Pole Dance (13 page)

"Er, and Ewww. No. What I meant was, what's your story?"

Jake's eyes stared into mine for a couple of beats before they began roaming the festive walls and glancing at the dining room that was slowly, but steadily, filling with people.

"Not much to tell, I guess," he said finally reaching for his beer. He looked everywhere but at me as he took a long drink before again pinning me with his golden gaze. I gave him time just like he had given me in my disaster of an interview.

"How much you want to know, gorgeous?" he rumbled, the now familiar one eyebrow lifting.

'Everything,' my heart whispered but I only raised my eyebrows and mimicked his come-on hand gesture casually as I took another slurp of my drink, using my tongue to snag the straw. I watched a slow smile work its way up his face as he took in my hand movement and then glanced back at my mouth. It hadn't escaped my notice he had called me 'gorgeous' twice now.

"Born and raised here. Mom took off when I was three so it was just me and my brother who was six at the time. Don't remember her but my brother remembers that Dad was a wreck when she left. Dad never fully recovered from her leaving, if you want to know the truth."

Jake paused and snagged a chip after loading it with the chunky salsa, chewing thoughtfully before continuing.

"One of my first memories is of Frank standing on a chair pushed up against the stove making chicken noodle soup from a can for our dinner." Jake's face was a scowl as he, lost in memories, slowly used his thumb to peel the label from his bottle of beer. "He didn't even know to add water to the soup until he was in second grade and could read the label." His voice stopped and I thought to change the direction of his thoughts and get rid of the scowl. Although, even the scowl worked at making his already gorgeous features into a beautiful vision of all-that-is-male hotness.

"How'd you meet Mrs. Baxter?"

"Dunno know if I had seen her before or what, but I was six. Frank was teaching me how to ride a two-wheeler when I took a bad spill." I watched as Jake's face softened from his scowl and took on a look I could only think of as 'love'. "The raspberry on my knee was pretty bad and was cryin' pretty hard at both the sting in my knee and Frank's face seein' it. Guessin' Ms. Lilly had watched our antics from her kitchen window and had caught it all. Came runnin' out her front door with a first aid kit tucked under her arm and fixed me right up with some kind of cream, a band-aid and a cootch and a coodle."

"A 'cootch and a coodle'?" I repeated, not ever having heard that expression before.

"What you and I would call a hug or a cuddle, yeah?" Jake replied with a grin tipping his face down to mine.

"Great name for it," I said caught in the magic of his story and his eyes.

"Became our go-to gal. Whenever Frank or I needed someone for somethin', Ms. Lilly was the only person we had. Dad was a wash when it came to even rememberin' he had sons, so we depended on her for everythin'. When I was 'bout eight, Frank and I filled up our little wagon with the mail that was pilin' up on the kitchen table and took it over to her. Ms. Lilly had us open every single piece and placed the contents in separate piles. When that was done, she put her hands over her face and was cryin'. 'Bout scared Frank and me half to death. Come to find out, there were rent checks from our Dad's three properties goin' back four months as well as unpaid bills for that length of time, too." I watched him take another sip of his beer. His eyes looked very far away.

"It was Ms. Lilly who taught Frank how to make a deposit at the bank and force Dad to sign checks that Frank had written. She even had Frank make a check out to her and she would give us both the cash and the ride to go grocery shoppin'. She was our angel."

There was a space of quiet as I processed his words. I could see Mrs. Baxter doing that, taking both boys under her wing, treating them as if they were her own. Much as she'd done to me.

"How'd you get into the strip club business?" I asked softly snagging my own chip but only dipping it in the liquid of the salsa. There are two schools of thought about salsa, one smooth and one chunky. I was firmly entrenched on the smooth campus.

"Sold one of the houses I inherited as well as a gas station after Dale, my business partner and best friend, convinced me it was a great investment. We had bought and refurbished that gas station out east of town then sold it. Sold it to Mahmood, who was a piece of shit then, too." Jake took another long drink before continuing. "That, along with the proceeds from the house, and with what Dale put in let us buy the club outright." he replied though I knew it wasn't the whole story. I studied Jake's hand, still working the label off his beer bottle, as I tried to add all the words left unsaid to the visual he created.

"Should've said, 'Just lucky, I guess' like the punch line of that ol' joke."

"What old joke?" I asked with a head tilt to indicate my confusion as well as my jolt back to the here and now.

"What's a nice gal like you doing in a place like this?" he replied with a smile before tipping the last of the bottle against his grinning lips.

Putting the pieces of the joke together, I giggled as the waitress, in oven-mitted hands, slid our plates in front of us. "Hot!" she cautioned before asking if we wanted refills on our drinks. Weird, but the whole time, or at least since my giggle left my mouth, Jake just stared at me. I shook my head and told her we were good for the moment.

First bites weren't taken as we both waited for our food to cool. Guess Jake had decided that turnabout was fair play.

"So, you told me a things about your life; parents dying, etc, etc. Anything else you want to add to that?"

I nodded as I was loading up my fork. This was such a freakin' treat for me. Tons of food that I didn't have to pay for--hell, yeah, I was going to invest as much of myself as he was investing in me, being in my company.

"Tuk yeah oaf to sedle, get ma barings…"

The mumbling was due to my efforts of trying for that ever moving state of 'Cool', in spite of digging into my enchilada while it was scorch-like. Trying to blow on something already in your mouth that is hotter than Hades, while you try to keep up your end of a conversation
and
still try to be cool, is the worst.

Haven't yet had that experience? Believe me, it isn't fun.

I watched as Jake did the one-eyebrow thing as he flicked his hand towards his chest. Oh! I knew what
that
meant. Jake wanted more information.

"Took a year off to settle and get my bearings," I repeated as I slurped then blew on the remaining bite on my fork. "Sister was in the car when the accident occurred. She was the only one to survive, but was in a coma for about eight months."

I stalled, using the winding of my cheese over my fork on my next bite. Did I really trust him enough to share the absolute shit of how I was lost without my family and the new responsibilities that their loss had created?

"With Mom and Dad gone, she was the only family I'd left." I kept my eyes to my plate as I finally shared the worst bit of it, the baddest of the bad within me.

"I, ah…I had to," I had to stop for a moment. I wanted to get this out. But this, this was down deep and didn't want to come up, to be vocalized.

"I was the one who gave the okay to turn off the machines that were keeping her alive." There I said it and I had never, ever shared that with another living soul.

I didn't wanted to see his face, convinced he'd have the pity-look which would, from him, absolutely crush me. But when I ventured a glance, he was still using his thumb holding the beer bottle to scrape off the label. He did a quick head-tilt with sympathetic smile (my mental judges gave him a solid ten for both intent and execution), before reaching for his fork.

Jake removed his arm from me as we both begin to apply ourselves to our food. It didn't take long before we were snagging bites from each other's plates since his carne asada burrito was just as good as the chicken enchiladas he had recommended.

The waitress came by to see how we were doing. Jake, after telling her of our satisfaction with everything, and me nodding my agreement but with my mouth too full to speak, asked her to take a picture with his phone.

I was shocked.

I was touched.

'Who
is
this guy?' I wondered as I smiled into the camera not realizing I had actually muttered it out loud until I heard Jake's bark of laughter.

Jake with no expression was hot.

Jake with a smile was mega-hot.

Jake laughing out loud at something
you've
said--pulling
you
close as his head falls back due to the force of the laughter
you've
caused?

Effing priceless.

I felt, more than saw, the flash of the camera on his cell phone since I was still lost inside my head, lost in the sounds of his laugh.

"Should've ordered two, seein' how you're not shy about eatin' mine," Jake teased. Glancing at the remaining crumbs on my plate and then at my fork that was generously piled with the beef and cheese of his burrito and I'd even swirled in both his refried beans and rice, I giggled.

"Guess I was hungry," I retorted with a smile. "'Course, I'm always hungry!" I popped the overfull fork in my mouth and rolled my eyes and did a little wiggle in ecstasy at the taste.

Jake watched me chew and the small grin he'd been holding slowly slid from his face.

"What?" I asked after swallowing as he kept his eyes on me. I raised my napkin and wiped it thoroughly around my mouth. Did I have something on my face?

"Nothin'," Jake said softly wrapping his arm around me again. "Just enjoyin' the view. Like your smile, pretty girl."

I glanced up at him and our eyes caught. I felt my body go stiff as his fingers slid up the back of my neck bringing my face closer to his. I watched his eyes again drop to my mouth and I somehow forgot how to breathe.

His face softened as he said, "Never thought I'd find eatin' to be fore…"

"Jake!" I heard a male voice bellow, cutting off Jake's words. We both turned to look out into the aisle. I heard Jake mutter, "Fuck," under his breath as he spied the blonde giant standing next to our table. He was easily Jake's height or taller, with a wide-open, boyish face that was smiling in delight at seeing Jake.

"Hank. Fiona," Jake said with a nod.

I had totally missed seeing the tall, leggy redhead standing slightly behind and to the right of the big, blonde man. She was beautiful in spite of wearing too much makeup but her clothes didn't seem to match her beauty. Her soft pink t-shirt with its ruffles and pleats was very stylish if you were a thirteen year old, but just a little too tight across her large chest and her khaki skirt was just a tad too short and veered over the border from 'sexy' to 'skanky'.

"This is Caitlin," Jake stated. "Caitlin, this is Hank and Fiona. Hank's a bouncer at the club and Fiona used to dance there."

"Hey, Hank. Fiona," I offered as I leaned into Jake, balancing myself as I leaned forward with one hand on his firm thigh. "Nice to meet you."

Hank pushed our coats into the corner and sat down across from us pulling Fiona in after him. I glanced at Jake and could see a muscle begin to twitch in his clenched jaw as his hand went from my neck and moved down to my shoulder where he began to rub my arm. While nothing was said, I got the impression that having this couple join us at this particular time was unwelcome.