Simple.
When Sam handed me an ID with my face and some other person’s name and told me to sign up for a weekly dance class at that same dance studio in Queens, I figured it out pretty quickly. Still, I went along, not saying a word.
He rationalized it by saying we were giving people a good time and making a bit of money. It wasn’t any different from selling booze during Prohibition. I bought that bullshit in the beginning. But, then again, I was only sixteen.
I was naïve.
I was stupid.
It really didn’t seem like a big deal. I had watched my friends smoke a joint after school. I’d been to parties where someone brought an eight ball of coke or a handful of ecstasy pills. I’d heard the whole “say no to drugs” campaign loud and clear, but drugs seemed to be everywhere in high school. Everywhere people were having fun. And when something’s everywhere people are having fun, it begins to feel less immoral. Almost . . . acceptable.
And when your own stepdad—the man who has raised you and given you everything—asks you to do something, the lines of right and wrong become a little more confusing, and it becomes easier to deny that little voice inside your head. I guess I didn’t have the best moral guide growing up.
When I actually saw the inside of a suitcase on the first Miami drop, though . . . it finally hit me. Sam doesn’t deal in eight balls and handfuls of party-time highs. He deals in hundred-dose vials of heroin. Bags of them.
Goddamn suitcases.
He deals in the stuff that turns people into junkies, ruins their lives, and eventually kills them.
And I’m helping him do it.
That’s when I stopped ignoring that little voice. I finally realized that what Sam has me involved in is plain wrong and it doesn’t matter how many cars and designer dresses he buys me. The wake-up call has brought a wave of guilt that I’m still learning how to deal with. Now I struggle to sleep, to eat. I’ve lost at least ten pounds off my already lean frame. Every morning I get up and feel the urge to walk out my door and never look back.
When I hear about another overdose on the news, I feel responsible. It’s not the recreational overdoses that are making the headlines; it’s the really addictive stuff, like heroin. It feels like the reporters are talking to me, judging me, condemning me. With my help, kids as young as fourteen have overdosed. Kids have been left orphaned because their parents overdosed. There really is no such thing as an occasional heroin user.
But I don’t want to spend the rest of my life struggling financially, so I guess my feelings of guilt still aren’t overwhelming enough. That, or I am just a truly bad person.
I deserve what happened to me with Sal, back in New York. I deserve to strip in front of a crowd of salivating men. I deserve a whole lot worse.
Sam also deserves to be punished for all that he’s done—to countless, faceless victims, and to me. For giving me love and protection that seemed unconditional, but actually had strings attached.
But who’s going to punish him?
I peek past the screen, through the crowd, and I see all the faces—waiting expectantly. All of those eyes will be on me. I don’t think I’ve ever been on a stage that big before in my life. Then again, maybe it’s just because I’ll be on it alone—basically naked—that makes it seem all the bigger.
I watch as three girls climb down from the circular platforms that jut off from the main stage. In between the main shows, the girls take turns teasing the audience a bit. But they know to get off now.
To let all eyes fall on me.
My potential boss is there too, looking classy in a midnight-blue fitted button-down as he leans over a railing, talking with that gargantuan bouncer—Nate, I heard someone call him—who was guarding the back door earlier tonight. Even in the darkness and at this distance, I can see the cut of his arms. The guy must have an immaculate body beneath those clothes.
There was plenty of chatter about Cain in the dressing room as I was getting ready. Comments about him being overly moody, suggestions for how to cheer him up followed by wicked giggles. It’s clear that any single one of them would give her left boob to sleep with him. I’m not at all surprised. Under different circumstances—both mine and his—I’d probably want the same. A dark-haired one named Kinsley made a comment about him “comforting” her last week in his office—in private. I wonder how many of them he’s slept with. It’s confusing, though. I mean, I had my dress on the ground. He could have tried something on me but he didn’t. I guess I’m not his type. That’s probably for the best.
I’m not sure what to think about the other dancers. I earned a few looks of surprise from them, but otherwise they pretty much ignored me. Ginger says it’s because they haven’t had a new girl in here in a while, other than Kinsley. And few people like her.
Terry taps on the glass window of his little booth and points toward the stage as the beginning chords of my chosen song—“Coming Undone,” by Korn—blast over the speakers. I earned a delayed nod of approval when I requested that one. I know it’s probably not the first choice for most dancers but I find it energizes me, and given that this is the song I work out to the most, I’m able to move fluidly to it, almost like in a routine.
And a strict routine is what I need.
With one last, deep breath, I manage to slip on that same coat of confidence I don through the drops.
And I remind myself that my mother did this.
That I can do this.
That I will do this so I can free myself from Sam’s softly padded shackles one day very soon.
I emerge from my hiding spot, my adrenaline firing on all cylinders, my heart pounding in my stomach. I zero in on the brass pole ahead of me and I time my steps with the beat of the music—the chords distorted within my ears, competing with my thumping heart—in what I hope is a sexy strut. Unable to help myself, my eyes flicker in Cain’s direction for just a moment, to see his dark gaze intently locked on me.
I want to run.
But I can’t. I force my attention back to the pole, seizing it with one determined hand. My brain may be going haywire but my body knows what it needs to do.
I begin.
Years of competitive-level gymnastics has given me physical strength, balance, and coordination to hit just about every move I learned in pole-dance classes and I don’t hold out now, executing the most complex spins, drops, and transitions with ease.
It feels surprisingly organic, the moves coming naturally to me. And if I keep my eyes glazed and my attention on the brass, the heavy beat of the music, and the soft blue hue of the stage lights, I can almost forget that I’m surrounded by leering men.
Almost.
But I can’t shake the feel of their eyes on me. And Cain . . . Somehow, his attention is more nerve-wracking than that of the hundreds of others combined. Probably because his opinion is ultimately the one that matters. When I make the simple mistake of letting my eyes graze over him during a boomerang hold, I find that same steely expression on me, only heavier. Heavy enough to halt my racing heart for a beat. And unsettling enough that my grip slips. Luckily, I’m not in the midst of a nose-breaker drop or another dangerous move, and so I quickly recuperate.
I hear a couple of hoots and hollers of “come on!” I can’t stall the inevitable any longer. Gritting my teeth, I reach up with my free hand to pull the snaps of the vest open. I let it fall from my shoulders and I toss it aside, exposing the stringy top beneath. The buzz from the crowd spikes with pleasure.