"Yeah. Couple months back."
"This is a romance book," she said, eyes scrunching up.
"That explains why I found it in the romance section. And why there was so much screwing in it," I agreed, smiling when a flush crept up across her cheeks. You never really saw a woman blush anymore. It was sweet.
"Wait... no," she said, shaking her head. "You don't read romance."
"I do, actually," I told her, shrugging. After years of ribbing on the topic from my brothers—as well as the Mallicks in my extended family—I had long since gotten over the embarrassment over the topic that used to have me exclusively ordering the books online or reading on my phone, so no one knew what I was looking at. "It's good research."
"Ah, research?" she repeated, not getting it.
"For the job, baby. You'd think my work would be easy, but after a while, you start to run out of new ways to phrase the same things, new fantasies to sell the callers. That's where the books come in. My family gives me shit about it, but if you ask me, if you want to know what women want, you should read a romance. Written by women for women, giving them exactly what they want. Though, I am more of a fan of the kinds with action plots. MCs, mafia, shit like that."
"Because you don't like the, ah, you know, the romance part?"
"The romance part is fine. I just like when shit blows up, or someone gets shot, or there is a car chase." She would understand that more if she knew about my past life, but you didn't bring up armed robbery to practical strangers. Especially since we'd never been caught, and the statute of limitations might have still been ongoing in a few of the cases.
Back in Navesink Bank, it was common for a lot of the people you brushed shoulders with to know about your criminal past, and not to judge you for it, since so many of them were in the same boat.
That said, the normal people, they didn't know all the dirty details. Clearly, they simply didn't want to. They wanted to put their head in the sand about it. Otherwise, they wouldn't have settled down in a place like Navesink Bank in the first place.
Katie was as normal as normal came. She went to work, she did her best, she never got into trouble. The woman probably never lied or did anything shady in her entire life.
It was admirable.
But it also meant she couldn't truly understand my still-intact adrenaline-junkie tendencies.
"They're like a late-night, premium-channel show," she said, pulling me out of my thoughts that, inexplicably, had turned to thinking it was sweet how her giant glasses slid down her small nose.
"What?"
"Romantic suspense books," she supplied, gaze skittering away. "You know... like we were talking about," she added. "They're like a TV show with all the suspense and violence and the, well, you know."
"I do," I agreed, shooting her a smirk. "I do know."
The "you know."
What a kind of prudish way to put it. Especially given where we both worked. I knew for a fact that she heard a million things nastier every day than the average person would likely ever hear in their lifetime.
That was one of the main differences between the women I worked with and myself. The ladies who called phone sex lines were typically just sad or lonely or stressed. It wasn't so much about getting off, about saying nasty shit, as it was feeling desired and hearing a man's voice. The orgasm, when they happened, were really just the cherry on the pie as far as I could tell. They wanted the intimacy. I gave them that.
But the men who called the lines to talk to the women? Shit. Quite frankly, I didn't even know so many kinks existed before. And I had known my fair share of screwing around in my time.
The men, typically, even if they were sad or lonely, they wanted the filthy shit. They wanted to hear these women say things they would never have their wives say, would never have the balls to ask for if they were face-to-face with an actual flesh-and-blood woman.
Granted, being willing to hear raunchy shit, and being able to say it were two completely different things. I knew several women who were around foul-mouthed assholes—many of whom I called family—that barely ever cursed themselves.
"I, ah, yeah," she agreed, shaking her head, gaze going to the doorway as if she was expecting someone to walk in and save her. Hell, I was pretty sure she would be thankful for the cannibal mountain people at this point.
Interesting.
"I am going to lock down the house," I said, moving to stand. "Double check the windows and shit since they don't seem like the most careful of caretakers, leaving the door unlocked like they did. That way, we can haul off to bed anytime."