was him sitting there, front row. Rafael Martinez. He was in her club, he’d seen her dance and now everything was over for her. He was there to bust her, he would tell everyone that she was a dancer, ruin her career, her life, everything she’d worked for. So, she’d maintained eye contact with him when she recognized him, then she’d stood straight and held her head high as she left the stage.
The more she thought about it now, however, her bravado waned. Her hands shook, and she could barely maintain her grip as she fisted her costume, and her money. She had to get dressed and face him. Reminding herself that she had nothing to be embarrassed about, she felt her anxiety diminish. But she knew that in his hands, he held the power to destroy her dreams. She had to see what he was doing there, and somehow try to convince him to keep her secret.
“Hey, great set, Jessie,” one of the other girls said, but she couldn’t be sure who said it. She was too focused on figuring out a way to save everything she stood to lose. She dressed quickly in a skirt and T-shirt, and toyed briefly with cutting out the back door, to get away without seeing Rafael, or even siccing one of the bodyguards on him. But neither of those things would solve her problem. She would have to see him at some point, better here at her regular club than at a debate. Taking a deep breath, Jessica steeled her resolve and stepped out from the back room to find him.
She looked around the club and, ignoring the glances of the patrons who’d just seen her perform, she found Rafael almost immediately, sitting at the table near the stage, casually sipping from his beer bottle and already watching her, his lips curved upward in a smug, amused smirk. Goddamn him. Straightening her shoulders, portraying what she hoped was an air of confidence, she walked toward him.
Taking a seat, she slid his one-hundred-dollar bill across the table to him, then leaned back. “I’m not taking your money,” she told him, crossing her arms.
“Then how will I pay for my private dance?” Rafael asked, his right eyebrow raised. “I’m a customer.”
The man was unbelievable. “You aren’t getting one. And I don’t care who you are. I don’t do private dances. I haven’t in years.”
“This is a good time to break that streak, isn’t it?” he asked with a sly smile.
“If I did, you certainly wouldn’t be the recipient. What are you doing here?”
“I could ask you the same thing,” he returned, taking an easy look around the club. She followed his eyes, watching women casually stroll through, wearing skimpy lingerie, if they were dressed at all.
She scowled. A new dancer had come out and the attention of everyone else in the club had turned to the stage as music filled the room. “Are you going to answer any of my questions?”
He shrugged. “I don’t think I need to. I’m the one who’s here for answers.”
She sighed. “What do you want?”
He lifted his wrist, and she saw from the large face of his Hublot watch that it was after 3:00 a.m. She rolled her eyes at him—that watch could pay her mortgage for at least a couple of months. Such pointless luxury. Yeah, he was certainly a man of the people, she thought with scorn.
“What do I want?” he repeated. “Well, right now, I kind of want an early breakfast,” he told her, leaning across the table. “Want to join me?”
She looked at him, in his casual clothing. He looked good in his suits, but in street clothes, he looked great. No, she didn’t want to go anywhere with him, and she was about to tell him as much, but she needed to figure out what his plan was with his new information. It had been a while since she’d eaten, and betraying her, her stomach rumbled loudly. “There’s a twenty-four-hour diner a couple doors down if that suits you. They have a pretty good breakfast menu. Unless you want something fancier, but in this neighborhood, you might be out of luck. And—” she gestured to his watch “—you probably shouldn’t flash that piece around here.”
“I’m not too worried about it. I can defend myself if I need to. But that diner sounds great,” he said with a smile, standing. “Let’s go.”
* * *
Being seated across from Rafael in the diner was a surreal experience for Jessica. She was physically tired from her performance, but she was mentally exhausted trying to figure out a way out of her current predicament, afraid that her secret would ruin her, but she couldn’t help looking at Rafael, regarding him quietly, trying to figure him out.
She had always been attracted to him, since the day she’d first met him. But she’d never let herself get close to him, and on only a few occasions had she ever been one-on-one with him. The reason why? Those dark brown eyes, his deep, low voice that flowed from his lips, effortlessly transitioning between Spanish and English. He was normally so polished, looked every part the well-put-together politician. But at three o’clock in the morning, the dark shadow of a beard colored his strong jaw and his hair was slightly disheveled, and it made her fingers itch with the need to reach across the table and smooth it. He looked rugged in nice but worn jeans and a fitted black V-neck T-shirt. It showed that there might be more to him than the arrogant politician-slash-businessman.
They looked at each other, not saying anything. She imagined that, like her, he was trying to figure out what to make of their current situation. Silent, until the shadow of the waitress fell over their table.
“What can I get for you folks?” she asked them, barely looking up at them from her notepad, seemingly unaware of the tension that radiated between Jessica and Rafael.
“I’ll have a coffee,” Rafael said.
“How do you take that?”
“Black.”
“And you, hun?” She turned to Jessica.
“I’ll have tea. Something herbal, if you got it.”
“Lemon okay?”
“Sounds good.”
“Any food?”
“No.” She shot a pointed look at Rafael. “I’m not hungry.” She was, in fact, starving, but she couldn’t afford to spend any longer in his company than she needed to.
The server turned to Rafael, pen poised to take his order. “Nothing else for me, either. Thanks.”
When the waitress walked away, Jessica folded her arms and leaned across the table. “I thought you wanted breakfast.”
“Well, I don’t want to order food if you aren’t going to have any. I can’t have you seeing my food, getting jealous and stealing any of my bacon.” He said, serious, before flashing a bright smile at her.
Flabbergasted, Jessica shook her head. Rafael had her at his whim, and he sat there joking. “So, what now?” she asked him, ignoring his attempts at humor. She needed to get down to business. “Are you going tell the press? Or leak the fact that I strip online? Or just plain old blackmail me into dropping out of the mayoral race altogether?”
Rafael honestly seemed to consider his response. “That was my first thought. But, you know, it’s not really my style to go to the press. Maybe I’ve had a change of heart. I’m not a snitch. And God knows I’ve got my share of skeletons.”
“Oh,
