“Never,” Alexa echoed, jabbing a bright orange fingernail at him. “Under any circumstances. And by the way, giving out your real phone number? That is getting involved.” She paused. “Has he tried to contact you?”

“Of course not. I scared him off, remember?”

Zack rubbed his temples. It had been three days since his latest disaster with John, and he hadn’t heard a word from him, professional or otherwise. Zack might as well have been a decorative plant for all the good he was at work. He was late calling clients. When he did call them, he was distracted and wooden. And he must have set a record for turning away new callers. Colette had already pulled him aside twice to ask him what was going on. He hadn’t managed to come up with a decent excuse. He had a feeling he was going to be up for one of their “random” performance reviews any day now.

“Man, this sucks,” Zack said. “I went from being the top operator to hanging by a thread in seventy-two hours flat.”

Alexa shrugged. “That’s how it is in this industry. We don’t exactly have job security. If you have a bad week, it ruins your numbers for the whole month. Just be glad we don’t do cam work. Gain five pounds, and you’re screwed.”

“Yeah, that’s true.” Zack tried not to act as miserable as he felt. “It still sucks, though. I knew it had to end eventually, but I hoped . . .” He had no idea what he’d hoped would happen. He was exploring uncharted territory. No one he’d hooked up with had ever made him feel as much as John did.

Zack knew one thing for certain: there was no way they could have gone back to “normal.” They were fools for even trying.

Zack snapped out of his reverie when he noticed Alexa staring at him. “What?”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Sure.”

“Do you promise to tell the truth?”

“I guess,” Zack said, somewhat wary.

“Are you . . . heartbroken?”

“What?” Zack squawked. “What makes you say that?”

Alexa lifted a shoulder and let it drop. “I know you like John, or at least you lust him. We definitely established that after you ran into him at the club, but . . . I don’t know, your face just then was something else. You were clearly thinking about him, and you looked so ruined. You keep saying you’re upset because you lost your best client, but I’m not buying it.”

Zack started to deny it, but Alexa gave him a piercing look. He shook his head. “I don’t know. How can you like someone you’ve never really met?”

“Tell that to the millions of couples who meet online these days,” Alexa said. “Trust me, it’s possible. And you guys have met.”

“Yeah, once. For like five minutes. That’s not the same thing.”