Sale + Excerpt Blitz: The Club Trilogy by Lauren Lowe

In anticipation of the newest three part release: 

The Infatuation, The Revelation and The Consummation,

 The Club Series Trilogy Box Set is NOW ON SALE FOR ONLY $2.99 (Normally $5.99)!

Now is your chance to meet Jonas Faraday!

He is practically perfect!

Amazon US:http://amzn.to/1JFOWwI

Amazon UK: http://amzn.to/1mMtmBJ

Nook: http://bit.ly/1OXhCD9

Kobo:  http://bit.ly/1TnXZru

iBooks:http://apple.co/22vAvH8

Blurb

USA Today and Amazon #1 Bestseller in New Adult, Romantic Suspense, and Romantic Erotica, The Club Trilogy, has taken the world of erotic suspense by storm with its unique blend of panty-melting sensuality, thrilling suspense, laugh-out-loud humor, intense character development and shocking plot twists. Now readers can devour all three full-length books of the epic love story of Jonas and Sarah (The Club, The Reclamation, and The Redemption) in one heart-racing collection, including a brand new bonus scene written especially for the trilogy bundle.

In The Club Trilogy, when wealthy playboy Jonas Faraday receives an anonymous note from Sarah Cruz, a law student working part-time processing online applications for an exclusive club, he becomes obsessed with hunting her down and giving her the satisfaction she claims has always eluded her. Thus begins a sweeping tale of obsession, passion, desperation, and ultimately, redemption. Find out why scores of readers call The Club Trilogy “my favorite trilogy ever” and “the greatest love story I’ve ever read”--and why international publishers have clamored to translate and publish upcoming editions in Italian, German, French, Spanish, and more.

“There’s never been a love like ours and there never will be again… Our love is so pure and true, we’re the amazement of the gods.”

CHAPTER ONE 

© The Club Trilogy by Lauren Rowe

Jonas

Name?

I inhale and exhale slowly. Am I really going to do this? Yes, I am. Of course, I am. The minute Josh ever so briefly mentioned “The Club” to me during our climb up Mount Rainier four months ago, I knew it was only a matter of time before I’d be sitting here on my laptop, filling out this application.

“Jonas Faraday,” I type onto my keyboard.

With this application, you will be required to submit three separate forms of identification. The Club maintains a strict “No Aliases Policy” for admission. You may, however, use aliases during interactions with other Club members, at your discretion.

Yeah, okay, thanks. But the name’s still Jonas Faraday.

Age?

I type in “30.”

Provide a brief physical description of yourself.

“Extremely fit. 6’1. 195 lbs.”

Wait a minute. I’ve been working out like a demon this past month. I walk into the bathroom and stand on the scale. I return to my laptop.

“190 lbs.”

With this application, you will be required to submit three recent photographs of yourself to your intake agent. Please include the following: one headshot, one full-body shot revealing your physique, and one shot wearing something you’d typically wear out in a public location. These photographs shall be maintained under the strictest confidentiality.

Jesus. Am I really going to send my personal information and three photos of myself to who-knows-where to some unknown “intake agent” for a dating service/sex club I know nothing about?

I sigh.

Yes, I am. I sure as hell am. Even if it’s against my better judgment, even if doing this flies in the face of rational and analytical thinking, even if my gut is telling me this is probably a horrifically bad idea, I’ve known I was going to do this since the minute I heard Josh talk about The Club four months ago.

“It’s incredible, bro,” Josh said to me, getting a foothold on a boulder and stretching his hand toward a nearby crag. “Best money I’ve spent in my life.”

The best money my brother had ever spent—and this coming from a guy who drives a Lamborghini? It was an endorsement I couldn’t ignore. In fact, thanks to Josh’s intriguing recommendation, I’ve thought of little else since our climb. Even when I’ve been smack in the middle of what should be an epic fuck with a hot kindergarten teacher or state prosecutor or barista or flight attendant or personal banker or dog groomer or graphic designer or court reporter or waitress or hairdresser or pediatric nurse or photographer, all I can think about is what I’m probably missing out on by not belonging to The Club.

“It’s like a secret society,” Josh explained. “You can find members anywhere you go, anywhere in the world, on a moment’s notice, and the members matched to you are always ... uncannily compatible with you.”

It was the “uncannily compatible” part of that sentence that grabbed me and wouldn’t let go, not the part about being able to find other members on a moment’s notice anywhere in the world. Because God knows I can find a sexual partner virtually any time I want, anywhere I go, on my own.

I hate to be blunt about it, but women throw themselves at me, I guess based on my looks (so they tell me) and money (so I surmise) and, sometimes, thanks to the Faraday name (which, believe me, ain’t such a prize). Young, old; married, single; hot, mousy; blonde, brunette; bookish, badass; full-figured, heroin-chic. It doesn’t matter. It seems I can have anybody I want, as easily as ordering “fries with that” if I’m so inclined. And, yes, over the past year or so, I’ve become increasingly, incessantly, obsessively so inclined. And I’m beginning to hate myself for it.

Before anyone gets all up in arms and starts righteously listing off all the women I could never bed—“Well, you could never fuck Oprah or Mother Theresa or Chastity Bono before she became Chaz”—let me be crystal clear about what I’m saying here: I can bed any woman I want to. No, not literally every woman on planet earth. I fully acknowledge I couldn’t nail a nun or Oprah or an eighty-year-old great-grandmother or a pre-op-transgender-lesbian. Nor would I want to, for Chrissakes.

What I’m saying is that if I, Jonas Faraday, want a particular woman to be naked and spread-eagle in my bed, if that’s what I want, if a woman turns my head and makes me hard, or, hell, makes me laugh, or think about something in a whole new way, or maybe if she can’t find her sunglasses and then chuckles because they’re sitting on top of her head, or if her ass is particularly round in a snug pair of jeans—oh, yeah, especially if she has an ass I can really sink my teeth into—whoever she is, she will, eventually and most willingly, float onto my bed like the beautiful angel she is, spread open her silky thighs and, after a only a few moments of mutual bliss, beg me to fuck her.

I wish I could say “end of story” right there, but, unfortunately, I can’t. Because sex is never the end of the story when it comes to me. And that’s why I need The Club. I can’t keep going to the same pond with the same fishing rod, dipping my rod into the same waters—no matter how warm and inviting those waters happen to be—and just keep bringing up the same goddamned tilapia, regardless of how moist and delicious. I just cannot do it anymore.

If I keep doing the same thing I’ve been doing, over and over, the same way I’ve been doing it, then I’m going to go completely insane—which is something I’ve already done once, albeit a lifetime ago and under completely different circumstances, and I’m not willing to do it again. What I want is something different. Something brutally honest. Something real. And if the only way to get what I want is to ignore my better judgment and shell out an enormous monetary sacrifice to the gods of depravity, then so be it.

Please sign the enclosed waiver describing the requisite background check, medical physical examination, and blood test, which you must complete as a condition of membership.

No problem. I’m relieved to know every member gets rigorously vetted. I sign where indicated.

Sexual orientation? Please choose from the following options: Straight, homosexual, bisexual, pansexual, other?

“Straight.” That’s an easy one. Just out of curiosity, though, what the fuck does “pansexual” mean? I Google it. “Pansexual: Not limited or inhibited in sexual choice with regard to gender or activity.” Ah, okay—anything goes. Interesting concept, solely from a philosophical perspective, but it most definitely doesn’t describe me. I know exactly what I want and what I don’t.

Do any of your sexual fantasies include violence of any nature? If so, please describe in detail.

“No.” Emphatically, categorically, no.

Please note that your inclination toward or fantasies about sexual violence, if any, will not, standing alone, preclude membership. Indeed, we provide highly particularized services for members with a wide variety of proclivities. In the interest of serving your needs to the fullest extent possible, please describe any and all sexual fantasies involving violence of any nature whatsoever.

Hey, assholes, I answered honestly the first time. “None.”

Maybe I should move on to the next question, but I feel the need to elaborate. “There is nothing whatsoever I enjoy more than giving a woman intense pleasure—the most outrageously concentrated pleasure she’s ever experienced in her life. Now, granted, if I do my job, her pleasure, and therefore mine, is so overwhelming, it blurs indistinguishably with pain. But, no, my fantasies do not tend toward violence or infliction of pain, ever. I find the entire idea repulsive, especially in relation to what should be the most sublimely pleasurable of all human experience.” What kind of sick fucks do they let into this club, anyway? My gut is churning.

Are you a current practitioner of BDSM and/or does BDSM interest you? If so, describe in explicit detail.

“Never,” I write, my fingers pounding the keyboard for emphasis. A distant memory threatens to rise up from its dark hiding place, but I force it back down. My heart is racing. “My extreme disinterest in bondage and sadomasochism is absolutely non-negotiable.”

Payment and Membership Terms. Please choose from the following options:  One Year Membership, $250,000 USD; Monthly Membership, $30,000 USD. All payments are non-refundable. No exceptions. Once you’ve made your selection regarding your membership plan, information for wiring the funds into an escrow account will be immediately forthcoming under separate cover. Membership fees shall be transferred automatically out of escrow to The Club upon approval of your membership.

What did my father always used to say? “Go big or go home, son.” Oh, how he’d laugh heartily from his grave to know the son he derisively called the “soft” one is harkening back to his father’s mantra to choose a sex club membership. “I guess you’re more like your Old Man than I thought,” he’d say. I can hear his ghost laughing wickedly in my ear right now.

It’s not the amount of money that gives me pause. I could buy either membership plan multiple times over and never hear so much as a peep from my accountants—but I don’t throw money away, ever, in any sum. Regardless, though, if I’m going to do this, which I am, doesn’t it make the most economic sense to join for a full year? My hands hover over the keyboard. My knee is jiggling.

All right, fuck it, yes, I admit it—it’s crazy and irresponsible to spend this kind of money on a club, or dating service, whatever the hell this is, especially sight-unseen. I’m Jonas, after all, not Josh. I’m not the twin who buys himself Italian sports cars on every whim or who hired Jay-Z to play his thirtieth birthday party (which would have been our joint birthday party if I’d bothered to attend). And yet ... I sigh. I know damn well what I’m about to do here, no matter the cost or how loudly the voice inside my head is screaming at me to retreat.

“One year membership,” I write, exhaling loudly.

Please provide a detailed explanation about what compelled you to seek membership in The Club.

I close my eyes for just a moment, collecting my thoughts.

“I love women,” I type. I take a deep breath. “I love fucking them. And most of all, I love making them come.” I smirk at the stark boldness of the words on my computer screen. There is no other context in which I’d ever make these crude statements to anyone.

“Perhaps what I’m supposed to say is, ‘Oh, how I love the smell of a woman’s hair, the softness of her skin, the elegant curve of her neck.’ And, yeah, all of that’s true; I’m not some kind of sociopath. Yes, I’ve been known to lose my composure over a woman’s sharp mind and wit—and that’s not sarcasm, by the way; when it comes to women, the smarter the better—or her husky voice or raucous laugh, or, yes, even a flash of genuine kindness in her eyes. Yeah, that’s all sexy as hell to me. But in my view, a woman’s hair only smells so damned good, and her skin is only so damned soft and inviting, and her laugh is only so infectious all as a delicious prelude to one thing—the most honest and primal and fucking awesome thing our bodies are designed to do. Everything else is just prelude, baby, glorious prelude.”

I take a deep breath. I’ve never articulated these thoughts before. I want to get this exactly right—otherwise, what’s the point of filling out this application?

“From as early as I can remember, I’ve always particularly admired women. As I grew up, that translated into a powerful sexual appetite, but nothing I couldn’t control. I could take a woman to an art gallery or concert or movie or candlelit restaurant and pleasantly ask her about her work, her passions, and even her beloved Maltese Kiki over a bottle of pinot noir and not even once feel compelled to blurt out, ‘I just want to fuck you in the bathroom.’”

I stare at the screen. I’m pretty sure I sound like an asshole right now. But it can’t be helped. The truth is the truth.

“And then, everything changed. About a year ago, I went on a typical date with a very pretty woman, and when I fucked her after dinner—and not in the bathroom, mind you—she did something a woman had never done with me before. She faked it.” I grimace. “She fucking faked an orgasm. It was so obvious as to be insulting. And it pissed me the hell off. Sex isn’t supposed to be about humoring someone or being polite—it’s not high tea with the goddamned Queen. Sex is supposed to be the truth, the most real and raw and honest and primal expression of the human experience. And orgasm, by its very nature, is the height, the very culmination of that honesty.”

Jesus, after all this time, I still get riled up about this. My chest is heaving. My cheeks are flushed. I can’t think straight. I need music. Music is the thing that calms me when my thoughts are racing and my pulse is raging. As a kid, my therapist taught me to use music as a coping mechanism and it still works for me. I click into the music library on my laptop. I choose “White Lies” by Rx Bandits and listen for a few minutes. Quickly, the song soothes me and clears my head, opening a window for my bottled thoughts and feelings to fly through. I listen for several minutes, until I’m calm again.

“I couldn’t understand why she’d lied to me,” I continue. “Why would she prematurely and artificially end a damned good fuck (or what I thought was a damned good fuck) and thereby exclude even the possibility of her actually getting off? Was I that big a hack at fucking her that she preferred ending the intolerable tedium to at least trying to come for real? I was beside myself.”

I inhale deeply and exhale slowly.

“One night, as I was tossing and turning and thinking about it, the truth grabbed me and wouldn’t let go. I suddenly knew she’d lied to me precisely because, yes, indeed, I was just that terrible at fucking her—because she’d thought getting off with me was so hopeless, that I was so hopeless, why even bother to try?

“It might have been enough to send me to a very dark place, a place I’ve been before (and it ain’t pretty), except for one thing: I knew down deep that I hadn’t really tried to get her off, not like I knew I was capable of doing. I’d concentrated solely on my own pleasure, not hers, and assumed that whatever I was experiencing must have been mutual. The more I thought about it, the clearer it became—she’d given me exactly what I deserved. And I was ashamed of myself.

“It was a watershed moment. From that instant, I became a man obsessed, singularly focused on fucking that woman again—only excellently the second time around—and making damned sure she came for real and harder than she ever had before. I wanted to teach her a lesson about truth and honesty, yes—but even more than that, I wanted redemption.

“Well, of course, she agreed to see me again—she actually seemed excited to accept another invitation from me, despite my apparent hopelessness—but this time, when I fucked her again, I was a new man, a man possessed, a man enlightened, you might say, singularly focused on her pleasure and nothing else. And the result was mind-blowing. Her entire body convulsed and undulated against my tongue from the inside out, slamming open and shut violently like a cellar door left open in a tornado. And the noises that came out of that woman were fucking amazing, too, the most primal, desperate sounds I’d ever heard—nothing at all like the hollow bleating she’d tried to pass off the first time around. She was a fucking symphony. Of course, women had come with me before then—but never like that. No, no, no, never, ever like that. I’d held her in the palm of my hand and pushed her over the edge, at my will, and into another realm.”

My heart is racing. My cock is hard.

“And the best part—the true epiphany—was that getting her off like that got me off. Holy fuck, did it ever. In fact, pushing that beautiful liar into untethered ecstasy, making her surrender to the truth, to me, to her pleasure, turned out to be the most epic fuck of my life—a high like nothing I’d experienced before. After that, I wanted that high again and again (though not with her, of course—never again with her)—and ever since, I’ve been chasing that high like a horse running to the barn with blinders on.”

I take a deep breath.

Has any of this babbling answered the question? Shit. I don’t know. But this is the best I can do.

“And that’s what’s brought me to The Club.”

I stare at my screen. I shrug. That’s all I got.

Please provide a detailed statement regarding your sexual preferences. To maximize your experience in The Club, please be as explicit, detailed, and honest as possible. Please do not self-censor, in any fashion.

My hands are trembling over the keyboard. The question I’ve been waiting for.

“Some guys say fucking a beautiful woman brings them closer to God. But, really, they should aim higher. Because when I make a woman come like she’s never come before, when I make her surrender and leap into the dark abyss, I don’t just get closer to God, I become God. Her god, anyway, for one, all-powerful, fucking awesome moment.”

I stare at the screen. My dick is straining painfully inside my jeans.

“Making a woman come, at least the way I’m talking about, is an art form. Every woman’s orgasm is a unique puzzle, a treasure locked away by a secret code. Almost always, the best and most reliable way to crack a particular woman’s code starts with licking and kissing and sucking her sweet spot, but even that seemingly ‘sure thing’ only works if, as I do it, I pay close attention to her body’s special cues and adjust accordingly as I go. I can’t just lick her—I have to learn her. Usually, after only a few minutes, though, I’ve got her figured out.

“I always know I’m on the right track when she suddenly and involuntarily arches her back, thrusts her hips reflexively into my mouth, and spreads her legs as wide as they’ll go. That’s when I know her body’s preparing to give in to me, that I’m breaking down her defenses—that she desperately wants me to unlock her secret code.”

I’m rock hard. God, I love that moment. I lick my lips again.

“When she thrusts herself into me and begins to open herself, I become ravenous, myopic, relentless. I lick her and kiss her and suck her with increased fervor, and maybe even nibble and gnaw at her, too, depending on what her body’s telling me to do, and she continues rapidly opening and unlocking, spreading and unfurling, untethering and breaking down. It’s fucking incredible.

“She’s a beautiful, blooming flower. The trick, of course, is to catch her the exact moment before her petals fall off, and not a second before or after, because what I’m aiming for—the holy grail, if you will—is to plunge myself into her at the very instant when doing so will push her over the edge. It’s tricky. Too early, and she might not come at all. Too late, and she’ll go off without me.”

I unbutton my fly and my cock springs out. I want to jerk myself off right now, but I want to get these thoughts onto my computer screen even more.

“She’s on the verge—so fucking close—and I’m out of my mind, a shark in a frenzy. Finally, she reflexively shudders in my mouth—a feeling so delicious, I often dream about it—and I know her body’s teetering right on the very edge, hanging by a thread, aching to give in, but her mind is keeping her from what she wants, usually thanks to daddy issues or a raging good girl complex or low self esteem (take your pick, it’s always something). Whatever it is, her mind is getting in the way of her body surrendering utterly and completely to the intense pleasure she yearns to experience.

“But I won’t be denied. She claws at me, gulps for air, her pleasure mounting and morphing into an agony she increasingly cannot contain. She whimpers, groans, writhes—and I’m so fucking turned on, too, I can barely contain myself. ‘Fuck me now, please, please,’ she often says, or some variation thereof, but I won’t do it, even though I’m losing my fucking mind, because I know she’s not maxed out just yet.”

I breathe deeply.

“Finally, like a key turning in a lock, something inside her clicks. She opens. Her mind detaches from her body. She becomes untethered. She surrenders.”

I let out a shaky breath.

“That’s when I plunge into her like a knife in warm butter and fuck her with almost religious zeal—sometimes pulling her on top of me to do it, sometimes turning her around, sometimes slamming into her the good old fashioned way—by then, any which way is equally effective—and the moment I enter her, her body releases completely, reflexively shuddering and constricting and undulating all around my cock, over and over again. Sure, she’s come before, of course. But never like this. No, never like this. It’s pure ecstasy in the way the ancient Greeks defined that word: the culmination of human possibility. For both of us.”

I let out a long, controlled exhale and shift in my seat. Holy shit, I’ve really gotten myself worked up. I breathe in and out deeply several times. I’m trembling. I take a moment to compose myself.

“I should be clear about something, in the interest of full disclosure. What I’ve described here is the ideal. The aspiration. Sometimes the timing works out exactly this way, and sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes, especially when I’m still learning a woman, or if she’s particularly hard-to-read for some reason, she might come like a freight train before I manage to get inside her. And if that happens, it’s nothing to complain about, believe me—fucking a beautiful woman immediately after she comes is also a delicious privilege, no doubt about it. But the pinnacle, the peak, the perfection to which I aspire—the holy grail—is and always will be bringing a woman right to the edge of ecstasy and pushing her over it from the inside out.”

I shift in my seat again, but my erection is too intense to ignore. I have to stop typing. How could anyone fill out this application without having to jerk off? I grip my shaft and pump up and down until a staggering wave of pleasure wells up inside of me and finally releases in fitful spurts. I go into the bathroom and pull off my jeans. I hop into the shower and let the steaming hot water rain over me, relaxing me, cleansing me.

Getting women into my bed isn’t my problem. The problem occurs right after a woman has had the best sex of her life, when her body has finally functioned at full-tilt capacity for the first time. That’s when a woman invariably confuses discovering the full extent of her sexual power with the ridiculous notion that she’s found her soul mate. Thanks to a lifetime of brainwashing by Disney and Lifetime and Hallmark, she naively believes glimpsing God during an epic fuck somehow translates into some kind of happily ever after with her Prince Charming. No matter what I’ve said beforehand, no matter how clearly I’ve presented myself and the limits of what I’m willing to give, she’s suddenly convinced she’s found The One. “He just doesn’t know it yet,” she tells herself.

And that’s when I hurt her, whoever she is—whether she’s a librarian or tax accountant or personal trainer or pediatrician or makeup artist or singer or bioengineer or therapist or paralegal. Whether she’s funny or sweet or shy. Whether she’s serious or sexy or smart. Whether she’s a tree hugger or a Sunday school teacher. I hurt her, whoever she is. Because I’m too fucked up to be The One. Not for her, not for anybody. She can’t change that fact. No one can. I can’t even change that fact—and believe me, I’ve tried.

Damn. How am I going to accurately convey all this information in my application? I get out of the shower, throw a towel around my waist, and get right back to my laptop. I stare at my computer screen for a brief moment, trying to find the right words to succinctly express my thoughts.

 “No matter how honest I am right from the start about how little I’m willing to give outside the four walls of my bedroom, women always seem to get hurt by me, nonetheless,” I type. “Either they don’t believe me when I tell them what I really want, or they think they can change me. And they can’t.”

I sigh.

“I’m not out to hurt anyone.” And it’s the truth. “All I want to do is give a woman pleasure like nothing she’s experienced before—which leads to my own ultimate pleasure. After I taste her and fuck her and teach her what true satisfaction feels like, I might want to lie in bed and talk and laugh with her, too—because, believe it or not, I enjoy talking and laughing quite a bit, as long as everyone understands it’s not going to lead to a heart-shaped box of chocolates and a weekend shopping trip to IKEA. Maybe I’ll want to get into a hot shower with her and lather her up, running my soapy hands over her entire, beautiful body. Maybe I’ll want to dry her off with a soft, white towel and then fuck her again, maybe the second time so intensely, so deeply, so expertly, we’ll come together, both of us gasping for air and shuddering simultaneously as our bodies discover the culmination of human possibility together.

“After all’s said and done, I’ll surely want to tell her how beautiful she is and how much I’ve enjoyed our time together. I’ll want to kiss her goodbye, gently and gratefully, thanking her for our glorious time together. And then, almost certainly, I’ll never want to see her again.”

My hands hover over the keyboard for a brief moment.

“And I don’t want to feel like an asshole for any of it.” I sigh. “Because I’m sick and fucking tired of feeling like a complete asshole.”

I pause again.

“You’ve asked me to state my preferences, but clearly what I’ve described here transcends preference. I need smart, sexy women who honestly want what I do—no lies—and who, most importantly, can clearly and rationally distinguish physical rapture from some kind of romantic fairytale.”

I stare at my computer screen, a sense of hopelessness threatening to descend on me. Am I kidding myself here? Do women like this even exist?

I type again. “If I could find even one woman, just one, whose ‘sexual preferences’ are uncannily and genuinely compatible with mine, I’d be ... ” What would I be? Elated. That’s what I was about to write. Elated.

Jesus. I quickly delete that entire last sentence. It’s a non sequitur, for Chrissakes. I mean, shit, I’m either a sexual sniper with a rampant God complex or I’m fucking Nicholas Sparks. I can’t be both. I have no idea what bizarre place in my brain that last ridiculous sentence came from. I guess that’s what happens when a guy like me tries to articulate his deepest, darkest needs without a filter—the thoughts come out in a jumbled, desperate, douche-y mess, inexplicably intertwined with all the fucked up shit I’ve tried unsuccessfully to fix with years of useless therapy.

What the hell is this mysterious “intake agent” going to think of all my incoherent rambling? I cock my head to the side, an epiphany slamming me upside the head. An “intake agent” is going to read my application—yes, of course—and that intake agent’s going to be a woman. Of course. And not the eighty-year-old pre-op-transgender-lesbian variety, either. They can’t let assholes like me, or, worse, crazy fucks with violent fantasies or bondage fetishes or some other latent form of psychopathy into The Club without first passing a woman’s gut check. Right? Right.

I grin broadly and place my fingers back on my keyboard.

“And now a message directly to you, My Beautiful Intake Agent.” I lick my lips again. “Have you enjoyed reading my brutally honest thoughts—my deep, dark secrets? I’ve enjoyed writing about them. I’ve never expressed these truths to anyone else—never even thought about them quite like this. It’s been enlightening to arrange the bare truth so clearly on the page and confess it to you—and therefore confess it to myself, too. In fact, telling you the brutal truth turned me on so much, I had to take a break midway through writing this to jack off.”

I smile again. I’m such a bastard.

“So, tell me, My Beautiful Intake Agent, are you surprised at how wet your panties are right now, considering the fact that you’ve been brainwashed your whole life by Lifetime and Hallmark to think you want flowers and candy and a candlelit dinner followed by silent missionary sex, a chaste kiss goodnight, and a trip to IKEA the following morning to shop for a mutually agreeable couch? And yet, despite a lifetime of conditioning about what you’re supposed to want, here you are, anyway, aren’t you, My Beautiful Intake Agent, imagining my warm, wet tongue swirling around and around your sweet button, wishing I were there to lick and kiss and suck you ‘til you were jolting and jerking like you’d gripped an electric fence? You’re a unique puzzle, My Beautiful Intake Agent, yes you are—a rare treasure locked down by a padlock. But guess what? My words have already begun to unlock you, as surely as if I were there to turn the key myself.

“So what are you going to do about the dark urges clanging around deep inside you right now, My Beautiful Intake Agent? Are you going to ignore them, or are you going to let them rise up and eventually untether your body from your mind? Perhaps you should use this opportunity, as I have just done, to touch yourself and think honestly about your deepest desires, to think about what actually turns you on, as opposed to what’s supposed to. Touch yourself, My Beautiful Intake Agent, and go to the deepest, darkest places inside you, the places you never allow yourself to go—and embrace the brutal truth about your wants and needs. Your whole life, you’ve been taught to chase all the Valentine’s Day bullshit, haven’t you? But that’s not really what you want. Tell the truth—to me and to yourself. You’d ditch all the Valentine’s Day bullshit in a heartbeat to howl like a rabid monkey for the first time in your life, wouldn’t you?”

I’m smiling from ear to ear, imagining some frazzled, middle-aged woman sitting in a cubicle in Dallas or Des Moines or Mumbai, reading my words with wide eyes and a throbbing clit.

“I know what you’re thinking: Cocky bastard! Asshole! A legend in his own mind! All true exclamations, my dear. But guess what? Cocky bastard or not, if I were there to lick you, nice and slow, right on your sweet button, the way you deserve to be licked, the way you’ve only ever dreamed of being licked, the way no man has ever done for you before, I guarantee it’d take me less than four minutes to deliver you unto pure ecstasy that would make you surrender to me, totally and completely.” I smile to myself.

“Yes, My Beautiful Intake Agent, if I were there to teach you what your body’s divinely designed to do, you’d be forced to admit an immutable truth, whether you wanted to or not: In addition to me being one cocky-bastard-asshole-son-of-a-bitch motherfucker, I’m also the man of your dreams.”

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Josh and Kat’s story releases on January 5th!

The Infatuation

Releases January 5th

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The Revelation

Releases January 12th

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The Consummation

Releases January 19th

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Author Information

Lauren Rowe is the pen name of the USA Today best-selling author, performer, audio book narrator, award-winning songwriter and media host/personality who decided to unleash her alter ego to write The Club Trilogy to ensure she didn't hold back or self-censor in writing the story. Lauren Rowe lives in San Diego, California where she lives with her family, sings with her band, hosts a show, and writes at all hours of the night. Find out more about The Club Trilogy and Lauren Rowe at www.LaurenRoweBooks.com.

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THANK YOU!