Hookup / The Sex Cure

CHAPTER EIGHT

Max

I EARNED MY first billion dollars with a dating app: Billionaire Bachelors. It’s a digital shopping list for all you out there who prefer Prince Charming with a generous side of cash. You punch in your zip code and then the app gives you the down low on all the Prince Charmings who meet your criteria. Billionaires are one of our most popular options, although you can pick your future mate based on other important qualities like good looks and favorite winery.

I whipped it up in the Santa Cruz dorm room I shared with Dev and Jack, spending every second we weren’t surfing with my head down in my code. I launched the app the day we graduated and I haven’t looked back since. Both Jack and Dev have bitched repeatedly about being two of Billionaire Bachelors’ leading men, but they weren’t willing to bankrupt themselves to lose their starring roles, so screw them.

My second app is Kinkster, and it’s equally popular (and unpopular with Dev and Jack who are adamantly vanilla in bed). One of the downsides, however, is that my PR team wants me to host a series of glamorous, sexy parties that sell the brand. Glamorous pool parties scream fantasy hookup, so tonight we’ve invited hundreds of celebrities, influencers and pretty people to my Santa Cruz pad to dance and get drunk on my dime. The music pounds away, drowning out the ocean and the buzz of dozens of conversations as my team puts the final touches on the event.

My fingers itch to text Maple and invite her over. It’s not that I think this party is her scene, but I’d like to see her again. I’d like to hear her laugh and just...hang out with her. Even if we don’t ever hook up, she’s fun. When we first started texting, our messages were purely functional. She said thank you for the roses. And then she asked something, or I did, but we fell into a rhythm. Question and answer. Rinse and repeat. Yesterday, though, when I gave her a menu of kinky sex options to pick from, I wasn’t joking. Not really. Something’s changed between us as we text. I stare at my phone, willing it to show me a clue. A sign. A multistep, results-guaranteed plan. I think I went wrong when I sent the menu.

I removed myself from the friend zone and went—

Somewhere.

Limbo sucks. I stare at my phone, willing it to buzz with an incoming text from Maple. Since it’s Saturday night, I don’t think she’s working.

Outside, the PR team continues birthing a party. Everyone’s focused on the infinity pool that spills over into the ocean, adding the little details that will make tonight one Instagrammable moment after another. Citrus trees in terracotta pots sourced from Italy. A pop-up bar with themed cocktails. White lights. White lotus flowers floating on the surface of the pool. The only thing missing is the kinky sex—but that will come later, after my guests have had time to settle in.

Those guests arrive thicker and faster as the night progresses. I watch from upstairs as they come. They’re allowed to roam downstairs, but the second floor is my haven and it’s off-limits. Two hours after the party officially begins, I’ve made a grand appearance and the music is so loud that I feel rather than hear my phone buzz in my pocket.

I step behind a particularly impressive citrus specimen and pull it out. Maple’s texted me a picture of take-out Chinese on a floral melamine plate balanced on the edge of a small tub, but it’s her words that have a smile tugging at my mouth.

Fancy a swim?

I do a quick volume calculation. You’d have to sit on my lap and even then there’d be no room for water. Immediate displacement. Need to know if downstairs neighbor has flood insurance?

My phone buzzes again, Maple’s picture flashing across my screen. Before I can overthink things, I answer.

“Hey, Maple.”

She launches into rapid-fire speech the way she does everything: bold and certain. “Do you like Chinese? Do you want to come over for dinner? We could watch a movie.”

“What kind of movie?”

She tells me all about the romantic comedy she’s Netflixing and the unlimited potential for happy endings. I mean, who doesn’t like getting his happy ending? I’m seriously considering ditching my party when a deafening series of shrill screams erupts from my pool. Water hits my back and I instinctively hunch to protect my phone. It’s water-resistant but that’s a lot of water. I’m enjoying our conversation and I don’t want to have to stop it in order to retrieve my backup phone.

“Are you killing someone?” She sounds cheerful but...

“Would that make you more or less likely to come over?”

“Less,” she says eventually. I like that she stopped to think about it.

“Then I’m hosting a pool party.” I lean against a convenient palm tree and eye the tangle of girls being fished out of the pool. From the size of the guy they crash-landed on, I suspect the football team I invited has shown up.

“Do I have to wear a swimsuit?”

I smile at my phone. “You should always feel free to swim naked in my pool.”

“Be serious.” Water sloshes on her end of the line. Is she in the tub?

More important: is she naked?

“You can do whatever you want, Maple. Wear a swimsuit. Don’t. Yoga leggings work fine, too. It’s a party, not rocket science. I’d just like you here.”

“So your pool isn’t full of bikini-wearing hot girls?”

“Truthfully, no.” I snap a picture of my pool and send it to her. “You’d be the hottest person here anyhow, especially if you showed up naked. You owe me a picture of your pool party for one now.”

That makes her laugh. My phone buzzes a second later and I fumble it. Jesus. There are a whole lot of white bubbles above the soft, sweet curve of...

“Did you just send me a boob shot? I thought you had a no-bathroom-selfies rule.”

She snorts. “I thought you lived for naked boob pictures.”

“I like them,” I say solemnly. “But I’m not sure I can commit to them being my favorite body part. I’d need to see all the parts first so I could make a fair assessment.”

Maple hums a bar of something. It’s a church hymn, which is kind of weird, but she says it’s just autopilot because she did a lot of zoning out in church as a kid (her dad was a minister) and that’s what she associates with tuning out the world. It’s her thinking noise, though, so I hope she’s making me a list of candidates for Max’s Favorite Body Part.

“Come over,” I say.

“Why?”

Because as much fun as playing word games with her is, I want to see her?

“We can play twenty questions in my pool.” I don’t know why I want her here, just that I do. “I’ll send a car.”

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