Zack started to answer, but then he faltered. In truth, he wasn’t serious about this job. He didn’t market himself or have his own website or offer special services like most of his coworkers did. They thought of themselves as independent contractors who were developing a brand. Zack wasn’t anywhere near that level. He’d gone into this hoping to pay his bills for a few months while he looked for a more mainstream career. Fortunately or unfortunately, he’d turned out to have a knack for it that allowed him to coast by with minimal effort.

“I’ll try harder,” he said after a guilty pause. He stared at the ground so he wouldn’t have to see the disappointed look on Colette’s face. “I just need to focus.”

“See that you do,” she said acerbically. “You have a Murmur waiting on your desk. Don’t half ass it just because your shift ends soon. If you have to stay late, do it. We’ll call it even for that unauthorized break you took.”

Zack nodded and made his way back to his cubicle. A single white sheet of computer paper rested between his desk phone and a coffee mug filled with unused pencils.

Most clients were either return callers or people who’d called in on a whim, but a few times a day they got a Murmur: a client who had a scenario in mind but hadn’t requested a particular PSO. Depending on what the client wanted, he’d be given to either whoever was available or whoever was best suited for the job.

Zack rested his elbows on his desk and scanned the Murmur. The client had requested a male, so far so obvious, with a deep voice and a “proclivity”—Zack made a mental note to google that later—for thinking on his feet.

Well, Zack understood why they’d given the Murmur to him. He was far from the best PSO out there, but he did have a reputation for being unflappable. One day Colette had asked him to train some newbies. He was supposed to read through a script with them, but instead he’d let them conference in on one of his calls as a joke.

It wouldn’t have been a big deal, except the client kept changing the scene every few minutes like he couldn’t make up his mind. Zack had jumped from being a student seducing his teacher to an English butler servicing his master in true transatlantic fashion. He’d even adopted a horrible fake accent that everyone agreed was the funniest part. Thankfully, the newbies thought to mute their phones, but the sound of their laughter still aroused suspicion around the office, and soon, everyone knew about it. Colette was furious when she found out, but now most calls that required quick thinking were delegated to him.

Zack scanned the rest of the memo for more information, but it seemed the client hadn’t requested a specific scene. He just wanted someone to “talk dirty” to him.

“What the fuck else is new?” Zack muttered. Obviously this guy wasn’t the most creative. Though he had requested a callback time, which was unusual. Normally, new callers were given to whoever was available immediately, but this guy wanted to hear from someone at 2:40 a.m., sharp.