But she doesn’t read. She doesn’t break out her Kindle or a paperback. Instead, she nudges me with her elbow and says, “I never imagined working for a construction firm meant I’d fly to Vegas like this. I should have tracked you down long ago. I would never have taken on all the crummy jobs I had before.”

I laugh. “Tell me more about your checkered work history.” I don’t actually know a lot about what she did prior to working for me. Her résumé didn’t score her the gig. Her gumption did.

She arches an eyebrow. “Like the time I worked for a phone sex operation?”

My eyes nearly pop out of my head. Then I school my expression and do my damnedest to act unfazed. “Oh, yeah?”

She nods. “It was kinda awesome. We did it all, but we specialized in furries and feet.”

I do my best to maintain a straight face as sights and sounds of Natalie twirling a phone cord as she purrs huskily about the high heels on her tiny feet, flash like a neon billboard before my eyes. I swallow then manage a dry, “Really?”

I’m not sure if I’m turned on or wigged out. Maybe both. Mostly turned on, though.

She nods several times. “You have no idea how many men have foot fetishes until you do phone sex. They want to hear you walking around in your heels. They like the sound they make on a hard wood—pun intended—floor.”

Damn, I love puns. I’m motherfucking crazy about them. But I’ve got no clue how to react to that one. I scrub a hand across my jaw. This is a whole new side to Natalie. And I can’t help but picture her strutting across the floor in stilettos. She’s already an intoxicating combo of cheerleader looks and tomboy heart—add in heels, and I’d be a goner. For the record, I’m not a foot fetishist whatsoever, but I bet she’d look sinfully sexy in four-inch pumps. Red ones. With her legs wrapped around my waist as I fuck her against the wall.

“And furries?” I ask, doing my best to stay rooted in the bizarre fetish portion of the convo, not the filthy personal fantasy part.

“People who wear full fur-suit costumes,” she explains.

“I get what that is.” I frown in confusion. “What I don’t get is that furries seem to be more of a real life thing.”

She nods exaggeratedly. “Oh, it’s huge in phone sex. You pretend to be wearing a full fox suit. Or sometimes a squirrel outfit. Raccoons were also popular. But mostly a sexy squirrel. That was the favorite.”

I’m trying. I swear I’m trying. But picturing Natalie whispering dirty words like rub your furry tail against me as I store nuts in my cheeks doesn’t compute. “Men called in wanting to get it on with a gal in a squirrel suit?”

She nods. “It’s called yiffing. Crazy, huh?”

I run a hand through my thick hair, a little wavy today. “A bit, but whatever floats your boat.”

She arches an eyebrow. “Admit it. You’re shocked.”

“Nah,” I say, acting all cool. Then I think fuck it. “Okay fine. Maybe a little.”

A huge smile flashes on her face. “Gotcha.” She points at me, and victory sparkles in her light blue eyes.

“Got me at what?”

“I heard you like pranks. Josie told me.”

I crack up and shake my head in appreciation. “Well done,” I say, then slowly clap. “You win at pulling my leg.”

I straighten out my left leg, and she does her best charade to yank it. I pretend she captured it, and she tugs harder at the air, my leg like a big fish she’s captured.

She grunts as she reels it in, then I set my foot down on the ground and knock fists with her. “Seriously. Dinner is on me tonight.”

“It better always be on you,” she says, then adds for emphasis, “Boss.”

Ah, there’s that reminder.

“Anyway,” she continues, “I might have been pulling your leg. But everything I said is true. I never said I made the calls. And I do know all that because I did work for a phone sex company. I just wasn’t an operator myself. I screened the girls who wanted to work for us, set up the schedules, made sure they were paid, logged all the calls. It was weirdly fun.”

“And I’m weirdly impressed.” I would never have pegged the phone sex business as part of Natalie’s work history, but the way she describes it completely fits her organizational skills.

She punches my bicep playfully. “And I wasn’t technically lying.”

“You were technically entertaining the hell out of me, though.”

“Good,” she says with a bright smile. “Want to know about more of my past jobs? I’ve had some interesting ones.”

“Sure,” I say, stretching out my long legs and thoroughly enjoying the legroom, not to mention the conversation.

“After the phone sex company I worked as a pet pedicurist.”

“That’s a job?”

She nods, the look in her eyes intense. “Hell, yeah. And it’s not a bad way to make a living. You have no idea what wealthy Manhattanites will pay to have someone come to their home and clip the chihuahua’s claws.”

“Why not stick with it then?”

“Shockingly, I didn’t want to spend my entire life working on dog feet. Don’t get me wrong. I love dogs, and paws are awesome, but when it started conflicting with my schedule at the dojo in the evenings I had to let it go.”

I tap her knee. “Which brings us to your true passion. Administering a side-kick to the head.”