Call Me Cat (4 page)

WHEN MY FIRST
call came on Sunday night, I nearly tore the phone from the wall in anxiety. "Hello."

"Catelyn, this is
Donna at The Pleasure Palace. We've got you a caller. He'll be an easy one for your first time. Straight vanilla sex. If he doesn't talk much, just keep him on the line as long as you can until he's done."

I took a sip of water and tried to get comfortable on my chair. "Okay, I'm ready."

When the man came on the line, all I could hear was his breathing. Creepy. I was about to start talking when he asked my name.

I'd worked out a whole cover story with a fake name and everything, and it all left my head. I stuttered, and then tried to sound sexy as I said, "Call me Ca
t." I cringed, hating to use my childhood nickname, but nothing else came to mind.
Great. Next I'll be giving him my full name and social security number.

"Hi, Cat. I like that name. Are you going to purr for me tonight, Cat?"

"Um, sure. Yes, I'm going to purr for you. Do you want to pet my… " Oh God, I really had to say this, didn't I? I'd spent the whole morning repeating the words
cock
and
pussy
into a mirror, but my training had deserted me. "Pu… pu…" Oh God. I swallowed. "Pussy?"

"Mmmhmmm. What are you wearing?"

Ignoring the skin on skin sound from his end, I looked down at my baggy sweats and old t-shirt. "What's your favorite color?"

"Red. I like red."

"That's amazing," I said in a sultry voice. At least I hoped it was sultry. "Because at this very moment I'm wearing a red teddy with black stockings and red stiletto heels. Would you like to see me undress? Or would you rather play with me first?"

I shuffled through my notepad with notes I'd made on different 'sexy' things to say as the slap-slap-slapping sound continued.
All weekend I'd read books and watched porn to get ideas, making diligent notes that I hoped would save me in this call.

"I want you to suck my cock and leave a red ring of lipstick around my head while I finger you."

"Ooohhh I like that. Yes, your…"
come on, say something sexy,
"… your cock is huge, almost too big to fit into my mouth, but I'm really good at taking your cock deep, and I love to suck and lick while you play with my pussy."
Nailed it.
I made some noises of pleasure. "Oh, baby, your fingers feel good inside of me. Do you like how wet and warm and tight I feel?"

I remembered I wasn't supposed to ask so many questions, so I
read my notebook and jumped into my next 'acting' scene. "I bet you're dying to …" Oh crap. What the fuck did that say? I'd crossed out a word and scribbled something illegible on top. My second grade teacher always warned me my chicken scratch would get me into trouble, but I never imagined this. Come on, improvise. "I bet you're dying to shove your thick cock into me, aren't you? But first I want you to come in my mouth. I'm going to suck and lick and stoke you until you come hard."

"No! I want to feel your pussy first."

Flipping a page,
I transitioned to the next act. "Sure, baby. I bet you want to suck on my hard nipples while I straddle you. Let me just pull my panties to the side and rub my pussy against your cock. I'm so wet for you, and your cock feels so good rubbing me like that. Mmmmm… I want you inside of me."

He groaned and the slap
-slap-slapping sped up. I glanced at the clock. We'd only been on a few minutes. I was supposed to keep them on as long as possible but at this rate he'd be done in under five. What did the other girls talk about for so long?

I read from the page that said "strip tease
," trying to sound extemporaneous and sexy. "Now I'm stepping back. I want you to see me fully before you take me. I want to feel your hands all over me, before I feel you inside of me. I'm slipping off my teddy so you can see my big, round tits, so full and soft with hard nipples just for you."

We
burned a few more minutes, but he started to sound impatient, so I took it further. "I want to feel your cock now, baby. I'm bending over so you can slam me from behind. Spank my ass while you fuck me. Oh yeah, you like that don't you?" I slapped my arm to make the sound, like old time radio, and moaned some more. "Oh your cock is so big. Push deeper, yes, just like that, deeper. Oh God, I'm coming on your cock so hard. Oh God. Oh God!" I felt like Sally in
When Harry Met Sally
. "My pussy is so tight, so wet and tigh
t,
and it's gripping your cock in waves of contractions as you slam me harder and harder."

I could tell th
e moment he came, and then he hung up, just like that. Twenty minutes of pleasure and thenwha
m-
ba
m-
than
k-
yo
u-
ma'am, but without the thank you.

I studied an
d wasted time on Facebook, waiting for my next call. When it came, I wasn't as nervous. It was more of the same, and I got better at talking through the sex acts, trying to keep it 'fresh' throughout the rest of the night.

The next day I went to school red eyed and ti
red, but I'd made decent money and managed to eat a decent meal.

T
he next night, everything went to hell.

"What do you want me to call you?" I asked the
first guy on the line, as I polished my nails a new shade of purple (a gift from Bridgett
e—
"Just because you're poor, doesn't mean your nails should look it.")

"I'm Ash. What's your name, beautiful?"

My hand slipped, spreading nail polish across my fingers and part of my coffee table. This couldn't possibly be the same guy, could it? There had to be more than one Ash in the world.

I swallowed and stuck to my script, hoping this was a cosmically fucke
d-
up coincidence. "Call me Cat."

"
CAT? LIKE, THE
animal? What kind of name is that?" His husky voice had the same cadence as the Ashton Benjamin Davenport the Third I'd met at the library, and he asked me the same question I'd asked him. But people always sounded different on the phone, so it was hard to tell if it was really him. If it was, I hoped he had no idea I was the girl from the library.

"A nickname. But I can be anyone you want me to be, baby." I tried to sound sexy, but my voice caught at the end so I sounded like a frog croaking, which, in case anyone's wondering, is so not sexy.

"To be honest, Cat, I'm not sure who I want you to be. I've never done this before. How does this work? You talk dirty to me until I come?" He sounded so sincere.

"That's the idea. But I'll be honest. I'm new to thi
s,
too. Last night was my first night. So really, this can go however you want it to. Within reason." I couldn't believe I was telling him this, but what could it hurt? And it could lead to a longer conversation and more money for me. And honestly, the longer I didn't have to talk about pussies and cocks the better.

"Well, that's interesting. So how does a nice girl like you end up in a job like this?" He asked with the same cocky flirtation he'd had at the library, and right then I knew this was my Ash. No, not
my
Ash, I corrected myself, but the Ash I'd met.

"How do you know I'm a nice girl?" Nails all but forgotten, I sat back in my chair and twirled the old fashioned cord on my phone.

"I'm a good read of people, even on the phone. I can tell."

"Even good girls have to pay the bills," I said, with more honesty than was prudent under the circumstances.

"And this was your only option?"

"Something like that. But enough about me, what brought you to my line tonight?" I was genuinely curious. I'd just seen him a few days ago, and he didn't seem the type to need a phone sex operator to get off.

"A series of unfortunate events," he said. "My last relationship ended badly, and I haven't really dated since. My brother said I needed to get laid. I told him I wasn't interested in the kind of girl who would just go home with a stranger. He gave me this number and told me to ask for your extension."

I stood and paced my living room, thinking about what he'd said. "That's odd. I've only worked here two days. The number must have belonged to someone I replaced."

I could imagine him shrugging. "Maybe. I figured it was worth a shot. The kind of life I lead, I don't make a lot of real connections. I know this isn't real, that you're paid to play a part, but I figured it would beat a meaningless night hitting on drunk girls in a bar."

"I get that, I guess. I've never found the bar scene entirely appealing, myself." I relaxed back into my chair, my legs tucked under me, and pulled my throw blanket over my lap. "Too much slobber and stupidity. That's just not sexy to me."

"What do you find sexy, Cat?" His voice deepened, sending a shudder through me.

Resisting the urge to describe him, I hedged. "Kindness. Chivalry. A guy who would stop what he's doing to help an old lady across the street or get a kitten down from a tree for a little girl."

He laughed. "Bullshit. I call bullshit on that."

"Really? Because you know me so well?"

"I know women," he said with that same aggravating arrogance. "And you don't want nice. You want strong. You want a guy who will throw you on the bed, rip your clothes off and make you come in ways you've never come before. You want a man who will defend your honor and kick the shit out of anyone who tries to hurt you. You want an alpha male. All women do."

I balled my hand into a fist around the phone cord. "What you're describing sounds like a barbarian. Maybe some girls like that, but not me. I need a man who's smart and kind and good."

"I'll concede you probably also need that, but in addition to what I said, not to the exclusion of it. And if you don't believe me, then you've never had a man treat you properly. Or kiss you properly for that matter." Something clicked on his end, and I heard him drinking.

"I suppose this is where you're going to tell me that I need to be kissed, and often, and by someone who knows how?" I couldn't help but smile.

"Well, yes, if I wanted to quote Rhett Butler. He certainly knew how to go about things. Rich, a way with women, always coming out on top. A man after my own heart."

"Figures he'd be your idol," I said with a touch of scorn. "But I'm no Scarlett O'Hara, so don't get your hopes up."

He turned on music, and its familiarity surprised me.

"Is that
Philip Glass's
La Belle et La Bete
?" I asked.

I could almost hear the smile in his voice when he replied. "Yes. I'm impressed you recognize him. I saw him in concert once in LA a few years ago and was
blown away by his avant garde approach to opera and theater."

"He played at my school once, in undergrad. I used to study to him during finals."

"You aren't anything like what I expected, Cat." He sounded almost disappointed when he said that and I frowned.

"I'm sorry. I know you're paying by the minute and this isn't the sexiest conversation ever. I've broken a lot of rules in this conversation already, I think. We can start over, if you want. I do know how to do this, even if I'm new." It was hard to refocus my attention, to become Cat the seductress vers
us Catelyn the law student, but I didn't want him reporting me for being argumentative and pissing off a client, especially my first week.

"No, don't be sorry," he said with a sigh. "You're perfect. It's jus
t
… it's nothing. I've just had a long day, is all."

"What do you do for a living?" I asked, enjoying the anonymity of my position. I could finally find out some things about this mystery man I didn't dare ask in person for fear he'd think I was interested.

"I created a program that manages people's money for them, and in the process I made a lot of money myself." He said this like one might say they worked at McDonald's.

"So you're a hedge fund manager?" I raised an eyebrow, impressed despite myself.

"Yes. Again, you surprise me."

"My best friend's father does the same thing. Makes a shit ton of money and has a lot of f
ree time, from what I can tell." Thus her inability to understand why I just couldn't fix my situation with money.

"I keep my investors under
one hundred to avoid FCC regulations. Keeps things simpler. What did you study in school?"

His question threw me off guard. Would it occur to him that I was the same girl he'd run into if I told him the truth? "I have a double Bachelor's in Criminal Justice and Criminal Psychology with a minor in Political Science."
For all the good it's doing me.

"
That's an overachiever if ever I saw one. And I'll bet you're doing this to pay for grad school?"

"Yes."

"College is overrated," he said. "Everything you need to know you can learn in a library with a library card and a few dollars in overdue book fees."

"So now you're loosely quoting
Good Will Hunting
? How original you are," I said. "Must be all that book reading you've done."

He laughed. "I see I've irritated you again. Is this how you react to all your call-ins?"

No, normally I'm faking orgasms until they come and I can get back to studying.
"No, you're a special case. But if you'd like to talk dirty, we can do that, too. It's your money."

"Cat, I think I'm enjoying this more. But I've got an early meeting with investors tomorrow so I'm afraid I'll have to cut this short. I'll be calling back tomorrow, and in the meantime I challenge you to look up the most successful and wealthiest people in history and see how many of them had college degrees."

He hung up before I could reply, and I sat there staring at the phone, wanting to throw it at the wall. What an infuriating man. I didn't want him to call back. Maybe I wouldn't take his call when he did.

But when I looked at the clock and realized how long we'd talked, and how much money I'd made, I knew I'd be taking all of his calls. Damn biker brat. At least he didn't know my real identity, and I would never see him again in real life.

Which was a good thing.

At least that's what I told myself.