Shopping for an Heir (5 page)

It hit her.

She suddenly knew exactly what he was doing. He glanced at his phone again and she realized:

He’d been negging her.

“Excuse me,” she said, standing. Steve was clearly well mannered, for he stood respectfully as she walked away to the ladies’ room, struggling to keep her shoulders relaxed, her purse clutched in her fist. As she turned the corner she saw his head bent over the blue glow of his phone screen.

Great.

Her hands flushed hot and cold as she reached into her purse, resting on the settee as she texted her best friend, Kari.

RESCUE TEXT NEEDED!
she typed.

Ten seconds later, her best friend replied.

Damn! Sorry. Will text. That bad?

Hard to explain, but it’s bad.

Need me to come in person and pretend to be your lover?

Kari had done that once. It blew up in their faces when the date asked for a threesome.

Never mind
, Kari wrote, as if reading her mind.
Didn’t go so well last time.

I draw the line at tongue kissing you,
Suzanne tapped, laughing to herself.
Bad enough we shared a sleeping bag that one time when we camped in Montana.

I’m only a lesbian when it’s negative two degrees outside
, Kari joked.
What’s he doing?

Negging me! Only it’s like he’s following a script
, she replied.

Her phone rang.

“Suz,
is
he following a script? Remember that dating service I mystery shopped, where we were trained on anti-PUA techniques?”

Kari pronounced the word like
POO-uh
.

“Poo-uh?”

“Pick-up artist.”

“Oh, God. Is that what he’s doing? Why? Why do guys do this shit?”

“Did he start out with something like, ‘I just have to tell you—’ and then flatter you?”

Suzanne’s stomach went cold. “Yes.”

“And did he show you pictures of himself surrounded by hot women and elite men?”

“Oh my God, Kari, yes!” Her voice went high and screechy. “How did you know?”

“And now he’s negging you.”

“Yes!”

“He’s following the Eight Tips.”

“What are ‘the Eight Tips’?”

“These PUA trainers have workshops and books where they train guys on how to get women to sleep with them. There’s a famous list of eight tips for bagging a woman.”

“
Bagging?
I’m about as likely to sleep with Steve Raleigh as I am to shove a breadstick up my ass.”

“Thanks for the visual. You know I’m eating dinner right now.” Kari paused. “Steve Raleigh, huh? I’ll Google him for you when we’re off the phone.”

“Sorry. What do I do?” she asked. Kari was more worldly when it came to dating. “I just want to tell him off and disappear.”

“You could,” Kari mused. “But what about having some fun with him?”

“Fun? You call this fun?”

“What if you turn it around on him? Make him suffer a little.”

“Now you’re talking my language. How?”

“If he’s really following a script, then his next step is kee-no.”

“KEE-no? Like the game?”

“No. K-I-N-O. It’s this stupid phrase that’s short for kinesthetics. He’s going to start covertly touching you in non-sexual places as a test to see where your physical boundaries are.”

“You mean he’ll groom me.”

“Basically.”

“This is so gross.”

“Welcome to the world of the pick-up artist. You’re an object. An animal who can be trained.”

“So turn the training right back around on him?”

“Exactly. He won’t know what hit him.”

“So what do I do?”

“KINO is all about quietly touching you. They start with the shoulder. The knee. The arm. Then they move on to brush the side-boob, the hip, and so forth. They’re testing your bounds.”

“So I give it back?”

“But on your terms, Suz.” Kari started giggling.

Aha. Suzanne was starting to understand.

“What else? What’s next?”

“Sexual dialing.”

“Like a booty call?”

“No, no. He’ll just dial it up. Start touching you on the belly, the breast, and so forth. Making it clear he wants sex.”

“Eww.”

“You know how cross-examination works in a courtroom, right?”

“What does that have to do with my awkward date?”

“Think about it, Suz. Use his techniques against him.”

Epiphany. Lightbulb.

“Got it.”

“Next, he’ll argue with you about some stupid thing.”

“He’s already done that. Who cares if I drink white wine with beef? He got really weird about that one.”

“It’s called ‘qualification.’ They do it to be all alpha and prove they’re not boring. He’ll do it again.”

“Too late.”

“And the final move is to get you into bed or get your number, but he’ll do it in a way that makes you think he’s rejecting you.”

“He already has my number.”

“Then he’s going for the pink hole.”

“Kari!”

“Well...he is.”

“KINO, dialing, qualification, pick-up.” Suzanne memorized it like she was studying for the bar.

“You’ll do fine. I kind of pity the guy.”

“I hate this.”

“I’m so sorry.”

Suzanne just sighed.

Kari began to giggle. “Suz? How much makeup do you have in your purse?”

“Makeup? I’m not wasting one more second on looking nice for that loser!”

“No, no. I have an idea. Shake out all your makeup.”

Thirty seconds later, Suzanne stared at two lipsticks, a mascara tube, some rouge, and a metallic-blue eyeliner left over from the last time she saw her teen niece.

She recited the items to Kari.

“Unbutton the top two buttons of your blouse.”

“My nipples will show!”

“That’s the point.”

“What?”

“Can you picture an online mail order bride? The kind on those dating sites where—”

“The kind that men who use PUA techniques frequent?”

“Exactly. Whore yourself up. With makeup, I mean. Go for it. Go overboard. He wants a hot woman? Give him one. Scare him off.”

Suzanne looked at her phone with an increasingly dubious expression. “You’re not punking me, are you?”

“I swear. Trust me.”

She picked up the mascara wand and applied three coats, until her eyelashes tangled in her eyebrow hairs. “Mascara done.”

“Now run the mascara wand through your eyebrows.”

“WHAT?”

“Really go for it. Trust me. He’s going to be the one on edge when you walk back out, all confident and done to the nines.”

“I’ll be done to the ninety-nines if I mascara-tint my eyebrows.”

“You know those Facetuning apps we make fun of? When people from our high schools use the makeup apps on their selfies and think no one will notice that their nose now looks like an eraser crashed into it and their eyes have the glow of an Avatar character?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re aiming for a real-life version of that, Suzanne.”

Two minutes later and she stared at a grotesque version of herself, hair pulled up in a rough updo, eyes like raccoon claws, eyebrows darker than Elvira’s, and lipstick so red she might as well join the pageant circuit.

“I look like a woman Donald Trump would date.”

“SUCCESS!” Kari shouted. “Take a picture and text me.”

Suzanne did.

Ten seconds later, she heard a low whistle from Kari. “Oh, Suzanne. You’re...breathtaking.”

“Yeah. I can’t breathe when I look in the mirror, either. Kari, what if a client comes here and sees me like this?”

“When did you start caring what your clients think?”

Good point.

“Open your shirt more. Show a little lace.”

Suzanne did.

“And add one more layer of lipstick.”

“I’ll need paint thinner to take it off if I do that.”

“Yes.”

Suzanne complied.

“You did it. Now go out there like you’re on the prowl. And use all the PUA techniques against him.”

Suzanne ended the call, shoved her phone in her purse, used the facilities, and went back to the table with a heavy heart.

Even if she was hardened and cynical, even if she knew Steve was using her for business information, it didn’t take away the sting.

Every date was a balloon filled with hope. Sometimes the balloon was filled with helium.

This time, it was full of shit.

And when it popped...

Squaring her shoulders, she looked for the table, her vision now obscured by so much mascara that everything in the restaurant looked like the woods from
The Blair Witch Project
.

As she bent her knees to sit, Steve said, “Cue your rescue text in five, four, three, two,—”

Bzzz.

He smirked, clearly expecting her to be embarrassed, pleased with himself for the barb.

She shrugged. “Can I help it if my friend has a bad case of premature emasculation?”

Steve paled.

She looked at the phone.

Check his Twitter stream, Suz. That guy’s a total ass.

Steve did a double take across the table and peered at her, cataloguing her face, examining her neck and breasts with a wolfish intensity as she tapped her Twitter app, remembered his handle, and—there it was.

A stream of real time texts over the last twenty minutes.

She’s about a five. Could be a seven if she tried harder.

White wine with beef? Amateur.

She served in the military. I spent six years at Boy Scout camp all summer and learned more about discipline than she seems to know. Maybe I’ll have to discipline *her*.

The tweets were all aimed at a handle called PUAsucksess, but good old Steve had forgotten to put a dot in front of them, therefore making them public. It was clear from his behavior that he thought those tweets were private.

She looked up, a slow burn, to find him grinning at her.

And then it happened. Kari totally called it.

The hand.

The hand reached out and tapped her knee, an exploratory touch.

You might say he was feeling her out.

Literally.

KINO, huh?

She reached across and gently poked his ear.

His grin faltered but he scooted his chair closer, eyes on her white wine.

Tinny laughter preceded his bountiful condescension. “Didn’t you learn about wine? I thought it was a prerequisite in law school.” Touch.

“No. I studied
law
in law school.” Poke. She poked his shoulder twice. He startled, eyebrows knitting together in confusion.

“Surely you know that moving in certain business circles is all about cultivating the right taste,” he said. His palm went to her knee, staying there.

Oh, God. This was worse than that blind date with the guy who kissed his ferret on the lips.

“No.” She cut him off, fast. “Moving in certain business circles is about being good at business,” she replied, her hand going to his chest, palm over his heart.

His eyebrows shot up, eyes widening.

She grinned.

“But taste is taste,” he said, ignoring the comment, looking down at her hand and licking his lips. “It is cultivated and rarified, and white wine and red meat together is like—”

“A fish riding a bicycle.” She began randomly pushing on his chest, pecs, shoulders, neck and earlobe, like he was a human version of a sheet of bubble wrap.

Pop.

Pop pop pop.

“Exactly.” He said the word like one praises a small child who has acquiesced, except his voice trailed off. “Drinking white wine with beef is a sign that you’re, well—”

“Uncouth?” Suzanne finished off her glass.

His nose wrinkled. “Uneducated.” He slid the hand on her knee up her thigh, his other hand reaching for her stomach.

Sexual dialing.

Kari wasn’t just right.

She was a psychic.

“Don’t worry. I’ll teach you,” he crooned.

“Teach me?” Her eyes widened. Oh, brother. Deciding to play along, she pretended to be appreciative. “That would be great, Steve. I am already learning so much from you.”

Like the fact that she’d rather date a guy who kisses his ferrets.

This was the problem with having Gerald as an ex.

Ten years.

Ten damn long years, and no one else had ever measured up.

Not that Steve Raleigh was even close.

“Hee
hee
!” she said, poking him in the stomach like he was the Pillsbury Doughboy. Twisting slightly, she broke the contact between his palm and her thigh.

“What are you doing?” he grunted, affronted by her finger poking.

“This!” She poked him again. “Just being friendly!”

His eyes narrowed, but he reached for her abdomen, clearly undaunted.

She dropped her napkin in his lap, “accidentally” overreaching for it, her half-closed hand colliding with his crotch with more force than he expected.

“Ow!”

“Sorry. I guess I’m not good at being friendly.”

He let a small glare come through, then recovered, leaning in, trying yet again. “You’re captivating in a way that—”

She bopped him on the nose, then pretended to “steal” it, her thumb poking out between her index and middle fingers. “Got your nose!”

Bop.

“Gave it back.”

He looked at her like she was crazy.

Progress.

Then barely masked anger. Strategically, if he was dating to manipulate his way into bigger and better deals on the business circuit, he had to be nice to her. Had to take whatever she dished out.

“I would love to see how we can mutually teach each other,” he said, drinking his wine.

“What do you have to offer?” She sat up slightly, eyes drifting down his body, ostentatiously stopping at his lap.

“You’re...bold.” The facade was beginning to crack.

“I’m me.” She shrugged, taking a bite of hearts of palm, the cold slide of chilled vegetable highlighting how bizarre the past hour had been. From seeing her ex to seeing his opposite.

“Does it work?” he asked, sitting back and pulling on his tie and cuff links.

“Does what work?”

“The aggressive feminist act.”

Okay. Gloves off.

“Shall we get to the point, then?” she said, shoving a piece of chilled marinated carrot in her mouth. Might as well get something in her poor stomach.