Taking the Heat. Victoria Dahl

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СКАЧАТЬ would have been a tragedy.”

      “Not an insurmountable one. I promise I’d have gotten you another.”

      She laughed again, her round cheeks going pink. “You’re really sweet. Thanks for helping me out.”

      Gabe was surprised to feel his own face going slightly warm. “No problem.” He backed out and closed the door, leaving this odd woman to her work. He knew less about her after their second interaction than he had after their first, but one thing was certain. She was high maintenance as hell. A drama queen, maybe. Or just high-strung. Whatever she was, he was staying far away from it.

      His phone buzzed as he reached the end of the hall and Gabe took it from his pocket, smiling when he saw his sister’s name pop up in a text box. Another high-maintenance woman, but one he couldn’t bear to keep at a distance: his middle sister, Naomi.

      How was your first day? she asked.

      Good. I’m out with the other librarians right now.

      She texted a big smiley face. Girls’ night???

      Something like that, he responded. Are you back home?

      Yes, Paris was a blast, but now Mom’s trying to feed me, and Dad’s just...disappointed.

      Yeah, Gabe was disappointed, too. But he was hopeful that once his sister got through a few more years of international modeling, she’d be ready to settle down and take over the family business. Then again, he’d been telling himself that for more than ten years. Unfortunately, Naomi had turned out to be one of those rare models who was even more popular in her thirties than she had been in her teens.

      And their older sister? Yeah, she was an even bigger disappointment to their father.

      It was all up to Gabe now.

      Gabe shook his head and texted back.

      Just eat one burger and make them both happy.

      I tried that last time. It didn’t get them off my back, and I had to run ten extra miles on the treadmill.

      Tragedy! he responded, then added a crying face to the text.

      Kiss my ass, little brother.

      Love you, too, he sent before he tucked the phone back into his pocket. One hour of this Dear Veronica nonsense, and then he could head over to his new place, ignore family and work obligations, and get on with his new life.

      * * *

      VERONICA COULDN’T FEEL her own hands and she couldn’t quite hear what she was saying. It wasn’t the martini affecting her, unfortunately; it was pure, unadulterated terror.

      Despite the numbness, her hands were still holding the letters she’d chosen to read, and the crowd was still clapping and smiling. She couldn’t remember much of the past forty-five minutes, but maybe it was going fine. She might even be doing a good job, but she had a feeling the crowd approval had more to do with the alcohol. Not that she minded.

      “And now, our sixth and final Dear Veronica letter,” she said into the microphone, lowering her voice a little to bring down the noise level in the bar. It worked. The roar subsided.

      She drank the last of her now-warm cosmo and took a deep breath. “‘Dear Veronica, I feel like I’m a pretty good catch. I’m young, relatively pretty, educated and fun loving. Men ask me out. I wouldn’t say I have any problem getting a date, and my standards are reasonably high. I expect a potential mate to be employed and funny and hot as hell—’”

      “That’s you, Steve!” someone yelled out, causing howls to erupt.

      Veronica smiled and pointed in the direction of the noise. “Find me later, Steve.” She waited for the laughter to quiet, then continued. “‘So why do I always end up being the booty call? Why am I never the girlfriend? It makes me feel like I’m not good enough. Don’t get me wrong—I love sex, but I’d like more than that, and the last three guys I’ve dated have all ended up being casual.’ It’s signed That Girl.”

      Veronica looked out over crowd. “Now...this letter might mean something to a lot of you.”

      There were moans of agreement.

      “Let me start with this. There’s nothing wrong with a booty call.” Veronica laughed at the ruckus that caused, then shook her head and moved on. “Sex is fun. Sex is good. Booty-call your way through life if that makes you happy. But apparently, it’s not making you happy, That Girl, so you need to figure out why you’re willingly participating in this unfulfilling little dance.

      “I notice that you referred to yourself as ‘relatively pretty’ and then referred to your dates as ‘hot as hell,’ which makes me think you could be flattered by their attention. Let’s be really honest here—there is nothing flattering about someone wanting to bone you.”

      She paused to let the crowd react, and a server sneaked over to hand her another martini. “Oh, thank you!” Veronica whispered, surprised and relieved. Her mouth was drying out and her hands were sweating. She gratefully took a gulp, then turned back to the audience. “I hear some disagreement, but let me be clear. There are men out there who will put their penises in a tree. There are men out there who will put their penises in sheep. You do not need to feel flattered that a man wants to put his penis inside you.

      “And as for women...think of all the slimeballs out there you see taking women home every single night. Those women are happy to sleep with a slimeball, so, men, don’t be honored that they’ll sleep with you, too. Sex is not flattery! It’s one of our basic animal needs and people will do a lot of nasty shit to get it.”

      “She’s talking about you again, Steve!” a man shouted.

      “Okay, Steve,” Veronica said, “don’t find me later.” She winked in his direction. “But for this letter writer... You describe yourself as ‘fun loving’ and I’m afraid proving that you’re down for casual sex is part of proving just how fun you are.” She paused to let that sink in and registered a couple of women who looked as if they’d just heard the truth.

      “If casual sex isn’t fun for you, then don’t do it. It’s not a requirement—it’s an option. Buy a good vibrator and take a break from being the fun girl who’s down for the superhot guy. Because if you think those men can’t tell that you’re flattered by the attention, you’re fooling yourself. If you believe they’re too hot for you, then you can bet your ass that they think so, too. And if you’re smiling your way through a booty call and pretending it’s a great way to spend a weeknight, those men are not going to try to talk you out of it.”

      She took a deep breath. Almost done.

      “So take a break. Reevaluate your choices. Figure out what you really want. And if what you want is to get serious with someone, then you wait for a person who’s serious about you. You wait for the guy who calls you when he doesn’t want sex.”

      A few of the women frowned and Veronica smiled. “Okay, wait for the guy who’s dying to do you and also wants to spend time with you not having sex. Is that better?” All of the women cheered. “All right. Thank you very much, everyone. This has been a blast. I’ll see you in the paper!”

      She waved blindly at the clapping crowd, СКАЧАТЬ