Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 68249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 341(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 68249 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 341(@200wpm)___ 273(@250wpm)___ 227(@300wpm)
“Whoops!” A woman cried out. “Sorry. I didn’t see you there. Honey, are you OK? Oh, wait a second, it’s you.”
I dropped my hands and squinted at the woman standing in the doorway, my vision watery. I blinked—wait a second, that hair, the pout… It was the stripper who’d charged into my studio a couple days back, carrying Jax’s phone.
“Cherry,” I said. That was her name.
“Cherry Vanilla,” she corrected, then tottered closer on heels so tall they made my feet hurt. “And you’re Riley, right? I saw you out there a couple minutes ago.”
My brow wrinkled. “Saw me?”
“In the booth with Mr. King,” Cherry said and let out a sigh between those pouty lips. “Listen, I wasn’t going to do this, but I gotta, I guess.” She grabbed my wrist and squeezed so hard the bones made a crack of complaint. “Stay away from, Mr. King.”
“Huh?” Shock dumbed me right down.
I’d figured Cherry probably had a crush on Jax, but this? What the hell?
I didn’t need this on top of everything else going on. It was yet another example of how bad things had gotten.
“Mr. King doesn’t sleep with women and keep them. Trust me, I know from personal experience,” she purred, her voice leaving absolutely nothing to the imagination. “He’s only using you until her finds someone better, understand?”
“And you want that to happen?” I asked and wrenched my arm free of her talon-tipped fingers. “You want him to find someone else? Or you want him to find you? You can’t want to be with a man you claim uses women and tosses them aside.”
Cherry’s heels click-clacked. She sought mental and physical purchase, tossed her crimson locks. “That’s whatever. That doesn’t matter. Look, don’t try to get smart with me. I know who you really are.”
“I don’t have to listen to this,” I said and walked past her.
“I know you’re just like me,” Cherry called after me. “You’re just like all the other girls on that stage, Riley. You’re no different. You’re just—just—a woman.”
“And?” I froze mid-stride, turned my head, and speared her with my best look of disdain. “Since when is it an insult to be a woman?”
Cherry’s mouth worked. Clearly, well-thought-out responses were beyond her. She was used to eye-gouging and hair-pulling, or the verbal version, at least. “You’re not special, is what I’m saying. And I’m warning you to stay away from him or you’ll regret it. Do you understand?”
I stared at her in silence.
She clopped forward a couple steps, those nine-inches ringing against the tiles. Even the bathroom was fancy here. “I’ll make your life a living hell if you don’t back off,” Cherry continued. “You’ll regret ever having met him.”
“I’ll regret it?” I shook my head. What more could Cherry Vanilla do to me that hadn’t been done already?
I’d messed up everything by falling in love with Michael, and now, if possible, I cared for Jax even more and—no! Not love. You don’t love him. You don’t. Stop it.
I teared up, and not because of the stripper.
Cherry took it as a victory. “Good,” she said, nodding. “Good.”
I spun on my heel and marched out of the bathroom. I let the door swing shut behind me, took a deep breath, dried my eyes, then started back down the hall. I rammed right into a brick wall.
“Chee-rist!” I yelped.
The wall grew arms which enveloped me. The “wall” also happened to smell exactly like Jax. Lemony, and rich, and—I pulled back in his arms.
“Easy,” he said.
“I keep bumping into shit,” I snapped, and rubbed my wrist. It wasn’t red, but it hurt a little from Cherry’s vicious grip. I dismissed her from my thoughts—I had way more serious problems to worry about.
“You all right, gorgeous?” Jax stroked a finger beneath my chin, tilted it back so I met his gaze.
“No, of course I’m not all right,” I said, then lowered my voice. “We just did something we never should have, and now, I have to go to the drugstore and get some Plan B before—well, shit, you know.”
Jax’s already hard body went ever stiffer. He ceased stroking me, narrowed his eyes.
“What?” I asked. “Jax, this is serious. I can’t—we can’t. This is not part of the plan!”
“Fuck the plans,” he said.
“No, not fuck the plans. You never fuck the plans. You carefully examine them and act them out. If anything, you make love to the plans because they’re the things that keep you sane at the end of a long day where you’ve just had sex in a strip club, been confronted by a—”
“Hey, hey, hey.” Jax cut me off by pressing his lips to mine.
I tensed, then softened. What’s wrong with me? I want to believe I can push him away, but he makes me feel so good. So real.
I broke for air and squeezed my eyes shut, forcing back tears of panic. Two weeks. Now this. Fuck!