Anything for Money: A Sex-For-Hire College Romance (10 page)

R
ipper Jack texted
me one Sunday afternoon:

I arrived at RJ’s house at five on the dot, knowing this would fluster him because I was never on schedule. I hammered the door like the police and he threw it open. He had nothing but a towel around his waist.

I didn’t mind!

He grabbed me off the doorstep like one of those angler fish on the Nature Channel. One second I was in front of his door, the next second I was wrapped in the arms of my muscular latino photographer. He smushed my face into his pectoral muscles.

I didn’t mind at all.
Nope.

But I also didn’t want to seem too easy, so I said, “Ew, dude! You’re all wet!”

“Sorry!” My head was against his chest like I wanted to check his heartbeat, so I only heard him through his torso. “Close your eyes.”

“Why?”

“You need a towel, and I need my dignity.”

I closed my eyes and he released me.

“Here,” he said. “Dry off. Don’t peek!”

Suddenly his towel was in my hands.

Somewhere on the other side of my eyelids, RJ was naked and guiding me through his house with his hands on my shoulders. He was in front of me, so using my innate knowledge of girl-physics, I knew he was facing me, bare naked from top to bottom.

“For once, I’m dressed and you’re naked!” I tried to joke, but my voice cracked. I ached to open my eyes, but I couldn’t since he was facing me. If he caught me peeking, I’d never hear the end of it.

It was a special kind of hell. Me alone with a naked RJ was precisely the situation I craved. Since I don’t have to play coy in my own mind, I’ll come right out and say it. I think RJ might be the catch of a lifetime. Both of me think that—Bad Rebecca and Good Rebecca.

Good me likes that he is confident, driven, talented, and going places. Bad me likes his scary background, his rough friends with their hints about his time on the streets, and his overwhelming self-confidence that slips into outright insolence. Bad Rebecca wants to punish him for all of that, by the way. She also wants to support his pure, unrepentant joy in everything dirty.

Both Good Rebecca and Bad Rebecca also love his accent, his indifference to what people think, and his… composure. He just never seemed out of his element. When you dig through all that extra manliness and sweep it aside… when you see him groggy and unguarded in the morning, he still has an iron core that says nothing will ever stop him, no matter what obstacles block his path. I wanted some of his aplomb. All over my face.

But he, apparently, didn’t want any of mine on his. Yep. We were ‘buddies,’ confirmed and cemented, and I probably couldn’t change that now without scaring him away. In my personal relationship math, it’s better to pine for him like a scented floor cleaner, than have him ghost out of my life because I was that clingy, annoying chick who took his friendship too seriously. RJ was simply too good at cutting himself free from entanglements and obstacles, and I didn’t want to be one of those.

RJ led me to his room while I kept my eyes clenched shut, and it may have been the hardest thing I’ve ever done.

“Don’t peek,” he repeated. “I can’t find my damn underwear… ” I heard him crash around. “You look sexy, by the way, but what’s new with that?”

“Nothing,” I said. “Nothing is new with that.”

He crashed somewhere else and then swore under his breath.

“I have better things to do than stand here while you run around naked, Jack.”

“No you don’t.” He brushed past me and I swear his bare thigh touched my hand.

I didn’t mind.

“Let me move you to my bed so you can sit down.” He took my shoulder in one hand, and my waist in the other. He
had
to be kidding!

He smoothly waltzed me three steps to his bed. Did I mention that he can dance? As in, that energetic, close quarters, wiggly stuff they do in South America. When RJ lays his hands on you, he leads you like a tour guide.

“Shit, Rebecca, you’re finally following when I lead. I think we found the secret to making you graceful.”

“You mean more graceful,” I said. “And what’s the secret?”

He whirled me around, and I had no choice but to spin for him.

He said, “When your eyes are closed, you’re more relaxed. You don’t try to make everything perfect. You don’t have to
be
perfect. Let me experiment on you… ” RJ guided my hands to his hips.
His hips!
“Don’t let your hands slide around! See if you can follow this.”

I didn’t have to move my hands at all to feel the muscles of his ass shift with each step. I tried to keep up with him, but I was distracted by my hands and the flexing body under them. His hip bones rocked, burning holes in my palms. As subtly as I could, I moved my thumbs from beside my fingers to the soft insides of his hip bones. Before long, I wasn’t merely resting my hands on him, I had him in a full monkey death-grip, like the proper tool-user I am.

“Nope,” he said, a blind eternity later. “You’re still as graceful as a drunk hippo, and your fingers are tickling. Sit here. The experiment is over.”

On/off. That’s RJ all the way. Serves me right, thinking with my libido.

I let him sit me on his bed. Being that clever death-monkey, I pretended to be uncertain and off-balance. I only separated with a lot of hand-dragging and other contact.

“You’re ridiculous,” I said. “How long are you going to stay naked?”

“To be fair, this is your fault. You were on time today.”

“Maybe I should strip to make you comfortable… ”

“No teasing, Rebecca. If we were both naked at the same time I’d probably ravish you. Talk about breaking our boundaries! You have no idea how sexy you look today. I’m prouder every day that I haven’t succumbed and made another pass. I will
never
break your trust.”

I didn’t say anything in response. If I’d tried, I would have mewled like a frustrated, cock-blocked kitten.

“So, babe,” he continued, “tell me about your outfit while I get dressed… ”

That mollified me a little. “I just finished it last night. This is a cheerleader skirt, but flouncy and ruffled. It’s supposed to flip around when I walk. You know how models stomp when they walk the runway?”

“And they never move their shoulders, yeah. That bothers me.”

“It’s not supposed to be natural. It’s part of the show.”

“When you walk, Rebecca, everything moves,” he said. “Watching you is a whole-body experience.”

“Yes, well, um… ” I was probably blushing. “I have more luggage than most of those models.”

“Your ti—I mean, breasts?”

“Don’t be crass, Jack. Call them my womanhoods, or just say bosom.”

“Let’s focus on your womanhoods, then. That’s a new blouse, because I would’ve remembered seeing it before.”

“It’s the other half of the outfit. Don’t tell my professor, but I basically ripped it off from the American Apparel company. They’re famous on the Internets for helping girls show side-boob. I just made mine a little more daring.”

“You should see how much my manhood likes your side-womanhood!” he joked. “Sorry. I mean that friend-to-friend.”

“Oh, it’s okay… ”

“You didn’t mention your pink underwear,” he said next. “Thanks for not closing your legs.”

I crossed my legs and gave a catty shrug to the air, hoping he was watching. That’s the only way to deal with men when your underwear shows: Make them feel
gauche
for even noticing. With most high-fashion outfits, those ‘oops’ moments are a simple fact of life, and a girl gets so used to them it’s a wonder the rest of the world doesn’t too.

“Though,” RJ continued, “the panties were the first thing I noticed when I opened the door. That skirt is short! I want to take it out to lunch later and see what people make of it at the mall.”

No matter how many backhanded compliments he made, it didn’t mean a thing. I knew this by now. Some frustration crept into my voice when I said, “Why am I here, RJ? And why did you tell me to dress sexy?”

“I’ve known you all semester, right? But you’ve never gone on a date. You haven’t had any kind of hook-up, apart from some photo shoots, which don’t count because it’s work.”

I nodded. This was common knowledge, and so sad.

“Well, I applied myself to your problem and found some boys for you.”

“You
what?”

“I have some boys coming over. To try you out.”

“They’re
what?”

“What do you mean, ‘what,’ Rebecca?”

“I mean…
what?”

“Let me dumb it down,” he said. I could hear his smirk. “I have hot boys. Coming to my house. To try you out. Don’t worry, I’ll be watching. You’re leaving here today with a boyfriend candidate.”

I thought for a long moment, and then said, “What?”

I heard the snap of elastic. “You can look now, but don’t laugh.”

I opened my eyes like I had a lottery ticket to check.

RJ stood in profile to me, still closing a dresser drawer. He wore a jock strap and nothing else. It left his smooth brown ass bare. Its pouch of breathable elastic contained the rest of him.

“Nice manscaping,” I said.

He answered with a frown. “You’re making me self-conscious, staring like that. I already said sorry. We’re friends, right? We have to be comfortable with each other.”

I folded immediately. “Fer sure.”

“I mean,” he continued, wearing nothing but his jock strap and his damp skin, “It would be weird if my friends got off on peeping at me. Wouldn’t it?”

“Fer sure,” I repeated. “Peeping, yeah,
horrible.
That would totally… um… cross the Rubicon.”

He nodded gravely—but I swear I saw a grin tweak his lips as he turned away again.

Was this boy playing me? Nah. More wishful thinking

He held up a pair of slacks and I nodded approval. He pulled them on—good-bye ass, I hardly samba’d you!

Next, he shook out an Ed Hardy t-shirt and quirked his eye at me. I nodded again. I’d given him that t-shirt. He’s not an Ed Hardy-wearing guy, but he always had it on when I visited.

“I’m finally respectable.” He flopped onto the bed next to me and reclined into my arms.

The only thing better than watching him bounce around his room was having him suddenly collapse into a nap against me. He even had that fresh-washed boy smell.

I was acutely aware of how his face pressed against my breasts. Backless American Apparel rip-offs that show extensive side-boob don’t allow for bras. RJ’s cheek, mouth, and chin nested against the real me—my ‘womanhoods.’

He had one nipple in his ear, and one against his lips. I knew this because they were poking through my t-shirt like little superheroes trying to save the world.

Despite this, he gave no sign of noticing. Despair suddenly surged through me. My life was untenable. I couldn’t lose RJ as a friend… but I couldn’t
not
have him as my boyfriend either.

I whispered, “Let me ask you something serious, Jack.”

RJ didn’t answer except to snore. That asshole! He had actually fallen asleep in the thirty minutes I needed to gather my courage.

On a more positive note, his hands wrapped around me in his sleep.

I wasted a few seconds being turned on, and then finally exploited the opportunity. I sank my fingers into his hair and held him against me. I was afraid to breathe, which left me conflicted because I love breathing.

“Breasts,” he mumbled, his voice dreamy.

“Are you awake, Ripper Jack?” I searched my mind for a suitable, platonic explanation why I would be holding his face against my breasts. Well, I’d started the visit mashed into his pectorals, hadn’t I? Turnabout is fair play.

“You’re more than just a good friend,” RJ murmured. I waited, my heart racing.
Was this it?
He finished: “You’re a good friend with boobs.”

Fuck.
On/off, as usual. Any power he really held over me, I was the one giving it to him. And I gave it gladly, I guess, because I let him nuzzle deeper into my breasts. I kept rigidly still… well, rigidly quivering. Somehow, he dozed off again.

To recap: I had RJ’s friendship, his compliments, his teasing, his constant push-pull,
and
his face in my breasts… but I didn’t have that look. I didn’t have RJ looking at me like he’d die without me. I had everything I wanted out of life, more than I deserved, but I didn’t have him.

S
omeone knocked
on the front door.

RJ woke with a start. “Guy number one!”

“Jack, I—”

He was already gone. I followed him to the front room and perched on the couch. RJ tore open the door and a devastatingly cute boy strolled in. His clothes were jacked-up and his hair was a tragedy, but that was just prevailing college-boy style.

His lips, though, holy crap!

His lips were big dark gashes on his face. Sensitive, delicate, bee-sting lips. I wanted to cuddle them, protect them from the world.

“Mumble-mumble-Seth,” he said.

I parsed that out slowly. “Did you say your name is Seth?”

“Yeah. And you’re Rebecca? Ripper told me you’re auditioning boyfriends.”

I sent a withering glance RJ’s direction. “Apparently I am, yes.”

“He said you haven’t been laid all semester, except for your modeling, and he’s taking ownership of your sex life.”

“The fuck, Jack?”

“None of that is untrue,” RJ said.

Seth slid onto the couch next to me. His lips were mere inches from mine, and just as phenomenal up close. He and I had just met, but something about turning my head to look up at him, and his breath on my cheek, created immediate intimacy.

“He made you sound interesting,” Seth said. “I hope you’ll let me take you on a real date someday.”

I gave them both a stern glance, and opened my mouth to lash them with some kind of jock-shaming. I had some choice words lined up. What I said was: “Hee-hee-hee… ”

“You’re a model?”

I nodded, trying not to stare at his lips. I felt I should explain any unprofessional course of action I might undertake in the next few minutes. “But I’m off duty.”

He leaned a little closer, studying me. “I love your shirt.”

Luckily I was already blushing. From his perspective, he had a clear shot into my top. Whatever the point of a backless American Apparel ripoff t-shirt might be, it’s not to conceal. Maybe it’s to advertise. That’s clearly what my breasts were thinking; his scrutiny caused them to perk to attention again.

RJ cleared his throat and said, “I fell asleep before I could give Rebecca the run-down, Seth. She doesn’t know.”

“Guys, if I’d suspected anything like this… this… ”

“Intervention,” RJ supplied.

“If I’d suspected an intervention,” I resumed, “I would have run out the door.”

“That’s the real reason I didn’t tell you until now.”

“No worries, sweetheart.” Seth’s hand slid around my back, slow and sexy. I gave RJ an alarmed look. “It’s like speed-dating, except… ”

“Except… ” RJ frowned, then grinned, then shrugged.

“Except what?” I exclaimed finally.

“Except with road tests. Compatibility tests—
sexual
compatibility. This isn’t speed-dating, it’s speed-hooking-up,” RJ said.

Seth whispered in my ear, “It means we make out.”

I wanted to say, “No duh, Jagger,” but then his succulent lips brushed my cheek, and they had all the healing touch of aloe.

“You guys have precisely three minutes,” RJ said.

RJ and Seth stared at me, awaiting my response.

I said, “Hee-hee-heee.”

“Ripper described you perfectly,” Seth said. “You’re ‘hot-but-strange.’”

“Then I’m flattered-but-pissed by that,” I replied.

RJ watched me with a fixed stare, and I gave him a wide-eyed look that eloquently communicated,
Really? Really!?

Seth repositioned himself, the better to croon in my ear. “Let’s just kiss. Just a simple. Little. Kiss.”

I wanted to be large and in charge, but I trailed off with a delicious shudder as his hot breath hit me. I caught eyes with RJ again, and I realized something incredible.

RJ was looking at me.

I mean, he was
looking
at me. And I only knew that, because I was looking at him right back.

Here I had a hot college guy with designer lips, jacked up clothing, and ridiculous hair that I wanted to comb out. I had this hot guy pressed against me like a pashmina scarf in a high wind… a pashmina scarf I probably could have seduced myself, but I wouldn’t, because I wouldn’t think I deserved him.

I should have been in heaven, and I was, but not because of Mr. Pashmina-lips: I also had RJ’s eyes on me. Locked. Intent. That was what I wanted, but never got. I wanted RJ to really
see
me, and now he was. Suddenly, I was okay with RJ’s plan to loan me out to potential boyfriends. I was okay with this whole ridiculous scenario.

“So… speed-hooking-up?” I asked with forced nonchalance.

RJ nodded tightly. His neck was speckled red, like the beginning of a blush.

I tried to say something else, but Seth’s fabulous lips fastened onto mine.

If you saw Seth on the street, you’d think “pillows,” and you wouldn’t remember the color of his eyes, or whether he had eyes.

Then, because you kissed him, and don’t even try to say you wouldn’t, you’d discover Seth’s lips were certainly soft, but also strong. They looked like pillows, but they pushed against my mouth like heating pads with a massage setting. He even tasted sweet, like he’d just finished a coconut slushy.

I pressed back. His hand on my back pulled me closer. We twined together like a knot pulling tight. I felt malleable in his grip. I molded against him like a stick of butter at room temperature.

His hand slid down my neck, and then into my shirt. He took my breast in his grip. My tight nipple carved a line in his palm.

With that liberty he took another. The hand on my back, which was on my skin (because backless American Apparel blah-blah), slid down my waist and then around. He had two scoops of Rebecca—one hip and one breast—as he worked my mouth.

“Word on the street is that Seth can kiss.” RJ narrated, his voice hushed, like a frickin’ nature show. “Rebecca, today’s men have all been vetted by other girls in your dorm. No duds in this group.”

I couldn’t do more than flutter my eyes in answer.

“All the girls got really excited when I told them I was finding dates for you. They practically threw these guys at me.”

Well
that
didn’t sound good. A girl’s trouble meter is a sensitive instrument.

“I got a few phone numbers, too,” RJ continued. “All this time, they thought you and I were a couple!”

Nope, not good. I hadn’t perpetuated that misunderstanding, but I hadn’t tried to corrected it either.

Then Seth renewed his kiss and I forgot my worries. He caressed my breast, building a heat in me like stirring embers in a camp fire. He tightened on my nipple, and then tugged it as he pressed harder into my mouth.

If his lips were succulent, his tongue was a revelation. A girl didn’t have to worry about Seth, he was a kissing savant. Whatever else in life he might be failing at, Seth kissed like a loosely edited romance novel. He was long, sloppy, and satisfying. Too bad kissing isn’t a legitimate career, because Seth could have supported a large Mormon family with his talents.

The room started to spin: that special feeling deep inside me.

Was I really—? Could I possibly be—?

“Time’s up,” RJ announced.

Seth pulled back. “Alrighty then.”

I couldn’t do anything but breathe at him, mouth hanging open, like a surprised sex doll.

“Ripper Jack was right, Rebecca. You’re very sexy. Damn, you’re a fucking dreamboat. I would love to see you again.”

“Thanks. Yeah… ”

“I think we’re compatible,” he said. He gave my breast one final, light squeeze, and stood. “Really. I know this is weird, but give me a call.”

“I will, Seth. You are a
psycho
kisser.”

“Rebecca, kissing takes two people.” He leaned down to me again, and I turned my mouth up like a hungry starling—but RJ grabbed his collar and lifted him upright with one arm.

“That’s it for Mr. Mouth,” he said. “And Rebecca, stop trying to make ‘psycho’ happen.”

RJ dragged him out the door.

* * *

W
hen RJ
and I were alone again, he said, “Good start.”

I blinked at him, still dazed.

“Just enjoy yourself, Rebecca. Don’t think so much. You’re too intellectual. You’re your own worst cock-block. Whenever we go out together, the attention goes one way, toward you. You never seem to notice other guys, and it worries me a little. Surely you can just go with the flow in three-minute increments?”

“I am so,
so
confused.”

He sat next to me on the couch, stroking my bare back with one hand, and squeezing my knee with the other. “Relax. Let my hand-picked men wipe away all your confusion.”

Another knock on the front door.

“Oh, no,” I cringed.

“It’s your next hook-up,” RJ said, excited again.

I knew I was flushed, but I tried to smile too. A thrill ran through me at the thought of the guy, a stranger, on the other side of the door. That guy and I were going to make out. He knew it, I knew it. I didn’t have to be coy. No waffling about whether I should say ‘no’ or not. It was all out in the open, simple and settled.

Overall, I think I liked it. I liked the open simplicity of it. Because historically, my dates are full of tragic misunderstandings.