style="font-size:15px;"> “I’m so, so sorry,” she said again, and to his consternation she burst into tears. Fat, heavy drops rolled down her cheeks, gathering mascara and makeup in their wake.
“Really, it’s okay,” Adam told her, struggling up onto his elbows. Her tears began to plop onto his head, and her distress grew.
“I’ll take you to the emergency room right away! You could have a concussion. Oh, God, why did I ever think I could do this? I should have known that if I tried to dance in public I’d murder someone.”
“I’m not dead,” Adam reassured her. But he almost had a heart attack as she straddled him in the high heels and then crouched down to take his face between her small, soft hands. She peered intently into his eyes, now raining black, inky tears onto his face.
They left pale white streaks down her heavily made-up face and he didn’t think he’d ever seen someone so beautiful look quite so pathetic. She sniffed woefully.
Of course, the rest of the guys could see nothing but their evening’s entertainment hovering provocatively over him. They leered enviously at the picture Adam and Cake Girl made, eyes fixated on her luscious bottom with its disappearing G-string. For some reason that bothered him. Vaguely, he noticed Dev snapping pictures with his cell phone.
“I’ve never done this before,” the girl sobbed.
Poor thing. She was truly upset. “What,” he teased. “You’ve never coldcocked a man before? It’s fun. See?”
“Of course I’ve never—” Briefly, she looked indignant. “What I meant was that I’ve never, um, stripped before. And I don’t know how to do it properly, and because of that I’ve hurt you—but I had to get out of there. I just had to! I was coming unglued.”
Adam struggled to sit up more, which brought him nose to, er, nipples. Or two inches of shadowy cleavage, depending on which way he looked. She removed her hands from his cheeks and moved back self-consciously.
“Well, I can assure you that none of the men here want you to strip properly.” He winked. “They’d much rather you did it improperly.”
Her lush mouth worked for a moment. Then she stood so that his eyes now met her—Oh, Christ. A tiny scrap of satin covered it, and it looked so sweetly beckoning. His mouth went dry and he averted his gaze.
She grabbed a handful of cocktail napkins and brought her breasts back to eye-level as she crouched again and gently held the napkins to his nose. “What can I do to make this up to you?”
Oh, honey. Don’t you know better than to ask a man that question? Adam swallowed with difficulty and tried yet again to reassure her. “Really, it’s okay. Calm down.”
“It’s not okay. I can’t calm down. And Yvonne is going to kill me now for sure. In the first hour of my employment.” She put a hand over her mouth as a thought occurred to her and she gazed at him in horror. “Oh, my God. You’re not going to sue me, are you?”
Adam shot her a wry grin. No, suing was not what I had in mind, sweetheart. But it rhymes.
He shook his head, which was a big mistake, since it made his nose throb like crazy.
“But I shouldn’t even be thinking about me. Come on. We need to go straight to the emergency room. You could be seriously injured, could have a concussion—”
“From a blow to the nose?” Adam laughed.
“Anything’s possible. My friend Becca once ran smack into a stop-sign pole because, you know, she was talking to someone over her shoulder? And she knocked herself out cold. So please, please, please let me take you to a doctor and make sure you’re okay.”
Her agitation was almost endearing. Adam finally made it to a full sitting position and reiterated that he was fine.
“C’mon, darlin’!” Gib bellowed drunkenly. “Show us what you’ve got! Shake it. Somebody start the music again.”
“Emergency room,” she pleaded, her eyes locked on Adam’s and strangely intense.
“But I don’t need—”
“Please,” she said piteously.
“But—”
She leaned forward and whispered, “Don’t make me get out there and dance. I can’t do it tonight. I just can’t. I’ll throw up.”
Her breasts nestled against his chest and her lush lips moved inches from his own. Adam felt the room begin to spin as all the blood in his body rushed south from his throbbing nose to his groin. His willpower spiraled down with it.
“Please,” she said again. “I’ll make it worth your while. I’ll dance privately, just for you….”
Only a complete pig would take advantage of this situation and exploit the poor woman, Adam’s big head told him.
Too bad he was now listening to the little head. She broke your nose, dude. And she’s a stripper. She does this a lot, no matter what she says. Why not have a private dancer, just for tonight?
Adam got to his feet, conscious of the fact that because of the spilled drink on the floor, he looked as if he’d messed his pants. He pretended to be dazed. “Guys,” he said. “I’m sorry, but I need to have my head examined.”
2
NIKKI FELT A RUSH of gratitude as she and her victim helped each other to stand. “I’ll drive him to the emergency room,” she said to the boys. “I’m the one who knocked him down.” But her gratitude turned quickly to alarm as she and Bloody Nose were surrounded by a wall of drunken, denim-clad testosterone and various expressions of male disappointment.
The consensus was that she, Nikki, had a job to do and she wasn’t going anywhere until she’d done it to their satisfaction.
“You gonna load him up into that cake, darlin’?” mocked the bowlegged guy who’d yelled for her to start dancing again. “It’s obviously made for the autobahn.”
Nikki bit her lip. “No, of course not. My car’s outside,” she said, turning to Bloody Nose. And she couldn’t wait to get into it, before Yvonne caught her and disemboweled her for screwing up the gig. “By the way, what’s your name?”
“Adam,” he said. “What’s yours?”
“Nikki.”
“Is that short for Nikita, female assassin?”
“No,” she said, flushing. “It’s short for plain old Nicole.”
“Plain and old are not adjectives that I’d use to describe you,” said Adam, wincing as he examined the blood-soaked cocktail napkins.
Nikki grabbed another handful, extended them to him and looked into the steady brown eyes behind their wire-rimmed glasses. She wondered which adjectives he would choose. But she didn’t have the nerve to ask. Clumsy and moronic might be among them. Or slutty.
