“I’m not going to.”
Whether I was patient enough to wait for Helen to come back to me was another story. But if my first day on the job the previous day had been any indication, Lock was going to keep me so busy with backbreaking labor for the next four hours, I wouldn’t have the chance to think about Helen. And that was good, since this was about me. Yeah, I wanted the girl, but this was more than that. This was me taking the reins of my life back. This was me standing on my own feet and being able to look at myself in the mirror without disgust. This was me living clear and clean. Then, and only then, would this be me going after my girl.
Chapter Twenty-three
Helen
Coming home from a night of men groping, leering, and opening their stupid mouths to hear Elena faking yet another orgasm was too much. Knowing who the dude was pounding away at her poor kitty made it even worse.
I’d known that lanky-ass fool was trouble when I saw him last summer. He’d been at Savage Beauties tonight with a handful of other frat bros. It stood to reason he was the one who’d told Theo about me riding the pole, although I’d never noticed him before. He must not have made himself known like he had tonight.
First, he’d heckled a couple girls on stage. Hakim had nearly squashed his head like a peach, and he became more subtle after that, sending me back to the bar multiple times when his drink order was “wrong,” tossing tips on the ground so I had to bend to get them, rejecting Carina’s lap dance in the middle of it because her minor, silvery stretch marks “disgusted” him, refusing to pay her since she didn’t complete her dance.
I threw my shoe at Elena’s door when I heard her moan, “Oh, Daniel,” with pure boredom. The dude must have been rich, or maybe he was blackmailing her. I couldn’t see any other reason she’d continue sleeping with him.
In my bedroom, I tucked my tips in the box I kept in my underwear drawer. It was stuffed full, since my payment to Reno was due tomorrow by five. I’d have some extra left this time, giving me some breathing room for once.
After I took a shower and washed the filth of the club from my skin, I tucked myself in bed, the suite blissfully quiet. Elena had either kicked Daniel out or fucked him to sleep. Either way worked for me. Pulling my covers over my ears, I went to sleep.
* * *
It was still pitch black when I slowly came awake. Something was tickling my face. I batted it away, but it came back a second later, dragging up my cheek.
My brain switched on, but my body froze. Someone was sitting on the side of my bed, touching my face. Then my covers were inched down from under my chin to my chest, down, down, down.
I stopped breathing.
Fight, flight, fight, flight.
I could close my eyes and pretend it was a bad dream.
I could scratch and claw and hope I could gain the upper hand.
I could lie here.
I could scream.
The intruder lowered himself over me, his chest pressing down on mine, then something touched my neck, hot and slimy, jerking me out of my stupor.
“Helen…” Daniel crooned in my ear. “Are you awake, beautiful?”
My hands came up, but I couldn’t fit them between us. “Get off of me,” I hissed, barely more than a whisper. There wasn’t enough air in my lungs to make my voice louder. If there had been, I would have screamed until the roof shook and windows rattled.
“There she is.” In the dark, his eyes searched mine. “You look like an angel when you’re asleep, Helen.”
I shuddered in revulsion. From the way he pressed his erection into my hip, he took it as something else. Or maybe he liked me being revolted by him. Maybe he got off on it.
“Get off of me, asshole.” I shoved at his shoulders and arched my spine. Daniel was lanky, but he had a lot of power in his limbs and easily held me down.
“Mmm.” He continued to stroke my cheek like a sweet lover. “I’ve been wanting to talk to you for a long time. You fascinate me.”
I reached blindly off the side of my mattress, struggling to find my bat, but only hitting empty air. Daniel’s mouth curved, like he thought it was funny how panicked I was. He even tsked at me.
Finally, my hand came into contact with something solid, but I only knocked it away. My bat fell against the floor with a clatter, and I whimpered at the loss, which made Daniel chuckle.
“Why are you so scared, Helen? I’m not hurting you. I’m barely even touching you. I just like looking at you. Isn’t that what you want? When you get on that stage or walk around in your little shorts serving drinks, don’t you want men like me to look?”
“Off,” I cried. “Off! Off, off, off!” Each successive cry got louder and louder until I exploded. “Get off me!” My cries echoed around the room, jerking Daniel back an inch or two. He stared down at me, squinting like he didn’t understand my protests.
“What’s wrong?” Perplexed. The asshole sounded perplexed.
Before I could say another word, my door swung open, and the light was flicked on. Elena stood there in her pink, silk, shorty pajamas, only pausing for a half a beat to take in the scene. Me, disheveled and no doubt red-faced and wild-eyed. Daniel, her boyfriend, pressing down on me. Then she flew into action. My bat was in her hands, poised above his head.
“Get up right now,” she hissed.
He sat up, his hands held up in placation. I scrambled to my headboard, pulling my knees to my chest.
“It’s no big deal, baby. Helen and I were just talking.”
“Unless Helen is suddenly great at talking in her sleep, no, you weren’t. Take your pencil dick and leave, Daniel.” She feigned a swing at him, making him cower. “I’ll be glad to introduce your balls to Batty. She gets lonely sometimes.”
Daniel leaped from the bed, covering his dick with both hands. “Crazy fucking bitches. Both of you. Dead lay and a whore, what a combination. Put the two of you together, it might make a good fuck.”
Elena pressed the end of my bat to his chest. “I guess you’ll never know, will you? Get the fuck out, right now, before I show you exactly how crazy I can be.”
Elena followed Daniel out of my room, threatening him all the way to our front door, which she slammed behind him. Then she returned to my room, handed me the bat, and turned off the light.
“Scoot over.” She pushed at my shoulders. When I shifted to the side, she climbed into bed, pulling the covers over both of us. “Lie down.”
I stretched out in my bed, the bat clutched in my arms like a damn teddy bear.
“You okay? Did he hurt you?”
I blinked up at the ceiling. “I...no. He scared the shit out of me, but he didn’t hurt me. I don’t even know if he was going to.”
“He’s a creeper. Ugh.”
“Says the girl having regular bad sex with him.”
“Make that past tense.”