Four Letters (Ariamella and Dane Stalling)

James Walker closed the personnel folder and sighed. This one was going to be a bitch. The girl had every warning flag of a pie in the sky idealistic journalism major fresh out of college, aiming to change the world. She was the last thing Alpha Magazine needed. Catherine in HR was going to get a chilly memo as soon as he was finished with the meet and dispatch. Catherine needed to get a glowing referral to Ms Mag as soon as possible. She had seemed like a good candidate when he hired her the previous year- willing and compliant. But the feminists had gotten to her. Her last three hires had been the same type- overbearing, conscientious, prickly women, intent on taking his magazine down.

“Hank, come in here,” he barked into his intercom.

Hank opened the glass door of James’s office. “Yeah Walk? What’s up?”

“Catherine has another hire on her way up for the ‘Women on Sex’ column. Do you still have that article list you guys had on the spec board a couple of months ago?”

Hank nodded. “It’s still on the board. Are you sure?”

Walker nodded. “It’s time to send a message. This isn’t a politically correct publication. We want Alpha in a plastic wrapper on the top shelf, but not behind the counter with the porn mags. We can’t do that if our woman expert keeps trying to get our readers to stop looking at our own photo features.”

Hank shrugged. “I could write the column myself again, like when we started.”

Walker shook his head. “If we got busted on that the whole publication goes down the shithole. I wish Catherine would send us a girl who would do just what I say.”

Hank grinned. “When would she have time to write, Walk?”

“Get out of here, you bastard,” Walk said, but without heat.

A few minutes later, Walker’s email bipped. The list from Hank. He remembered the guys rattling the themes off over the poker table between hands of Texas Hold ‘em as he read them off the screen. “One night stand,” “BDSM,” “Seduction,” “Infidelity.”

They were the poison assignments- the ones that would weed out the serious feminist journalists and guarantee someone much easier to handle. Someone who wouldn't rock the boat.

There was a rap on his door. He didn’t look up, but he knew it must be her. “Come in,” he said, his eyes glued to his computer screen. “Sit.”

Ding!

A young woman checked her phone for the third or fourth time as elevator doors opened to the forty-second floor of the Bellamy-Daniels Publications building. 7:50 AM. She frowned to herself as she slipped the device into the front pocket of her purse, stepping out of the congested small space and out to the spacious area of the wide hallway. Her chocolate eyes flicked upwards to the large logo that was the sole decoration on the wall in front of her, reading the word "Alpha" in bold, capital letters. It annoyed her to cut it so close to 8 AM, but she hadn't anticipated the Monday morning rush to be so hectic, and on top of that, she had to obtain a guest ID at the building lobby because her personal badge to enter the building - not to mention the doors of the magazine office itself - hadn't been issued to her yet. That alone had eaten up fifteen minutes of precious time; time that could have been spent settling down at her new job, or getting a macchiato from the Starbucks that was conveniently located on first floor for all her caffeinated pleasure. She walked down the hallway to the left and raised the ID up to the frosted glass doors of the office, waiting just a second for the 'click' of the doors to unlock before she swung one wide open.

The inside lobby was a pristine white with modern decor that seemed to strike the perfect balance between masculinity and fashionable taste. A perfectly made-up blonde receptionist looked up from her furious typing, flipping a section of golden curls behind her as she eyed the female who had entered the room. While other women might have withered underneath the clear judgmental appraisal, the young woman returned the receptionist's cool gaze with one of her own. She had already encountered that type of woman enough to know that she never actually cared what they thought of her. After all, they were just front-desk ladies, and she was someone of actual importance. At least, that's what she thought privately to herself. She stepped forward, a flash of annoyance running through her once more as she realized it would most likely take more time to check her in.

"Marisa Demmings," she said smoothly, placing the ID on the white surface and nudging it forward.

"Do you have an appointment this morning, ma'am?" the blonde asked in return, a fake smile plastered on her face.

"I'm a new employee here."

"Oh. Well if you'll wait just a moment, I'll get everything ready for you." The receptionist waved toward the sofas to the right and picked up a phone in her other hand, making the dismissal clear as daylight.

Marisa opted not to sit and instead took a step to the side, pulling out a small stack of personal documents that held her resumé and personal research on Alpha magazine. She looked to the wall behind the blonde's head, inspecting the same black magazine logo. Briefly she questioned, not for the first time, why she had taken the job. It wasn't that Alpha was an undesirable first career opportunity; the magazine was a top contender in sales, on par and in the big leagues with the likes of GQ and Esquire despite being rather young, only having been in publication for 30 years or so. In fact, Alpha had really only taken off within the past seven years under the direction of James Walker, a man who was known in the publishing world for his creative brilliance and avant-garde approach to the magazine. Marisa figured the popularity and success partially came from his young age. It put him within the age range of primary readership, and it was likely that he knew exactly what men wanted to see in the magazine.

But in spite of all its success, she still had hang-ups about joining the team. When she had initially applied for different positions within Bellamy-Daniels, her expectation hadn't been to get a call back from Alpha, but rather the magazine that sat just one floor above: Allette, one of the leading women's magazines. She had interned for teenAllette the summer after her senior year of college, and along with some other internships and important journalism accomplishments, it decorated her resumé quite nicely for someone who was a fresh graduate. Well, technically she had received a call from Allette, but not for the journalism position she desired. Nancy from HR had called her about an interview for the editor-in-chief's senior assistant position, which was supposedly a large step for someone who hadn't even been a junior assistant. Alpha, on the other hand, had called her for a journalism position, though it was to join their 'Women' department as the 'women on sex' opinion columnist. It wasn't exactly a topic that she thought would let all her skill shine through, but it was something rather than nothing, and it definitely paid more than the $35,000 yearly salary of being a Starbucks runner and schedule organizer for Heidi Steele, some fifty-something year-old woman who was rumored to be a bitch to all her assistants. Marisa wasn't stupid, and given her connections and careful research for all potential job opportunities, the choice between James Walker and Heidi hadn't been much of a choice at all.

The auburn-haired young women checked her phone once more just as a different voice called out her name. 7:54. Good. She looked up to see another blonde, a friendlier looking one, smiling as she stood in the entrance of another set of frosted glass doors that led to the rest of the office. "Ms. Demmings? Welcome. My name is Andrea, assistant to James Walker. My apologies on the the wait and the ID. It'll be ready by the end of the day, so I'll have it sent to you before you leave." She led Marisa though the office, stopping at various points to give items to different employees. Envelopes, documents, a five dollar bill; all while keeping up her introduction speech. "Catherine - the one you had met for your interview - is sending you to Mr. Walker, where you'll get a more formal introduction and exactly what it is that you're assigned to do."

Andrea stopped outside a room larger than that of the rest of the floor. The doors was made of the same frosted glass, and the entire front wall consisted of floor-to-ceiling glass panes, though they had been dimmed and were impossible to see through. "Right through the door," the blonde said, motioning forward before retreating back to her desk out in the hall.

Without further hesitation, Marisa knocked twice on the glass, hearing a "Come in," from within the room before she was even able to lower her arm, and she grasped the handle and turned it, entering the room just as the same voice said, "Sit."

It was rare that she ever was surprised at the things she encountered in the professional world, but James Walker was one of those exceptions. He was young - maybe 40? Not even? In any case, the girl walked forward and gracefully sat in one of the black chairs placed in front of his desk, crossing her legs and placing her bag just to the left of her feet. She sat still with a professional smile on her face, knowing it was appropriate to let him extend his arm for the handshake first as he was her boss. Well, her boss's boss's boss. There was still the department editor and executive editor to answer to.

James still had his eyes on the screen. He hit the print button and looked up. It was a full ten heartbeats before he could say anything.

The others had been plain by choice. He expected no different today. A very intelligent, very angry, aggressively plain woman. In fact, he wouldn't have been surprised to see one of the last two columnists in front of him. What he didn't expect was this Marisa looking good enough to walk right into a modeling shoot on the forty first floor. The color of her hair was striking. Auburn dye jobs were a dime a dozen in the city and they were all trying- and failing- to look like Marisa.

Walker had asked Catherine to include photographs of job applicants, but she said she couldn't require that because it could cause unfair hiring practices. He hated it when she was right.

He smiled, stood and reached over his desk to shake her hand. "You have a very impressive resume and a little bird tells me Heidi had her sights on you too. I have to say I'm pleased that you're in front of my desk instead of hers."

He pulled the paper out of the printer and looked at it for a moment, wondering if he really needed to dump this particular set of jobs on this particular woman right now. With her qualifications, she could just walk upstairs to Allette... or downstairs to Marc Taylor's studio to get another job if she didn't like it here. The magazine needed a loyal writer in the position, though, and he couldn't think of a better way to test that loyalty.

"All right. You understand that you will be writing the Women on Sex column." Walker steepled his hands. "I'm not under any illusions that what we do is journalism. What we do is entertainment that looks like journalism. That doesn't mean that we don't check our facts and get our stories as right as we can, but this isn't a newspaper. Your column is among our most popular, both in the print edition and on alphazine.com. Smart men know that they don't understand women very well. They have questions they can't ask their wives or girlfriends... or their mothers. Your job is to try to get into our readers' heads, anticipate their questions, and answer them in your column."

He took a breath and let it out, then he handed her the paper.

"Here are the first four columns you'll write for us. After that, you'll be expected to come up with topics on your own and run them through the editorial team. You'll report directly to Hank, our Executive Editor. I'll introduce you when we're done here."

Walker found that he was reluctant to cut the interview short like he had intended earlier.

"Let me tell you a little about why we want to do these particular stories now. One of our competitors, Player Magazine, ran a series a little bit like this, with one big difference. They used one of their staff writers, a man under a female pseudonym, who plagiarized heavily from online erotic stories written by amateur writers. One of the writers recognized his own writing in the magazine and ran it back through the site, which sued the magazine for copyright infringement on behalf of not one, but fifteen different writers. The idea was a good one, but they took a shortcut and ended up folding and liquidating to pay off the suit. I want these stories done right. They have to be forthright, honest, believable, and they have to kick so much ass nobody will want to compete."

He put his hand on her personnel file. "If I'm reading this right, you could be the right person to do this job. If you aren't... well, Heidi likes her nonfat decaf lattes served at exactly 175 degrees. Do you have any questions?"

The young woman arched an eyebrow as she skimmed over the paper, flicking her hazel eyes between it and the man who had given it to her, while he relayed the story behind the series of articles. She eyed the headings of each section carefully, not bothering to read over the more elaborate details written within the assignments, and finally placed the page on top of the slim document bag on her lap.

As an intern for teenAllette, she had often been passed around each team and given the opportunity to observe and edit for different subjects and topics. More than once she had found herself sitting in front of stacks of potential articles for their 'love and relationship' section. They, of course, weren't explicitly about sex, but she had been able to gain insight on what it meant to write about the desires of men and women. She figured writing for Alpha would be no different, but as she stared at the four bolded subjects, she found herself suddenly questioning how she would accomplish such a task.

Marisa looked up at James as he finished his speech on the background of her assignment, reciprocating the same easy smile that he gave her. A part of her agreed with him, pleased that she had turned up in front of his desk instead of Heidi Steele's, although there were definitely more reasons than just one as to why she appreciated her new job...

"I do have a question, or maybe a couple of them," she said, still maintaining the eye contact. "These subjects are certainly very interesting, but I was wondering what angle you wanted me to take when writing about them?"

Entertainment journalism was almost an entirely different field in itself. Those who had perfected the art had all the writing skill to publish an academic paper, but also the personality and creativity of any fiction novelist. The combination of the two was what really made opinion columnists popular, no matter what the topic was; fashion, music, sports, or even sex.

Marisa's hand's gestured down to the paper in her lap, and she glanced downward at the first item on the list. "Take... One night stands. Or casual encounters, casual sex; whatever sounds best. Men and women obviously hold different opinions on that particular subject, but I'm the one writing my opinion of it. Do I write about what women think of it, whatever that may be, or my own personal thoughts on it? Should I write about how women would like men to go about it? Or I could just write about how fun some women find it to be."

One side of her lips turned up in a half-smirk, the action serving as borderline inappropriate commentary about the subject at hand. But, like all other aspects of Marisa's bold nature, it was arguable that it only added to her charm and charisma.

Walker flashed the half-grin back at her. She hadn't so much as blinked at the assignments. Not only that, she was already working on a plan of attack. He was impressed. He realized that she wasn't going to bolt and she wasn't going to bitch. She was going to try to knock the ball out of the park and that changed things for her, for him, for the whole damn magazine.

"I have a particular luxury, Ms. Demmings," he said, standing up and walking over to the window that looked down on South Grand. "I am my own demographic. You'd be surprised how many editors in chief are making magazines that aren't their cup of tea. Our audience is me, men who want the same things I want, who see the world more or less like I do. It makes editorial decisions easy except for one thing. I also like to be surprised. Our readers like to be surprised."

"I could write those opinion pieces myself if I just wanted information in the magazine. Hell, I could have Hank write them. He wrote them for the first three issues before we could afford to hire a woman to do them for us. You have an extremely important piece of anatomy that I don't have. You have a brain that isn't mine, and based on your file, it's an excellent one. I can't tell you specifically how to approach those columns. I want you to surprise me, but I can tell you what will blow the lid off of the column, not just for Alpha, but for the entire men's magazine industry- Vulnerability. If you expose yourself in those words, honestly, pulling no punches, it would be absolutely revolutionary."

He went to a cabinet that had a small refrigerator and took out two chilled bottles of water. He handed one to Marisa and cracked the other one and took a sip. He sat in his chair and pointed his chin toward the main office. "The writing staff is excellent here, but we write about other people. Every opinion is safely at one remove from the writer. Every emotion is someone else's. Even the cheesecake photos, as high class as they are, are not real. Models are just as much actors as our writing staff, and then we Photoshop them to make them even less real. You could write the column like that, starting with 'Every woman is different, but on balance, they'll tell you...' and blah blah blah. The sad thing is that it would work. You could make it a compelling piece just like that. But if you write the piece naked- emotionally naked- two things will happen. You will jump our subscriptions by four, maybe five percent, and you will earn exclusive bragging rights for having the biggest balls in the office."

Walker grinned crookedly. "Maybe that's not what you're looking for, but there's a treasure trove of information right outside these doors. That staff out there will help you get anything you need once you have their respect, and I mean anything.

He was handing her the keys to the kingdom, and he wasn't sure why. She was hot, but this was Alpha. Hot was everywhere and Walker got more than his fair share of card keys for hotel rooms slipped into his mailbox, or even his car when he left the windows cracked. If you were trying to sleep your way to the top, well, he was the top. But that game didn't appeal any more. Not for a long time. He had Andrea return the card keys to the hotels along with a few complimentary copies of the current edition for their lobbies.

His instinct told him that Marisa understood the goal of the magazine at some subsurface level. While the gossip mags admired his "singular vision," he knew that was exactly what he didn't need. Too many publications had become ingrown failures because of singular vision. He needed to cultivate diversity, but diversity with the understood goal of making the magazine great.

Walker buzzed Hank and leaned over his desk toward Marisa, his voice low. "Don't tell me what you're doing. I want to see it for the first time in the proofs. I want to be surprised. I'll know things are on track if I see Hank sweating bullets, trying to run things by me. Understand?"

The door opened and Hank stepped in. He saw Marisa and straightened his tie.

"Hank, this is Marisa Demmings, she's taking Claudette's place on Women and Sex. Can you get her set up with a desk and a laptop? Oh- and tell her about how the Red Paper Source works. I think she's going to need it."

"Sure thing. Should I get a headshot of her for the byline?"

Walker shrugged. "It's her column. Ask her." He smiled at Marisa and almost winked.

"Really?" Hank looked at Marisa and back at Walker like he'd lost his mind. "I mean, sure thing, Walk. Whatever you say."

Hank waved for Marisa to follow him. The noise level jumped as they entered the open space of the main office. A dozen telephone conversations were going on at once, and several clusters of people were deep in conversation. "The IT girls have Macs, PCs, and Linux laptops in the inventory." He pointed at an empty desk in the corner next to a floor to ceiling window that looked out on the high rises surrounding the building.

"That one's yours unless you're scared of heights."

Marisa's eyes followed the editor-in-chief as he stood, amused and thinking to herself that James Walker was in a class all on his own. Maybe for the reasons that he stated, sure, but also because he was much more than that. He not only shared common interest with the kind of men who read Alpha, but rather, he was their interest. He earned what they didn't and possessed what they didn't. He probably even ate what they didn't and spent money in ways they could only imagine. No, she thought, James Walker was part of an entirely different demographic. He was part of a group that didn't follow standards just because some magazine told him to do so; he made the standards, set them, solidified them, and was a walking definition of them. Briefly she wondered how he had gotten to such a point being so young, but upon second thought decided it didn't matter. The point was that he had made it, and she wanted to know how.

She saw herself in him, or maybe it was that she could one day see herself in his position ━ powerful and one of the top players in the field. Marisa prided herself in her intelligence even if she didn't blatantly flaunt it and show it off. That much was obvious, especially after James had stroked her ego with his compliments. Like a peacock fanning its tail feathers, she sat up straight and gladly took the bottle of water from his grasp, the easy, wide smile on her face revealing a dimple on her left cheek.

He was almost right in guessing what she wanted. While being labeled 'mvp' of the magazine and having the full support of her fellow staff members was certainly appealing, what she was looking for was a career-launching opportunity to get her foot in the door, so to speak, of the business world. What she craved was a shot to let her shine through the rest of the hopefuls. She wanted presence.

And for the first time since she had last met with Catherine, she felt as is Alpha was handing that opportunity to her on a golden platter.

Of course, she still had her doubts about it all being right for her. When Marisa had graduated from UCLA last spring, she'd expected her first internship to be with the LA Times or even a smaller newspaper where she could cultivate her reporting and production skills. But it had been the magazine publishers and media businesses who'd made the first offers. Not that it surprised her. It was Los Angeles, and what else could she expect? The city was filled with as many beautiful people as there were brilliant people, and the ones who were graced with both tended to be snatched up rather quickly by the employers who liked every aspect of their employees to be immaculate, from the work they did to the clothes they wore. It wasn't that working at places like Allette and Alpha were beneath her, but it wasn't typically the places she had imagined herself working at in the long run. But, she reminded herself, once she had connections and the ability to boast a few years at one of the top international magazines, only then could she be picky with the jobs she accepted.

Her mind snapped itself out of idle thoughts as James leaned over his desk, and she caught his last words: "I'll know things are on track if I see Hank sweating bullets, trying to run things by me. Understand?"

"Crystal clear," she replied smoothly, genuine with her words. No matter what the assignment was, a job was a job, and she fully intended to carry it out correctly.

The door opened and a man stepped in ━ Hank, James had called him ━ who took her away and and through the office. She garnered looks as she walked through the maze of desks, and she knew it. A little peek out of the eye here, a discreet turn of the head there, and the slight nudge of one man's arm to another as he pointed her out. This was the kind of attention that she drew, not because she was an attractive female. Those were everywhere, and one could walk in the nearest office in downtown LA or walk through the red light district of Hollywood Boulevard and pick one up. What set Marisa apart the way she carried herself, the way she walked confidently behind Hank, and the way she kept a slight smirk on her face that was impossible to tell whether it was because she was about to smile or if it was because she had a permanent resting bitch face.

And that tiny smile broke out into a full grin when Hank stopped her in a cozy corner of the office that offered a view of the city. "It's perfect," she admitted, laughing slightly at his joke. "I love natural light. And a Mac would be great, thanks."

Marisa walked leisurely around the L-shaped desk, heels making quiet taps against the hard carpeted floors, and she placed her bags on the light-colored wood.

"About that byline... Could we hold out on it for now? I few ideas running around in my head about how I want to write this column, and if I'm going to make it stripped and emotionally impactive as Mr. Walker seems to want it... Well, to put it plainly, I'm toying around with the thought of it being anonymous, you know? Instead of coming from me, those words could be from the everyday woman. It makes it applicable to anyone and everyone. Entertainment and journalism, right?"

Hazel eyes flicked up to look at Hank's own pair, and Marisa flashed him the same smirk that she had with James. "What do you think?"

"Well," Hank said, considering, "I hadn't realized Walk had said all that. Maybe making the byline anonymous would be a lot safer, you know, given the nature of the articles. We had to get a restraining order once because Andrea picked up a deranged fan. He was sending her fingernails and hair clippings and stuff."

He was dialing his phone as he talked. "Excuse me," he said to Marisa, then, "Yeah, China, can you get a couple of Airs out of stock and bring them to Claudette's old desk? Bring the 11 and the 13. Thanks."

"The Red Paper Source is a way we share leads anonymously within the office," Hank said, "You can ask someone where the best steak in town is with no problem, but if you want to find out where to find a heroin dealer for a story or for background, who do you ask? Somebody in this room knows or knows someone who knows. I'll show you." He stood up and faced the room. "Hey, anyone knows where to buy heroin, give me a red paper on it."

The conversations lulled a little and a few people looked up, but it didn't seem to surprise anyone.

"It'll take a few hours. The hallway over there leads to the restrooms and there's a bulletin board around the corner with a counter under it. There's a bunch of red strips of paper there. Someone will grab one on their way to the bathroom and put the information I need on it and stick it to the bulletin board. We do all kinds of stories, so people are used to hearing about how to find prostitutes, who to call for a hit man, how to hack email passwords, how to steal identities, who sells explosives within ten miles of here. Anything, really. The system works pretty well. It protects the in-office source, but we can share ticklish stuff if we have to. It saves a lot of research time."

A young Asian woman walked in then with a couple of flat Apple Computer boxes. She set them down on the desk. "Hey, I'm China," she said, holding out her hand, "I work in IT with Megan. China's my nickname because I'm so delicate."

She looked like she could chew nails.

A young man with a loose tie walked in and handed Hank a sheet of paper. Hank's aw-shucks demeanor fell away as he read the copy.

"No good," he said, "Shit, don't they teach active voice at UCLA any more?"

He handed the sheet to China. "Can you help Jamie with this- he's got seven passive verbs, two dangling participles, and damned if he didn't manage to typo the word 'typo.' Never bring me copy again until she says you can."

China smiled sweetly at him. "Your ass is mine, you pretty, pretty intern."

Jamie muttered "Grammar Nazi" under his breath and China punched him.

"He's fucking Grammar Attila the Hun, man," she said, "don't make him small."

Hank smiled as he watched them go. "The IT staff realized the writers wouldn't read their training materials if the writing was bad, so they traded skills. One of the editors taught them good writing and they taught him how to find out if his son was using porn on his home computer. China is actually one of our tightest proofreaders now, but she likes keeping the equipment running."

"All right, then, That's about it for me. My desk is over in the other corner. Holler if you need anything." He turned to go, then turned back. "I'm glad you've decided to go anonymous on those pieces. I just feel a lot more comfortable with it that way."

Marisa almost rolled her eyes at Hank's departing comment, getting the distinct feeling that he wasn't behind the whole idea of writing on such risqué topics as James was. Well it worked out perfectly, because she doubted a serious news center would consider her if they popped her name into Google only to discover that she was writing columns on doing the naughty. Not only writing about it, but all the intimate details involved with it; what woman liked in men, what they liked in bed, and maybe even a "10 Sexy Things You Didn't Know About Sex!" piece. While her friends would find it hilarious and maybe a little bit hot (her roommate already wanted all the raunchy details that came with writing about sex), she could only imagine what future employers would think when she wrote about the juicy pros and cons of bondage, or even cheating.

A hint of a smile tugged at one side of her face, and she sat to set up her laptop. It wasn't long before a voice interrupted her out of her thoughts, and she lifted her head to see an impeccably dressed man's beaming face looking down at her.

"Going with the 13? Well, not that I should be surprised. I know how you women like it. 'The bigger the better', right?" A wicked grin lit up his face before he gently nudged her shoulder with a half-made fist, and Marisa gave him a look that said, 'that's real funny but get out'.

"What, no 'size matters' jokes? ...Oh, don't give me that look, honey. I couldn't make a move on you even if I wanted to. I don't exactly play for your team, you know?" He chuckled quietly at his own joke before continuing the introductions. "I'm Christian, the style director for Alpha. I choose the clothing for our models, and help with artistic direction of the covers. I'd ask who you are, but I think everyone's got that figured out already."

"Do they now," Marisa answered, eyes sparkling with the same playfulness that he was giving her. "I'm Marisa, the new columnist for ━"

"Women on Sex, I know. A change from the last couple of girls we had writing for us. If you have time, or if you're curious, go ask Hank about them. They were... interesting."

"I'm pretty sure they have to be, with the stuff that Mr. Walker has in mind." She pulled out the paper from underneath her stack of files, flashing it towards him. "First item? One night stands. I don't even know where to start with my prelim searches."

"Well, hon, you could start by calling Walker as 'Walker.' Or James, or... something. Around here, 'Mr. Walker' is reserved for all the lucky ladies who get to meet him and, you know, attempt to get a little luckier. Or it's for people like Andrea, who have to call him that in front of guests and are probably still hoping to get something." Christian's voice dropped almost conspiratorially, his eyes amused as he appraised the new employee up and down. "Second, look around you, Marisa. If you want one night stands ━ or whatever ━ you're looking at a whole bunch of them just walking around. It's Alpha. Tried Red sourcing it yet?"

Marisa laughed. "Noted, to the first thing. And god no! I'm not going to just up and announce that I want to talk casual sex on my first day. Besides, I kind of want to... settle in first. To make sure I know where I'm headed with this first series."

Christian looked at her with the same curious smile and raised an eyebrow over his circular glasses. "You can always put up an ad in the Casual Encounters section of Craigslist if you want, but chances are your best bet is to start within this office. There's always the IM system if you want to make your notice a little more discreet."

A look of surprise crossed Marisa's features. "Won't that raise a red flag? The whole 'sexual talk in the office' thing is supposed to be off-limits."

"So, this is Alpha. We write about style, sexy women, and yes, even sex. No red flags there." He winked at her and sauntered away, quickly starting up conversation with one of the passing men.

Two hours had gone by, and Marisa's laptop screen sat empty at her desk. Countless doodles on a notepad lay on her right side, and she sighed. Thinking of how to even begin the articles and tie them together had been a challenge in and of itself, but at least she had some sort of idea. Maybe, she thought to herself, Maybe I have an idea... In order to pull it off, she'd be limited to interviewing men from the office, but they had to know something, right? It was worth a shot, and if she didn't get what she needed, she always had time to change her plan of attack. Marisa had always been a 'high risk, high reward' kind of person, and one difficult little topic wasn't going to change that. Quickly, she pulled up the minimized instant messenger window and typed a message that was sent to everyone in office:


Only just about a minute later, a separate chat window popped up.


An easy smile turned up the corners of Marisa's lips. Good. Now, she just had to wait.

Cameron Montri came into the office at three o'clock and threw his black leather jacket across the back of his chair and set his double espresso on his desk. He stood in front of his computer and tapped a few keys, watched the IM chatter history for the day go by. He was about to grab an apple from the break room when something caught his eye.

"What the hell?" He looked up and scanned the office for the new face. She was against the glass, staring out the window. He read the IM again. I need someone to talk casual sex. He shook his head and walked to the men's room. He picked up a red strip of paper on the way. He went in a stall and wrote in bold letters:

Talk about casual sex? Lame. Cole's at 7:00. I'll find you.

He pinned the strip up on top of a few others that had accumulated during the day and went to get his apple.

The best part about reviewing bars was reviewing bars. The bad part was that Walker wanted something nobody else in the business did. He wanted not only drink, atmosphere, and service scores on the bars, he wanted a hookup percentage. They didn't call it that in the mag, of course. It was expressed as a "Lucky Score" but what it meant practically was that Cameron had to stay in a bar from nine until closing, stay sober, and do a rough count of the men who came in alone and left not alone. Those nights he went home alone. It wasn't science, but people seemed to eat it up. Some bars were even using his score in their newspaper advertising. He typed another email to Hank asking for an intern to do the damn counting.

Cole's was on rotation for a yearly review. It was consistently in his top ten list and they had a new mixologist that was killing it. Cameron expected that it probably would go up a rank or two this year.

He sat back in his chair and watched Marisa from across the office. She was a stunning beauty, and she must have known her shit because Walker hired without photographs. Cameron had heard him complain about it good-naturedly at staff meetings. "How are we going to avoid a harassment lawsuit if I keep hiring beautiful women?" he'd said. Andrea had come back at him like a whip, "My victims are too afraid to press charges," she said, deadpan, and deliberately adjusted her bra.

Marisa wasn't his type exactly, he defaulted to Indian and East Asian girls, but he was pretty much brand-agnostic. Beauty was beauty and for him that covered a lot of territory. Alcohol, though, was a different story. He had put bars out of business with his column. His mother had called him from Phnom Penh when the owner of a bar threatened to kill him in a newspaper interview following the fatal review. "Don't you feel bad putting hard-working people out on the street?" she had asked him. "Mom," he had said, "If they had been hard-working, they'd still be in business." Anybody who didn't respect their profession didn't deserve to be in it- and that applied to journalists as well as barkeeps.

Cole's had a 55% lucky score, but he figured his chances tonight were one in five. Maybe.

It was definite, Marisa thought, that the worst part of any job was the first-day acclimation of getting used to... everything. Literally, figuratively, mentally, emotionally ━ the thing was a chore, and it was one that she despised. It meant she had to be attentive to every little thing that went on around her, and while that wasn't necessarily bad or tiresome, it was just worrisome if she she picked up on something that was actually false. After Christian had come around, she figured he was the office gossip, the one who you came to if you wanted to know something about someone. Practically anything about anyone.

But as it turned out, the true gossip was Andrea and the other girl that worked with her just outside James Walker's office. She hadn't heard them talk maliciously about anybody in the times she had walked by, but she saw that people came to them for information both work-related and not. Marisa had spent enough time in offices filled with alpha females to know which ones were really on top, and just because they had the title of "Assistant" under their name didn't necessarily mean they were out of the running of being one of those hidden office lionesses.

And she knew it, that she and Andrea would get along just fine.

Marisa wasn't anything close to the type to engage in office talk and the juicy little tidbits that came along with it. Knowing where to get it was what made women like Andrea important. They wouldn't just share that information with just anyone, and she suspected Andrea wouldn't just blabber it off just because she asked for it. Yet, Marisa knew with what she had in mind for the series of articles, she'd need the dirt on a few of the men walking around. Not horrifyingly disgusting announcements of all their sexual endeavors, but just the minor things like how they flirted, or the small details that floated around about how good they were in bed. Of course, she wouldn't actually need those details until after she had chosen the right man for each article.

And this was where the young woman excelled in her line of work. Choosing which people to interview, especially on anonymous leads, was a difficult task but one that she had remarkable intuition for. There was no way to get to all of them in that first night, and it would have been a stupid decision to even want to get through all of them. She had no doubts in her mind that some of those people who were going to put up red slips of paper were going to prove to be completely useless for what she needed. It was a harsh thought, but one that was entirely realistic, and if a journalist didn't possess that kind of mind, then they were shit out of luck when it came to discerning between good leads from the bad. She knew there was going to be bad, and lots of it.

So when five o'clock came around and many of the employees who had began their day early started trickling out, Marisa walked over to the bulletin board by the restrooms to pick up whatever slips had been left for her. Her eyes scanned the board to the first group, fingers raised in gesture to unpin them, when she froze. A bright grin made its way onto her face at the first line she saw.

Heroin? Dude that's easy...

Ooh, okay. Obviously not her group of slips. Her attention turned to the second group of slips, all pinned up haphazardly on the board, and she quickly took them down to read them at her desk. The first few were unpromising and unimpressive; she was about to swipe them away when one in particular caught her eye...

Talk about casual sex? Lame. Cole's at 7:00. I'll find you.

This was it. Marisa smiled to herself. The others had been filled with phone numbers, questions, comments about casual sex that bordered on being douchey, but this... whoever had written it was the real deal. It had the confident, flirty flare of a guy who was looking to pick someone up, and this was exactly what she wanted. 7:00 couldn't come any sooner.

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Marisa arrived at 6:50 just out of habit for being 10 minutes early, and she took a seat at the bar. How long had it been since she'd stepped foot in here? The place was almost iconic for her, having been the place of poison when her friend's dragged her out for a night in the city on her twenty-first birthday. A hint of a smirk crossed her face. Speaking of one night stands... Well, she hadn't gone home with the guy after after Cole's, but he'd followed them to a club, then she was brought home. That was an experience all on its own. She wasn't really a casual sex kind of person, but as far as those things went, she could remember the sex was bad. At least, definitely not good. Hopefully whoever wanted to meet her tonight was someone that walked the walk as easily as he talked the talk.

Cameron sat in the back corner of Cole's, his little laptop in front of him, the screen brightness turned almost all the way down. He was doing the initial write-up for the bar. He'd written the same things over and over about Coles, and the words just appeared on the screen. He hardly had to think about them. "Cole's is the oldest bar in Los Angeles, and I have to say, it's looking pretty good for being 99 years. They were serving whisky here before my great grandmother was old enough to drink." It was all just a run up to the real review- the beer and wine selections, the cocktails, the food. The bar was always busy, and most of the people there now were getting dinner. Later the atmosphere would get louder, looser.

He grinned when he saw Marisa come in. Cameron was struck with the easy smoothness of her walk. She wore heels, but she may as well have been barefoot. She moved with confident grace.

It was pretty early for a pickup, but Cameron saw a few of the regular predators lock on. The first guy clearly had a strike while the iron is hot philosophy and slid onto a stool next to her before the door had even finished swinging shut. He leaned in and stroked her hair, touched her shoulder. Cameron wished he could hear that conversation. He wanted to know what her turn down style was like. Would she say she was meeting someone, or would she go for a withering takedown?

Whatever it was, it worked, and fast. The guy retreated to the far end of the bar and ordered a double of something.

She was irresistible- long legs under a dress that ended at mid-thigh. She lit up the whole bar. The next guy was a little smoother. He stood, a stool between him and her, hoping not to spook her, but still making a claim. He looked at his own hands a lot when he talked.

Cameron caught Brent's eye behind the bar and ordered a turkey dip and a prime rib dip. He got a couple of beers too, a Belgian Hefeweisen and a local Stout. He put his laptop into a weathered leather satchel and waited for the antique clock over the bar to nudge over to 7:00.

The guy was still standing there, talking, when Cameron leaned on the bar on Marisa's other side.

"You were looking for casual sex," he said, smiling at her, "I can help you with that." He nodded toward his corner table, turned and went back to his booth and sat down. The sandwiches hadn't arrived yet, but two beers sat sweating on the table, one cloudy gold, one almost black.

". . . haha, yeah, not that it wasn't right or anything, but- but . . ."

The sandy haired man in front of her trailed off some story about work when he heard Cameron's words, gluing his eyes to his hands for what seemed like the thousandth time. He wasn't bad looking. In fact, plenty of women would even say he was attractive, but his reserved, almost shy nature was something to get used to. He was interesting to talk to though, and even when Marisa could tell he wanted something from her, she didn't really mind it. Not really.

Really? Marisa thought, blinking once, eyes widening before she glanced up at the ceiling in an obvious eye roll. She watched the Asian man retreating back to his booth. He was somewhere in between Guy #1 and Guy #2, tactful enough to keep his distance but forward enough to throw the bone out and say something so crass. Yet she found herself intrigued, curiosity spiking up even more once she realized: haven't I seen him before? But of course she'd had to have seen him before. Duh. The red paper slips came from people in the office. He might have been fuzzy, and she didn't know his name, but at least he was recognizable.

"You know what, um . . ." she said, turning back to Guy Number 2. What was his name again? Nick? Neil? Oh, Nate. "Nate. I would love to finish this conversation, but right now I need to talk to my, um, friend . . . coworker." She felt bad about abandoning him, especially because he was nothing like the first man, so she dug out a pen and a pad of sticky notes, scribbled her number on the top square, then peeled it off and handed it to him. "Call me," she murmured with a smile before slipping away to the booth.

"Really?" Marisa asked with a hint of sarcasm, slightly raising an eyebrow at Cameron. She stood staring at him, letting her eyes drop down his body and back up to his face before flashing him a grin. "I was starting to think that whoever wrote me the slip didn't have enough balls to actually do something like that, but congratulations, you proved me wrong."

She slid in across from him just as the sandwiches came, and another smirk lit up her face. "Dinner? I didn't realize this was a date." The teasing was lighthearted, but after the first guy who approached her, the attitude running through her was pushing record highs. At least Cameron didn't do what that asshole did and touch her. She liked compliments and open appreciation -- it didn't take much to flatter her -- but there were definitely lines that weren't meant to be crossed upon a first meeting, and creepily touching others was one of them. There were also so many guys like him walking around the streets of LA (or anywhere really) that the 'I'm such a stud' approach hardly worked anymore. Good looks weren't the only prerequisite for sex when it came to her; she liked substance to fill the great outer shell, even if it was just a one time thing.

"So," Marisa began, her smile calmer and friendlier now. "I'd ask what I can do for you, but I think the real question is what you can do for me. I could start with formalities, the whole 'I'm Marisa, the new Women on Sex columnist, blah blah blah' thing, but we both know you already know who I am. I'd like to know who you are, and then maybe -- if you're lucky -- we can actually get to the sex part." She meant talking about sex, of course, but there was no harm in joking around, was there?

Cameron watched Marisa slide into the booth across from him and smiled at her. "I'm Cameron Montri. I review bars for Alpha," he said, "and you're Marisa Demmings, Walker's new wunderkind if the rumors are to be believed."

He pushed the Hefeweisen toward Marissa and picked up the stout. He took a slow sip. "I don't believe rumors," he said, "I believe what I see, and what I see right now is a very beautiful woman who's probably pretty smart working hard to get a jump start on her career."

He took another sip of his beer. "You're not off to a bad start, but you haven't published with Alpha yet. You'll have to pop that cherry right if you want to keep moving up the ladder."

"So I invited you and you came. I don't care if you call it a date or not. I knew you were going to be here and I got you some food. If you're in Cole's at 7 on a week night, you're here for a French Dip sandwich. They invented them here. At least, they claim to have invented them here. If you don't want a French Dip at Cole's, you're trying to get shitfaced or laid. Or both."

Cameron took the steak sandwich and dipped it into the soupy sauce. He let his eyes close as he chewed. The first bite of a Cole's steak dip was a religious experience. He dipped it again and held it up for Marisa.

"You have to try this. It's the best first impression a sandwich can make. Pay attention to how it makes that impression. It's delicious, the meat is tender, perfectly cooked, served with these crazy pickles, but it's more than that. It's making a promise. It promises that there's more where that came from. It promises me that the next bite after a mouthful of beer will be stunning in a whole new way. Casual sex is all about the promise your first impression makes. And manipulation."

Cameron ate for a while, watching Marisa eat, watching her breathe, looking at the place where her cleavage disappeared into a dress that should have come with some sort of warning label.

"Is that a Vera Wang?" he said finally, "Marcus downstairs had a shoot for one of her collections and that dress reminds me of some of the dresses they were shooting that day. It looks like it was made for you."

"Look, I want to help you for a few reasons. First, and most selfishly, I would much rather look at you across the office than any of the last few girls they've had in there. Secondly, my guess is that you'll be very good at what you're doing. If you increase sales, my year end bonus goes up. Third, if you have the balls to show up here for a story, I might actually end up liking working with you."

"Okay, the players are going to hate me for telling you this, but here's how the manipulation part of it works. It's basic economics. I create a trade deficit- a debt that you have to pay back somehow. I'm banking on the probability that you either don't have money, or you feel that it's somehow demeaning to pay for your own meal. It doesn't occur to you that if I offered dinner, I should pick up the tab. If I'm picking you up, I'm going to hint that you got your drinks, you got your sandwich, you got your sparkling conversation. When do I get what I want?"

Cameron leaned back and wiped his mouth carefully with a paper napkin and smiled. "If you don't like beer, I can have Brent mix you one of these fantastic boozy milkshakes they make here."

"Now, I spend a lot of time watching pickups in bars. It's my job. Your part of getting picked up is to look fantastic, and you do. The next part is more important though. You want to be in control of as much of what happens as possible. What that means is for fuck's sake, never give anyone else your number. Stay in control of who can reach you. Never take him to your place. You can't get away from him if he's in your house. Most of these guys are pretty harmless, but if he decides to experiment with tequila, he might not stay that way. And in the morning, it's way better doing the walk of shame away from his place than from yours."

Cameron looked at her closely. "Maybe you get off on being out of control. Whatever, but you start the night in control no matter what."

He rolled his eyes at himself. "I sound like your dad. Tell me how you're going to kill this column. Besides following me around to all the bars in town hoping I get lucky."

An unreadable sparkle swam in Marisa's eyes as she raised an eyebrow. "You want me to spill my secrets here and now? I had been planning on seeing your reaction to it once you read the piece but... Maybe it won't hurt to tell you. Later." The half smile grew to a wicked grin, and she took another sip of her Hefeweisen, feeling her neck grow slightly warmer as the liquid hit her throat. Men like Cameron were hard to trust. One one hand, he was a critic; incredibly (and sometimes brutally) honest -- he said so himself: he didn't believe tumors. He believed what he saw. On the other hand, he had already made it quite clear that he understood how manipulation worked. It was an art applicable to all areas of life, not just picking up women at bars. But Marisa liked him all the same. He was charismatic and intelligent, with his looks being an added bonus.

A relaxed smile hit her lips. "Do I look like the kind of person who gets off on being out of control? If you're talking about him over there--" she subtley gestured over to the bar where Nate sat-- "I think I'm good on that. The guy's gonna end up opening up my crumpled piece of paper three days from now, and he's going to regret that he never ended up calling me."

She leaned back in the booth, placing her hands on her lap. "I know the type that plays guessing games with themselves and end up losing. I'm not saying I understand men any better than the average woman, but knowing some things help me stay in control. You're not the kind to play with yourself, are you? Or maybe you do like playing with yourself, who knows."

A short pause went by, then Marisa spoke again. "Okay, about the column, I have some special plans for that. I've read the column from some of the past issues, and dear god, I don't understand how or why some of those got past editing. I don't want to go cliche and just talk about all the overdone casual sex topics. You know, the ones telling readers what to expect, what not to expect, and how to get rid of those stage-five-clingers who keep calling even though it was a one-time deal. I'm looking to take this to an entirely new level. What I want to do is take these controversial sex topics and make them into a sort of series written by a woman who doesn't just tell men what to do, but show them why it works. A fantasy, if you will, from me to them. Sex and relationships at work are pretty much taboo even though most people feel they're totally acceptable. I'm going to lay everything bare for the readers. And the really good news here is that I get to make my presence known, and you'll get your year-end bonus. I guess we'll all end up happy."

"Well hey, I'm all about happy endings, financial and otherwise," Cameron said, grinning. Marisa's eyes were expressive and he found that he had to force himself to concentrate on what she was saying. She was very carefully dressed, he had noticed it in the office. Her makeup was perfect. Her hair. He wanted to feel it between his fingers. He wanted to feel it in his fist. He tightened his grip on his sandwich.

She was smiling. "Do I look like the kind of person who gets off on being out of control?" She said, and he followed her eyes to the hands man. She had a point, he wouldn't bother her. Something else caught his eye. Marisa didn't notice it, but almost every man in the bar was looking at her. One in particular caught his eye.

"It's the precedent, Marisa. At least four men saw you give him your number. Me, Brent over there behind the bar, the sleazeball that hit you up as soon as you walked in, and the guy at the other end of the restaurant." The man had his back turned, but he was watching the room from a mirror on the wall.

"Brent is a good guy. I'd trust him with my car. Hands man is polite, damn near chivalrous. You handled sleazeball professionally, but the guy with his back turned? I've never been able to prove he's passing roofies, but he leaves a lot of bars around here with women who can barely walk after two glasses of champagne. You let him know you were on the market."

Marisa was teasing him. Hands in her lap, she seemed almost prim.

"In my opinion," Cameron said, "people who never play with themselves never find out what they really like. I know what I like and I know what a lot of women like. Do you?"

Cameron sipped his beer thoughtfully. He gestured at Marisa with his glass. "You haven't been out of control since you started wearing a bra," he said. He let his eyes fall to her breasts for a moment, then looked her in the eye. "I bet you don't even know if you get off on being out of control. You're going to find out, though, if you write your column like you say you will."

"Sit here and watch the room tonight. Watch the pickups, the rejections, the flirting and groping like you've never seen it before, just observing. You'll collect enough material for one of the terrible articles Claudette used to write. You'll make Hank happy, at least. He worries."

He wiped his fingers carefully on a paper napkin. "Readers don't care what happens in the bar. That's just foreplay. Not even that. Pre-foreplay. When you leave tonight with my arm around your waist, when the door swings shut behind us and we're standing on the sidewalk, that's where the interesting stuff starts. That's when doubt and your body will be at war." He leaned over the table a little. "I will fight the same war. Sometimes I win by winning, and sometimes I win by losing."

He smiled then and leaned back. "I win, mostly."

"I'll bet you love winning," Marisa replied, gazing at Cameron from under her lashes. "You just love being on top, don't you." The words came out more as a statement than a question, but that was exactly how she intended it. She fell into the flirty back-and-forth with Cameron, surprised at how easy it was despite having only known him for a grand total of thirty minutes.

He was wearing his signature smile, that stupid little grin that came out to play whenever he thought he was being smooth, and Marisa returned it with one of her own sly smirks. She could tell that the man in front of her was used to getting his way, especially with the women who entered his life, and she didn't plan on being just another girl who became flustered at playing his game. Not that his charm wasn't working on her, because it totally was, but she didn't believe in giving in. Not until the last minute, at least. It wasn't something she would admit to Cameron, but she had to hand it to him-- whether it was natural or learned from years of practice (somehow she had the feeling he was trying his luck with women even in adolescence), he was good, and she was impressed. Like Nate (Hands Man, as Cameron called him), most men were intimidated by her, unable to take her home, much less buy her a drink at the bar. She loved men who were like her: ambitious, passionate, confident, and a little bit vain. It made for an alluring mixture, one that she found particularly intoxicating.

"Oh, I wouldn't say that I'm never out of control. Even I take off my bra at times." Marisa smiled innocently and dabbed a napkin at her red-stained lips, raising her glass and pausing to look at the amber liquid before taking a sip. She was toying with him, and he with her, engaged in an intricate dance of wit and wordplay. Then the young woman leaned forward, almost conspiratorially, offering up more of the cleavage that Cameron seemed to like so well. "And sometimes I like when someone else takes it off for me." This, of course, didn't necessarily mean she got off on being out of control, but getting men to think she liked giving up control always ensured that she actually stayed in control. It worked most of the time, at least.

She straightened her posture, pleased with herself, and the table fell into a comfortable silence as she resumed eating her turkey dip, enjoying it how Cameron advised her to, and keeping her eyes on the men and women who entered the bar. It was only 7:30 or so, but it was evident that it was a Monday. Even Marisa knew what it was like to want to remove the stress from the beginning of the week—hell, even in her interning days, she knew what it was like to want to pre-game the alcohol Sunday night at the mere thought of waking up to Monday. Men and women alike were at bars to start the week off happy, and like Cameron said, most of them chose drinking, sex or both. Whatever, she wasn't judging. Stress relief was stress relief, whether that came as a tipsy haze or euphoric ecstasy.

A man caught her eye then, a guy probably somewhere in his mid-40s, and she watched in amusement as he approached a young brunette who was laughing animatedly with her friends, giggling amongst themselves and whispering things here and there in each others' ears. The girl herself was pretty enough; long, dark waves hung down to mid-back and framed a delicate face with doe-like blue eyes. Looking at her, Marisa could see why the man chose her over all the others. She gave off an air of innocence and approachability, someone who could be swayed by pretty words and a charming smile.

The journalist raised an eyebrow as the guy went in for the kill, touching the brunette's arm and shooting her a friendly grin. He was sexy in his own way, obviously fit and dressed well. He looked like he belonged in James Walker's posse, if not for the fact that, in Marisa's mind, Walker himself was on an entirely different level. The young woman seemingly rejected the offer, shifting her eyes nervously to her friends. Maybe he was too old for her? But The arch of Marisa's eyebrow rose even higher when the man persisted, this time clearly offering to buy her drink by slyly flashing his card in hand. This time the girl perked up, and Marisa almost laughed—money always talked, especially when the card was black.

"Ah, there it is," she said, "the one condition you forgot. The girls who are all about obscene amounts of money in the bank. But hey, at least the girl has taste." She laughed, then brought the half-empty beer glass to her lips for a final time to take one last sip. "Her friends are eyeing you, Cameron. One of them looks like she could eat you up, right here, right now." She nodded over to the general direction of the group of young women, one of which clearly had her sights set and looked ready to aim. Marisa dug an elastic band out of her bag to tie her hair to the side, then she lightly pushed her glass away, feeling a constant, low heat on her cheeks and neck. She wasn't drunk at all, but she knew her limits. The girl could hold a lot of things, and liquor wasn't one of them.

Marisa leaned forward and Cameron enjoyed the implied invitation even more than the alluring view of her cleavage. Her skin looked like silk with a pulse. He licked his lips. The desire to be seen, to be noticed, was universally human and he found it to be one of the most attractive things about a woman. If she thought she was controlling him with a peek and a wiggle, well, that was fine. And it was working. If he was honest with himself, he had to admit it was working.

Part of Cameron didn't care. If this happened, it was a one-night thing. What did he care if she put a bit in his mouth and steered him all over the countryside, especially if that countryside was gift-wrapped in her stunning red dress. But there was something smug about the way she wiped her mouth, the way she teased, and it made him burn. He knew she would be easy if he played her game. He didn't want her to be easy.

"Being on top," he said, "has nothing to do with it. That's just schoolboy dominance. Pissing contests, notches on bedposts. Sexual positions are tools in the hands of artists, and art is much more interesting than dominance. Anyone who forgets that is a lousy lover." Cameron smiled. He was on thin ice. It would get thinner.

He took a bite and watched Marisa watch the room. The pickup amused him. The initial turn down, the flash of the card. Most pickups were one kind of transaction or another.

"He's buying more than just one night," Cameron said, "She's going to call in sick tomorrow, and maybe the next day. Maybe it will be worth it."

Marisa's face had a pleasant glow. She was down to her last sip of beer and when she pulled her hair aside, she showed the curve of her neck.

"You have a stunning neck," he said, looking in her eyes. He reached out and touched her, ran his finger from just below her ear to her shoulder. "You shouldn't hide it."

Marisa pointed out the girl making eyes at him. She was tiny woman with a jet black pixie cut. She could have been an elf with bright green eyes.

"You think she wants me, huh?" he said, but he shook his head. "I don't think so. She's playing the room, finding her biggest competition. That's you tonight. She's going to try to steal me from you. I think I'll let her a little."

Cameron looked directly at the girl and smiled. He waited a full three breaths, then he barely gestured with his head. She took a suggestive swig from her bottle of beer, grinned, and walked over, hips swinging. She wore low-cut jeans and there was a hand's breadth of porcelain skin between the bottom of her white tank top and the edge of the jeans. Her left shoulder and upper arm were decorated in colorful tattoos—Mexican skulls, tropical flowers, and a line in Spanish, "No deseo mas que mi locura" in evil looking script.

Cameron sipped his beer as she walked over, watched how she moved under the tank top. She stopped in front of him and set her bottle down on the table, her back to Marisa.

"You look like trouble," he said, grinning up at her.

She picked up his beer and took a long pull, and set it back down in front of him. "You have no idea," she said. "I'm Noir."

"Of course you are. I'm Cameron. You're fun to look at up close." He took some time to admire her ink, noticed a thorned vine on her hip that disappeared into her jeans.

"I have more," she said.

"I counted on it," he said, and let his eyes flick over to Marisa's face for a second. "I'm working tonight, helping my colleague out with a project. She's a sex reporter."

Noir seemed to notice Marisa for the first time. "No shit. Like ten things that will drive your man crazy in bed?" She laughed and kept her eyes on Marisa. She counted her fingers slowly. "One two three four five six seven eight nine ten. Let me know how that turns out." She wiggled her fingers and picked up her beer and slipped her pinky into the bottle. "I can teach you one thing that will blow his..."

"Tomorrow night," Cameron said, "The Misfit in Santa Monica."

Noir turned to him and nodded. "We'll fit right in." Then she turned back to Marisa. She bent over at the waist and kissed her on the cheek and whispered something in her ear that Cameron couldn't hear, then she walked away, dropped a ten on the bar, and carried her beer out the door, dangling it loosely by the neck.

"I'll bet you'll blow his mind and a lot more tonight, hon."

Marisa watched Noir walk away, hips swinging as she pushed open the door to the evening air. A grin seemed to split the tattooed girl's face, and Marisa saw her lift the bottle to her lips and take a long swig before disappearing beyond the view of the window looking out on 6th street.

"I like her," Marisa finally said after a few moments, not bothering to hide the smile that came to her lips. She looked Cameron in the eyes, the warm hazel irises glinting with total amusement. "I might just let her steal you from me."

The echo of his own words was teasing but deliberate, a subtle reminder that he wasn't the only one who was good at playing fun little verbal games. One night stands weren't exactly her thing, but she liked challenges when they presented themselves, and Cameron was definitely on a level she had never experienced before. But if he thought he was winning their game, she would ensure that he took a good, long look at the situation. Maybe he thought he was good at winning—her appropriately buzzed brain told her he would tonight—but she wanted to be the hardest win he'd ever had. And for the little stunt he pulled with Noir, she'd drag out the night just for him. Good things came to those who wait, she thought to herself. And he'd be waiting for as long as she could help it.

She wiped her mouth one last time, then grabbed the small clutch bag she had brought with her. "Excuse me," she said with the tiniest of grins creeping up on her lips, sliding out of the booth to stand. Her dress, appropriate for the office despite ending an inch above her thigh, was now hiked up to a smidgen higher than mid-thigh because of her seated position. "Just a moment," she told Cameron as she turned to walk to the restroom, not bothering to tug the hem of her dress down. What difference did a little more skin service make? Probably not much.

There wasn't really any reason for her to disappear into the women's room other than to wash her hands and kill time, and she did exactly both. Besides, she had to think of some ways to end the night that didn't result in sex. Not that she was opposed to it, but work would always come first for her, and she had actually planned to talk about casual sex in the first place. Otherwise this was a wasted opportunity, and while she had weeks before the mark-up of Alpha was due, the deadline for a first draft of her column was by Friday evening. She intended to get as much initial material as possible, and Cameron was just the start... not of a whole train of sexcapades, of course, but strictly for sources on one night stands. He seemed like he knew how to get down and dirty. Down and dirty for column material, she told herself as she inspected her reflection in the mirror and ran her fingers through her auburn locks before swiping some clear gloss across her still red lips.

A few minutes had passed before she came back out, still without the slightest clue as to where she wanted to go. But hey—sometimes it was fun to see where life took her. "This was definitely interesting," she told Cameron as she sat at the edge of the booth and crossed one leg over the other, showing off some mean high heels. Simple but sleek in their design, they seemed to embody the very woman Marisa was.

"But we have some time left before everything is over. I got my drinks, I got my sandwich... Looks like the sparkling conversation is all we have left." The hint of a smirk turned up her lips, and she cocked her head slightly to the side and rested her hands in her lap. Her gaze held a promise; it was a promise that said Cameron would get everything he wanted, and more, as long as she got everything she needed by the end of the night. And those kinds of transactions were the ones she liked best.

Cameron was deeply impressed with Noir. Marisa seemed to be considering actually following her out of the bar. He half expected her to disappear when she went to the restroom. He considered it himself, but he had a date tomorrow and a deadline today and that meant finishing the article, even if it was the same stuff he always wrote about Cole's. The place was brilliant and consistent. A great place to come as a client, but not really interesting as a place for a journalist to cover. He almost wished they'd drop his sandwich someday or serve him a stale beer just so he could praise them for fixing the problem. They never did, though. They were perfect and perfect was boring.

So when Marisa walked off to the restroom, her skirt riding just a little too high, he loved the view, and he loved the fact that she let the dress defy gravity for just those few seconds.

She came back, freshened up in some imperceptible way and sat, waiting for him to impress her. And his mind went blank. Sparkling conversation was all she'd gotten since she walked in the door. Well, since he'd rescued her from hands guy anyway.

He spread his arms and smiled.

"I'm an open book, Marisa," he said, "I'm all yours. You want to know something? Ask. But I'm telling you, a nice, refreshing, honest conversation isn't going to write any kickass articles. You need to get out of your head and into your panties. If you want to change the world, write after the orgasm, not before."

He spun his beer around and shook his head.

"I'm sorry," he said, "I've just been doing this a long time. I can't do a review of a bar by talking to patrons as they leave the place. I have to sit in the seat, put my own elbows on the table, drink the beer myself. I have to make love to the bar. Get everything it offers, and then tell my readers about it."

"What just happened though," he said, tipping his head towards the front door, "was a master at work. Total confidence and the willingness to walk away. She made a liar out of me too. There was no transaction."

Cameron closed his laptop, slipped it into his bag and left a fifty on the table. "Come for a drive with me," he said, "It's going to start getting noisy in here pretty soon."