Thrill Me

BECK DESMOND took the phone away from his ear and stared at it with immense irritation. From the black receiver emerged the shrill heavily New York–accented voice of his agent, Alex Barkhauser, chattering away. He felt like affecting a high thin voice and saying, “Yes, dear” at regular intervals.

Except that was undoubtedly what she wanted him to do.

After a deep breath, he put the receiver back to his ear. Might be a good idea to hear at least some of what she was saying.

“…me wrong here, Beck, your books are great, you know they’re great and you know I love them. But I just feel…”

He pictured her squinting off to one side, gesturing in swooping circles the way she always did, as if she were beckoning the words out of her mouth. “Yes?”

“I just feel like we’re sitting on something that could get bigger, you know?”

“Bigger.” He let the word drop, then waited. Old sales technique his father taught him; let the silence sit and your opponent will fill it with what you need to know.

“Sharon and I think you should try more emotion in your stories, more warmth, add a girlfriend for Mack, soften him up a little. Believe me, you’ll double your readership. Women will buy you in droves. Right now you’re selling to men. Women are a huge market in book sales. Huge. This is the next big step in your career.”

Beck leaned back in the chair he’d brought with him from his condo on East 97th Street, spanned his temples with his thumb and middle finger and squeezed to try and relieve the ache. “Let me get this straight. You want me to take my hero, Mack, who has seen more of the baseness of human nature than anyone alive, and—”

“Soften him up. Give him more heart. Give him more sensitivity. Give him…”

“A puppy?”

He heard a sharp thwack, and knew Alex had slammed her palm on the desk, a sure sign his complete joke of an idea excited her. “Yes! Perfect! A puppy. Small one, the kind women love to stop and pat in the street. He could meet his—”

“You’ve got to be kidding me, Alex.” Next she’d want Beck’s ruthless detective spending afternoons shopping for shoes. “Mack is a man. No, he’s more than that, he’s the man.”

“So make him the man with the woman.”

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“Because he’s a loner, he’s a tough guy. It’s not him.”

“Give him a woman strong enough to change him.”

“Strong enough to—” Beck reached for his bottle of Evian water and found his fingers trying to strangle it. Change him? Change the man Beck had lived with in his imagination for seven years, through more harrowing adventures, more near-fatal experiences, more death-defying risks than any mere mortal could stand? The man who’d taken down serial killers, drug lords, crime bosses, international art thieves, muggers, murderers and everything between? Change him? With a woman? “I thought women knew never to get involved with a man hoping to change him.”

“She can change him without trying. Simply by being who she is and affecting him that way. Having him become a better person because of loving her.”

“The only effect I want any woman to have on Mack is a raging hard-on. I don’t write romance novels.”

Alex made the sound of exasperation New Yorkers excelled at, a cross between a cough and a raspberry. “I’m not asking you to write a romance novel. Just make him more human.”

Beck exhaled his annoyance. The very quality that made Alex Barkhauser an incredibly effective agent on his behalf, also made her a formidable opponent. Namely, she was a pit bull. “I’m sorry, I can’t see Mack—”

“Here’s an example.” Pages rustled over the line. “The sex scene you have here with whatsername.”

“Tamara.”

“Tamara.” Alex’s voice turned scornful. “Total stripper name. Call her Susie or something.”

“Susie? Susie wears pigtails and scuffed sandals, not black lingerie. And women named Susie don’t masturbate.”

“Well no woman masturbates like this.”

“Like what?” The defensive edge in his voice disgusted him.

“Like a male fantasy from a porn movie.”

Beck’s mouth opened to protest. Then closed. Because it had nothing to say. That’s exactly what had inspired the scene. A movie he’d snuck in to see as a teenager and had never forgotten.

“You can’t tell me your girlfriends do it like that when they’re alone. Wearing this entire black lace getup, do you have any idea how itchy and uncomfortable that stuff is? Plus, you have to be five-eleven, one hundred and ten pounds but oh, yes, somehow with enormous boobs, to look good in it. And the ten-inch dildo? Please.”

“Alex. Can we move on to—”

“Make it more real, Beck. That’s what I’m saying. The book rocks otherwise. But make Mack’s relationship with women, his attention to women, his sex with women, more real. Less like a teenage boy’s wet dream. Let’s start there and see where it takes us, okay?”

“Where it takes us? To five percent sell-through, that’s where it takes us. For every female reader we gain, we’ll lose two men. I guarantee it.”

“No. Your stories are great, Beck, this story is great, that won’t change. You’re not going to lose men over a love interest for Mack. Most men have actually been in love, you know.”

“But this is fantasy. They read my books to escape all that.”

“To escape being in love?”

Beck closed his eyes. “That came out wrong.”

Or maybe not. Weren’t most men wanting to escape now and then from the female-directed rules of “relationship” into something nice and tidy like good guys blowing up bad guys?

Relationships had to be examined and worked on in exhaustive detail. Men had to be told they weren’t doing this, that or the other to female satisfaction. And always the question, what happened to the wonderful romantic men they used to be?

The wonderful romantic men they used to be disappeared about the same time the adoring sweet women they were dating became critical, judgmental shrews.

“Just try it, Beck. Try it. Soften up the sex scenes. Especially make Tamara’s self-pleasuring scene more real. Try that one first. And when Mack joins her, make him feel it in his heart as well as his dick.”

“Alex—” Beck sighed. It was hopeless. When your editor and agent were against you, things were tough. Add in the members of the marketing department and the ever-dreaded focus groups, and you might as well bend over and take it.

If he had a dime for every person envious of a writer’s so-called complete freedom in his work…

Well, if he did, he’d be rich enough to keep Mack’s mind on his dick during a sex scene, where it belonged.

“Okay.” He ran his hand over his aching head and jaw. “Just on the one scene with Tamara. See how it feels. How it reads.”

“Wonderful. You’re fabulous. It’s going to be so much better, you’ll be amazed, I promise.”

“Right.” He shook his head and hung up the phone harder than he needed to. Got to his feet and strode over to the window, pulling back the sheer curtains to gaze out at Madison Avenue.

Damn it to hell. He might have known this would hit eventually. This or something like it. He didn’t know a single writer who hadn’t come up against a brick wall at some point in his or her career. And Beck’s journey so far had been relatively easy. Alex had picked him up when he was still unpublished, working as an editor, still learning the craft in his own writing and from that of his authors. She’d seen enough raw talent to judge him a good commercial risk.

After extensive revisions, his first book had sold, then his second and his third. Mackenzie “Mack” Adams had starred in six books in the past six years, and for a while it seemed Beck’s star would never stop rising. Three years ago he’d quit his job to write full-time. Then the flattening sales, the apparent loss of reader interest.

And now back to extensive revisions. And the girlification of a true man’s man.

Worse, to rewrite the scene the way Alex et al wanted him to, Beck was going to have to find a woman who would be willing to describe her masturbation practices for him.

Of all the research he’d done, this was potentially both the most enjoyable and the most agonizing. Not to sound arrogant, but the women he’d dated hadn’t needed to touch themselves when he was around. And asking old girlfriends their current autostimulation techniques wasn’t the most tactful way to get back in touch.

No way would he ever admit to male friends he needed a woman to ask. He didn’t have any female friends close enough to broach a topic like this. His brothers would tease him unmercifully or slug him if he suggested asking their significant others.

The ideal would be a sexually open complete stranger he could talk to and never see again. Like that was going to happen. Though if it were possible, HUSH was as likely a spot as any to find one.

This was all too depressing. Next he’d start contemplating hiring a hooker.

His cell rang again and he rolled his eyes and reached for it to check the display. He didn’t feel like talking to anyone at the moment.

Oh.

Mom.

“Hi, Mom.” He rubbed his forehead, waiting for his headache to get worse. He loved his mother, loved his whole family, but his idea of how much time was appropriate for a man his age to spend with them differed vastly from theirs.

“Hello, Beck, how’s the writing going?”

“Fine. Just fine.” She asked every call, to be polite, and every call he answered fine. His entire family was in the restaurant business, an Italian place on West 55th Street—he was the black sheep. They wouldn’t care or understand about his line of work, so he generally didn’t bother sharing.

And he was pretty sure asking his mother about masturbation would not be a good way to start.

“Thursday night is the thirtieth birthday party for your brother Jeffrey.”

“I know.” He screwed his eyes shut, the predicted worsening of his headache making its first throbbing appearance. Of course he knew, Dad had called him two days ago to remind him and Mom a week before that. “I’d really like to come. But I have revisions due on Friday, and it’s going to be close.”

“Sure, close, you can’t get away for an hour?”

No use. He could try to explain that it wasn’t just the minutes he’d spend away from his keyboard he’d miss. It was the mental buildup, the interruption, the wind-down time it would take to get back into his work. And how was he to know if Thursday night was going to be a particularly creative time, when everything would come together in a huge burst of output?

“I’ll come if I can, Mom. I promise.”

“Good enough. Everything okay there? You want me to send you some food to the hotel? Something decent? Some of your dad’s osso bucco?”

“Thanks, Mom, they’re feeding me fine.”

“Okay. Okay. I’ll go. But everyone wants to see you, the whole family misses you. You sit in that room all day long working, it’s not healthy.”

He chuckled. “I should be out in the fresh air?”

“I get it.” She laughed. “You’re not a little boy anymore. Moms are all the same. But if you need anything, you call me.”

“I will.”

“Even if you don’t. Just to say hi. Okay?”

“Deal. Thanks for checking on me.”

“You’re a good man, Beck. I worry about you.”

“I’m really fine. Bye, Mom.” Beck clicked the phone off before she could start listing single women she knew, then stood there imagining her bustling to the front of the restaurant, making sure everything was perfect, flowers and candles on the tables, menus clean and carefully piled, staff in place, complimentary antipasto dishes lined up in a neat row.

That world could have been his.

Sometimes he thought he’d been switched at birth, and somewhere some serious scholarly couple were wondering how they had ended up with a boisterous half-Italian chef for a son.

He needed a drink.

More than that, he needed one out among people. Usually he was content to be in his room, or prowling the hotel; he was a loner at heart like most writers, something his jovial family of extroverts couldn’t understand. Tonight, for some reason—probably that the soul was about to be ripped out of his life’s work—he’d rather indulge his demons with strangers around than tackle them on his own.

And who knew? Maybe his sexually open female stranger was at the bar right now, waiting for him.

2

Note on Exhibit A waitstaff board:

Don’t bend over near guy with mustache and cowboy hat who’s at Exhibit A every night. He’s an octopus; hands everywhere.

Jessie

IT TOOK ten strides to go from the window to the door of room 1457. May only took a few minutes to clue into that fact. And eight to go from the wall with the desk, to the wall next to the bed.

May had also clued into the fact that men who flew her halfway across the country and then backed out at the last minute with a lame-sounding excuse and then didn’t call again really pissed her off.

May had tried ringing Trevor, but his voice mail had picked up. She’d left a message in a broken, pathetic, scared voice, asking him to call her. Which he hadn’t. And that was over three hours ago.

Then she’d hated herself so much for sounding broken, pathetic and scared, she’d gotten pissed instead. Royally. Because what the hell was she supposed to do now?

Oh, sure, he’d been a total doll in the voice-mail message. He felt soooo bad about this unexpected and unavoidable—and she noticed, unspecified—schedule change. May was welcome to stay the full week on his dime. Enjoy the luxuries and amenities of the hotel to their fullest.

Yeah? Well considering she’d been planning to have sex all week, a spa, indoor pool and rooftop garden were not quite adequate substitutes. Neither were the plastic penises she’d discovered in a drawer, which might be anatomically correct, but had the distinct disadvantage of not being attached to sexy and fun-to-talk-to men.

Creeping home with her tail between her legs, instead of delicious and slightly sore memories, didn’t sound remotely appealing. But then neither did staying here completely on her own in this overwhelming city, at a hotel populated by other people having all the naughty fun she was supposed to be having.

Not that sex had been the entire point, of course. Part of her had probably secretly hoped she and Trevor would hit it off emotionally, too. And maybe that was where part of her anger was coming from now—from the disappointment that it couldn’t happen, and she was back to mourning Dan. But even if she and Trevor hadn’t fallen for each other in any serious way, they would have had fun, and a week’s adventure she’d always remember fondly.

Damn, but her toast was good and burned.

She whirled and headed for the phone, called Midwest Airlines and winced at the cost of changing her ticket. Jotted down the flight times on the hotel notepad under the childish caricature she’d done of Trevor as Satan. Couldn’t be helped. She could go home standby on a flight tomorrow; the agent seemed to think the planes wouldn’t be full.

Maybe that was best. She didn’t belong here. With Trevor around, she could have managed it. On her own, it would just be too depressing.

Her cell phone rang and she hauled it out of her purse. Trevor?

Nope.

“Hi, Ginny.”

“Hey, girlfriend. I can’t believe you answered the phone! Why aren’t you puffing and panting? I was just going to leave you a dirty voice mail.”

May sank onto the bed, mortified to feel tears coming up. “Trevor’s not coming.”

“Hmm. Did you go down on him? I read in Cosmo that men who have—”

“No, not that kind of coming. I’m serious.” The tears went back down and she smiled. “He’s not coming to the hotel. At all. This entire week.”

Ginny’s gasp made her feel better. Her friend would understand. She’d tell May to rush back to Wisconsin and come over to her apartment, and they’d make sundaes together and rent a romantic movie and have a total girl—

“How are we going to find you someone else?”

May’s jaw dropped. “Someone who?”

“Another guy for the week.”

“Oh, right. You want me to advertise?”

“No, no. Walk into a fancy bar and smile at someone, that’s probably all it takes. It’s New York! You could probably go out and get Jerry Seinfeld or one of those guys from Friends.”

“Ginny, this isn’t a joke.”

“I’m pretty sure Alec Baldwin still lives there. You might—”

“I was thinking of coming home.”

“What?”

“I. Was. Thinking. Of—”

“Is it the money? I know the hotel is megabucks, but maybe you could spring for a couple of nights at least? Or move to another hotel?”

“Actually…” May gestured around the room and let her hand slap down on her thigh. “Trevor said he’d pay for me to stay at Hush even though he’s not going to be here.”

“What? And you’re thinking about coming home? To Oshkosh!”

May sighed. She’d thought Ginny would understand. “What am I going to do here alone for a week?”

A thud came over the line. May winced. Her overly dramatic friend had dropped the phone and probably crumpled to the floor to make her point.

And okay, Ginny did have one. May sounded disgustingly whiny. And mousy. And naive. This was an amazing opportunity.

It just felt all wrong.

Ginny came back on the line and May placated her with promises to think it over, then dejectedly ended the call.

Fine. This totally sucked. She needed a drink. Granted, it was barely four o’clock, but who cared.

She flipped open the elegant leather-bound service menu, then paused.

Ginny had scored one point. Did May really want to come all the way to New York and only see the inside of an airport, a cab and a hotel room?

She wasn’t brave enough to go hang out in a local bar, but the hotel bar would probably be okay. The very thing that made HUSH perfect for her and Trevor would make her feel safer, albeit conspicuous. The clientele at a hotel like this had to be all couples. Why else pay these prices? There were other hotels in New York just as luxurious for the single traveler. What made HUSH special was the emphasis on the erotic, and the assurance of tasteful discretion. Which meant couples. Unless someone was into some seriously expensive self-stimulation.

So yes, a few eyebrows might rise at the sight of a woman alone. But most likely not. The staff was undoubtedly trained not to raise eyebrows at anything. And the couples—honeymooners, marrieds trying to spice up their lives, about-to-pop-the-question daters—would be so into each other they’d barely give May a glance. Besides, she’d be channeling Veronica Lake big-time and give off movie star, off-limits vibes.

Done.

A wry smile curved her lips. So it wasn’t quite the adventure she wanted. But it was still better than being home alone in her apartment with another frozen dinner, missing Dan.

Good.

She took off the city- and travel-smelling suit, refilled the tub, grown chilly in the hours she’d spent angsting, took a long, luxurious, fabulously scented whirlpool bath, helped herself to the lotions and felt much better. She unzipped her suitcase and, sighing, pulled out what was supposed to be the first outfit Trevor would take off her.

A black spaghetti-strap tank with built-in bra to show off her NFBs, aka “no fair boobs”—a nickname Ginny made up in high school, furious nature bestowed on May a slender body and full breasts.

Over that, a sheer gauzy top with red flowers. Next, she dragged on sheer black stockings, then a midthigh black skirt, and slipped her feet into spiky black heels that made her nearly six feet tall.

Never, ever, ever would she be caught dead in anything like this in Oshkosh. Not because people would be shocked by the outfit. Because they’d be shocked by her in the outfit.

She strode defiantly to the mirror, got her first look since she’d worn the clothes in the dressing room and bit her lip.

Actually, she was shocked by her in the outfit.

But New Yorkers wouldn’t be. And people at HUSH wouldn’t be. And she had nothing much more conservative to wear except the suit she’d brought for the plane, and she was not going to wear that tonight.

She’d wring some tiny drop of adventure out of this trip or die trying.

So.

Lipstick, subtle eyeshadow, darker blush than the apple-cheek pink she usually wore. She’d paid for a makeup lesson at her salon and had been pleased with the results, though frankly she didn’t think she looked very much like herself. More like Veronica.

Onward, upward, clothes and makeup done, now for the attitude.

She smacked her lipsticky lips together, then pouted them out slightly and made her expression blank, cool, haughty.

Oh, that was good. Very good. This girl didn’t come from Oshkosh. No way. This was a sophisticated woman of mystery, no doubt hiding depths of passion men would long to dive into. This was a woman who knew which men she wanted to dive and how to get them to do so. This woman could hold her own at the Erotique bar at HUSH Hotel in Manhattan, New York, U.S.A.

And that’s exactly what this woman was going to do.

At the lobby entrance to the Erotique Bar at HUSH Hotel in Manhattan, New York, U.S.A., May/Veronica wavered. It was one thing to imagine herself striding confidently into a strange bar, another actually to do it.

She stood just inside the leaded glass doors and pretended to survey the room coolly, trying to control the panic launching her heart into triple time. A circular bar to the left, with pink lighting overhead, around it funky high black chairs with inverted triangle backs. To the right, tables on black carpet, with low round-backed leather armchairs in the same seafoam-green color as the lobby. Several empty seats at the bar, quite a few tables free. Where would she be least conspicuous?

Possibly at a table, but then if an unattached male did happen to be prowling around, she’d be stuck. Better to sit at the bar, tended by an attractive young woman who looked even taller than May, with ash-blond hair in a perfect French braid, the kind May would love to have instead of her long schoolgirl mop. Either that or the bravery to cut it all off.

She pulled out one of the fabulous chairs, which she coveted for her kitchen in a more neutral color, and sat. There. She’d done it. Maybe a curious glance or two from the couple on her right, but nothing more than that.

“Hello there.” The bartender approached with an easy grin and a Southern accent. “How are you this evening?”

“Fine. Thanks.” May couldn’t help returning the woman’s grin, even if it wasn’t very Veronica-like of her, and instantly felt herself starting to relax.

“What can I get for you?”

Ulp. She supposed Miller Lite would not cut it here. Or a blender drink with a cute umbrella. Okay. On to new adventures. “A…martini. Please.”

The bartender gave a slight nod and waited expectantly. May tried not to panic. What else was she supposed to say? Shaken not stirred? A martini was a martini, no? Her father had always ordered them that way. Or not?

The bartender reached under the bar and slipped a one-page menu in front of her, heavy white paper, black bordered with an embossed pink HUSH logo at the top. “Just FYI, if you want something other than a straight gin or vodka martini, we have a specialty menu here. The sour apple and Cosmopolitans are our biggest sellers.”

May nodded, grateful for the quick and gracious rescue and scanned the menu, trying not to bug her eyes out at the prices. She could have dinner at Ted’s Diner in Oshkosh for the price of one drink here. But if Trevor was paying? “I’ll have a Cosmopolitan.”

“Coming right up.” The bartender grinned again and moved off to start making the drink, holding the bottles up high when she poured, measuring off the doses with graceful flourishes. “Is this your first visit to Hush Hotel?”

“My first to New York, actually.”

“Where are you from?”