The Sexopaths (13 page)

‘I can’t believe you want me to
screw someone else.’

‘What happens will just be like a
film.  It won’t be real.  As if an actress from our movie has come to
life and joined us on the bed.’

‘I must be dreaming this.’

Monique giggles, this time more
confidently.  ‘So long as you don’t fancy her more than me.  I have
picked you a sexy one.  I’ll show you.’

She rises and returns half a
minute later with her tablet.  She quickly finds the web page she’s
looking for and spins the machine across the table to him.

He’s silent for a few seconds
while he gathers his thoughts.  Unbelievably, the website is the same one
that Xara uses to advertise her services.

‘Well?’

‘She looks a bit like you.’ 
He hastily adds: ‘Not as nice, obviously.’

‘I can always tell when you lie.’

He shakes his head slowly, as if
to say she’s wrong but she doesn’t know it.  He tries to appear like he’s
seeing the website for the first time; he fights the urge to make the two taps
that will transport him to Xara’s familiar homepage.  The blurred-faced
blonde girl now on screen he has also viewed before.

‘Jasmin – early twenties, ’
he recites.

‘I think she is a bit older than
it says.’

‘What made you pick her?’ 
He realises in saying this he has revealed something of his knowledge of the
website – that alongside this page are many others.  But Monique
seems not to notice.

‘It says in her biography that
she sees couples.  Lots of them do
two-girls
, but not couples.’

‘You sound like quite an
expert.  What’s the difference?’

‘With a
two-girl
it is two
prostitutes and one client.’

He finds her unfazed use of the
word prostitute a little shocking, calculating.  He prefers the softer
euphemisms.  Even
hooker
doesn’t have the same clinical ring to
it.  The image visits him of Monique plying that trade, some time past
– her familiarity with its methods returning in the heady Russian sauna;
performing oral sex as the guy grins in the gloom, detached doorknob in
hand.  Adam shakes his head, like a fly-ridden horse uses its mane as a
switch.  He backtracks to correct his earlier slip:

‘And there are more of them?’

‘Yes – there are about
fifty girls in Scotland on that website.’

He navigates around, clumsily, as
though experimentally.  What if Monique
had
found the website when,
disoriented by adrenaline, he’d left it on-screen the night they’d got back
from Mykonos?  Right now it doesn’t feel like she’s laying a trap –
it wouldn’t be her style to weave a patient and complex web – she’d just
come swinging out of the shadows, down him, sink her fangs into the flesh of
his neck.  He tells himself to keep calm, he says:

‘Oh yeah.  Gallery.  I
see.  How did you find this site?’

‘I just Googled escort services
in Edinburgh.  It was top of the natural search.’

‘Angels365.’

‘Did I make a good choice?’

‘I’m sure you did.  Do you
think they get a day off when it’s a Leap Year?’

Monique cocks her head as if to
say ‘Who knows?’

He itches to check Xara’s
page.  The field report of her cavorting with a couple he recalls, but not
whether she openly advertises this particular service.  Could
she
have been a candidate in Monique’s recruitment process?  Jesus –
imagine opening the front door to find
her
on the threshold!  While
he’d be dumbstruck she’d stay calm, assume control… drop clever little remarks
to tantalise his fears... knowing his body, his likes, desires… that look in
her dark eyes saying now I really own you.

He blinks and refocuses upon the
prostitutes’ website before him.  Though Monique has handed him permission
to browse, he refrains from exploring further, ere his disobedient fingers
default and rush like unleashed hounds to the spot where they once caught a
rabbit unawares.

Instead he scrolls down the
introductory page, its bubblegum-card portfolio inviting the boys to
collect.  He wonders to what extent these girls are mutually acquainted; some
advertise their ‘two-girl’ services in tandem with other named individuals on
the site.  Do they pore over one another’s web pages, and amuse themselves
with punters’ field reports?  The gallery displays a single photo of each
woman, her pseudonym, her grading (Jasmin is ‘Adventurous’) and her approximate
location for incalls.  A ticked box indicates that out-calls are also
available.  Curiously – a small fact he hasn’t previously registered
– Xara’s is unchecked.  There is a mixture of blondes and brunettes
– though more blondes than would be seen in the typical street, which he
suspects says something about the girls’ perceptions of client preferences
– and of skin colours, shapes and sizes.  More salient is the
variation in degrees of undress, from shots that might grace a high-quality
lingerie catalogue, to the positively pornographic full-frontal, judiciously
placed spread fingers preserving what little shaven modesty is left to the
imagination.

He homes in upon Xara’s picture
– while her head is turned away from the camera, her pose invites the
viewer to concentrate upon her polished tawny buttocks, drawn tight by the
semblance of a g-string slicing between them.  He wonders if Monique
considered her, indeed what thoughts entered her mind as she first scanned this
page.  He finds Jasmin’s photograph.  Like Xara she conceals her
identity, a side-swept blonde veil revealing just a glimpse of nose, full lips
and one sparkling blue eye.  She numbers among those conservatively
attired, posing in expensive-looking matching bra and pants.  She has a
bearing of intelligence, sophistication even, and perhaps of being in control
of why she’s there.  Could that be what influenced his wife’s
choice?  Had Monique delegated this task to him, Jasmin would not have been
his pick; the more provocative would have won out.

He guesses this adventure of
Monique’s has been taking shape for some time.  He can’t believe that
their charged exchange, riding the sexual high in Jurmala – what, only
three nights ago? – stimulated such a prompt and decisive outcome. 
And there are other little details that suggest premeditation.  For the
past few weeks she has intensified her exercise regime, daily throwing herself
into aerobics in front of the tv; in Latvia each morning she’d unfailingly
visited the hotel gym.  She’d also told him in passing that she’s brought
forward her regular beautician’s appointment; it’s rescheduled for
tomorrow.  Initially, other motives had crossed his mind.  Next week
she has a Board meeting in Paris; something she
hasn’t
mentioned of
late.  But perhaps these extra efforts are all about the girl.  The
explanation appeals to him.  Naturally, she’ll want to look her best
– he can understand that.  He reflects on Jasmin’s superficial
resemblance to Monique.  Has Monique subconsciously selected a female not
dissimilar to herself – or, indeed, intentionally so – and would
that be for her pleasure… or to limit comparisons on his part?  Would she
secretly yearn to experiment with the extreme contrast of an exotic brunette
(like Xara)?  Maybe.  But would she want
him
to do so? 
Oh – to get inside her head!

‘We can change her to another
one.’

Monique’s voice recalls him from
his musings.  Does she think he’s disappointed?  But how does he deal
with this – is enthusiastic delight what she wants to hear?  He
says:

‘No – she seems fine,
really.’

‘She’s more expensive than most
of the others.  I thought that was a good sign.’

Adam chuckles.  ‘That’s not
like you’

‘You get what you pay for, my
darling.  Except in my case, of course, when I give you everything for
love.’

‘You’re too generous.’

‘Maybe I shall start charging you
after this.’  She giggles.

He doesn’t doubt she could charge
as much as any of the girls before his eyes.  He says:

‘You’ve spoken to her, I take
it?’

‘Three times.’

‘
Three
times!  How
come?’

‘Just to make arrangements. 
Girl talk.  She sounds very nice.  We are quite good friends
already!’

‘I don’t believe it.  What
are you like?’

Adam reflects on this feminine
aspect; even hardened call girls prefer a few minutes of seemingly inane
chit-chat, when intuition does its silent work, like the coded circling before
felines lock in combat.

Now he asks:

‘And do you think she’s genuinely
into…
liaisons
with girls?  Or just making that up to widen her
customer base?’

‘I asked her that.  She told
me she has been dating a girl – until recently.  She says she is
really looking forward to it.  Of course, my darling, I have told her how
sexy you are.’

Adam shakes his head again, for
her benefit, a kind of visual rendition of pinching himself.

‘And she’s coming here?’

‘Nine-thirty.  I booked for
two hours.  Camille will be fast asleep and we shall have plenty of time
to get ready and have some champagne or maybe a nice cocktail.’

‘Are you sure about this? 
Camille could wake up.’

‘My darling – you know she
never
wakes up.  I feel better that we should do it at our home, where we are
most comfortable.’

She’s thought it through. 
Her territory.  Her imposing battery of make-up and the full force of her
wardrobe close at hand.  Her bed.  He wonders if she weighed these
benefits against what he sees as the glaring risk of revealing their address,
of inviting an unknown escort into their home.  But, then – they’re
a married couple – it’s not as if there’s anything to hide.  As far
as he knows it’s a legal commercial transaction.  It’s not so different
from having a visiting beautician or hairdresser… or masseuse, come to
that.  And he and Monique are hardly kiss-and-tell material –
anyway, most of the people he knows would probably be secretly impressed.

Monique is looking at him
quizzically, as if she detects his uncertainty.  She says:

‘I said we would phone her
tonight.  So you can introduce yourself.’

‘Oh no.’

‘Look – it is easy. 
Just like talking to a normal girl – not like you would expect.’

‘Really?’

A sense of premonition creeps
like a spider from between his shoulder blades and systematically raises the
hairs on the back of his neck.  Conversing in the presence of his wife
with someone who shares a web page with Xara doesn’t feel like a good
idea.  He attempts a weak delaying tactic:

‘What if she’s…
working
?’

‘Then she won’t answer, my
darling.  Try.’

His mobile is lying at the end of
table.  Reluctantly he reaches for it.  He looks up at Monique.

‘Should I withhold my number?’

‘They don’t answer – it
says on the website.’

‘But she’ll get my number.’

‘What is the harm?  She has
mine already.  Ring her.  Put it on speaker.’

Adam can’t think of a plausible
excuse, and daren’t say he’d rather do it in private.  Monique will ring
if he won’t.  He taps in the number displayed beneath Jasmin’s picture and
lays the handset on the table.  Staring intently at the computer screen,
he asks:

‘Did you tell her our names?’

‘Yes.’

There’s a muffled crackle and
Adam holds up a silencing hand.

‘Oh hi – is that Jasmin?’

‘Aha.’  The voice is a
little breathless.

‘Hi - this is Adam… you’ve been
speaking with my wife?’

‘Who are you?’  She sounds
like someone woken from a dream by a stranger.

‘Er… my wife - she’s called
Monique?’

‘Do I know her?’

He gestures to Monique and
mouths: ‘Are you sure this is the right one?’

She nods, confidently.  He
resumes the dialogue:

‘Jasmin?  My wife, Monique,
she found you through Angels365.  I’m looking at a picture of you
now.  You’re wearing pink and black underwear.’

‘Right now I’m completely naked.’

‘I can believe that.’  He
raises his eyebrows at Monique.  ‘So you’re coming to our house tomorrow
night?’

‘Am I?’

‘Well… I think that was what was
arranged.’

‘Oh, yeah… you’re the
couple?  Your wife’s pretty fanciable, by the way.’

‘I know.’

‘I’m with a client.’

‘Oh right – sorry to…’ The
line disconnects.

He frowns and spins the handset
on the smooth table surface.  He says:

‘What did you make of that?’

‘I think she is quite a
character.’

‘She was naked with a client.’

‘Well – like I said, she
did not have to answer.’

‘She sounded kind of off her
face.  And she didn’t remember at first.  Are you quite sure about
her?’

‘Maybe we can call her again
tomorrow, during the day, when she’s less distracted.’

‘I don’t know – what is
there to say?’

‘So you can get to know her?’

‘She said she fancies
you
. 
How come?’

Monique giggles.  ‘She asked
me to email her a photo of us.’

‘And you did?’

‘Just from my phone… the one I
took of us in the café-bar at the airport at Riga.’

Adam shakes his head
disbelievingly.  Sure – it’s a nice shot… but where might this
end?  He protests:

‘What if she posts us on her
Facebook page?’

‘I don’t think so, my darling.’

‘Did she ask anything about me?’

‘Just whether I was making the
appointment on your instructions.’

‘Cheek.’

‘It is usual, apparently –
like the old hitchhikers’ trick where the girl flags down the car while the
boyfriend hides in the bushes.’

‘And did she believe you?’

‘I said I was very
bi-curious.’  She laughs, but not in quite the mad way Adam would have
expected at such a remark.