“Oh my God,” she heard someone say. “That’s so fucking hot.”
She looked into Jack-or-Jake’s eyes, allowing her tongue to trace the contours of her top lip. His pupils were fully dilated, and they looked like raisins, which reminded her that she needed to go grocery shopping. She stepped out of her G-string and was now fully nude except for her necklace and heels. She could see Jack-or-Jake’s erection straining against the crotch of his jeans, and she turned around so she didn’t have to look at it. Slowly—because everything had to be done slowly—she bent all the way forward until her hair touched the floor and she could grab her ankles. She sighed with pleasure as the pendant from her necklace hit her chin; this was such a good hamstring stretch. At Cherry’s suggestion, she’d taken up yoga to improve her strength and flexibility, and it was amazing how many stripper moves were actually yoga moves. Right now she was practicing prasarita padottanasana, or wide-legged forward fold—except she was naked, with her ass in someone’s face.
Behind her, she could feel Jack-or-Jake’s hands lightly touching her butt, but this time she decided to allow it, since the Prince song was about to end. The more turned on he was, the more he’d want to go private. She began to roll herself back up again, engaging both her legs and core to keep the movements sensual. This was a hard enough move on a mat in yoga class, let alone on a hard floor, with a whiskey shot in her, wearing stilettos.
As soon as she straightened up fully, she saw him.
He was coming out of the hallway where the bathrooms were, as tall and lean as ever, same familiar gait, blue Nokia cell phone in one hand. Even in the dim light, she could tell he looked different. The twists were gone, the goatee was gone; he was clean-shaven now, with a simple fade. The shorter hair made his face look more chiseled. The glasses were new as well, rectangular-framed and stylish.
But it was unmistakably, undeniably Drew.
Her first instinct was to run, duck, or throw herself under the table, basically anything so he wouldn’t see her. But her feet wouldn’t step forward, her head wouldn’t turn away, her hands wouldn’t cover her face. All she could do was stand there, naked, her breasts still moist from the whiskey, utterly frozen.
And then he saw her.
Recognition bloomed on his face as his gaze darted from her eyes to her breasts to her crotch to the new tattoo on her thigh he was seeing for the first time, and then back up again. Recognition turned into shock, and shocked morphed into confusion. If a hole were to suddenly open up in the floor, she would have gladly dropped into it. Because anything was better than the way Drew was looking at her right now.
He was seeing her, and there was nowhere to go, and no way to rewind.
The music was too loud for her to hear him actually say her name, but his lips formed the word Joey, and that was enough to bring her all the way back into herself. Just like that, Ruby was gone, and now she was herself again, buck naked in a strip club, and painfully, excruciatingly ashamed. It felt like one of those anxiety dreams where you thought you were clothed, only to realize that you were naked in front of a roomful of people.
Except it was actually fucking happening, and there was no way to wake up. Joey was in a nightmare of her own making.
A couple of Drew’s friends spoke to him, gesturing for him to sit down. Someone poured him a beer from one of the many pitchers on the table. He finally took a seat, but pushed the beer away. Someone else smacked him on the shoulder, waving a twenty and pointing to Joey. Drew shook his head decisively. No, he did not want a lap dance. Or, perhaps more accurately, he did not want a lap dance from her.
Jack-or-Jake had his arms wrapped around her waist from behind in a too-snug embrace. Normally she would never have tolerated this, but staring across the table at the person she loved most in the world, she wasn’t sure her knees wouldn’t buckle. She felt dizzy. Nauseated. There was a ringing in her ears. Her stomach hurt.
“Baby, let’s do the Champagne Room,” Jack-or-Jake said into her ear. She could feel him pressing against her. “I have to be alone with you.”
She opened her mouth to say no—because surely she couldn’t do that, she couldn’t go with one of Drew’s friends into the goddamned Champagne Room while Drew was looking right the fuck at her—but no words came out.
Instead, she nodded dumbly as Jack-or-Jake pulled her away from the group and toward the room with the curtains and the velvet booths, where two hundred fifty was just the starting price for a bottle of champagne and a whole lot more. As Jack-or-Jake fumbled through his wallet to pay the bouncer, Joey chanced one last look back. She made brief eye contact with Drew before he took off his glasses and turned away.