9½ Days

Sheris dropped her menu on the table. “Now what in the world made you bring up my ex-husband?”

Mel looked embarrassed. “It just slipped out? I must have heard him last night?”

“Has he still got that little radio program? I didn’t realize.” Sheris tried unsuccessfully to sound dismissive and bored.

Jordan pictured the full-size, full-color billboards on I-95 and the B/W Parkway coming into the city and hid her smile. If Sheris wanted to pretend to be the only person in the Baltimore metropolitan area who didn’t listen to In the Mood with McGuire, so be it.

“Logan was just one in a long line of relationship regrets.” With that, Sheris changed the subject. “I’m going to have the Crusted Chicken Romano over Fettuccine. How about you girls?”

“Mmm. Sounds good,” Melanie replied. “But I’m going to go with the Seafood Cobb Salad.”

Jordan’s stomach growled at the thought of fried chicken and carbohydrate-laden pasta or fat-packed avocados, shrimp and blue cheese. She stifled a sigh, knowing she couldn’t afford to let down her guard. “I’ll just have the baked fish and a tossed salad.”

After placing their orders, they spent some time catching up on news and acquaintances. Inevitably, though, the conversation turned intimate. Sheris dabbed a spot of pasta sauce from her mouth.

“In some ways it’s a relief that things ended with Grant, but I sure am going to miss the sex. That guy could go all night.”

“Really?” Melanie pouted a little and searched her salad for any shrimp she’d missed. “With the kids around most of the time, I’m lucky if Bill and I manage more than thirty minutes. What about you and David?”

“Um, actually things have been a little, um…how do I say this?” Jordan leaned forward and dropped her voice to a whisper. “I bought a sex manual.”

“Good for you!” Sheris grinned at her. “Which one? I have a fairly extensive collection myself.”

“I got Fifty Fast Fantasies last week.”

Sheris nodded and speared a chunk of chicken off her plate. “That’s a good one. I especially enjoyed Ride Him, Cowgirl and The Butler Did It.”

Jordan choked on a bite of her baked trout and felt her cheeks flame. How could Sheris be so casual about acts that embarrassed her just reading about them? She looked over to see that Melanie had reacted the same way.

Mel’s eyebrows arched toward her hairline. “You, um—you acted them out? I mean, you actually—”

“Well, of course, honey. There’s no reason to buy a sex book if you’re just going to leave it in the drawer.”

“Shh!” Jordan and Melanie both tried to silence her when two men at a nearby table looked over with undisguised interest.

“Oh, come on, girls. Our college days aren’t that far behind us, are they?”

“I don’t know, Sheris. My college days weren’t nearly as social as yours.” Jordan set down her fork. “I mean, I bought the manual. But I’m not sure I can go through with some of those fantasies.”

“Nonsense. You wouldn’t have even looked at a book like that, let alone bought it, if your sex life was satisfying.”

“Shh!”

“Well, you wouldn’t have. So obviously you’re curious and curiosity is key to great sex.” Sheris pushed her empty plate aside. “You have to be willing to discover things about your partner and let him find things out about you. Like, I found out that Scott was into ropes and James loved to be spanked—”

“Eeww!” Melanie wrinkled her elfin nose. “Too much information!”

“Hey, I’m not saying I always agreed to it. But you have to be willing to give if you want to get what you like in return.”

Jordan considered Sheris’s advice while Mel demanded exact details about costumes and props. What was it she really wanted? Sex, certainly. Affection and attention, of course. But more than anything, she wanted to feel burning desire and urgent need. She wanted to feel like she did two days ago.

Melanie was still pressing. “Well, how did you do it, Sheris? I mean, did you suggest it, or did the guys? And if it was you, how did you bring it up?”

“I don’t think I can.” Jordan shook her head. “What would I say? ‘Hi, honey. I made dinner reservations. And afterward, would you mind wearing this slave boy outfit I bought you?’ There’s no way!”

“That is more my style than yours.” Sheris grinned. “So don’t discuss it. Just arrange the setting for your favorite fantasy and surprise him one night. My point is, Jordan, if you want a more exciting love life, you have to lose the sweetness and discover the sweat.”

Jordan’s mind immediately returned to the faceless firefighter. Now there was a man who’d made her sweat. And moan. And climax within seconds of his touching her. She felt heated blood rushing to her cheeks—and other places—as she remembered how incredible he’d made her feel.

She’d never felt that way with David.

It was getting harder to ignore the crushing unhappiness that pervaded her nights. Ironically, she had discovered that being in a poor relationship was lonelier than being on her own. Being single didn’t feel as incomplete as having a lover she feared didn’t love her at all, one she’d struggled to love in return.

Time was running and only David could help her.

LATER THAT NIGHT, Jordan stood in the bedroom of her Federal Hill row house and stripped off her business clothes. She carefully sorted the dry-clean items from the hand-wash only before pulling on a ratty pair of sweatpants and an even older T-shirt. In the bathroom, she removed the hairpins from the chignon she wore at the office and brushed her hair until it fell loosely to her shoulders. Then she creamed the artfully applied makeup from her face.

Jordan stared at herself in the mirror, carefully studying the parts without looking at the whole. A blemish was coming out on her chin. A quick squeeze and it was gone. Tiny wrinkles were developing under her eyes. She’d have to get some retinol cream. Reaching for the tweezers, she plucked several strays from her brow. Then her eyes narrowed as she focused on her hairline. Was that one gray? The tweezers quickly yanked out the offending strand.

She spent several more minutes checking for flaws before sighing heavily and turning out the bathroom light. Downstairs in the kitchen, she opened the refrigerator and tried to decide if she wanted a lettuce or a spinach salad for dinner. Neither one was really appealing tonight. She glanced across the room to the cabinet above the coffeemaker.

No. She shouldn’t.

Maybe she could mix the red leaf lettuce and baby spinach together, then julienne some raw vegetables over the top. There were some tomatoes in the crisper and—she felt the contents of that cabinet calling to her.

No!

Okay, she’d skip the salad and just make vegetables crudité with some low-fat cottage cheese on the side. She slammed the refrigerator shut. It was no use. She was going to open that cabinet. She was going to reach inside and she was going to blow her diet all to hell. Like a thief sneaking into forbidden territory, Jordan rushed across the room and grabbed the bag of Dove milk chocolates. Holding it up to her face, she inhaled the addictive scent of cocoa butter and sugar.

Just a few. Only a few.

She walked down the hall to the living room, flopped onto the overstuffed couch and tucked her bare feet underneath her. After laying the bag beside her with the opening in easy reach of her hand, she picked up the issue of Style and Grace magazine on the far cushion. Idly flipping though the pages, Jordan unwrapped a chocolate. She’s so pretty. Not an ounce of fat anywhere on her. Another page. Another chocolate. Look at her thighs. They don’t even meet. Another. And another…

There was Camryn.

Her numb fingers dropped the candy she held back into the bag. Her sister looked stunning. Simply stunning. Her golden skin was bared in a flame-red slip dress with a plunging neckline. The artful lighting emphasized the high ridge of her cheekbones, the long line of her torso and the subtle definition of her athletic legs.

Jordan looked down to see the lone chocolate left in the bag. She felt sick. Guilty and sick and weak and ugly.

Think about something else, anything else. She’d have to run an extra mile tomorrow morning. Damn it! She tossed the magazine away and got up to turn on the television. One of the cable stations was showing Black Lace, a movie in which the main character enticed her boss with anonymous love notes.

Yes, that was the answer. Focus on the seduction. If she could learn to act sexy and alluring, it wouldn’t matter how she looked. In the fantasies, she could be anyone she wanted. In the dark, he’d never see that she wasn’t perfect.

She ran upstairs and got the Fifty Fast Fantasies book from her bedroom. Snuggled onto the couch once more, she ran her index finger along the table of contents until she found one she could use. A scene in the movie distracted her for a second, then she gave all of her attention to the chapter called Strangers For One Night.

Pretend your lover is a handsome stranger. Why not pick him up as if he were a one-night stand? Surprise him in an unexpected location, wearing your naughtiest undies underneath. Let your “stranger” know that you don’t normally do things like this, but you can’t resist him. Then take him back to your place and give him a night neither of you will ever forget.

For her this to work, Jordan would have to be sensual, naughty and fun—everything the guidebook recommended. Well, at least she could fake it. When she’d found the high-school drama class, she’d found herself. As long as she put on an act, as long as she’d played a role, she’d become confident and outgoing and even somewhat popular. It hadn’t taken long to figure out that the way she wanted people to see her was just another stage personality.

Her grandparents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary was a little over a week away. She needed David by her side. She needed him to perpetuate her lie. Otherwise, she could already hear her cousin’s snide taunts if she had to show up alone and admit that her engagement was a fraud.

She could do this. She had to do this. It would give her the chance to discover her wild side. And it would save her a week of awkward questions and embarrassment. If she could act in high school and all through college and at the office, she could do it in the bedroom.

Jordan grabbed a notepad and began making a list of things she would need to make the Strangers fantasy a reality.

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