“I had to put the Kindle in the cupboard in the bathroom because I was reading that scene last thing at night,” Sadie added. “I couldn’t fall asleep with it next to me.”
Clearing my throat, I whispered, “I put mine in the freezer.”
Sadie’s head snapped in my direction. “You can do that?”
Wincing, I shook my head. “Only if you want to have to buy a new Kindle. I wasn’t thinking when I did it, though.”
Both women stared at me for a moment, then burst out laughing. Yeah, I was a dick. I’d put my freaking electronic device in the freezer overnight, meaning I’d fucked it up like a goober. I had no excuses for being such a moron, I’d just acted on impulse. Lesson learned. But, hey, I got a new Kindle out of it, and the new one was outstanding.
Still chuckling, Sadie grabbed Santana’s hand and shook it gently. “I’m not bullshitting you—I don’t have that kind of personality—when I say that Killer In Mind might well be the best book I’ve ever read in my life. The relationship between them was intense, hot, and just beautiful. The psycho side of it was insane and so well written, I want to see it in a movie. And the sex…” she fanned herself, then winked at me. “Am I right?”
“I jumped Marcus the night before they left after I read one of them. I don’t know what it was, but I was all over him.”
“Elijah got that treatment, too,” she winked. “He’s told me to buy the others for when he gets back.”
Like brother, like brother, that was the only way to describe it because Marcus had done the same thing.
“Thanks, you guys. That means a lot to me.” Santana sounded relieved, making my heart hurt for her.
It couldn’t be easy to put yourself out there in something like a romantic thriller novel, especially when you were as subdued as she was, so I could only just imagine how she felt knowing we liked it.
I was the same way with my music. The number of posts online from people complaining about jingles and the nasty things they wrote about them was unreal, but a lot of the time, it was water off a duck’s back for me. Like it/don’t like it, whatever floats your boat, but I’ll bet you recognize the brand and consider it when you come across it in a store.
Well, unless it was that damned Imagine Insurance jingle. Whenever I heard it, my hands clenched into fists, and I can guaran-damn-tee you when I moved here and decided to change my health insurance and home insurance providers, I didn’t go with Imagine Insurance. Then again, if what I paid for the contraceptive shot this morning was anything to go by, I’d made a mistake choosing my new health insurance.
“I’d give my right tit—no, wait, my left one because I love my right one—to know what’s going on in your brain right now,” Sadie said loudly, pulling me out of my thoughts and back to our book club session, to see both of them staring at me.
“I was thinking about jingles and the mean shit people write about them online and comparing it to the stuff Santana will undoubtedly come across. Then I got to thinking about that Imagine Insurance jingle.”
I didn’t need to explain it any further because both women groaned.
“That one gives my arse a headache,” Sadie muttered. “When Elijah was talking about insurance for our place, I told him to go with whatever he thought was best, but if he went with them, I was divorcing him. And I meant it.”
“Well, see, it also got me to thinking about what I paid for my contraceptive shot this morning.” When both women raised their eyebrows, I clipped, “One hundred and ten dollars. Is it any wonder unwanted pregnancies happen? What if you can’t afford that? A couple of years ago, I used to pay fifty bucks for the pill, and even then, I thought it was extortionate.”
Santana stayed quiet during this, just listening to what we were saying, but Sadie was intrigued by it all. “Would it be cheaper to use condoms?”
“Think about how many of them you’d use in average per month, then divide it by how many are in the box, and work out how much you’re spending on them versus being on a contraceptive. Sex is fucking expensive.”
“How much are we talking?” Santana asked quietly, and when we both looked at her, she shook her head. “I’m thinking for book research.”
Sadie and I exchanged a look that said we both called bullshit, but I went ahead and did the math for her.
“It depends where you buy it from and the brand, but I’d hazard a guess at about eighty dollars a month. At least. When you consider how long the shot lasts for, you’re saving money for sure.”