Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 80834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 404(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 80834 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 404(@200wpm)___ 323(@250wpm)___ 269(@300wpm)
“It’s just the sodium overdose from last night,” I insist, the lie sour in my mouth. “Listen, I need to get to work now.” Then, I grab my phone and wave. “Bye now!”
She lets me go, but I feel her gaze on my back all the way down the path to my car. After starting the vehicle, I drive around the block and then pull over to the curb, trying to calm down. My heart pounds and my pulse races. There’s even a sheen of sweat at my brow, so I need to get control of myself. I whip out my phone, and oh shit, but there are three missed texts from Tara, who’s agreed to cover me in my lie. (“hope u didn’t get caught LOL,” “tell me everything,” “I want details or I’ll die”). There’s also one from Jack (“did you make it home safe?”), and a notification from the cam site reminding me of a payout threshold I haven’t hit this week.
I type a quick response to Jack: “Made it home. Parents are sus but I think I’m fine. Miss you already.”
He replies instantly: “Call me if you need backup.”
I almost laugh, and for a second, the anxiety lifts. Then it comes crashing back, harder than ever. I remember the look in Jack’s eyes when he told me he was falling in love, the way I’d promised him everything and given him only half the truth.
My hands shake so badly I can barely type. I send Tara a string of panicked emojis, then bury my face in my arms, trying not to scream.
The walls are closing in, and I don’t know how much longer I can keep my lives apart.
But for now, I just need to breathe and get to work.
I just hope I don’t blow everything up before I figure out what the hell I’m doing.
10
CHAPTER 10 – COMING CLEAN
Jack
The best part of retirement is the noise level: zero. There’s no 6 a.m. reveille, no jets howling overhead, not even a neighbor dumb enough to run a leaf blower past sundown. In this slice of the American Midwest, the only nighttime sound is the faint, arctic hum of my fridge and the occasional wild coyote trying to mate with a mailbox. Most nights, the silence is like a trophy—something I earned, something I’m damn proud to own.
I’m in my usual spot at the computer, whiskey glass sweating on a coaster, half-watching a YouTube video about hypersonic flight and half-heartedly scrolling through whatever bottomless pit of content the modern world serves up. The night is thick and dull, the kind that makes you want to open a fresh bottle or send a doomed text to someone you know you shouldn’t.
That’s when the ad appears, pixel-bright in the corner of my screen:
***”Sensual Cam Girls—Live Right Now!”***
A cheap banner, girl-next-door in a polka dot bra, biting her finger. I’ve ignored a thousand of these before—clickbait, malware, instant regret—but this one feels like a dare. Maybe it’s the dull ache between my legs, or the boredom, or the fact that I haven’t seen Eliza in four days and she’s all I can think about. I click.
Just like that, I’m on the landing page, all pinks and neons, thumbnails of grinning girls arranged like a snack sampler for the horny and the lonely. Each square pulses with “LIVE,” the way a cockpit glows at night, too bright and slightly sickening.
I hover over a few: one chick with a nose ring and more tattoos than a Yakuza; another with “cosplay” in the description and a bright blue wig. None of them hold my attention for more than a heartbeat.
Until I see her.
There’s no face, just the back of a young woman kneeling on a white comforter, ass arched, blonde hair cascading down to the small of her back. Something about the posture—the curve of the spine, the tilt of the head, even the color of the sheets—hits me like turbulence. The username reads “BunnySnowGirl.”
No. Fucking. Way.
I click through, heart already knocking. The feed is high-def, every pixel sharp. She’s on her hands and knees, back to the camera, hips swaying with a slow, expert rhythm. The pink toy in her hand is impossibly large, and the sounds she makes—low, breathy moans—are all too familiar. They spill out of my speakers and fill the room with heat.
There’s still no face, but as she shifts, I see more that I recognize: the side of a big, luscious breast; the tips of her sunkissed hair; that bottom lip I’ve kissed a hundred times. There’s a little beauty mark on her left hip, just like the one I’ve traced with my tongue. My throat goes dry.
I sit there, paralyzed. My first reaction is laughter—loud, desperate, this-can’t-be-real laughter. But it’s not funny, not even a little. My hands start to shake, just enough to rattle the ice in my glass.