I give her a second before I touch her elbow. “So, Cindy, can you keep this on the DL? I don’t want to cause a scene. I’m just looking for a friend, her name’s Lou—no, I mean, Honey. I think she works here.”
She fans her face. “It is you, isn’t it? Holy cow!”
“My friend? Do you know if she’s here?”
“I’m not sure, the wait staff doesn’t mingle too much with the dancers. But I’ll go ask.”
I slide a bill from my wallet and press it into her hand. “No. Don’t ask. Just go take a look; if you see any new girls, ask their name. Don’t tell her I’m here. I want to surprise her.”
She peeks at the money in her grasp, a big smile sliding to her lips. “Sure thing, Sugar.”
I find a dark corner to wait for Cindy to come back and tell me if my suspicions are true. My gut wrenches as the music cranks up for the next dancer. When the girl who comes onto the stage isn’t Lou, I breathe a sigh of relief.
The idea of her taking off her clothes for other guys is enough to give me a fucking aneurism. The Lou in my mind doesn’t mesh with the hot mess from the other day. I can’t stand the thought of men ogling her beautiful skin, of her shaking her ass for someone else.
My brain knows she’s moved on from the relationship she and I had years ago. But I guess I never really thought about her moving on to have relationships with other guys. And I sure as hell never thought I’d see the day when she’d take her clothes off for strangers.
Especially after the bullshit her mom pulled.
It was the tail end of Lou’s junior year of high school. I was a senior, and, miracle of all miracles, I was about to graduate. I’d given her a phone, because her mom wouldn’t pay for one. I made enough at my job that it wasn’t a big deal to add a second phone to my plan. Not like I was going to attend college and needed to save every penny. And with all the shit she put up with from Lonnie and those douche bags he hung out with, I felt better knowing Lou could call if she needed me.
I’d pulled into the parking lot at the SuperMart, just in time for my shift. My phone vibrated. I slammed my door as I dug it from my pocket.
“Hey, Lou, I’m just getting to work. I’ll call you later, okay?”
The voice was strained as it whispered. “Mom’s lost it.”
I looked at the screen. Surely this was someone else, not Lou. What the hell?
“Lou? Is that you?”
A gasp was followed by pop and a howl of pain.
“Get in that room, you ungrateful bitch.”
Fuck. That was definitely Lou’s mom, Candace.
“Lou, you there?” My blood curdled.
“Who’re you calling? That boy? You think he can help you? You think he cares about you? You stupid girl, no one cares about you. He wants the same thing D’Jon wants, that pussy.”
“Momma, no!”
The connection crackled, and my heart thumped as I pulled the door of my truck open and jumped in. “Where are you, Lou?”
“Gimme that damned phone.”
“Momma, please!” Lou’s voice hit a high pitch on the last word.
“I said get in your room!” The phone went dead.
I hit the gas and sped toward Lou’s house.
I slammed on the breaks and threw it into park. I didn’t even turn the engine off before I ran into the house.
A touch to my arm pulls me from my second darkest memory. The day my mom died was the first. I swipe a hand across my face.
“Hey, Sugar. She’s in the back. She’ll be on stage in about twenty minutes.”
Twenty minutes. Twenty minutes to figure out how to get her to come with me instead of stepping on that stage.
TWELVE
My stomach crawls, pushing on my lungs, making it almost impossible to breathe. I have to give a lap dance to fucking Lonnie Fisher, the worst reminder of everything I was trying to leave behind when I left the first time. But, this dance has to happen before he’ll let me take the stage.
The stage I can handle. I mean, there are enough lights and enough people that it seems so much less personal.
Sassie—damn, I hate having to remember to call Sadie that—tells me lap dances get easier when you see how much money you make from them. Supposedly, that’s where I’ll make my real income.
Well, fine. I’ll just pretend Fisher isn’t the same shithead who called me names, asked the most inappropriate questions in the library, and leered at me every time we passed in the halls. He was two years ahead of me. I was never so glad to say goodbye to a graduating class, so I could finally get some peace.
I’m sure Buck was happy too. He got in a lot less fights after Lonnie left campus. There was still the occasional guy who looked at me funny or laughed at the wrong time. Buck always took offense on my behalf faster and more often than I ever did.