“Calm your ass down, Krit. Fighting with Jason ain’t helping her. It ain’t about him and you know it, so stop putting blame there and go calm the f**k off,” Rock said as he stepped beside Krit. “Walk this off,” Rock told him.
Krit swung his angry glare back to me. “He left her. Like the spoiled, arrogant piece of shit he is. Didn’t even try to help her. She loves that sorry sonuvabitch!”
Rock stepped in front of Krit and said something low enough that I couldn’t hear him. I wanted to know what he thought I had done to Jess, because he sure as hell didn’t have his facts straight.
“Let him talk,” I said. “I want to know what it is I did exactly, ’cause the way I’m looking at it, I was the one who got screwed over,” I said to Rock’s back, and everyone around us went quiet.
Rock slowly turned around, and his attention was completely focused on me now. “Excuse me?” he said. The warning edge to his voice just added to my confusion. What had Jess told them I had done?
“I didn’t do anything to Jess. She slept with him and broke things off with me,” I said, pointing at Krit.
“She didn’t f**king sleep with me!” Krit roared, fighting to get loose again as they held him back. “She just wanted you! Trust me, I tried like hell, but she only wanted you and you ran, leaving her at the first sign of trouble. What’s the deal? A stripper not good enough for you? Being forced to f**king strip to pay her momma’s hospital bills too low for your uppity ass?”
“Enough!” Rock said, stopping Krit. “Get him the hell outta here before I shut him up myself.”
I no longer cared that Rock was the size and build of a brick wall. I needed to know what the hell Krit was yelling about. “No!” I said, moving toward him. “I want to know what he’s saying,” I told no one in particular. “Who is stripping to pay her mother’s hospital bills?” I stopped as the words coming out of my mouth clicked. “No,” I said, shaking my head. They didn’t mean . . . “No!” He was lying.
Krit looked at me incredulously. “You don’t know,” he said, almost too quietly. “She didn’t f**king tell you.” He shook his head and slung off the guys holding him. “Motherfucker!” he roared. “You don’t even f**king know!”
I turned to look at Rock, still feeling the horror of what he was saying register in my brain. “What hospital bills?” I managed to ask through the gripping tightness in my throat.
“Her momma’s. She’s got cancer. They don’t have insurance, and she’s got to have a mastectomy. They had to move to a cheaper place, and Jess had to get a job that paid the bills and paid the large monthly payment she has to make to the hospital for her mother so she can get the surgery and get chemo.”
My chest felt like someone had just dropped a load of f**king bricks on it. “When did she find out?”
“About four weeks ago.”
“He doesn’t even f**king know,” Krit was still ranting. “She told me it wasn’t his problem. I thought she was f**king protecting him, but she hadn’t even told him.”
I looked at him and her story all started to make sense. “She never slept with you four weeks ago.” It wasn’t a question. I knew the answer.
“Fuck, she wasn’t even talking to me four weeks ago. She was too busy escaping town without telling anyone. I ain’t had Jess since you took her away from me.”
My blood pounded in my head, and I knew I was heaving, as my breathing was difficult. “Where is she?” I asked Rock.
“She’s in Mobile at Delilah’s,” Krit answered instead. “Rock don’t know shit. I’m the one who goes there and pays for all the damn lap dances so she doesn’t have to give them to those horny-ass men.”
The image of Jess’s body being on display to a bunch of men was all it took. I turned and took off running.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
JESS
Krit hadn’t been back since I had yelled at him outside. I needed to call him and apologize. He hadn’t deserved that. And without him here deflecting all the lap dances, I was having to stomach my way through them more and more often.
It was almost my time for the stage. This was the easiest time of night. The lights blinded me, so I couldn’t see the men watching. I was all alone up there and dancing for fun. I adjusted the top of the red velvet. My nipple was almost showing, it was cut so low. I would be taking it off soon anyway, but Dee liked us covered when we walked out onstage.
“You’re up,” the stage manager called, and I checked my lipstick to make sure it was on correctly before heading up the stairs and to the curtains. The first night I had done this I had been so sick I was afraid I would throw up onstage. But then I’d walked out there and realized I couldn’t see them.
The beat started, and I knew it was my cue. I pulled back the curtain and lifted my leg before slowly setting it outside, then let the rest fall back until I was standing there in my costume and stilettos. I heard the usual catcalls and cheers, but I tuned them out. The cool metal of the pole touched my hand as I started my routine and focused on the music.
A loud shout startled me, and then some other noise. I stopped dancing and squinted into the dark room. I could see a man moving through the crowd to the stage, but it was so dark all I could tell was that he shoving people out of his way. I glanced around, looking for one of the bouncers before he made it to the stage. I had heard horror stories about men climbing onto the stage to get to a dancer. I wasn’t sure I’d ever be able to get back up here again after that kind of experience.
I backed up, ready to run offstage, when the stage lights hit the man’s face.
Jason.
That wasn’t right. Why was Jason here? I watched as he jumped up onto the stage and stalked toward me with a determined look on his face.