“What does she look like?” his youngest brother, Robbie, asked.
“She’s the reason this place is called Almost Heaven.”
“Just almost? Doesn’t sound too hot.”
Watching her dance was almost heaven. Dancing with her—naked, in private, horizontal—that would be heaven. “What’s up?”
“I’m on my way home from bailing Uncle Garry’s secretary out of jail again and thought I’d give you a call, since you’re the only person I know who’s voluntarily awake at this ungodly hour on a weeknight. Hey, remember Kayla Conrad?”
Rick’s pulse jumped, and he totally lost interest in why Uncle Garry’s sixty-some-year-old grandmotherly secretary had been arrested. Kayla had lived across from the Calloway home when Rick was a teenager. Blond, beautiful, she had been the classic older woman for him. And Mitch. And Russ, plus at least half a dozen other guys in Copper Lake. They’d gone on to make plenty of other women happy, all thanks to Kayla.
“Yeah,” he said, his tone almost reverent as he backed out of the parking space, then followed Amanda’s car around the building. “I remember Kayla.”
“She’s getting married.”
“Really? To someone we know?”
“Not well enough, Mom says. Tom Fitzgerald, the pastor at the church.”
Kayla marrying a pastor. Rick never would have guessed that one. Of course, a week ago, he never would have guessed that he’d be wanting to hook up with a stripper.
“Anyway, some of us are taking him out for one last night on the town. We can’t do it Friday night—he’s got a wedding to perform—and, strange guy, he doesn’t want to do it Saturday. Says he needs sleep before delivering the Sunday-morning sermon. So we’re doing it a week from Friday. Want to join us?”
“If he’s a good pastor, he had his ‘one last night’ a long time ago,” Rick said before turning onto the street. “Sorry, man, I can’t. I’m working.” He didn’t have a clue whether he was on the schedule for that night, but a lie was better than a night out with the good reverend, Robbie and his buddies.
“Yeah, yeah, you’re always working. Who ever thought anyone would say that about you?”
Rick couldn’t even take offense at the comment. He’d skated through school and had never held a job at a company that wasn’t owned by his family until he’d graduated college. The family had always cut him a lot of slack and he’d taken advantage of it until he’d started his first job in law enforcement. He hadn’t wanted any slack then. He’d loved it, from the first job with the Atlanta Police Department right up to the present.
“Well, I’m home now,” Robbie said. “Maybe I’ll see you next weekend.”
“Yeah, give me a call.”
“And call Mom. She misses your ugly mug.”
“I will. Later, Rob.” Slowing, Rick eased into a parking space that fronted the restaurant’s plate-glass windows and flipped his phone off. Amanda’s car was parked two spaces down, and she waited for him on the sidewalk, a jacket folded over her arm.
Damn, she was pretty. Just as Kayla Conrad had been every boy’s teenage fantasy, Amanda had to be every conscious man’s fantasy. The way she looked, the way she moved, the way she smiled…everything about her was so damn good.
He was undercover, he reminded himself as he got out of the car. She could be dirty. He was supposed to be committed to Julia.
When he stepped onto the curb, he caught a whiff of her perfume—sweet, spicy, exotic. It held its own against the smells of heavy foods from the restaurant and traffic on the street. Her hair was held by a band at the crown of her head, and the heels that made her legs look incredible had been traded for sandals with narrow straps and thin soles.
Hell, her legs were incredible with or without heels. Even in jeans.
“Ride ’em, cowgirl,” he said in greeting as she fell into step with him.
“And here I thought you’d be thinking I was thinking, ‘Ride me, cowboy.’”
“Yeah, the words did cross my mind at one point. Must have been the naughty things you were doing with that pole. About the time the guy shouted out that he had something long and hard for you.”
“Like I haven’t heard that one before,” she murmured as she walked through the door he was holding for her. The air inside was ten degrees cooler than outside. She shrugged into her jacket as the hostess came to seat them.
Their booth was brightly lit, in the middle of the dining room. The closest other diners were a family, parents and three kids, looking worn-out, dazed, probably traveling somewhere on the cheap.
“Unless you’re a fan of really bad coffee, I’d get something else to drink.”
“So you come here often.”
“I bring all my dates here.”
The reminder of his number-one date—his one and only, if it had been the real thing—made her blink. Julia’s claim on him meant something to her. She didn’t poach. Even this—an innocent meeting, nothing but coffee, with Julia knowing about the whole thing—made her uncomfortable.
Was it because her parents had had a long, happy marriage? Ironic, when his own commitment to fidelity had come from his parents’ long unhappy marriage.
The waitress took their orders—Coke for him, along with a fat, gooey cinnamon roll; Diet Coke for her—then left them alone. After a moment’s silence, Amanda said, “Julia seemed to have a good time tonight.”
“Are you kidding? She was like a kid in a candy store. She’s always been the good girl. She never argued, never talked back, never got her clothes dirty, never skipped school, never exceeded the speed limit, never, never, never. Now she’s getting a chance to hang out with the…”
“Bad girls,” Amanda supplied.
“Well…yeah. And it turns her on.” Damn. Bad choice of words. Last thing he needed was to think about turn-ons with the biggest, hottest turn-on of all sitting across from him.
Face warm—though not necessarily from embarrassment—he shrugged. “What I’m trying to say is—”
“You said it fine. This is her chance to step outside her comfort zone, to do things she’s never done before, to become a person she’s never been before. Everyone should try it at least once.”
Tension draining from his neck muscles, he asked, “What’s outside your comfort zone?”
She smiled at the waitress as she delivered their drinks and his roll, then meticulously removed her straw from its paper, tearing one tip, sliding it loose, creasing it flat before folding it in quarters. “I don’t think anything’s outside my comfort zone. I’m a stripper, remember? A bad girl. One step above scum of the earth.”
Rick paused in the act of slicing a chunk of icing-drizzled roll with his fork. “Did your mother tell you that?”
“Her sister.”
“And what qualifies her to make that judgment? Is she a psychologist? Psychiatrist? Sociologist? Arbiter of all that’s good and evil in the world?”
“She’d like to think so.”
He scooped up the first bite of roll and offered it to her, but she shook her head. “So what’s outside your comfort zone? Besides meeting my mother,” he said before filling his mouth.
“Not just your mother. Any mothers. They tend to look at me and see a bad influence.” She sipped her diet pop, gazing into the distance, then refocused. “Going to college was. Teaching will be. Going back to the dreary little nameless town where I grew up would be way outside my comfort zone.”
“Hey, I’m from that same town. Mine’s an hour east of here. Where is yours?”
“Between the middle of nowhere and the end of the line.”
The roll was so good that it made up for the bad coffee he’d had last time. Rick ate a third of it before speaking again. “You’ll do fine teaching. The girls will all want to be like you, and the boys will all want to be with you.”
“I was thinking if I cut my hair, got glasses and borrowed some of Julia’s suits…”
“The boys would still notice. It’s a hormonal thing.” H
e ate the last bite he could hold of the roll, then sat back and studied her. He would hate to see her cut her hair, though he didn’t know how she stood it in Atlanta’s hot, humid summers. The weight and stickiness must be unbearable…but it was damned sexy.
She shifted under his gaze. Took a long drink of pop. Folded her hands together on the tabletop. Moved them to her lap. Finally, when she was starting to really get on edge, he broke the quiet and changed the subject. “Julia mentioned a special this Saturday. What is that?”
She blinked a couple of times, then apparently recalled the brief conversation with Harry in the dressing room. “Haven’t you ever worked any?”
He shook his head.
“They’re just private events. Bachelor parties, birthday parties, private dances for small groups. Things like that. Harry provides the girls and the bartender and pretty much anything goes.”
Anything, Rick knew, meant just that. Prostitution, sex games, threesomes, gangbangs. Didn’t think you’d be interested, Harry had told Amanda. Good.
“How’s the money?” he asked casually.
“Better than a night at the club. The customers are usually celebrating a special occasion, so they’re willing to splurge. Some of the dancers like them. Some don’t.”
“What about Tasha? Did she do them?” The instant the name left his mouth, Rick knew he’d made a mistake. There was nothing obvious in Amanda’s reaction—the tightening of her jaw was subtle, the narrowing of her gaze minimal—but she was instantly suspicious.
She drained the last of the pop from her glass, leaned back against the cushions and settled her attention on him. Her voice was quieter when she spoke, stiffer. “Exactly what is your interest in Tasha?”
He clasped his hands together on top of the table. “I don’t know. I don’t even know her. We talked for maybe a couple minutes. But there was just something so young about her. Vulnerable. She reminded me…”
He didn’t flinch under her gaze but held it as if there was nothing more—or less—to the answer he’d given. Let her think there had been someone vulnerable and young in his past. Let her think he had a soft streak toward some of the girls, as she did.
“She’s nineteen,” Amanda said at last.
“Which can be a lot younger for some kids than for others.”
She acknowledged her own words with a nod. “Tasha was pretty tough for her age. She’d wanted to be an exotic dancer since she was thirteen. Once she made it, she loved it. She was proud of her job, her success. If someone gave her a hard time, she gave it right back.”
“Sometimes tough is just an act.”
“And sometimes it’s the real thing.” Then she grinned. “Of course, men thinking a girl is vulnerable is usually a good thing in this business. You get a half dozen guys who want to take care of you, and you’ve got some damn good tips.”
Rick scowled. “I can tell the difference between an act and the real thing.”
Her grin matched his scowl in intensity. “That’s what most men think. A flutter of the lashes, a breathy little voice, a little helplessness in the manner and men think, ‘I can rescue her. I can be her hero and take care of her.’ And all it costs is whatever he has to spend.”
“I’m not interested in being anyone’s hero.”
“Too bad. You could probably do it well.”
He tried to swallow, but his throat was dry. A gulp of watered-down pop didn’t help much. His voice was still raspy. “Okay, so a woman who likes to manipulate gullible guys won’t have any trouble finding plenty to use. I’m not gullible. There was just something about Tasha…”
“That got under your skin. It happens sometimes.” She breathed deeply and her brow wrinkled as if she were trying hard to think. “Yeah, Tasha did the specials. Her and DinaBeth and maybe four or five others from the other clubs. Tasha looked on them as less time on her feet, more money at the end of the night. In her life, everything was for sale—her dances, her companionship, her body.”
“Hard to believe she’d just walk away from such a good market for what she was selling.”
“Like she said, she got a better offer.” Amanda paused, then corrected herself. “Like Harry said. No one talked to her besides him.”
Harry had said the same about DinaBeth a few weeks earlier and about Lisa a month before that. “Don’t you think it’s odd that someone who loved her job, who was proud of it, just walked away from it without a word to anyone?”
Amanda tapped her nails on the table. “A lot of the friendships you make in this business aren’t long-term. Over the years, I’ve danced with at least a hundred different girls, but I was really friends with maybe three or four. I remember faces, some names, but I don’t stay in touch. I don’t celebrate holidays with them. I don’t know where they are or what they’re doing. And I doubt they ever think of me and say, ‘I wonder whatever happened to Amanda.’”
“But you said DinaBeth and Tasha were friends. Did Tasha keep in touch with DinaBeth after she left?”
Tiring of the slow, rhythmic tap, Amanda stilled her fingers and called an image of Tasha to mind. As usual, DinaBeth was nearby. They danced together, partied together and had even, on one occasion, vacationed together. They’d gone to New Orleans for Mardi Gras and brought back enough tacky beads to go around.
Yeah, they’d been friends. But Tasha had been surprised by DinaBeth’s leaving. She would have told me, she’d protested to Harry when he’d told them DinaBeth had quit. She told me everything.
Amanda had seen so many girls come and go that she’d long ago stopped being surprised. She’d worked more than a few clubs herself where she’d given notice as she walked out the door. She was an independent contractor. Notice was a courtesy, not a requirement.
But she’d never left any friends behind without saying goodbye.
“I don’t know if they stayed in touch. I’d guess no.” She hesitated, nerves tightening, then asked, “Do you think something happened to Tasha?”
Rick’s features were set in an even, give-nothing-away mask. “A nineteen-year-old girl who loves her job walks away one night and never comes back? What do you think?”
Security was always a problem for strippers—less so at Rosey’s clubs than elsewhere, but still a problem. A lot of girls used stage names and didn’t give their personal information to anyone, not even the other dancers. Sometimes overeager customers decided to wait outside the club to have a one-on-one with a dancer in private. Some customers tried to buy addresses or even went so far as to follow a dancer home.
But neither Tasha nor DinaBeth had ever complained about trouble with a customer. Friendly or not, that was information they would have shared with the other girls.
They had merely done what countless dancers before them had—changed their minds and moved on without wasting time on goodbyes. The only difference was Rick, asking questions when no one else had been the least bit curious.
Had he been truthful when he’d said there was just something about Tasha? Had there really been someone similar in his own life, someone she reminded him of? Despite his denials, had he thought he could be the one to rescue her?
Or had he had something going on with her? A dancer and a bartender hooking up wasn’t uncommon. Granted, he was practically old enough to be Tasha’s father, but that wasn’t at all uncommon, either. He might even have admitted it if Amanda hadn’t put him on the defensive first by pointing out her age.
A shiver rocketed through her, and she pulled her jacket tighter. “I should probably go.”
He stretched out one hand but didn’t try to make contact with her. “We can change the subject if it’s making you uncomfortable.”
“It’s not the subject. It’s you. Hundreds of dancers have walked away without goodbyes and never included those of us left behind in their new lives. The only difference this time is that here you are, asking a lot of questions about a girl you say you hardly knew. If you hardly knew her, what the hell difference does it make?”
/> For a long time they stared, his gaze as steady as hers wasn’t. Finally he broke it to look at the check and slide to his feet. Then he pulled a ten from his wallet, laid it next to the check and gestured for her to rise. She did and headed for the door, for warmer temperatures and cleaner air and the security of her car only a few feet away.
As soon as they stepped outside, he spoke. “There was a girl—pretty, smart, brash. Her family didn’t have much money and when her father died, they pretty much split up. She came here, looking for a job that would make life just a little bit easier, and wound up onstage in a club. Just for one week, she said, but the money was better than she’d ever seen. She’d stay two weeks, save all her tips and then quit. Then it became a month, two months, until one day she just disappeared. No one ever knew what happened to her.
“Today she’s been pretty much forgotten, by the people who knew her as a pretty, smart girl, by the family who didn’t approve of what she was doing, by the dancers she worked with night after night at the club. Call me sentimental, but I think a person should be remembered by someone. She shouldn’t have to pass through life and be forgotten as if she never existed.”
“You remember,” Amanda said quietly. Had he dated the girl? Befriended her? No, wait, it was Copper Lake. He might have lied to, used and betrayed someone from the wrong side of town, but he wouldn’t have been friends with her.
“I don’t understand how a nineteen-year-old girl can disappear and no one thinks anything of it.”
“Haven’t you ever wanted to change your life? To wake up living someplace else, doing something else, being someone else?”
“No…but there’ve been a few times I wouldn’t mind sending my brother off someplace else.” He slanted her a look. “Have you?”
“Of course.” Then, before she could stop it, the question was out. “Which brother?”
“Robbie. The youngest. You can’t imagine what a pain in the ass he was as a kid.”
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