Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 126154 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 631(@200wpm)___ 505(@250wpm)___ 421(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 126154 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 631(@200wpm)___ 505(@250wpm)___ 421(@300wpm)
I don’t do drugs. I don’t drive my cars at excessive speed. I don’t visit bars and drink myself into oblivion. I don’t even smoke expensive cigars.
I do sex.
Dirty, filthy, brutal sex.
I should sign up for some anonymous self-help group. Go along to some grotty community centre in the dregs of London for a Styrofoam mug of cheap coffee, and the pleasure of perching myself on one of their grimy plastic chairs as I psyche myself up to say it.
My name is Alexander, and I am a sex addict.
I’d get a round of applause, and then I’d have to tear up, eat a biscuit, and tell them all how good it felt to face down my own demons.
I have no intention of doing any of those things.
I remember the glorious pained grunts as Candice took my cock dry. I remember the soft flesh of her hips yielding to my grip as I held tight and pushed in all the fucking way.
I remember the way her pretty tits bounced, her big nipples so fucking ripe for my mouth.
I remember the way she wriggled and squirmed with my hands around her throat.
Paying Candice was a delight. Money well spent.
But I think I’ll go with Elena this evening. I haven’t seen Elena in a while.
I slip into my Mercedes and fire off a text message before I start up the engine.
Elena. Tonight. Nine thirty.
Sent.
I wait.
The handset vibrates in my hand as the message icon flashes.
Room sixteen. Harley’s tavern. Your name is Ted Brown.
I’m smiling the first genuine smile of the day as I pull out of the car park.
Melissa
It takes us three weeks of back-breaking effort to get a compliment, let alone a promotion. Another two weeks on top of that to get a regular smile from our line manager at the start of shift.
Week seven of scrubbing steel and grouting and toilet bowls until our hands are blotchy, and both Sonnie and I are questioning just how sound our ambitious little scheme is turning out to be.
She drops her sponge in the canteen sink and shoots me a look of pure apathy. “Whose idea was this?”
“Yours.” I smile as I wipe down the air conditioning vent. “And mine. Alexander Henley’s seat, remember?”
She takes a deep breath. “Mmm, I hope it smells half as good as I imagine.”
“Oh, it will,” I say. “He smells incredible.”
“And there she goes… never quits with the bragging…” Sonnie’s laugh makes me laugh too. “Tell me about it again, hon. I need the motivation.”
I clear my throat. “It was a day like any other day… rushing my way through the back alleys to school, knowing I’m late for registration again…”
“Yeah, yeah,” she prompts. “I got this bit. Late, sneaky cigarette, dregs of tobacco in your crappy tin, yada yada. I want the bit about him.”
“You have no patience.” I laugh. “He smells musky, deep… rich, like the orient… his eyes are dark… like…”
“Midnight…”
“Midnight in winter…”
She’s already laughing. “Boy, we got it bad.”
“Yes. Yes, we do.”
“Imagine it,” she says, and her eyes glint with that goofy sparkle that takes over every time she floats away into fantasy. “Being with a man like him. A man who has everything. Imagine waking up in the morning and being Mrs Alexander Henley. He has it all, right? The real deal, the full package. Mr perfect, living the dream…”
“Living the dream,” I repeat.
She picks up her sponge. “I guess we’ll just have to make do with sniffing his seat.”
I wipe the damp from my forehead. “Yeah, well, you’d better get scrubbing. We’re quite some way from the eighteenth floor.”
“Amen to that,” she says, and gets to work.
We’re about to check out for the day when we’re accosted in the cleaning corridor on floor five.
“A word, girls, please,” our line manager says, and beckons us inside her office. Sonnie looks at me, and I look back, and I’m not sure whether I should be worried or excited.
Worried definitely wins out.
We step on through and I close the door behind us, hoping that’s the right etiquette.
Janet. Our line manager’s name is Janet, but should I call her Miss Yorkley? Janet or Yorkley?
“Sit,” she says, and I hope I don’t have to choose.
We sit. My hands are in my lap. My heel tapping.
I really want this job. Need this job. For Joseph, and for me. For my shot at smelling Alexander Henley’s seat. For my shot at smelling Alexander Henley himself. Please God.
“What’s your secret?” Janet Yorkley asks.
Sonnie looks at me, and I guess I have to answer for us both. “Sorry?”
“Your secret.” She raises an eyebrow. “You must have one. Canteen’s never looked so good, so they tell me, and our staff survey showed the floor-seven toilets as ten out of ten for cleanliness. We never have ten out of ten, for anything. These people just cannot be pleased.” She leans forward. “But you’ve managed it, two newbies in the crappiest floor of this building, and you’re the ones who got us a perfect score. So, what’s your secret?”