Read Online Beautiful Player by Christina Lauren - Free Book Online Page B

respond to this, so I just drank. I’d never thought about these things, had instead preferred to just try anything and everything that a given woman wanted, but I found that I really liked that Ziggy pondered all of this.
    “But lately, I’m kind of figuring out what I like,” she admitted. “That’s fun, but it’s hard not having a way to figure it out firsthand. Hence, porn.”
    She took a long drink and then grinned over at me. Two weeks ago if Ziggy had said something like this to me, I would have been secondhand embarrassed for her to be so open in her inexperience. Now I found that I wanted to protect it, just a little.
    “I can’t believe I’m encouraging this conversation,but . . . I worry porn might give you a false sense of what sex should be like.”
    “How so?”
    “Because the sex you see in porn isn’t very realistic.”
    Laughing, she asked, “You mean most men don’t have a Pringle can in their pants?”
    This time I didn’t choke. “That’s one difference, yes.”
    “I have had sex before, Will. Just not much variation. Porn is a good way to see what rings the old bell, if you know what I’m saying.”
    “You surprise me, Ziggy Bergstrom.”
    She didn’t respond for several long beats. “That isn’t my name, you know.”
    “I know. But it is what I call you.”
    “Will you always call me ‘Ziggy’?”
    “Probably. Does it bother you?”
    She shrugged, swiveling on her stool to face me again. “A little maybe? I mean, it doesn’t really fit me anymore. Only my family calls me that. Not, like, friends.”
    “I don’t think you’re a kid, if that’s what you’re worried about.”
    “No, that isn’t what I’m worried about. Everyone grows up being a kid, and learns how to be a grown-up. I feel like I’ve always known how to be a grown-up, and am just learning how to be a kid. Maybe Ziggy was my grown-up name. Maybe I want to let loose a little.”
    I tweaked her ear, and she squealed, pulling away. “So you start to let loose by watching porn?”
    “Exactly.” She studied the side of my face. “Can I ask you some personal things?”
    “You need my permission now?”
    She giggled, shoving my shoulder. “I’m serious.”
    I slid my empty pint glass down the bar a little and turned to meet her eyes. “You can ask me anything you want if you buy me another beer.”
    She raised her hand, catching the bartender’s attention immediately. Pointing, she said, “Another Guinness,” before turning back to me. “Are you ready?”
    I shrugged.
    Leaning forward, she asked, “Guys really like the anal, don’t they?”
    I closed my eyes for a beat, holding in a laugh. “It’s just called anal. Not the anal.”
    “Don’t they?” she repeated.
    Sighing, I rubbed my face. Did I even want to go there with her? “I guess? I mean, yeah.”
    “So you’ve done it?”
    “Seriously, Ziggy?”
    “And you don’t think about how you’re in—”
    I held up a hand. “No.”
    “You don’t even know what I was going to say!”
    “I do. I know you, Ziggs. I know exactly what you were going to say.”
    She made a face, turning back to the television above the bar, where the Knicks were killing the Heat. “Guys can just turn off their brains. I don’t even get that.”
    “Then you haven’t had sex worth turning off your brain for.”
    “I think you turn your brain off even for mediocre sex.”
    Laughing, I admitted, “Probably. I mean, you had mussels for dinner. That’s like . . . sinewy, chewy sea shit. But still, you could give me a blow job and I wouldn’t be thinking about how you just swallowed mussels.”
    I detected a hint of a blush beneath her cheeks. “You’d be thinking about my awesome blow job skills.”
    I stared at her. “I . . . what?”
    She started laughing, shaking her head at me. “See? You’re already speechless and I haven’t even done anything yet. Men are so easy.”
    “It’s true. Guys would fuck every orifice they