After filling my stomach with the absolutely mouth-watering food Archer cooked for us, I fell asleep out on the balcony. In fact, I didn’t wake up until I felt him scoop me into his arms and place me in bed. He softly shook me awake and wanted me to take a few sips of water along with my pain medication, but the second I got it down the back of my throat I fell right back to sleep.
And didn’t wake up until I smelled coffee.
“You a caffeine drinker?”
I groaned as I rubbed my eyes. “Does a duck with a boner drag weeds?”
He chuckled with sleep laced in his voice. “Another Letterkenny fan.”
I yawned. “Great show.”
“Very great show.”
I grunted as I pressed myself up. “Wow, that was a lot easier than it should have been.”
He handed me my mug of coffee. “Here, I’ve got your pain pill, too. We’re right at that twelve-hour mark, so I want to get this in you before the pain creeps up.”
I lazily took the pill and chugged back the coffee, allowing the burn to pull me from my sleep. The sun shone through the glass balcony French doors and the sloshing of the ocean waves could be heard from the window that had somehow been cracked.
“Did you open my window?” I asked.
Archer sipped his coffee. “I did. I figured you might enjoy the sounds. Want me to shut it?”
I shook my head. “No. I like it. Thank you.”
He patted my knee. “You’re very welcome.”
I watched his connection as his hand tapped against my body. And granted, I was still beneath the covers of my bed, but damn if it didn’t feel wonderful. It felt like a jolt of lightning rushed up my muscles, causing my back to twitch.
The hell was that?
“Are you an actual breakfast eater? Or a leftover breakfast eater?” Archer asked.
My stomach growled. “Is there any more of that soup?”
He grinned. “Oh, there’s plenty. I had two bowls with some buttered toast myself.”
“That sounds fantastic. Can I have some?”
He stood from the edge of my bed. “A big bowl of soup and some buttered toast, coming right up. Be back in a few.”
After he left my bedroom, I slid gingerly to my feet. It hurt just to move because my joints were so damn stiff, but I made it into the bathroom. Peeing was a venture, mostly because it hurt to bend my body and wipe the way I needed to. So, I decided on a very long shower after I ate breakfast in order to make sure I really got myself clean enough.
But I caught my reflection in the bathroom mirror and paused.
The bruises around my eyes had grown deeper in their color with time and the cuts around the frame of my face looked swollen. I sighed as I tilted my head off to the side, taking in the ligature marks that seemed to spider with little cracks beneath my skin.
“Jesus,” I whispered.
“Josie?” Archer called out.
I eased myself out of the bathroom. “Sorry, I was just cleaning up a bit.”
He set the tray of food on my bedside table. “It’s here whenever you’re ready for it.”
I walked back over and crawled back into bed. “So, how long do you think I need to stay here?”
He blinked. “What do you mean?”
I snickered. “Do you always answer questions you don’t like with other questions?”
He clicked his tongue. “You’ll stay here until you’re better.”
“Yeah, so when my pain goes away.”
“It would be better if you stayed until your bruising went away, too.”
I shrugged. “Well, as much as I’d like to, I can’t. I have a job to get back to and money to make.”
His eyes widened. “You’re not seriously thinking about going back to that place, are you?”
I took a bite of the soup. “I don’t have a choice. It’s my job, and while stripping is wonderful and rakes in a lot of cash, I’ve only got about three months in savings before I’m in serious trouble. And I’d like to not dip into that as much as possible, since I’m trying to save up to buy my own place one of these days.”
He shook his head slowly. “You’re crazy if you go back there and work for those assholes.”
I scoffed. “Did you hear anything I just said? I have to work. I have to make money. That’s how shit works in the real world.”
“You think I don’t know that?”
“You’re acting like you don’t. So, I’ll ask again: when is the soonest I can get out of here? Does Cole know?”
I wanted more than anything to get back to my normal life. I wanted more than anything to get back on that stage and feel strong again. Feel powerful again. But Archer didn’t seem to be a fan of the notion.
Not like I cared, but still.
Archer licked his lips. “Why don’t we leave that question for after you’re done with your pain pills? You can’t strip well while high, I’m sure, and you’ve got nine more days of the stuff. So, let’s get through those pills and see how you feel. Yeah?”
I sipped my soup again. “It’s a deal.”
He didn’t get up, though. Instead, his eyes lingered on me before he spat his next question out.
“Was this your first encounter with the new owners?”
I kept my gaze turned down into my soup. “Not particularly. I mean, I’d seen them in passing, especially when the previous owners were giving them tours of the place. I didn’t like the way they looked at us, though.”
“How did they look at you?”
I’d never forget their faces as long as I lived. “Like we were disposable, almost.”
His hand settled onto my shin. “Do you have the stomach to tell me why they were beating on you in the first place?”
I blinked back tears and reached for a slice of toast. “They were trying to take fifty percent of what I’d made that night. Fifty percent, can you believe that shit? We already give five percent of what we rake in and put it in a fund that pays out the bouncers and shit like that. But another fifty on top of that? I told them no fucking way, and if it got me fired then so be it.”
“And they decided to hurt you instead.”
I shrugged. “Because I guess we are disposable to them.”
“Tell me again why you want to go back to this place?”
I shook my head. “I don’t expect you to understand. I only expect you to respect it, all right?”
He stood to his feet. “Whatever. It’s your death.”
His words shocked me so badly I dropped my spoon into my soup. I whipped my head up, sending a ricocheting slab of pain racing down my back. I grunted as I watched him storm out of my bedroom, slamming the door behind him in the process. And as I listened to him storm down the hallway, my jaw slowly unhinged in shock.
What the hell was his problem?
What did he expect me to do? I worked at one of the better strip clubs in Santa Cruz. Any other place already treated their dancers like sleazeballs, and I had worked hard to gain the skill to work in a place like the one I worked at. I took endless amounts of bullshit and overcame so many fucking issues just to get there, both physically and mentally. And he wanted me to throw it away because the new owners were assholes?
Yeah, they were assholes. But there were laws governing this sort of thing. One anonymous report and the police would come down on them hard.
That was all it would take for dickweeds like them.
I waited for Archer to come back, and after a few minutes my door cracked open. I picked up my bowl of soup and polished it off, then reached for yet another piece of toast. And when he slipped into my bedroom, I gathered everything onto the tray and held it up for him.
“Thank you. That was great,” I said.
He sighed as he took the tray from my hands and stood there. “My apologies for my reaction.”
I shrugged. “You’re good.”
He sat on the edge of the bed. “No, I’m not good. I just—seeing you in the condition you’re in and then actually talking about going back to work at that place… it makes me a bit sick in my stomach.”
I studied his face. “You had someone in your life get hurt like this, didn’t you?”
He snickered. “Some days I wish it was only like this.”
My heart hurt for him. “I’m sorry.”
He stood back to his feet. “It is what it is.”
“Do you want to talk about it?”
He made his way for my bedroom door. “I’m going out for a ride. You can make yourself comfortable and do anything you’d like around here, but I’m telling you that it’s a bad idea right now to leave. Okay?”
“So, you don’t want to talk about it?”
He shot me a cold, hard look. “No leaving. I don’t want to come home and find you dead on the sidewalk because you did something stupid.”
I shrugged. “I’ll make sure to hide away, then. Make it a bit of a game if you wish to find me.”
He glared at me. “No leaving. Got it?”
I hunkered down beneath the covers. “Yeah, I got it.”
I didn’t know who pissed in his Cheerios, but if he thought he could control me he had another fucking thing coming. I sure as hell wasn’t going to take orders from some sort of Ice King that wanted to appear softer to me in an attempt to get information. I didn’t respond well to people like that. All he needed to be was genuine, and it was clear to me that he was simply putting on an act. To what end? I didn’t know. But judging by his questions, he was digging for information.
“We’ll see how that works for you tonight,” I murmured to myself.
His bike engine revved beneath me and I closed my eyes. The warm soup and rich toast settled in my stomach and caused my eyelids to flutter closed. The bed was so big and soft. It cradled me like a cloud as I slowly slipped into an effortless slumber. Archer’s bike revving off into the distance was the last thing I heard before darkness overcame me, but it didn’t stop my mind from rushing a thousand miles a second.
And the last thing I remembered thinking made me feel like I was weak and out of control again.
What did I say to make him hate me so quickly?
