Maybe she’d drag Sasha to a dog adoption event or something this weekend. They’d both be more successful looking for unconditional love if they stuck to canines. Maybe there was an app for that, too. They could each swipe right on the Fido of their dreams.
“If you make them message you in the app, you can at least report the inappropriate photos and get them banned.”
“But we’d gone on two dates.” Sasha wiped under her eyes. “I thought the text was asking me for a third.”
“You know they have sex toys that will literally suck your clit for you now?” Her friend was looking for a husband, but Hannah was starting to doubt the utility of a husband given the recent advancements in sex toys.
“And you know I like the full-body contact.” They’d had this conversation before.
“Let me see the dick.” Her friend handed over her phone after Hannah made a “gimme” motion. The offending photograph displayed, and Hannah’s avocado toast nearly made a reappearance when she took in the sickly pink cast of the unimpressive appendage. “Has he ever heard of grooming?”
Sasha hiccupped; Hannah had been hoping for a laugh. Jesus, this was a lot of crying over one photo of a sad penis. But Hannah understood. It wasn’t the single photographic assault that put her over the edge; it was the sheer number of them Sasha received by virtue of her willingness to brave the dating pool. It wasn’t just dirty; it was fetid and foul. Like wading through thigh-high pig shit in knee-high boots.
Hannah’d soured on it long before her friend had, but she recognized the lost look in Sasha’s mink-brown eyes. It was the same look that Hannah had had on her face after her on-again, off-again boyfriend had told her two years ago that she was “just not the kind of girl you marry.”
But Noah was just the last in a long line of guys who treated her like a warm body before they had sex and yesterday’s soiled socks afterward.
It would also be the last time she’d allow herself to be brought low by a man. Ever. Her resolve to stay single was not being eroded with every text from Jack.
It. Was. Not. Crumbling.
He only liked her because she was mean to him, anyway. The sick shit of it was that her newfound iciness drove men crazy. She’d never gotten as much interest when she was soft and vulnerable and pink-wearing as she did now. Still, she rejected all of them, because as soon as she showed a man anything that didn’t jibe with her hard, cold image, he thought she actually wanted something real from him and he was out the door.
Except for Jack. That kiss.
She didn’t have time to dwell on the nonexistent state of her love life. And the puppies would have to wait until tomorrow. Right now, she needed her friend to get her head straight and off this guy’s subpar schlong.
“At least you have some good information now.”
“Huh? The only information I now have is that he doesn’t groom.” Good, her sense of humor was back.
“Also, you know his dick is too small for you.”
Sasha looked at her phone, tipping it sideways and her head in the opposite direction. “It’s bigger when you hold the phone horizontally.”
“Honey, dudes are too plentiful and low in value for you to be wasting time on a guy who thinks that a dick pic—a shitty one at that—is romantic.”
“I just can’t believe he sent it to me at work.” She stood up and put her hands on her hips. Her voice rose when she asked, “Seriously, who does that?”
“Guys are simpleminded and useless. We’re better off without them.”
“That’s easy for you to say.” She pouted her lips and smoothed on some gloss. “You’re so independent, and you can’t go two blocks without tripping over some guy with a monster member that wants to serve you. Like that guy from Saturday night.”
Hannah laughed but decided that she definitely wouldn’t tell Sasha about the texts. If her friend only knew how unsatisfying it was when a guy pursued her these days. Every time a guy hit on her, all she could think about was how much work he would be and how disappointed she would be when he started acting like an ass.
Except Jack. Some traitorous part of her brain wouldn’t let go of the idea that Jack wasn’t like the rest of the jerks and losers. Why couldn’t her brain let her have her broad generalizations about an entire gender?
“Give me the phone again.” Sasha handed over the phone and Hannah did a Google search for cat pictures. The guy had had the nerve to ask for pictures of her friend’s pussy, and he’d be getting some angry pussy. Once she found a photo of a famous angry-looking cat, she downloaded it to the phone and sent it with the caption Don’t even think about asking me if it’s wet.
Once she handed over the phone, she picked up her notebook and favorite black and red pens. “We have to get to the staff meeting.”
* * *
—
HANNAH WANTED TO BE her boss when she grew up. Like her, Annalise Koch had grown up as the only child of a single mother. She’d not only pulled herself up by the bootstraps; she’d made her own freaking bootstraps. But unlike Hannah, Annalise was happily married. So maybe she only wanted to be like half of her boss.
“Sasha, how’s the proposal for Senator Chapin’s daughter’s wedding coming?”
Koch Events was responsible for the most expensive weddings and poshest events in Chicago. But the wedding of a sitting senator’s daughter was a coup in and of itself. The former president and first lady would be there, as would representatives from every lobbying firm and political action committee that had any connection to the city of Chicago, the state of Illinois—hell, the whole United States.
Hannah would kill to be the lead on that kind of event, but weddings weren’t normally her thing. As the resident expert on selling sex, she handled the parties hosted by local sports teams and cosmetics companies and the risqué gallery openings. Basically, if the night was likely to end with the police showing up—either to mop up drunk and disorderlies or to arrest an artist for public indecency—Hannah was the woman in charge.
The only problem with her brand within the company was that she was never going to get the senator’s-daughter’s-wedding type of event on her docket. And without those types of events, she was never going to become a vice president. She rubbed the embossed words on the business card she kept in her notebook. Lead Event Planner just didn’t have the same ring to it as Vice President in Charge of Classy Shit, did it?
Sasha, with her commitment to happily-ever-afters, was the go-to wedding gal. At least, she was when she was on her game. And Hannah would have no problem with Sasha being promoted before her. They were a team, and Sasha would pull Hannah up along with her.