The Revelation (2 page)

“Thank you. And on the other hand?”

“Well, on the other hand, I really, really like
being
naughty
.”

Josh makes a sexy sound. “
Oh
. Well, that
is
quite a
conundrum
. What on earth are you gonna do
about it?”

“I dunno—I haven’t decided yet. Maybe I’ll just look
through your pervy blonde-porn-star folder while I figure it out.”
I scroll through the photos again, my smile hurting my cheeks.
“These women all look the same, Josh,” I say, still going through
the photos. “Looks like you’ve got a
type,
huh?”

He audibly shrugs. “I like what I like.”

“Who are they?”

He pauses briefly and then exhales. “They’re just
women I’ve met.”

“
Met
? I’m guessing you’ve done more than
meet
these girls.”

He doesn’t reply.

“Have you
slept
with all of these women?”

“So now you’re slut-shaming me?”

“No. I’m the last person in the world who would ever
slut-shame anyone.”

“You do realize the whole point of your application
to me was to make me feel safe enough to reveal my inner-most
perverted thoughts to you? You’re supposed to be luring me into
emotional intimacy
, Kat.”

“Oh crap. That’s right. Shoot. I should have warned
you: I suck at emotional intimacy. I’m working on it, though, I
swear.”

“You’re never gonna break down my walls now,” Josh
says playfully.

“Damn. Oh well.” I audibly shrug and he laughs. “So
who took all these photos? Was it you?”

“Nope.”

“No? Oh, I thought you were gonna say yes. Did you
take
some
of them?”

“So we’re playing a game of Perverted Twenty
Questions, are we?”

“Yeah. Isn’t it
fun
?”

“No.”

“Come on. I’ve still got nineteen questions to
go.”

“Nineteen? Ha! More like ten. And that’s
generous.”

“Okay ten. Did you personally take
any
of
these photos?”

He exhales loudly. “Just one.”

“Oh, now that’s an interesting answer. Not what I
expected. I thought it’d be all or nothing.” I suddenly remember
Sarah saying Oksana photographs every girl in The Club. “By George,
I think I’ve got it,” I say. “Are these the women you slept with in
The Club?”

Josh sighs loudly. “Correct. All but two of
them.”

“Well, now I’m confused again. You mean all but two
of these women were in The Club—or there are two Clubbers missing
from this folder?”

“Your mind is a scary place, Kat. You’re like Henn
but in a totally different context. You’re a man-hacker.”

I laugh. “Thank you. Now answer the question,
please.”

He exhales audibly. “Every woman from The Club is
there—
plus
there are two non-Clubbers in the folder,
too.”

“Ah. Interesting. Two bonus-women from real life.
This just gets more and more intriguing. Which ones are the
non-Clubbers and why’d you put them in the folder with all the
Clubbers?”

“Aren’t you out of questions yet?”

“Nope.” I pause. “I’ve still got eight to go.”

He scoffs.

“You personally took
one
of the non-Clubbers’
photos—not
both
of them?”

“Correct.”

“Hmm. So that means one of the non-Clubbers
sent
you her photo?”

“Correct. You’re now officially out of
questions.”

“No way. I’ve still got at least eight left.”

“Eight? You started with ten and you’ve asked like
fifty.”

“I’ve been asking
sub
-questions to questions,
Josh—sub-questions don’t count as full questions.”

He grumbles.

“So, come on, which one of these pretty ladies was
the one non-Clubber you personally photographed? And why’d you put
her in the Sick Fuck folder with all the others?”

He pauses. “No comment.”

“Aw, come on.”

“You’ve got my application. That’s what I promised
you—nothing more. Perverted Twenty Questions is now officially
over.”

“Aw. Not fair.”

“It’s totally fair—and if not, then too bad. Life
isn’t fair.”

“Just tell me why you have all these photos and then
I’ll drop it. I promise.”

Josh exhales. “Okay, Madame Terrorist. Fine.” He
mutters something to himself under his breath. “I requested a
specific type of girl in my application, and so The Club emailed me
photos of women they’d selected for me to make sure they were
exactly what I wanted. And at the end of my membership-month, I
didn’t know what the fuck to do with all the photos so I put them
into a folder.”

“And labeled it ‘Sick Fuck.’”

He doesn’t reply.

“And you didn’t have any inkling these women were
hookers before Jonas told you?”

Josh pauses. “I was pretty specific about what I
wanted in my application, so I figured The Club likely made some
kind of special arrangement to deliver on my wishes—but I didn’t
know for sure. Just because a woman is willing to meet a rich guy
in a hotel room and fulfill his sick-fuck-fantasies doesn’t
necessarily make her a hooker, does it?”

I consider that bit of logic. “No,” I finally say.
“Not necessarily. Especially when he looks like you.”

“Thank you. But, honestly, I really didn’t care one
way or the other if the women were being paid on the side—I just
didn’t wanna know about it. All I was trying to do was escape
reality for a month—I wasn’t looking for some sort of deep soul
connection.”

“So you asked for blondes?”

“Kat,” he says softly. “You’ve got my application.
Just read it. No more questions.”

The earnest tone of his voice has thrown me. I
thought we were bantering, and now, suddenly, he seems totally
sincere. “Okay. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.”

I wait a beat. “But can I ask one more teeny tiny
itty bitty question? In the name of emotional intimacy?”

He chuckles despite himself. “What?” he asks.

“Thank you. Wow, we’re
killing
the emotional
intimacy thing, Josh. We’re emotionally intimate beasts.”

He chuckles again. “This isn’t emotional intimacy,
Kat—this is just plain torture.”

“I’m almost positive they’re one and the same
thing,” I say. “Though I can’t be sure.”

He laughs a full laugh, which I take as a good sign.
“Okay, Madame Interrogator, what’s your last question?”

“Do you typically only sleep with blondes—or just in
The Club? And is it sex with
blondes
that makes you a sick
fuck?”

He pauses for a moment. “That’s two questions.”

“Sorry. Couldn’t help myself.”

“Okay. Here’s the deal: I’m gonna tell you the
answer to these two questions and then this interrogation is
officially done.”

“Okay.”

“I don’t
only
sleep with blondes. I’ve been
with women of all shapes, sizes, colors, ethnicities, and hair
colors, and I’ve enjoyed them all. In fact, I’ve enjoyed them all
immensely.
”

“Thanks. Little more info than I needed.”

“And, no, I don’t have some bizarre complex whereby
I think sleeping with a beautiful blonde woman somehow transforms
me into a sick fuck. Yes, I specifically requested
blondes
in The Club because The Club was about fantasy-fulfillment and
escape from reality, and, call me unimaginative or trite, but when
I shop at the fantasy store, at least for purposes of fulfilling
the fantasies I specifically asked for in The Club, that’s what I
want—a classic blonde. Why? I don’t know. It’s just the way I’m
wired—I definitely have a
type
.” He makes a sound that
emphatically signals he’s done talking.

“Thank you,” I say smoothly, scrolling through the
photos again. “Yep, I’d agree you definitely have a type.” I snort.
“Actually, they all look just like...” I abruptly stop speaking.
Holy shit.

There’s a long beat.

“Yeah, Kat,” Josh finally says. He lets out a loud
puff of air. “They look just like
you
.”

He’s read my mind. I swallow hard.

“Less attractive versions of you, of course,” he
continues softly. “They’re all wannabe-Kats. You’re what my brother
refers to as the ‘divine original.’”

I’m tingling all over. “The ‘
divine
original
’?” I breathe. “What’s that?”

He lets out a long groan. “I can’t believe I just
said that. It’s this Plato-thing Jonas is always babbling about.
Forget I ever said it—I wanna gouge my eyes out every time my
brother mentions it and now it’s me who’s saying it. Gah.”

I press my phone into my ear, my breathing shallow.
“What does it mean, Josh?” I ask softly. “Whatever it means, it’s
making me tingle all over.”

“It just means you’re the original template and
everyone else is a knock-off.” He lets out a long sigh. “Like, you
know, you’re the authentic Gucci bag and everyone else is one of
those counterfeits they sell on the sidewalk in New York.”

I pause, letting that sink in. I’ve never been to
New York, actually, but his metaphor is still perfectly
understandable to me. “So does that mean I make you a sick fuck
more than anyone else?”

He growls with exasperation. “You don’t make me a
sick fuck—
no one
makes me a sick fuck. Someone I cared about
once
called
me a sick fuck and I was pissed as hell about it
when I named that folder, that’s all. I was, you know, flipping
that person the bird when I named that folder
.
”

While Josh has been talking, I’ve been leafing
through the photos. There’s one girl I keep going back to again and
again. She’s not working the lens or
trying
to be sexy like
the others—in fact, the woman is clearly put off by posing for the
photo—and her shyness about the whole thing makes her all the more
alluring. Suddenly, there’s no doubt in my mind this shy girl is
the non-Clubber Josh photographed himself—and, if my Scooby Doo
senses are right, she’s also the one who pissed him off by calling
him a “sick fuck.”

“What about the shy one?” I ask.

“The shy one?”

“The one who looks mortified to be posing for a
naked photo? She looks pretty divine-original-ish to me. Is she the
one you photographed yourself?” I swallow hard. “Is she your
ex-girlfriend?”

He doesn’t reply.

“Did she call you a sick fuck?”

“Click out of there, Kat,” he says softly, a
stiffness overtaking his tone. “Interrogation over.”

My skin erupts in goose bumps. He’s not kidding
around. Shoot. He sounds genuinely upset.

“Okay, I’m out,” I say, exiting the folder.

“I’m gonna go,” he says evenly. “Happy reading.”

“No,
wait
. Please, Josh.
Wait
.” The
angry edge in his voice has made my chest tighten. Clearly, I’ve
pushed too hard. “I’m sorry, Josh. Sometimes I take things too far.
It’s a major flaw of mine.”

Josh chuckles despite himself.

I bite my lip, smiling into the phone. “I’m sorry—I
didn’t mean any harm.”

“Says the woman with a bomb strapped to her chest.”
He lets out a long exhale. “Just read my goddamned application,
okay? I can’t take it anymore. The anticipation’s killing me. Just
read it and make your decision already.”

“My
decision
?”

He pauses. “Whether to sleep with me or not,” he
finally says.

“Oh yeah, that’s right,” I say. “Well, a girl’s
gotta know if she’s gonna wake up chained to a goat.”

“No, a
donkey.
”

“Oh yeah. That’s right. A girl’s gotta know these
things.”

“You never know what might happen with me. I’m kind
of a sick fuck.”

“According to whom?”

He doesn’t reply.

“The Shy Girl?”

He pauses. “Yeah.”

“That’s Emma?”

“Yup.”

“Well, Josh, I haven’t even read your application
yet, and I can already tell you Emma was full of shit.”

He lets out a yelp of surprise.

I clear my throat. “So back to the reason I called
in the first place,” I say. “Where are the three photos you
submitted with your application?”

“Well, strangely enough, Kat, they’re in a folder
marked ‘Club Application Photos.’ Imagine that.”

“Oh. Well, gosh. That makes a whole lot more sense
than putting them into a folder called ‘Sick Fuck.’”

Josh sighs. “Hey, can I just come up there? I
thought I wanted to stay as far away as possible while you were
reading my application, but all of a sudden I’d rather just sit
next to you while you read it and watch your facial
expressions.”

My heart leaps. “Are you by any chance planning to
distract
me again, Joshua William Faraday?”

“Maybe.”

I smile broadly into the phone. “Yeah, I think
that’s a great idea,” I say. “Get your YOLO’d-ass up here, Playboy.
We’ll read the damned thing together, line by perverted line—and
maybe,
if you’re extra nice to me, I’ll let you distract me
again.”

I can hear his smile again.

“I’ll be right there,” he says.

Kat

The minute Josh and I hang up from our call, I
scroll through his blonde-girl “Sick Fuck” folder again, this time
more slowly than before. These are some spectacularly gorgeous
women here—and he thinks I’m some sort of ‘ideal form’ of all of
them? Surely, he’s just flattering me. I mean, come on.

I stop scrolling.

Holy crap.

I recognize one of the women in the folder. I think
she’s a well-known model—like, literally on Victoria’s Secret ads
and the covers of fashion magazines. Yep, I’m sure of it. Her name
is Bridgette something. Is she the ‘bisexual supermodel’ Josh said
he turned down? She’s gotta be the second non-Clubber in the
folder.

I look at my watch. Gah. Josh should be here any
minute. I click out of the “Sick Fuck” folder, intending to take a
quick peek at his three photos before he arrives, but on a sudden
impulse, I find myself dragging the entire “Sick Fuck” folder into
the trashcan and pressing “Empty trash.” Oops. My finger must have
slipped.