Chapter 3 Josie
“Why do you care that Ares told Chef Alphahole to give you a call?” Cecilia snapped on a bracelet and tugged down her tight red blouse, smoothed down her tight mini skirt, and reached for a pair of hoop earrings on her dresser.
“If someone thought you needed help and didn’t ask you and went ahead and interfered, you wouldn’t be mad?” Josie said from her friend’s bed.
“Here, try this.” Maisy passed her something pink in a glass.
Josie took a sip and tried it, making a face. “Yuck, too sour.”
“I think it’s perfectly sour.” Maisy reached for Josie’s drink and Josie passed it back over.
“Are you kidding?” Cecilia said, putting on her lipstick. “I would take all the help I could get.”
“You don’t need help.” Maisy snorted.
Josie caught her eye and the two women giggled. Cecilia Yen, with her famous composer father, her two-bedroom condo with views that don’t stop in Kitsilano, wasn’t hurting for connections. Cecilia turned from the mirror and stuck her tongue out at her friends.
“I think I’d faint if either of the Montague brothers knew my name. There’s no harm in using your connections, Josie. It makes it easier,” Maisy said.
Josie shook her head, her curls bouncing on her shoulders. “I don’t want special treatment.”
She fought hard to get where she was, and she didn’t want people to think that she couldn’t do it.
But people—like Chef McNabb—thought she couldn’t.
Josie pushed away the memory of a counsellor in college, telling her that she’d be a good recipe developer.
When the counsellor told her this, Josie’s mind spun into overdrive.
She imagined herself trying out recipes, maybe even writing recipes.
The idea made her happy and her mind spin with possibilities, but that would mean giving up on her dream.
And Josie never gave up.
She didn’t give up when she had to fight to prove herself at every job or in college, when she had to advocate for her accommodations. Not that any accommodations solved everything. It didn’t make her faster or feel less tired at the end of the day.
But she fought her way through and she proved to those who said she wouldn’t last a second semester in culinary school, wrong.
“I don’t need help,” Josie repeated.
She caught the glance between Maisy and Cecilia, and pushed down the threat of tears.
“Maybe what you need is a distraction! Want to come to Club Bandit’s holiday play party?” Cecilia passed her phone to Josie.
“Like a sex party?” Maisy’s scrunched face conveyed exactly what she thought of the ad for the exclusive BDSM club.
“No!” Cecilia laughed. “A play party. You know we’re going to Club Bandit tonight.”
“I would never do that,” Maisy said.
“But Josie has wanted to try kink. She’s borrowed books from me.”
Josie blushed furiously. She always wondered about some spicy things from reading romance books and tried to get her ex-boyfriend to tie her up, but he never wanted to.
“Want me to buy you a ticket?” Cecilia asked. “You too, Maisy.”
“Definitely not my thing. But you can be adventurous if you want, Josie.”
“I don’t know.” Josie played with the silky bedspread between her fingers.
“Why not?” Cecilia asked, raising her eyebrows.
“I want to try stuff that’s true, but I don’t know if I want to do it in public. Ethan never wanted to try anything.”
“Yeah, that doesn’t surprise me,” Cecilia said. She squirted perfume on her wrists and rubbed them together.
“Henriks is trying to get in the room, Cecilia,” Maisy scrambled off the bed, and scooped up the tiny kitten.
Josie reached out and patted it under its chin. Its wide green eyes stared up at her.
“So soft.” Josie patted the purring kitten.
“Thanks for kitty sitting,” Cecilia said. “It’s been forever since Layla and I have been off on the same night and day.”
“And you’re going to a sex club?” Maisy shook her head.
“Are you kidding? I’ve been dying to get into Club Bandit and they finally approved my membership. Tonight is a workshop on CBT. That’s cock and ball torture, Maisy.”
“Layla is game for that?” Josie asked.
Cecilia smirked. “Oh yeah. She might want a playmate, I wouldn’t mind.” She leaned over to give Henriks a scratch.
“I can kind of see that.” She grinned thinking of shy and quiet Layla. As someone who was keenly aware that people are more than what they seem, the image of her friend’s girlfriend holding a whip wasn’t hard to visualize.
“Seriously, let me know if you want to come to the holiday party.”
A thrill raced through Josie at the thought. She knew Ella Ridell, the wife of Zee who owned Club Bandit and thought of her friend Ivy, whom she was sure was a member when she lived in Vancouver but she’d never been brave enough to ask them for an invitation to the private club.
“I don’t have anyone to go with. I haven’t dated since Ethan.” Josie couldn’t imagine going to a play party by herself.
“Yeah, that’s not a loss,” Maisy said.
Josie’s face heated. She knew she should have broken it off with Ethan before she did but she wanted to keep giving him a chance. He was her first serious boyfriend and a part of her thought they’d do the whole marriage and kids thing.
But then he said that she wouldn’t be as successful as he would be and he was looking for someone to match his level of work.
“Besides, reading about it is one thing. I don’t know if I’d actually like pain.
” She bit the inside of her cheek, wondering if she wanted to continue this conversation.
But it’s true she thought about kink. About being tied up by a strong but kind and teasing Dominant.
Did one exist? She didn’t know. The Doms she read about weren’t always kind.
“Kink is not all about pain,” Cecilia said. She gave Henriks another scratch. “You can have a whole D/s relationship, a power exchange where one person is in charge and the other person submits without breaking skin. Though I like having my skin broken.” Cecilia grinned.
“Too much information!” Maisy said.
“But there is wax play, sensation play, ordering someone to their knees, orgasm control—all of that is without pain. Rope. You’ve said you want to try rope bondage.”
Her mouth went dry at the thought, she squeezed her trembling hands.
Could she actually do it? Wanting to try something and actually doing it were two different things.
She could stay in the world of wondering of fantasy or she could step outside her comfort zone.
She’d never really been good at that. Once she found where she was comfortable, she didn’t change.
“Text me if you want to go Josie and I’ll buy tickets while I’m there.”
“I don’t think it’s for me, but thanks.”
“A hundred percent not for me,” Maisy said.
She thought of how Ares held her as they danced at Erik and Kayleigh’s wedding. She could never ask Ares to a holiday sex party. They were friends. And you didn’t get naked with your friends. At least she never had. Ares was older. They came from different worlds, it would never work.
And she was furious with him right now.
Cecilia’s phone buzzed. “Layla’s waiting downstairs, got to dash.”
Josie gave Henricks to Maisy, then swung her feet on the floor and followed Cecilia out to the living room.
“You guys know you can crash here and I’ll be back in the morning. Layla has a brunch shift and I have dinner service.”
“Have fun, mom,” Josie teased.
Cecilia shoved her feet into impossibly high heels and clucked Josie under the chin. “Nope, I’m not into the mommy thing. Bye.” Her friend gave her a wave, laughing as she closed the door.
“She’s too much,” Maisy said.
“But we love her.” Josie stumbled and grabbed for the wall.
“And I love how stocked her fridge is! Let’s get something to eat.” Maisy grinned.
Josie followed her into the kitchen with the quartz countertops, sleek appliances, and cool lighting.
Laughing, they put together plates of snacks and after checking on Henricks—who was sleeping on the bed—they brought their bounty to the living room.
Josie curled on the over plush couch, her feet under her.
“I can’t imagine having a kitten and working the hours she does,” Maisy said.
“But she’s always wanted one and can hire a pet sitting service during the day,” Josie said.
“When are you going to date again?” Maisy asked, grabbing a slice of melon and dipping into a yoghurt sauce.
“Never.”
Maisy tilted her head, her dark eyes glowing. “I think it’s kind of sweet that Ares recommended you. That’s how our industry works, you know that. Word of mouth is everything.”
Heat flamed across Josie’s face, because she thought they were done with this conversation. “I do know that. But if he had sent people to my catering business…that’s different. He’s sent me new customers over the years and that’s always been fine. It’s the fact that he recommended me for a job.”
“Yeah, totally sounds awful. I work in my parent's restaurant Josie. My parents are well-respected restaurant owners and you know that I’ve only had three interviews in the last two months. It’s hard to get in the door. We’re not all Cecilia Yen.”
“I thought you were happy working with your parents.”
“It’s okay but I might want to branch out and do something on my own. You know what I mean.”
“I know. But it hurts.”
“I get that there are times that people have overstepped and tried to do things for you because they didn’t think you were capable, but I don’t think this is one of those times. You should give the guy a break and ask him to the holiday party.” Maisy grinned.
“Maisy!” Josie tapped her friend’s knee. “I cannot ask Ares Montague to a kink party.”
Maisy waved her arm at Cecilia's shelf of pretty bottles, most of them unopened.
“Yeah, you could. Want to get drunk and call him?”
“Cecilia would kill us if we touched her collection,” Josie couldn’t help but giggle.
“She’d deem it a worthy cause. A couple of drinks for courage and you send a text, what do you say?”
“No! I’m not going to send Ares a drunk text message.
” Her face was so red-hot it felt like it was on fire.
“Besides, I have to put the finishing touches on my December calendar. I’m getting Christmas orders in every moment it seems and I need to check with Carter to make sure he doesn’t need that annex kitchen. ”
“Wouldn’t he tell you by now if he did?” Maisy asked.
Josie took a piece of prosciutto and shrugged.
For the last several months she’d been working out of a bistro restaurant after her home catering business grew to need more space.
Carter was the son of one of her mom’s friends and she liked the cool laid back chef.
He used to have a food truck and had a small kitchen at the side of his restaurant.
It gave Josie her own entrance and her own equipment.
“Yeah, but we don’t have an agreement in writing. He’s been very generous about letting me use the space he insists that it was just sitting there. But Christmas is a busy season.”
“What’s it like to have two smoking-hot guys interested in you?” Maisy popped a grape into her mouth.
“Carter? No. He’s just being friendly.”
“Okay, keep deluding yourself.”
Josie frowned. Two nights ago, Carter had complimented her on her tortellini but that’s just because he liked pasta and had few pasta dishes on his own menu at his casual French bistro restaurant. He stopped by and sometimes helped her pack up her orders if he had a lull.
“He asked me to the food truck festival, but that’s only as colleagues.”
“Sure. I get asked out by my colleagues all the time.” Maisy rolled her eyes.
“No, I think you’re wrong, Carter isn’t interested in me.”
“Whatever you think, babe.” Maisy patted her leg.
Josie shook her head. “Enough about me. What about you?”
“The last date I went on was with some douchebag who wanted a bunch of kids and for me to give up the long hours of the restaurant business. We were not compatible.” Maisy flicked her straight brown hair off her shoulder.
“How did you meet him?”
“On a dating app, where else? Unlike you, I don’t have billionaires lusting after me or hunky chefs wanting my attention.”
“I think you’re wrong, at least about Carter.” Josie stuck her tongue out. Carter was a nice guy, but she wasn’t attracted to him.
Maisy raised an eyebrow. “You don’t give yourself enough credit, Josie. You’re talented, you have a sunny personality, and you’re pretty.”
Josie shook her head, tapping her cane next to her. “Right, but I’m a real catch with all the accessories I come with.”
“Stop it.” Maisy threw a pillow at her. Josie caught it and threw it back, and the two women broke into giggles.
Henriks chose that moment to jump on Josie’s lap, which caused her to startle and jump.
Maisy lifted the kitty off of Josie’s lap. “I got you, Henricks.”
“Thanks. See, I’m an uncoordinated mess, not a catch,” Josie plucked a piece of cantaloupe from the tray and held it out to Henricks.
“Cecilia doesn’t want him to have people food.”
“Yes, but Cecilia is learning how to squish a man’s balls or something and isn’t here, right Henriks?”
Josie glanced at her friend and they fell into another fit of giggles as the cat happily licked off the juice of the cantaloupe from her fingers.