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  "It fits perfectly. You were sort of born in a Petri dish too. I mean, sure, your dad paid some lady to carry his spawn and drop you out nine months later, but she was acting like a beaker of sorts. And since she didn't have a name—"

  "She had a name. I just never knew it." Which was only partly true because my dad had told me her name was Jane Doe. And for the first eight years of my life, I thought of her, this woman I'd never seen before but who I had always imagined as having soft skin and smelling like cookie dough, as Jane Doe. The harsh reality hit me with a good dose of humiliation when the second grade teacher in my exclusive private school asked us to write poems for our moms on Mother's Day. When I wrote mine about my imaginary cookie dough perfumed mom, Jane Doe, the teacher had a good laugh. Then she sent me to the headmaster's office for being a smart ass. I was suspended for the rest of the day. Our housekeeper picked me up from school. I waited in my room the entire afternoon, sure I was going to feel the buckle of my dad's belt once he got home. But when he discovered why I'd been sent home, he told me to Google the name Jane Doe. And while I read that the name I had etched into my brain as my mom's name turned out to be nothing more than two syllables used as a placeholder for any unidentified woman, my dad walked into his office and made one loud, angry call. The headmaster and teacher were immediately removed from their positions.

  Jack's attention was temporarily diverted as Dorothy of Oz walked past the table. He reached up and stuck some money in her g-string. He dropped back down in his chair. "How is your dad anyway?"

  "The doctors give him four months. He's down to about a hundred fifty pounds, which on his frame makes him look like a skeleton."

  "Guess that 'laser focus' chant doesn't do you much good when you're facing the big C," Jack said with a shake of his head that landed his bangs in his eyes. Recently, he'd decided to let his hair grow long, thinking it gave him an edgy vibe. Mostly, it just made him look like he was trying to be a teen again. "Death," Jack continued. "It's the one thing that makes us all equal. You can have a bank account worth more than a major city, but when the grim reaper comes around, he doesn't accept bribes."

  The music started back up. "You are full of all kinds of philosophical bullshit tonight."

  "Yep." He drummed the table for a second to go along with the beat of the song and to add to the clamor of idiots at the next table, yelling and drooling as they waited for the next dancer. "Speaking of your dad, did you tell him that you lost your job? Shit, that might just put him in his grave faster than the cancer."

  Jack knew enough about me and my unorthodox upbringing to talk casually and coarsely about my dying dad. I probably wouldn't take it from anyone else, but Jack was different. He was my sounding board, the person who occasionally kept me grounded. But only when I wanted to be grounded. Which was rare.

  "My life is none of his damn business anymore. Besides, he's pretty buzzed on morphine most of the time. I think he's finally coming to grips with the fact that he's not invincible." I refilled my glass. "Guess that's the lesson I learned today too."

  "You haven't told me exactly what happened."

  The lights on stage dimmed, then lit back up. "Introducing the newest addition to Fantasm's hot entertainment line-up—Shay Starling. And you asshole's up front," Rocky continued, "behave or else."

  I sat forward to respond to Jack. "Let's just say my cock got in the way of business. I've been—" A flicker of movement pulled my attention to the stage.

  The new dancer strutted out to an old Bon Jovi classic. She had a black top hat pulled down over her shiny hair. Her long white blonde bangs were pushed into a fringe over her big eyes, eyes that could only be topped by the full, lush lips beneath her tiny nose. She moved like smooth cream as she gracefully flowed across the stage on incredibly long legs. She was wearing a black tail coat over a blue sequined vest. I caught a glimpse of a matching blue g-string as the panels of her coat fluttered apart.

  Jack kicked my foot under the table to grab back my attention. "She's something, eh?"

  It took me a second to drag my gaze away from the woman on stage. "Huh? Yeah. Shit. She's in the wrong place."

  "So what the hell are you going to do now?" Jack asked, without taking his eyes off the dancer.

  I returned my attention to the stage as well. "I've got to get my life back in control."

  A short laugh shot from Jack's mouth. "Maybe you need to apply some of your dad's militant, draconian methods of self-denial. Didn't you tell me once that he caught you masturbating and he went full dictator on you?"

  I nodded and thought about how crazy that story sounded in my head whenever I replayed it. "I was fifteen."

  "Yep, that's the age I remember jacking off every fucking chance I got. My mom thought I was having digestion problems because I spent so much time in the bathroom. She made me eat stewed prunes for a week."

  "Stewed prunes would have been a treat compared to what I went through." I stopped for a second and rolled my fists as one of the goobers at the next table climbed halfway onto the stage. Rocky, a big, brutish guy with a lot of skull tattoos was there in a split second, yanking the fool off the stage.

  I sat back and stretched my legs out. "I was in the shower, doing my thing, when Dad just barged into the bathroom. He told me masturbating was the reason I was bringing home Bs instead of As in math."

  Jack laughed. "Well that explains me failing geometry."

  I took a drink of beer and watched as the black tail coat dropped off the dancer's slim, white shoulders. Her skin looked smooth as silk. My cock tightened as I envisioned myself trailing hot kisses down the center of her back.

  "What happened after he caught you?" Jack's question snapped me out of my erotic daydream.

  "He made me watch hard core porn every night for an hour before I did homework. I had to struggle through math with a raging erection. But that wasn't all. The fucking madman took the doors off my bedroom and bathroom, making sure I didn't have a minute of privacy. He told me self-denial was the only way I was going to learn discipline."

  Jack's eyes widened. "Holy shit, the more you tell me about your childhood, the more I wonder how the hell you are able to function as a human at all. Not that you're always human."

  "Thanks."

  "And did the porn slash self-denial thing work? Besides turning you into a warped adult, I mean?"

  "I got an A in math, so I guess so." I picked up my drink and turned my focus back to the girl on stage. She was stripped down to a lacy bra and her sequined g-string, which split her milky white bottom into two perfectly bitable pillows. "What did you say her name was?"

  "Shay. She has the kind of body, curves and face that give a guy wet dreams while he's wide awake."

  I sat forward as Shay spun around and stretched her lithe body around the pole. The rest of the spectators hadn't settled down yet. They were waving their money around and nearly falling over themselves to get a better view.

  "I can't pinpoint what it is about her," I said. "Her lips are too full and her nose is a touch crooked and yet . . ."

  "She's incredible," Jack added.

  "Yeah."

  "It's just a natural sex appeal. And she doesn't seem to give a damn that she has the men in this room crazed and out of control. She just keeps to her routine and shoots that sweet Cover Girl style smile out at the crowd every once in awhile."

  "And I'm already wondering what that Cover Girl smile would look like across a pillow after a night of fucking." I'd just lost the chance at a highly lucrative partnership because I couldn't keep my cock in my pants, yet I was still obsessed with fucking. Maybe Jack was right. Maybe I needed to employ one of my dad's severe tactics for regaining focus. Self denial. "You're right, Jack."

  He pulled his eyes from the dancer. "That your dad was hatched in a science lab?"

  "No, well, maybe that. I need to use my dad's methods to bring back my focus. I'm going to start my own damn company, but I've got to get my head one hundred percent back in the g
ame or I will fail. Your analogy about the kid at the party was spot on."

  "You're going to stick bowls of candy all around your house?"

  I stopped and tilted my head in question. "How the fuck do you make so much money?"

  He pointed to his face. "This mug is my secret weapon. I'm kidding about the candy. Let me guess—you're going to set up televisions all around your beach house and play cheap, dirty porn movies twenty-four seven, which you will watch with your hands tied behind your back so you can't jack off."

  "Would you shut up for a second so I can finish. First of all, those porn movies are fucking background noise if I'm working on the computer or something. They were effective when I was fifteen, but now that I've experienced the real thing in hot curvy 3-D, they are useless. I need the real thing. I need temptation that is right in front of me so I can get back that laser focus I used to have."

  The highly seductive dance on stage was coming to an end. The bra came off, revealing two star shaped pasties covering what I was sure were the most delectable pair of nipples on earth. A thunderous yell vibrated the walls. Shay kept to her routine, seemingly unaware of the ruckus she was creating on the club floor. Cash was flying onto the stage at her from every direction.

  "Speaking of focus," Jack noted. "She doesn't miss a step. Rocky might just have found a gold mine with her. I swear that woman could bring a grown man to his knees with just a wink and a smile."

  I leaned forward to get a better view of the stage. Shay, Rocky's new dance star, twirled around like a seductive ballerina. She looked totally out of place in the center of the crummy stage with its tattered silver curtains and sputtering spotlights. Her almond-shaped, brown eyes swept along the crowd and stopped temporarily on me. Our gazes stuck for a second, then she pulled hers away to finish her dance. My entire body instinctively leaned toward the stage as if that split second of locked gazes had secured me to her.

  Jack's voice drifted to me through the noise in the room and the thumping pulse in my ears. "You haven't told me what you're going to need for this self-inflicted punishment."

  "I need someone to hang around the house, someone who I crave like a madman. All the while keeping her at arm's distance."

  "Are you thinking about that rich little hell cat? What's her name? Kimberly?"

  I shook my head "Nope, that would never work. Kim basically grabs my cock the second she walks in the door." I watched with keen interest as Shay swept up her discarded clothes and the money that was strewn across the stage like fallen leaves. Men were crawling over each other, shoving elbows into noses, trying to push more money into her g-string. Rocky had to stand right next to her on stage to keep them from grabbing her.

  I sat forward and pulled my wallet out from my back pocket. I plucked out a crisp hundred dollar bill, then I walked to the edge of the stage and held it up.

  Shay caught a glimpse of me, standing politely, away from the fray, with my new hundred dollar bill. She sashayed over with enough swing of her hips to spin the sparkly pasties covering her nipples. Her plump round breasts hung low, near enough for me to smell the perfume on her skin, as she leaned down and favored me with that magazine cover smile. On closer inspection, her eyes were a sable brown with flecks of gold and those too full lips were shiny with gloss. I kept my focus directly on her face as I reached up and pushed the hundred dollar bill into the lacy band of her g-string.

  She winked at me and swiveled away on her high heels, leaving everyone with an unforgettable view of her ass as she walked off stage.

  I turned my attention back to Jack. "I need that girl."

  5

  One month later

  The doorbell chimed, ejecting me from my deep, drunken sleep. My head nearly exploded with pain as I squinted into the streams of daylight seeping past the blinds. A small, soft foot pushed against my thigh, jerking me further out of my groggy state. I lifted the cover and noticed that a long, smooth leg was attached to the foot. And past the long pair of legs was a supple, naked ass with a blue ink dragonfly. The insect tattoo curled its tail as the woman under my quilt stretched and relaxed again on the mattress. A squeaky yawn came from the far corner of my massive bed, a sound that couldn't have been attached to the dragonfly woman unless she was seven feet tall. I lifted the blanket higher, and in the shadows of the bed linens, I discovered another woman curled up in a cozy sleep.

  The doorbell echoed through the house again, stirring both of my drowsy sleep partners, but only for a few seconds before they both purred into a dream state again. I climbed out of bed. My feet landed squarely on a pair of silky panties. The trail of clothes and shoes led out the bedroom door to the hallway. A black leather mini skirt straddling the doorway was just about the only thing I remembered about the night before. I vaguely remembered the skirt shoved up above a pair of pink lace panties, which I didn't see anywhere in the room.

  The pain in my head was compounded by the nausea in my gut. The room spun wildly as I grabbed my jeans off the floor. I pulled the phone from my pocket. It seemed my new friends and I had slept away most of the day.

  I buttoned the fly on my jeans as I plodded down the hallway to the entry. Jack's tall silhouette filled the wavy glass on the front door. I pulled it open and headed into the kitchen before he'd even stepped inside.

  "Do you mean you've been holed up right here in Malibu this whole fucking time? I've been calling and texting for days." Jack's loud voice ricocheted off the plaster walls and slammed right into my throbbing forehead.

  I put my hand up to stop him from continuing. "You'll need to lower your voice about a hundred decibels unless you want to see my skull explode." I reached for the coffee pot and poured myself a cup of two day old coffee.

  "Must have been one helluva night." Jack plucked something up off the stool in front of the kitchen island. It was the infamous pink panties.

  "Guess I didn't just imagine those after all." I stuck the cup of coffee in the microwave.

  "Is it safe to sit on this stool?" Jack asked.

  "Unless you fall off of it, I think it's safe."

  Jack settled on the stool and rested his forearms along the granite ledge. He was wearing that smug smile that sometimes made me want to throw my fist at him. "Well, Archer, you look like something my dog ate and puked back up."

  "Thank you for lowering your voice, but one more rule. Don't talk about puking, otherwise you're going to find out what I had for dinner last night and something tells me it had to do with oysters." I pressed my arm against my stomach and closed my eyes until the spinning stopped.

  "Nash, what the hell are you doing? It's been a month since you got fired. I thought you'd have your own equity firm up, running and steaming right past MG Enterprises already."

  I pulled the coffee out and winced at the taste. "Shit, maybe this is even older than I thought." I dumped it into the sink. "I stupidly thought I could convince some of the big clients, people who I helped secure the equity they needed to start a successful business, to follow me or at least hand out some good recommendations. Turns out Morris Grant has a lot bigger hold on his clients than I realized."

  "Fucking hell, so he got to them all before you could sweet talk them to your side?"

  "Seems that way. Doesn't help that he let it be well known how I lost the deal with Rad Video. I think he sent out a 'lock up your daughters' kind of warning."

  "Jeezus, you've got to start from scratch then."

  I filled the coffee maker and pushed the extra strong brew button. "Or I could just, as you said, stay holed up here in my beach house, drinking and fucking until all the money runs out and my will to live goes with it."

  "Fuck that. As your twisted old pop would say—stop feeling sorry for yourself. What happened to the crazy ass idea you had back at Fantasm the night you got canned? You were going to whip yourself into shape with some major self-denial."

  "Is it all right if I use your shower?" an airy voice called from the hallway. The blonde with the tattoo was standing
in the doorway holding my shirt in front of her naked body.

  "Sure thing," I answered. Jack and I both watched as she turned around and walked away.

  "Was that a dragonfly?" Jack asked.

  "Yep."

  He twirled back around on the stool. "Seems to me you are doing the exact opposite of your initial plan. Instead of self-denial, you are going full self-gratification. How many other women are hibernating in that big bed of yours?"

  I shrugged. "Last I counted, there was one more. And that plan I had sounded fucking insane an hour after we left the strip club. I'll get my act together soon."

  "Is that coffee I smell?" an unfamiliar voice popped up over the back of the living room sofa. A face with long dark lashes and curly brown hair popped up after it.

  The woman peered at us. "Ooh, aren't you two a nice sight to see in the morning," she quipped before dropping back down. "Let me know when the coffee's done," she called.

  Jack shot me a well-deserved judgmental scowl. "Apparently, you forgot how to count. Seriously, buddy, you're like a fucking runaway train. Put on the brakes before you careen off the tracks for good."

  "Again with the stupid analogies."

  "And you know I'm spot on with all of them. What about that dancer, Shay? She's still there. I was just in Fantasm a week ago. She twirled across stage and everyone went nuts."

  I shook my head. "It was a crazy idea. Enough about my life, what have you been up to?" I poured myself some of the freshly brewed coffee. It slightly dulled the pain in my head. I pointed to the pot of coffee, but Jack shook his head.

  "I'm dating someone," Jack announced suddenly. "It's only been three weeks, but I think I might have stumbled onto the real thing this time."

  I nearly spit out my mouthful of coffee with a laugh. "Bullshit."

  Footsteps carried our attention to the living room. The woman on the couch had strategically placed a pillow over her bare breasts and in front of her pussy. She surveyed the room as she headed toward the kitchen. "Has anyone seen my panties?"