“Hey, dude. What’s up?” Hudson answers after a couple of rings. “You got an update on Summer’s Edge?”

We just spoke a couple of hours ago about a poorly performing apartment complex called Summer’s Edge we’re trying to offload onto another investor. It’s in a decent area of town, but the complex itself is comprised of older units that rent for cheap. There always seem to be several vacancies and unpredictable tenants, which doesn’t help when you need steady cash flow to plan your business. It’s also going to need a new roof and an overhaul to the heating and cooling system within the next two to three years. If we can sell it for the right price before then, Hudson and I won’t have to deal with the headache of owning Summer’s Edge anymore, something we’re both very much looking forward to.

“No. No updates yet,” I tell him. “I’m guessing we’ll hear back from the investor sometime tomorrow.” Without taking a breath, I add, “Beth doesn’t think I can have a female friend.”

He pauses for a few seconds, as if trying to catch up to the abrupt topic change. “That’s bullshit. You can do anything you set your mind to. I’ve seen it.”

Hudson, only a couple of months older than me, has always been infinitely wiser.

“Thank you,” I say, feeling the tiniest bit redeemed. “I’ve sort of struck up a friendship with the newest tenant, Emery. Beth was giving me shit about it.”

Several moments of stony silence follow, where I’m sure Hudson is trying to process what I’ve just told him.

“Well, don’t torture yourself. Just because I’ve laid down the law on not hunting in the herd doesn’t mean you can’t get laid. You can be friends with Emery. You’ll just have to go back to hitting the bar scene again to hunt for pussy.”

Why does that idea hold zero appeal? Standing around in a too-loud bar, buying drinks for girls who I know after one glance will let me walk them outside and fuck them in the back of my BMW. The idea just doesn’t excite me like it used to.

“Yeah, of course.” Suddenly I don’t know why I’ve called him. “Update me if you hear anything from the investor.”

“Will do, buddy. Have a good night,” Hudson says, ending the call.

As I pull into my usual parking spot, I can’t help but look up at Emery’s front window. It’s dark, and I wonder if she’s still at work. The idea depresses me on her behalf. No one should have to work that hard. I’ll do everything in my power to make sure she has fun when we go out to eat this weekend.

Not too much fun, though. The kind of fun where my cock stays neatly tucked into my slacks. Oh, joy.

Chapter Eight

Emery

On Friday evening, I walk to Rico’s Taquería with a plan to scarf down dinner in twenty minutes and hightail it back to work. But as soon as I sit down with a cold beer and a hot quesadilla, the fatigue of my first week suddenly all comes crashing down on me. I must have been running on pure adrenaline for a while now. The office was almost deserted when I left, anyway, so I decide to call it an early day and head home. After polishing off the huge quesadilla and a beer, I’m more than ready for the weekend.

I’ve just taken off my shoes when someone knocks on my condo door. I open up to see Roxy. Her outfit tonight is even more memorable than the one I first saw her in. Tonight she’s wearing a skin-tight leopard-print minidress with side cutouts and matching platform stilettos.

She gives me a little wave. “Hey, girl,” she sings. “Want to hang out sometime? I meant to ask you sooner, but this past week has been nuts. Desiree got food poisoning, so Angelique and I had to take over her shifts.”

Still feeling loose and carefree from a good time with Hayden, I answer on impulse. “Is now a good time? I’m not doing anything.” The night is still young, after all. Even if I can barely translate legalese right now, I have enough energy and focus for casual chatting. A little girl talk sounds like fun.

Roxy raises her penciled eyebrows in pleasant surprise. “Awesome. Wait a sec, I’ll bring over a bottle of wine. You like red or white?”

I shrug. “Whatever is fine.”

She leaves and comes back in a few minutes with a big bottle of local Shiraz. As she sets it down on the dining table, she asks, “Mind if I smoke?”

“Um . . .” I look around my fresh-smelling, pale-carpeted place. “Let’s sit on the balcony.”

We grab two wineglasses and a corkscrew and go outside. The moon is almost full; the stars twinkling invisibly in the sky are reflected in the city lights below us. I pour the wine while Roxy lights up.

The night is calm and she tries to exhale away from me, but sometimes a gentle breeze still catches her smoke and makes me splutter a little. The smell is faintly nostalgic. Dad used to sit out on the porch and smoke a pipe in the evenings. Although he was gone by the time I was two years old—and even though the smoking probably helped kill him—the scent of tobacco sometimes reminds me of Mom’s stories. She always talks so affectionately about him, it’s like he just stepped out for a moment.

Roxy takes a long drag and sighs it out in feathery white tendrils. “So how’s the Golden Coast treatin’ ya?”

I start recounting my first week in Los Angeles. Mostly my shiny new job, since I’m still starstruck about working for an actual law firm, and I’ve done almost nothing but work since I got here. Not that I mind practically living at the office.

I’ll probably repeat most of this stuff to Hayden over dinner tomorrow, minus the goriest details about Larry The Creeper. It’s stupid, and I know it’s stupid, but I still feel embarrassed about how I let my boss treat me . . . and how I intend to let him continue treating me, all for the sake of keeping my job. I don’t know what would be worse—Hayden failing to see what the big deal is about Mr. Pratt’s behavior, or Hayden demanding to know where he lives so he can kill him in his sleep.

So it’s nice to talk to a woman who can really commiserate about the problem without trying to play Mr. Fix-It. Roxy cackles and grimaces in all the right spots of my stories. As good a friend as Hayden is becoming, there are some things that most men just don’t understand.

“I think changing my outfit helped a little,” I say as I finish. “Flats instead of heels, pink lip gloss instead of red lipstick, dress pants instead of a skirt. And a camisole under my blouse to make sure there’s no cleavage showing.” Not that Mr. Pratt hasn’t looked for it. He practically broke his neck trying to see down my collar at the Wednesday lunch meeting.

“So has he stopped touching your ass and acting like it’s an accident?”

“No, but he does it less often. Although he’s started dropping all these passive-aggressive comments, like ‘Where’s the funeral, har de har?’ or ‘Oh, you looked so sweet before, what happened?’ Or my personal favorite, ‘You don’t need to dress like a nun, sweetheart. You should enjoy that amazing figure while it lasts.’ So I consider it a mini victory.”

“What a douchebag.” Roxy rolls her eyes. “I’ve had gross customers before, but I knew what I was getting into when I started working at Kitty Queen’s. You didn’t bust your hump in college just to put up with some old perv. And strip joints have a bouncer who can step in if someone gets too rowdy. At your job, you’re on your own. Worse than on your own, actually, since the problem is with the guy who’s supposed to protect you. Not that I haven’t had a few handsy bosses before . . .”

When she first told me she was a stripper, I barely batted an eyelash. Once you meet her, it seems the most obvious profession in the world for her. She’s outgoing, gorgeous, and confident, with just a hint of being a wild child. The only thing that surprised me was that she didn’t use a more subdued euphemism, like dancer or exotic entertainer or something. Then again, there’s nothing subdued about Roxy.