“Chatting on my time, ladies?” He sends a pointed look at Fable, who for once in her life keeps her lips clamped shut. It’s a miracle. “I suggest you get back to work.”

Not saying a word, she turns tail and takes off, leaving me alone with a man who is very, very pissed off.

And I think it’s all directed at me.

“I just spoke to my father,” he starts, his voice tight, his eyes narrowed. “He had some interesting information.”

“About what?” I ask warily.

“About you.” He pauses, waiting for my surprise to settle in. “And what you did when you worked at Gold Diggers.”

My knees threaten to buckle, and not in a good way. “Wh—what are you talking about?” I know exactly what he’s talking about. I’ve kept this secret from him for months. Almost a year. I never wanted him to know the truth.

Colin steps closer, glancing around as if to ensure we’re alone. “You know exactly what I’m talking about.”

Panic flares and my brain scrambles. I didn’t want him to find out, especially like this. I want to deny it. I want to pretend this isn’t happening, but I can’t. So I decide to be completely honest.

Even if the truth might cost me everything.

“You already know I was a stripper there,” I admit, my voice small. “I danced, but only for a little while. A few months.” Regret crashes through me, but I push it aside. I can’t say anything more.

“You’re lying to me, Jen. Why would you lie to me? I thought I was your friend.” He’s starting to yell and I shush him, not wanting to draw any attention.

“We shouldn’t talk about it out here.” I grab hold of his arm to try and drag him back to his office but he jerks out of my grip, his expression full of disgust and horror.

All of it aimed directly at me.

“You’ve had plenty of opportunity to tell me the truth. I need to hear you say it.” He spits out the last word. “I could’ve helped you. You know this. God, Jenny, why did you let them touch you?”

Dread consumes me and my head spins. How does he know? He’s not saying what he knows but I can tell. He looks positively horrified, and I hate it. Hate that this is a part of my past and he’s learned about it from someone else. I should have told him. I should have been honest with him from the start. “I refuse to have this conversation out here where anyone could be listening.” I reach for him but he steps back, clearly not wanting to be touched. By me. That hurts. “Let’s go to your office. Please.”

“No,” he says vehemently. “Say it, Jen. Tell me what you let them do to you.”

Sighing, I throw my head back, staring at the ceiling for a long minute before I finally look at him. “It was only for a couple of months. I was desperate. I started working there as a cocktail waitress like I told you, but the girls who danced would rake in so much money, I became jealous over what they made. Every single one of them encouraged me to dance and after awhile, I finally decided why the hell not? So one night I drank a few shots for liquid courage, got up onstage, and proceeded to make an ass of myself the very first time I danced.”

I remember the embarrassing moment like it was yesterday. The men that catcalled me and the others who openly laughed. My dancing skills had been subpar at best and I’d been a little drunk and sloppy on my feet. But after awhile, I’d gotten into it and danced with wild abandon.

Glancing at Colin, I see he’s glaring at me, expecting me to say more. I don’t want to say more.

But I do.

“The money that the men threw at me when I danced felt empowering. I—I became addicted to the tips. I needed that money. I was all alone. Soon I was dancing six nights a week, working as much as I could. Making as much money as I could. After I’d built up some confidence, I started to offer lap dances.” I look away from Colin, unable to stand to see his reaction. He must hate me so much. “My tips exploded. I saved and saved, ready to put a deposit down on an apartment of my own so I could get away from my awful roommate when one of her creepy boyfriends snuck into my room when I was at work. He searched through my stuff and found the secret stash of cash I kept in a crappy old shoe box under the bed.”

“He stole your money.” Colin’s voice is flat and I refuse to look at him.

“He took it all. My roommate was pissed when I accused her boyfriend of stealing from me. She kicked me out. I was devastated.”

Desperate. Scared.

“Why didn’t you call your parents? They would’ve taken you back in.”

“They hardly noticed I was gone!” I look at him now, see that he flinched when I yelled my answer. “I left because I didn’t seem to matter to them anymore. No one cared. Going home would’ve been a step backward.”

“So you lived in your car instead.” The sarcasm in his voice is thick.

“What was I going to do? I felt like I had nowhere else to go. I was embarrassed, Colin. At the very end of my rope. I did things that I’m not proud of. Not proud of at all.” Things I never even told Fable and she’s my closest friend. She’s the only one who would probably get it.

Colin rescued me within two weeks of the theft, something I’d never told him about either. I don’t like talking about my Gold Digger days.

Clearly, neither does Colin.

“Why didn’t you tell me all this? I mean, I knew what you were . . . doing, but I sure as hell didn’t know everything.” He steps away from me and rubs the back of his neck, looking confused. Hurt. Disappointed.

Completely devastated by my confession.

God. He thinks I’m disgusting for what I’ve done. And he doesn’t even know the half of it. “Why is it any of your business, what I’ve done with my life?” I know why it’s his business—I want him to know. He’s one of my closest friends.

And now I’m pretty sure I’m in love with him.

“I’m your friend, Jen. If friends can’t be honest with each other . . .” His voice trails off, the implication clear.

I’m nothing but a liar and a slut. How dare he jump to conclusions? How dare he judge me? Yeah, I’m not proud of the things I did, but I had no choice. I was alone. I couldn’t go back home; my parents were too wrapped up in their own problems to want to deal with mine. They’d ignored me for years and once they lost my brother, it was as if I didn’t exist.

My brother. The only one in my family who really noticed me. The only one who seemed to care as we got older. Now he was dead. I had no one.

Just myself.

“Friends don’t treat each other like they’re trash. At least, not the ones I know,” I say, turning away from him and walking out of the room. I don’t stop as I head toward the employee room and go to the short row of lockers. I open mine up, grab the old purse I’d started using again after the robbery, and slam the metal door, heading back out into the restaurant. I storm past Colin, my head held high, my gaze anywhere but on him.

“Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he barks after me.

I turn to him, my nose tilted into the air. “I’m leaving.”

“You leave right now and you’re fired,” he threatens.

Oh my God. He means it—I can see the grim determination written all over his face. “So fire me, then.” I drop my gaze, refusing to look at him. If I do, I might break down and cry.

“Jenny.” He whispers my name and I chance a glance at him. “Talk to me.” I see the vulnerability in his eyes, the confusion and the sadness. Maybe some of it is tinged with disgust; I don’t know. I can’t really tell. All I know is that he’s judging me and making me feel even worse about my mistakes than I already do. It’s better for me to cut my losses and run. Just like I originally planned.

“Don’t make me do this,” he continues, his deep voice rumbling with agony. “Don’t make me fire you.”

“Are you serious right now? Go ahead.” I flick my chin at him. “Fire me. It’ll give me the excuse to get the hell out of this place even sooner.”

Chapter 20

Colin

I take Jen’s hand and drag her back to my office, not giving a shit if anyone sees us arguing. I’m not letting her leave like this. Not until I hear everything she has to say.

“Tell me everything,” I say to her when we enter my empty office. Thank God, Dad is gone. My entire body is shaking I’m still so damn angry and agitated over my confrontation with Jen.

“There’s nothing else to tell,” she says, her voice so low I can barely hear her.

She’s lying. There’s more. What my dad told me . . . I want it all to be a lie.

But I’m scared it’s the truth. I remember finding her in that damn car. Hell, I have nightmares about finding her in that guy’s car.

The words Dad said still cloud my brain. I’ll have nightmares about them, too. I f**king know it.

“You’re holding back,” I tell her, desperate for her to be honest with me. I need her trust. I feel like I’ve broken it and I can’t stand it.

She lifts her chin, defiance written all over her pretty features. “You know all that you need to know. You always have. I can’t believe you’re making a big deal about it now.”

The words threaten to burst out of me. I can’t ask her if the story my dad told me is the truth. How he went to Gold Diggers and saw a picture of Jen on the wall. That the bartender told him she was one of their best dancers and rumor had it she took money for sex out in the parking lot when she wasn’t dancing.

Jesus.

I need to hear her say it. I want her to trust me enough to confess all.

But she won’t. I don’t understand why. I won’t judge her.

Will I? Shit, I don’t know.

“All I’m asking is for you to be honest with me,” I say, my tone pleading. I sound downright desperate.

And that’s because I am desperate.

“I already said. There’s nothing else you need to know.” She crosses her arms in front of her chest. “Is that all?”

“You’re not going anywhere,” I threaten.

“The hell I’m not.”

Damn! I can’t believe she’s pushing me to this. “You walk out, I’m firing you.”

“I’m walking out.” Her eyes flicker. I see the worry. The fear. It doesn’t stop her from telling me she’s leaving.

I harden my jaw, glaring at her. “Fine, you’re fired, effectively immediately. I’ll have your final check for you later this evening.”

“Keep it. I don’t want your money,” she flings at me as she turns on her heel to leave. “It’s full of conditions anyway.”

All I’ve ever done is take care of her. Watch over her. “If making sure you’re protected and safe are so-called conditions, then you’ve never protested before,” I call after her as she leaves.

She doesn’t turn around. Doesn’t say another word. I don’t understand her. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t understand me, either.

No one does.

Dad enters my office minutes later, slowly shaking his head, his expression somber. No doubt he notices the devastated look on my face, because I’m barely keeping my shit together.

“She tell you?” he asks.

“I don’t want to talk about it.” I start looking through drawers, looking for . . . what? I don’t know. If I look at my dad too long, I might break down and cry like a baby.

He sighs. “She’s nothing but a whore, son. You really want a girl like that in your life?”

I leap out of my chair and lunge at him, ramming his big body against the wall so fast, the back of his head thumps the wall hard. My face in his, I glare into his eyes, see the fear and confusion swirling in them. “You call her a whore again and I will tear you apart. Do you understand me?”

He releases a harsh, stuttering breath. “You really care about her that much? Even after everything I told you?”

“I don’t turn my feelings on and off like a goddamn light switch,” I tell him. “I’m not like you.”

Dad’s eyes darken with anger. “You don’t know me.”

“You’re damn right I don’t know you. You never stuck around much. Hell, it’s been two years since the last time I saw you,” I yell, furious at my dad, at Jen, at myself.

What the f**k is wrong with me? With everyone in my life? Everything’s hard. Nothing’s easy. I’m tired of it. I want my life to be simple. I want to be happy.

I want to be with Jen. But again, it’s not that easy.

“You never seemed to want me around. Your mother deterred me from being a part of your life every chance she got,” he throws back at me.

Stunned by his words, I release my hold on him and step away. “What did you say?”

“You think I didn’t want to be a part of your life? You think I stayed away from you because I wanted to?” He brushes his hands down his front, straightening his shirt that I wrinkled, then runs them through his hair, smoothing out the unruly strands. “Your mother did her best to keep me away from you.”

“Why?” I don’t believe him. I know she hates him, but she wouldn’t force him to stay away from me . . . would she?

I hid away and cried a lot when I was a kid, wishing my dad cared enough to want to spend time with me. She knew this after finding me more than once. I’d been jealous of what Danny had with his dad. A solid, loving father/son relationship. They would go out in the yard and toss a baseball or football back and forth to each other. They’d go fishing together. They included me all the time, always making me feel welcome, but deep down inside, I felt like an intruder. A jealous, unloved interloper.