Offensive Behavior

Except for the no father and seriously loaded part. Also boy parts.

She sent him a text: Google me yet, Mr. Rich and Famous? She got a reply almost instantly.

You really could fly. He’d seen video. You’re incredible.

And he’d chosen to focus on that and not the way her sporting career came to an ignominious dead stop. You’re not too slack yourself. She watched her phone. She wanted him to text back but she didn’t want this to be something more than she could handle. She swiped the keyboard. I’m off to work. Have a good night. She looked at the screen again. He’d got the message. Then she hit the shower to get ready for Lucky’s, irrationally irritated that he’d not tried harder to keep a conversation going.

For all she knew he was out picking up.

Lordy, this is why she didn’t need a man in her life. Screwed with your head.

Things got stickier at Lucky’s because she simply wasn’t a good enough liar to play this off as anything but what it was, a very hot one-night stand and a short but sweet fling.

“How good is his equipment?”

That was Lizabeth’s opening question. Zarley pantomimed the innocent, with a finger to her lips, and downcast eyes. “More than ample.”

“Did he know how to use it?” said Kathryn.

She laughed. He did now. “I’m not going to kiss and tell.”

Lizabeth looked at Kathryn. “We’ll have to torture it out of her.” She brandished a nail file in Zarley’s direction.

Kathryn snapped the elastic of her bikini pants in the time-honored tradition of these are creeping up my ass. “We’ll just oil her pole, that’ll fix her.”

Zarley laughed and Therese gasped. “You’d do that?”

Lizabeth transferred her nail file aim to Therese. “Yeah, don’t mess with us.”

Melinda rolled her eyes. “Don’t listen to them, honey. Lou would have anyone who did something like that out of here so fast their G-string would strangle their fallopian tubes.”

“Interesting option,” said Lizabeth.

Therese still looked freaked out. Zarley leaned back on the edge of the countertop that served as their dressing table. “It was fun. He’s geeky. You saw that at breakfast. He has no furniture and he drinks straight out of the bottle from the fridge. But he’s sweet too.” And intense, so intense thinking about him now had everything south of her hips twitching. “That’s all I’m saying.”

Lizabeth paused from fixing her eyelashes and blinked at Zarley with one sparkle-studded falsie on. “You seeing him again?”

“Yes.” That got hoots and catcalls. She put up a hand to silence the mirth. “But it’s just a quick fling. Reid and I are not in the same time zone, so when we’ve worn it out between the sheets it’s over.”

Because that’s what happened when you had a thing, it was good till it wasn’t and the idea was to get out before it went bad.

“And he’s cool with that?” Kathryn said from the doorway. She was about to go on.

Zarley hesitated. He’d come on so darkly possessive this morning, which was not okay, despite the fact it was seriously hot and also confusing. He didn’t get to do that after one night together and then with what she’d learned by googling him, it was clearer than ever the two of them wanted different things. The girls were all looking at her. Kathryn’s music, Blue Foundation’s “Eyes on Fire” had started.

“He’s totally cool with it.”

And if he wasn’t, well he would be when she’d finished with him.

She danced her first set and tried not to feel like something was missing. She liked her sexy secretary costume, a butt-grazing box-pleat skirt and a white bra top worn with black-framed glasses and pencil in her bun. The routine she chose was also comfortably familiar, as was the song she danced to, Jessie J’s “Sexy Silk.” But the back booth was empty and much as it should’ve made her happy to know Reid had kept at least that part of his promise, it was a downer too. He was her most appreciative audience, after all.

When she came off stage she stood with Kathryn in the wings watching Therese. The girl was still painfully nervous and instead of a cheeky disdain in her manner like Zarley used, the haughty, no touching attitude Kathryn projected or even the too-hot-to-handle way Lizabeth worked the stage, Therese was all fumbling enthusiasm. She got laughs instead of lustful looks.

That might’ve been how the night with Reid played out, more energy than desire, more groping and manhandling than genuine skill, but he was a quicker study than Therese.

Bastard was probably already on the prowl.

She leaned into Kathryn. “Would you do me a favor?”