The Slut's Guide to Romance(ONC 2024)

5

I'm a professional. It's what I keep telling myself and yet, I'm pacing my room debating on whether or not I should do something no investigative journalist would do.

I want to tell Lucca, Alexia is still in love with him. She didn't say it, but, in her California haze, she said enough to know that it's true and I know he's still in love with her.

What kind of friend would I be if I didn't tell him before I tell the world?

What kind of journalist would I be to gossip about my interviews?

I just don't know. But if it were me... I would want to know. And who knows. Maybe telling him can bring this thing to a proper end.

Maybe Levi and Honor get back together.

Maybe Like Levi and Rose they remain friends.

Maybe if they are, I get to see more of Alexia. Maybe we could even be friends. Stranger things have happened.

My pacing pauses as Alexia gives me the dirty details about the night Lucca taught her the difference between coming, orgasming and a "beautiful climax." With that little sigh that almost made me melt in my seat.

It was so distracting I didn't even get to ask what the difference was. I was too captivated by her. I need to remember to ask her that during our next session. I'm sure I'm not the only one who would be curious.

A lot of my listeners are like me. Book lovers who yeah, have dated, but never had a heart pounding, all consuming romance like the ones we read about in books.

Who am I kidding? I barely date. I had sex once. In high school, and honestly it wasn't that great.

The way Alexia and Owen describe it, sex is amazing in a way that makes me wonder if I just did it wrong or is it genetic? Do the Fairchilds have a predisposition to adding marvel to the mundane, or are they these sexual beings that draw in kindred souls like Lucca, Mila, Adrian and Inez?

My body clenches as I listen to Alexia's detailed recollection playing in my studio headphones. Thinking about the way her perfectly lined teeth sunk into her plump bottom lip makes me feel weak in the knees.

Her voice is almost breathy as she moans–not hums but moans, "God, that man."

My body shifts to take a seat on the bed as I find Alexia behind me in a dark silk bathrobe with her damp hair wrapped in a black towel.

"Shit!" I rip off my headphones as I drop back onto the bed. As I fall, I can see a smile peel at Alexia's full lips. One that actually reaches her eyes.

"Did I scare you?" Alexia giggles. "I knocked but you didn't answer."

"So you just come in?" I sit up and toss my equipment aside. My heart banging against my chest as I take a deep breath and try to seem calmer than I feel. "I could have been sleeping. Or changing."

There's something flirtatious in Alexia's smirk that leaks into her tone as she purrs, "It's nothing I haven't seen," with a little shrug while she leans over to thumb through the scattered papers beside me.

"What's all this...?" She asks, her eyes scanning my notes.

"Just my notes," I reply, gathering the papers to maintain my journalistic integrity.

I don't like my subjects to know what I think of them before I'm ready to post. It gives them time to backtrack and try to control the narrative. I learned that much before I dropped out of college.

"About me?" Alexia stands very close, her smile at its default setting.

"Some of it," I reply. "Some of it is about Lucca–"

Her eyes light up at the sound of his name. Alexia's breath held for a moment as I continue to speak.

"Your story... your side of it. Is a lot more–"

"Graphic?" Alexia smirks. "Are you uncomfortable, Lilah?"

The only thing that makes me uncomfortable is the way her tongue caresses my name. With the books I like to read, nothing really phases me when it comes to sex. I'm just unsettled by the warmth her saying my name like that brings to my cheeks.

"Detailed," Turning away from Alexia I pile my notes and set them aside on the desk by the bed. "It's more detailed. Lucca doesn't really like to talk about sex. Then again he doesn't really like to talk about–"

I turn and, for a moment, I'm so sure Alexia was just checking out my ass.

Or–judging it? Is she judging me?

I'm not shapely or anything. Far from my tall lanky body, but her eyes were down... there. And now they're looking me in the eyes as if daring me to say something about it.

"Me?" Her head tilts slightly and continues to smile softly.

I'm just imagining things. It's like high school all over again. She makes me feel strange, my defenses go up trying to find the worst in her–or worse than that, trying to convince myself she's mean because she likes me.

I mean... I wasn't wrong back then. The snarky cheerleader did like me enough to hook up with me at a party after graduation but... this is different. She is the woman who broke my best friend's heart, and even if she wasn't. This is still work.

"Um... yeah," I walk the papers over to the desk that will be my work space for the next two weeks. "It's kind of a sore spot for him. Even off the record, I couldn't get him to tell me fully what happened between the two of you beyond, 'life.'"

"I guess that's true," Alexia quips.

"You guess?" I turn to find her watching me.

"We haven't got to that part yet," She says with a practiced smile.

"Will we?" I wonder. "We're trying to condense years into two weeks. I had more time with everyone else. Time to fact-check and double back."

"Oh well, that's just not true," Alexia says as she swings her leg and gracefully flutters down onto my bed. "If you double checked then you wouldn't have let Simone and Hana lie about me on your podcast," Alexia nonchalantly declares. "Jade too, but that I can get. She's older than all of us. Her memory would be a little worse for wear and I did punch her in the head a few times," she says with a charming smile as I stand utterly confused. 

wc:1096

Thank you for reading The Sluts Guide to Romance. Don't forget to like, share and comment to tell me what you thought about the chapter.

Looking for a new ONC read? Check out News Flash by @zoe_grimm (she/her). In this romantic comedy, an overworked personal assistant discovers his nepo baby client has a bigger crush on him than he realized in the middle of his mandated vacation.