I shook my head and said, “Fuck it! She’s gone.” Out of desperation for a piece of anything, I decided to call Rachel anyway. I wanted to see how long she would take to get over to my hotel. Evidently, she already knew where I was staying. I guess everyone knew.

“You make up your mind yet?” she asked me when she picked up her line.

There was no small talk in this woman’s game.

“How long will it take for you to get over here?”

I was going straight for the jugular myself.

“Twenty, twenty-five minutes.”

I doubted she could get to me that soon, but at least she had her thoughts in line with mine on not wasting any time.

I said, “That’s all? Are you sure?”

“What? Look, I’ll be there then in ten minutes,” she told me. “I’m right around the corner from you.”

I was stunned. What could I say to that?

“Okay.” That was about it.

“What room are you in?”

I gave her my suite number, hung up the phone, and was utterly confused.

“What did I just do?” I asked myself. “Did she just con me into that?”

A few minutes earlier, I didn’t want anything to do with the girl. Now she was hurrying on her way over to my room for hot sex on a platter.

“Shit!” I cursed. It was too late for second thoughts, but just because she was on her way over didn’t mean I had to do anything with her. Nevertheless, I straightened out the bed, the room, the bathroom, and tossed on a pair of blue jeans with my bright white T-shirt to prepare for her arrival.

Sure enough, in sixteen minutes, there was a knock on my door.

I took a breath and walked over to answer it. Before opening the door I looked through the peephole.

What the…I panicked. It wasn’t Rachel out in the hallway. It was Victoria.

I quickly opened the door and asked her, “Did you forget something?” I wanted to give her whatever she forgot in a hurry and get her out of there before Rachel arrived.

Victoria smiled and said, “Actually, I didn’t.”

I had a fast decision to make. If I used too many words with her, we would be caught. If I tried to walk her back to the elevators or even allowed her to walk back on her own, we could still get caught.

Victoria went on to explain, “I got inside the cab, made it halfway home, and realized that you were right. I was missing you already.”

That sealed my fate for the night. I allowed her back into the room and shut the door. I locked it and put the latch on. Rachel was just out of luck.

Once the decision had been made, I immediately turned my cell phone off, and then the lights. Victoria walked straight over to the hotel phone and took it off the hook herself. I guess she had enough of that.