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)
I turned toward whoever the hell it was, my heart beating out a tattoo of panic on the inside of my rib cage.
A silhouette waxed into view, just outside the light of the lampposts on the streets. Heels clicked against the gritty concrete, hips swayed, and the rough scent of perfume physically assaulted me.
“Who are you?” I asked, squaring my shoulders. God, I was a dumbass. I’d broken into this damn studio and hadn’t thought for a second to bring something with to defend myself. I was hardly in the bad part of town here, but this was Miami. Shoot, it was Florida. Crazy shit happened here all the time.
The figure didn’t answer my question. It clip-clopped closer and halted a few feet from me, face hidden in shadow like some horrid nightmare creature.
I clenched my fists and forced myself to anger. “Who are you?” I growled this time.
“You know who I am,” she said and took one final step forward, out of the darker shade and into the murk. Bright red hair propped atop her head, falling past a pale face with lips stuck in a perpetual “fuck me, daddy” pout.
It was Cherry Vanilla.
The stripper.
“What the hell? Cherry? What are you doing here?”
“You didn’t think I’d let you get away with it, did you?” she asked, folding her arms and tapping her long nails against her forearms.
“Get away with what?”
“With having me fired! With pulling me away from Mr. King! He was always mine, mine forever until you came into the picture and ruined it all,” Cherry hissed. “And now you’re going to pay for what you’ve done.”
My mind reeled, grabbing at facts and thoughts aimlessly. “Cherry, I—how did you know I’d be here?”
“You own this place,” she said, simply, and shrugged her shoulders. “And I see Jax here all the time.”
“All the time…” This was bad. This was real fucking bad. “Cherry, have you been following me?”
“As if,” she said, and tossed her hair.
“OK, have you been following Jax?”
She didn’t answer that question, which had to mean she had been. Cherry was so obsessed with him she’d decided following him was the only option left to her, and she blamed me for how she’d been dismissed. Of course, it’d had nothing to do with me…had it?
“I warned you,” Cherry whispered, her voice snaking through the night. “I warned you to stay away from him, remember? You hoed yourself out to him in the club, and I told you it’d be the last time you ever got to be with him. Why didn’t you listen? Now, you’re going to have to pay the price.” She took a step forward, and I took several back, my sneakers scraping on loose pieces of gravel. “Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
“Cherry, you don’t have to do this. Jax isn’t—” but I couldn’t finish the rest of the sentence. Jax wasn’t part of my life anymore? Except he was. The baby growing inside me was part of him. I’d have that little piece for the rest of my life, even if I couldn’t have him.
“He’s what? He isn’t what?” Cherry asked and stepped closer. Streaks of light from the lamps on the construction site moved across her form, across the breasts on display in their purple velvet cupped bra and the ripped leatherette jacket she’d tugged over it.
I glanced back down the alley, sought my escape route. I could probably run faster than she could in those heels.
“Don’t even think about it,” Cherry hissed, and I snapped focus back to her.
The stripper dragged a switchblade out of her bra and clicked it open. Light glinted on the end of the blade—at least it wasn’t rusty—and she swished it from side to side in front of me.
“Cherry, this is ridiculous. I’m not anything to Jax. I’m not—”
“You’re not?” She let out a ridiculously high-pitched giggle. “That must be why he sold Club Queen. Because you’re not anything to him.”
“He did what?” I forgot about everything but the club and Jax for a second, searched Cherry’s expression for the truth. “He did what?”
“I’m done talking,” the stripper whispered and stalked forward, assuming a crouched-over pose, the knife out like a jagged tooth.
I backed up several more steps, keeping time with her movements, and eyed the chicken-wire fencing that separated the construction site from the alley. I could climb it, right? I’d likely get my ankles slashed by an insane stripper during the process, but better my ankles than my carotid artery.
“Hold still,” Cherry said. “I’m going to cut you now.”
“Thanks for the instructions,” I replied, and looked back at her. I flinched, but not because of the knife or Cherry’s comical attack position—Crouching Stripper, Hidden Benjamin.
Another figure moved down the alleyway, keeping close to the fencing, hulking, strong, with shoulders I’d clung to, a body I recognized even in the dark because I’d dreamed about it, tasted it, felt it beneath me and inside me.