Chapter 187

I go on stage three times that night, and each time afterwards men beg me for a private dance. But I just laugh and shrug, telling them that’s not my style, but even as I say it I bite my lip a little, letting them think that maybe they can convince me. It works, too, because each of these men crowd the edge of the stage when I go on, throwing more money, desperate to show me how generous they are, how much more they’ll give me if I just dance with them when I come off the stage.

After my third dance, though, I don’t come out again, not wanting to see any of those men. Instead, I tip one of the waitresses and ask her to go get Frankie, to bring him back here so that we can sneak out the back.

When he comes through, he doesn’t look directly for me – instead looking around the women’s dressing room with real curiosity.

“Always wonder what it was like back here?” I ask, laughing at him as I pay the matron at the back of the room for the outfit she sold me on credit and then handing a cloth laundry bag with the outfit in question to the girl who allowed me to use her makeup in exchange for the fairly expensive rhinestone bikini.

“It’s Valhalla,” Frankie says, grinning at me as he finally brings his attention to me. His grin deepens when he looks down at me dressed again in Christian’s sweatshirt and basketball shorts, the huge sandals on my feet. “You look…less glamorous.”

“Yeah, well,” I sigh, flicking my hair back over my shoulder. “If I dressed like that all the time I wouldn’t get anything done.”

He doesn’t say anything, just smiling at me, as the manager comes over.

“Boyfriends aren’t supposed to be back here,” the manager murmurs, frowning at Frankie.

“Oh, he’s harmless,” I sigh, stepping forward and pulling the wad of bills out of the pouch of my sweatshirt, counting out the manager’s fee and the twenty percent I promised him.

He raises his eyebrows when he sees the rather thick stack of bills that I hand him. “You want a job, Bunny?”

“Nah,” I say, tucking the rest of the money safely in my pocket and moving a bit closer to Frankie’s side. “Not in the cards. We’re heading on tonight.”

“You want to come back tomorrow, at least?” the manager asks, raising an eyebrow at me. “We’re having a competition and the same girl you filled in for tonight was supposed to be in it. You’d be helping me out and you could make some serious cash.”

I take a moment, tilting my head to the side. “How serious?”

“Bambs,” Frankie murmurs, reaching out a hand and cupping my elbow in his palm.

“No really,” I say, looking between him and the manager. “How serious?”

“Just come around noon,” the manager says, giving me a smirk. “It’s an all-day thing with finals going on around ten. And I’ll tell your fans out there to expect you.”

I nod eagerly to the manager as he walks away, back towards the room.

Frankie just sighs, looking down at me, shaking his head like he’s not sure that this is a great idea.

“Come on, Frank,” I say, giving him a nudge with my elbow along with a too-cheerful grin. “I’ll treat you to dinner. And what do you say we stay in a motel tonight, instead of sleeping in the car?”

“I’d say,” Frankie says, slinging an arm around my shoulders and pulling me close, “that money just seems to slip through your hands the moment you get it, doesn’t it, bunny rabbit?”

I laugh as we start towards the back door. “With skills like mine, Frank? There’s always more money coming.”

“There’d better be,” he murmurs. “Because I want Olive Garden tonight.”

I burst out laughing as the pair of us walk out the door and into the night.

When Frankie and I stumble into the motel room the next night, we’re both laughing a little hysterically, our arms packed with bags – fast food, clothes from the trucker stop down the street, basically everything we’ve been denying ourselves for days and splurged on tonight.

Oh, and another bag just…stacked with cash.

“God, I can’t believe it,” Frankie says with a sigh, dumping his share of the bags on the tiny table by the window and kicking the door shut before he flops onto one of the queen-sized beds. “I have never seen a crowd go so wild before – and all the rest of those dancers wanted to kill you, Bambs.”

“Well, luckily for them, I’m out of their hair,” I say with a sigh, dropping my own bags and taking a minute to lock and bolt the door behind us, grinning as I find the bag with the burgers and fries and bring it with me as I likewise sit on Frankie’s bed, starving and glad to be done with the day.

I mean, I’ve been dancing since noon, and it’s hard work.

“You were amazing,” Frankie murmurs, digging into the bag and passively handing me a double cheeseburger while pulling out his fries and starting on them, his long body laid out on the bed, his legs crossed at the ankles. “Seriously, I can see why that manager wanted you to come back – you won…hands down.”

“And made him a pretty penny,” I say with a happy sigh, unwrapping my burger and taking a big bite before speaking with my mouth full. “And us too.” I point over to the bag where we put all of my cash – shoved rather hastily in. “How much do you think we got?”

“Thousands, Bambi,” Frankie says, flicking his eyes up to me with a little bit of awe in them. “Seriously, we should have brought you to Vegas. You could fund a third-world nation with those skills.”

“Thanks,” I say, giving him a clever wink and laughing. “But…I don’t think Vegas is precisely in the cards for us, is it?”

“Nah,” Frankie says with a sigh, popping another fry in his mouth as he likewise looks over at the big bag of cash. “Unfortunately, you’d get too famous too fast.”

We’re quiet for a long moment now, each of us lost in our thoughts but…honestly, I think probably thinking about the same thing.

“So…” I say quietly after a moment, letting my burger fall into the wrapper on my lap. “Does this…change our plans at all?”

Frankie sighs for a second and then sits up, leaning against the headboard as I am and turning to face me. He holds my gaze seriously for a minute, studying me, I think maybe trying to read my mind a bit.

I can’t help it. I smile a little.

His own face breaks into a smile as well, a bashful one and he looks down at his hands for a moment before setting his food aside. “Things are very different now, Bambs,” he murmurs. “We have…a couple of grand. We could sell the car, get about…five hundred more.” He shrugs. “It opens doors.”

“Doors to what?” I ask, curious about what our options really are.

“Doors to a lot,” he says vaguely, looking up again into my eyes, holding my gaze in a way that makes…well, makes my stomach turn over just a bit. “I mean, what do you want, Bambs?”

And as I stare back at Frankie…I’m afraid the answer is that I don’t really know what I want.