician who’d recently campaigned vigorously based on his vehement opposition to gay rights. (I flagged that application as “do not approve,” but my recommendation was ignored.) It wasn’t the secret gay life part that got me so riled up—I figure half these guys are joining The Club to cheat on someone—it was his disgusting and inexcusable hypocrisy, his self-loathing disguised as moral superiority that got me seething. That guy almost made me throw my hands up and quit—but then, after I cooled down a bit, I decided not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

  True, twenty percent of the applications are revolting, but eighty percent of them are semi-titillating, or at least fascinating or amusing or even sweet; the pay is fantastic; and the work schedule is pretty easy. So, all things considered, it’s an ideal part-time job for a first-year law student who needs the money but also needs time to attend classes and study. If I quit, I’d have to find something else, anyway—I’m drowning in student loans as it is, and the law job I’ve committed to take after graduation doesn’t come with a lawyer-sized paycheck.

  But, anyway, the point is that even the most appealing applications haven’t made me fantasize about having monkey-sex with the applicant. And yet, here I am now, after reading a certain megalomaniac’s application, doing just that. What the hell?

  Jonas Faraday.

  Who is this guy? I mean, really? Despite all The Club’s warnings and demands for complete honesty, most applicants lie about something—hence the reason The Club hires law students like me to rigorously vet applications. Sometimes, the guy shaves years off his age, or says he’s single when he’s married, or describes himself as “extremely fit and 190 pounds” when his pictures tell another story.

  So what’s “Jonas Faraday” lying about? That he’s some kind of woman wizard who can have any woman he wants and make them come as easily as shooting ducks in a barrel? Puh-lease. No man can have any woman he wants—no matter how rich or good looking he might be—and I’m living proof the second part is impossible, too. But what else is he lying about?

  Let’s find out.

  I put my curser over the first photo attached to the application and click on it. This ought to blow an icy frost into my blazing panties pretty damned quick.

  Oh. My. Gawd.

  I’m looking at a picture of the most exquisite male specimen I’ve ever seen, dressed to perfection in a meticulously tailored suit. Holy crappola. His eyes. His lips. His jawline. Did I say “his lips” yet? Okay, let me say it again. His lips. Wow, I’d give anything to kiss them, even once. I just want to run my fingertip over those lips. I want to lick those lips. Holy moly.

  The photo is from some sort of professional photo shoot. I can tell by the quality of the image and the lighting. Obviously, whoever this guy is, he’s a male model. I sigh. Okay, that’s a relief. I might have had a stroke if the guy who wrote about licking my “sweet button” until my “mind detached from my body” actually looked like this.

  Damn. If this alleged “Jonas Faraday” guy looked even remotely like this male model he’s pretending to be, I’d believe he was some kind of pied piper for women. I mean, a guy who looked like this could certainly bed me any time he pleased, thank you very much (assuming I didn’t know he was a narcissistic asshole, of course). But it’s a moot point because there’s no way he looks like this. No effing way. This is a blatant “catfish” attempt if I’ve ever seen one—where the applicant tries to pass himself off as some ridiculously perfect human specimen, as if nobody’s ever going to discover the discrepancy between the Greek god he’s claiming to be and the elf from The Lord of the Rings he actually looks like.

  I click on the next picture and, this time, I practically black out.

  “Wow,” I say out loud.

  The bastard attached a bathroom-mirror-selfie, wearing nothing but tight briefs and a cocky grin. Oh man, there are muscled cuts above his hips, and his stomach is rock hard and chiseled. His nipples are small, perfect little circles. There are tattooed inscriptions running down the inside lengths of both forearms. I can’t make out the phrases, but I’m drawn to them. I touch them on my screen with my fingertip.

  I suddenly imagine this Adonis’ naked body presse
d against mine, and every drop of blood in my brain whooshes directly into my crotch. What the hell is happening to me right now? I’m like a frickin’ cat in heat. This is so unlike me I want to slap myself silly right now. And, anyway, I don’t know what I’m getting so worked up about. This Greek god is not the one flirting with me—the one flirting with me is some normal-looking guy who swiped these images off a European ad for condoms.

  I click on the third picture. Another selfie. A headshot this time, as instructed. He’s staring into the camera, unsmiling. His gaze is matter-of-fact. Unapologetic. Intense. Magnetic. Confident. I can’t look away. He’s stunning. Well, the male model is stunning. I’m transfixed. I’d really like to have sex with a man that looks like this just once before I exit this planet. I’d really like to feel someone like this touching me, kissing me, making love to me—and, wow, imagine if he did it all expertly, like this Jonas Faraday claims to do. Talk about a perfect storm.

  I close my eyes.

  Maybe that’s the thing that’s got me so hot and bothered about this guy’s application—I’m realizing I desperately want to have sex, just once, with a guy who knows exactly what he’s doing.

  The guys I’ve been with have been cute and well-intentioned but just sort of ... I don’t even know how to put it. Functional? Clumsy? Clueless? Or maybe it’s just been so long I’m just not remembering it right. I haven’t had sex in six months—and that was a drunken one-night stand I don’t even remember in any detail. But reading “Jonas Faraday’s” words, and now looking at the photos of this male model, I just can’t help thinking—what if I were to have sex with a guy who was masterful at it and looked like this, too? Yeah, that’d be my holy grail.

  I sigh.

  I’m really veering off task here. I’ve got a job to do. I force myself to click out of Mr. Perfect’s photos. Okay, no more ridiculousness. Time to work. Job, job, job. Do, do, do.

  I load the three photos onto my Google images software to run them against all the existing images on the Internet. I don’t normally start my research this way, but, more than anything, I’m dying to find out the true origin of these photos. After I press the “go” button, I grab myself a glass of wine in the kitchenette and put on some music. I linger for a moment against the counter, sipping my wine and listening to Sarah Bareilles sing me a happy song, trying to distract myself from the tingling inside my body that won’t go away.

  I shake my head and take a big swig of wine. And then another. I can’t believe I’m getting turned on by a wack job who signed up for a year’s membership in a sex club. I mean, come on, he admits explicitly he can’t form any kind of emotional connection with a woman to save his life. So why is my body reacting this way? Even before I saw those three mesmerizing photos, I’d already physically reacted to his application exactly as he predicted, and quite emphatically. As I lean against the counter, thinking about those photos again—his body, his eyes—an insistent ache keeps tugging at me. A throbbing I can’t ignore.

  Damn, I can’t resist.

  I take another big swig of wine and slide my fingers inside my pajama bottoms, just for the hell of it. When my fingers reach their target, I close my eyes and let out a low moan. Wow, I’ve never been so wet in my life. If he were here, he could enter me like a hot knife in warm butter, just like he said, without needing to do a damned thing first.

  My laptop beeps and my eyes pop open. There’s a result window on my computer screen. I pull my hand out of my pants and lurch over to my kitchen table. “No matches” is the message on my screen. What? Surely, if this guy took those images off some gay porn site, or a Facebook profile, or an ad for ass-less chaps, there’d be a frickin’ match. How can these photos not be posted anywhere on the Internet? Where’d he get them, then? My heart’s thumping in my chest. He couldn’t possibly look like this, could he? No way. He couldn’t turn me on with his bare words and then turn out to look like a Greek god, too—could he?

  All right, I’ll start at the beginning, like I usually do. I Google “Jonas Faraday,” even though I’m sure he’s using an alias (despite The Club’s strict instruction against it). Much to my surprise, the search instantly calls up countless links for a “Jonas Faraday” in Seattle. I click the link at the top—a website for Faraday & Sons, Global Investments, LLC, based in Seattle with satellite offices in Los Angeles and New York, and much to my shock, there he is, boom, right on the homepage. Jonas Faraday. The Adonis himself. The most beautiful creature I’ve ever beheld. Ever, ever, ever. Like, seriously, ever. He’s standing next to another very good-looking guy with darker hair but similar looks, both of them in sleek suits. The caption under the photo says, “Brothers Joshua and Jonas Faraday carry on the legacy of their late father, company founder Joseph Faraday.”

  So, there you go. He really looks like this. Oh my God.

  I scrutinize the photo. The other guy, his brother, seems authentically happy, smiling with what appears to be genuine glee. Jonas, on the other hand, stares at the camera with such burning intensity, it’s not clear if he wants to murder or devour whoever’s behind the lens. I smirk. The photographer must have been a woman—which, of course, would make the answer to my question “devour.” I bet he took that photographer home after the photo shoot, whoever she was, and “delivered her unto the culmination of human possibility.”

  I feel a pang of envy.

  His muscled torso flashes across my mind. His abs. His eyes. His sculpted arms with those elegant tattoos along his forearms. His lips. I imagine those lips whispering “Sarah” in my ear as he makes love to me—or, ha! Who am I kidding?—as he fucks me, as he so clearly stated was his predilection. I imagine those lips smiling up at me from between my open thighs. I shiver. Another swig of wine. I’m losing my mind here. Have I had a brain transplant recently and I just don’t remember? These thoughts are not normal. At least not for me. My heart is racing.

  I click onto the selfie-headshot he submitted and stare into his smoldering eyes. In this shot, unlike the one in the suit, there’s a sadness behind his eyes. Is that loneliness? Exhaustion? Whatever it is, I can’t resist it. He looks totally different here than in the suit and tie photos—bare, somehow. Vulnerable. The more I stare at his mournful face, the more I’m sure: This is the money shot for me, the one that makes me want to touch him and kiss him the most, even more so than his almost-nude selfie. It’s just so disarming. Beautiful, really. It makes me ache all over, and not just in my panties. In my heart.

  A nagging realization begins washing over me, nipping at me, threatening to consume me—a slow but steady drip, drip, drip of a deep and secret truth. I want to feel the sensation of losing myself completely to someone. I want to know what it’s like for my body to detach from my mind, just once. I want to convulse and shudder and whimper and shriek the way other women do—the way he describes it. I want to experience the kind of pleasure that blurs into pain. Yes, I admit it—I want to howl like a rabid monkey. I do. And something tells me Mr. Jonas Faraday, the cockiest and most self-aggrandizing human being on planet earth—and yet the most physically alluring creature I’ve ever seen, too—with the saddest and most captivating eyes—just might be the man for the job. In fact, if I’m being honest here, I’m ardently hoping he is.

  But why am I wasting time fantasizing about him? This is a man who just applied to The Club—for a year—and I’m his frickin’ intake agent. It’s a non-starter. I need this job more than I need to howl like a monkey.

  Damn.

  He told me to touch myself and think about what turns me on. Well, there’s no harm in doing that, job or no job. I grunt with exasperation, grab the bottle of wine off the kitchen counter, and stomp into my bedroom, slamming the door emphatically behind me. If I can’t have him in real life, then I’ll just have to crank up the music, close my eyes, and imagine a world where I can.

  Chapter 3

  Jonas

  My entire morning was hijacked, stranding me in a conference room with my management team, half
listening to a phone call with Josh in Los Angeles and my uncle in New York and their respective teams. “That new acquisition isn’t performing as projected.” “Yeah, but the question is whether that’s a trend or a blip?” “Can someone put that into a spreadsheet?” Blah, blah, fucking blah.

  Ever since I submitted my application to The Club the night before last, I can’t concentrate worth a shit. Even when the checkout girl at Whole Foods last night smiled and asked me what I was doing later, I just grabbed my bags off the conveyor belt and said, “I’ve got a busy night.” And she had piercings, too—which means she had major daddy issues. I can’t remember the last time I passed on a woman with daddy issues—they’re usually my Achilles heel. But my head’s just not in the game right now.

  Within minutes of sending in my application, I received an automated email from a “no reply” address, informing me that my application had been received by my intake agent and would be queued up for immediate processing. “The review process takes up to two weeks and is designed to ensure maximum protection, privacy, and satisfaction,” the email said. “Thank you for your patience.”

  I was pissed as hell to find out things would take so long. I’d hoped to get a warm and quick welcome from The Club—like how a Hawaiian hotel hands you a mai tai as you walk into the lobby. What could possibly hold things up for two weeks? I’d answered every question honestly and followed all directions to a tee; I’m not a serial killer or felon or druggie; and God knows they’ve got my full membership fee, in cash, sitting in the bank earning interest. So what the hell could possibly take two weeks? I can’t stop checking my private email account, hoping things will somehow go faster than expected.