Free The Hotel 3 (The Billionaire Seduction) by Lola Darling Page B

is silence.
    “Hello?” I say. Another quiet beat. I’m about to
hang up when—
    “Um…hello?”
    The voice sounds quiet, feminine, definitely over the age of consent,
and too nervous to be a hooker. So far so good.
    “Well hello there.” It’s not my best line, but her
hesitation tells me she’s new at using the app, which means
I’ll have to take it slow so she doesn’t hang up before
the fun even gets started.
    “Hi,” she finally replies back. There’s an awkward
silence.
    Wow, we’re off to a great start.
    “So…” I say, trying to sound friendly. “What’s
your sign?”
    She laughs, and it sounds nice. Genuine, soft, real – the kind
of laugh that you don’t get in Hollywood too often. I laugh a
bit too.
    “Truthfully?” she says. “I’m…a
Scorpio.”
    “Oh really ,” I reply, drawing out the word,
insinuating this actually means something.
    “Why does everyone always say it like that? I don’t even
know what it means! It’s the sign of revenge, right? And
jealousy? But that’s not me at all.”
    “It’s also the sign of sex, death, and reinvention,”
I tell her. “You know, like rising from the ashes. Big emphasis
on the sex part, as it were.”
    “Oh.” She giggles nervously, and I can practically hear
her blushing over the phone. “That explains a lot, I guess.”
    “Does it, now?” I’m intrigued. “Explain it to
me. I’m all ears.”
    She huffs out a breath, exasperated. “That’s not what I
meant! I meant, it explains why people assume things about me, not
that I’m some kind of nympho or something. I mean, it’s
garbage, right? Nobody really believes in this stuff.” She
laughs again, and I can feel the warmth in it. Or maybe it’s
the drink, because at this point I’ve lost track of how many in
I am.
    “How very sensible of you,”
I say.
    “I don’t know if I’m sensible. I mean, I’m
talking to a stranger on a booty-call app.”
    “Booty-call app? I thought this was for ordering pizza.”
    She giggles again, letting her nerves out, and something about it
makes me smile.
    “Sorry, this is my first time using this. Have you done this
before?” she asks.
    “What? Spoken to a woman with an incredibly cute laugh? Sure.
Not that often, though.”
    “Haha! Very charming. But I meant used this app.”
    “A couple of times,” I say, figuring the white lie will
help increase her comfort level. “You? Any internet dating,
or—?”
    “Never. It’s not really my…thing. I guess you’d
say. This is pretty out of character for me.”
    “Oh yeah?” There’s just something so undeniably
appealing about breaking in an uninitiated new booty-caller, I’m
happy to listen to her talk about her lack of experience.
    “Yeah. I just saw something about it on TV and figured I’d
give it a shot.”
    “People still watch TV?” I tease.
    “Haha! Yeah…I dunno. It was kinda like…fate. The
timing was just a little too…perfect.” She sighs.
There’s clearly something upsetting her, and although normally
I’d do a 180 at the first sign of baggage in a woman, right now
it’s nice to know I’m not the only one having a rough
time.
    “So signs are garbage, but fate is a thing?”
    “Haha, I know. I’m a mess.” She tries to laugh
again, but I hear a tremor in her voice.
    “Maybe. Aren’t we all?”
    “I don’t know. You sound like you’ve got it all
figured out.”
    “Believe me, I really don’t.” For some reason,
being honest with her is coming to me easily. Partly it’s the
whiskey, but she’s just shown me her vulnerability, too.
Normally I’d put on my game face and flirt my way past anything
heavy, but with the anonymity of this app I can actually just
be…myself.
    “Oh yeah?” Her voice is genuinely curious, coaxing more
out of me. And I realize: I want to tell her more. Some part of me
needs this.
    “Yeah. Right now I’m all alone in a house that’s
bigger than the neighborhood I grew up in, I’ve drunk an entire
bottle of