Dressed in a ridiculously small two-piece bikini with a pair of cut-off jean shorts covering her bottom half, Jennifer stood at my side as I watered the flowers.

She lifted her chin and gazed up at San Diego’s signature clear blue sky. “This day’s perfect. It’s only ten o’clock, and I’m frying out here. You should change clothes.”

I was wearing shorts and an old tee shirt. Obviously more modest than her, I felt if I wore any less, I’d be committing a crime.

“I’m fine,” I said, taking another look at her. “You should consider getting a different top. Where’d you get that thing, anyway?”

She tugged at the small triangles of material, shifting them from one side of her boobs to the other. Eventually, she centered them over her nipples and gave up. “I bought it at Nordstrom’s Rack last week. I love it.”

I moved the hose to the Cleveland Sage and then looked her over. Attempting to cover her boobs with the two pieces of material of her bikini top would be like trying to cover an SUV with a beach towel.

It was a matter of what part she wanted to conceal and deciding if what was exposed was acceptable.

“You should really do something with those things,” I said with a nod of my head. “I don’t want the neighbors thinking you and I are, you know, bumping uglies.”

“I bought it to get sun,” she snapped back snidely. “Not go to out to dinner.” She tugged at the hem of her shorts, and then peered out at the street. “If that worthless biker would stop by from time to time, they wouldn’t think you’re bumping uglies with me.”

It had been ten days it since I’d seen Cash. To him, it might have been normal to go such a lengthy period of time without making contact.

To me, it seemed like a lifetime.

“Do you think I should have waited?” I asked. “You know, to give him a blowie?”

“Hell no.” She buried her nose in the purple flowers and inhaled a long breath. “I’d have sucked him off on day one. I’d have ridden that dick, too, but that’s just me.”

I moved the hose to the next flower. “Do you think if I’d have screwed him that he’d have come back?”

“I doubt it’s over. He might be coming back, you don’t know. Bikers are weird. Their clocks don’t spin at the same speed ours do. They answer to no one, and don’t give a shit about time of day, or days of the week. Every day is a weekend, and there is no night or day. It’s a constant party with those guys. He’s probably recovering from some striper party they had at the clubhouse or shooting it out with a rival club down in Chula Vista.”

I scrunched my nose. “Stripper party?”

“Yeah. They have those things all the time. They’ve got stripper poles in their clubhouses. Girls fall all over themselves to get a chance at riding the polished brass in an MC’s clubhouse.”

“More Netflix facts?”

“No,” she said. “This stuff’s common knowledge.”

“Seriously? They have stripper poles in their clubhouses?”

“Stripper poles. Machineguns. Heroin. Cocaine. Safes full of money. Meth labs. Stolen motorcycles. Yeah, their clubhouses are off-limits to pretty much anyone. Except for the club whores.”

I released the trigger on the nozzle’s sprayer and stared at her. “Club whores?”

“You didn’t know?”

“I had no idea. What do they do?”

She pinched her eyes closed and arched her back, pointing her sparsely covered boobs at the sun. “Basically, they’re naked robots. They’re all wacked out on meth and do whatever they’re told. Gangbangs, orgies, cum-fests, that kind of stuff.”

“What’s a cum-fest?”

“All of the bikers surround the girl and whack off on her face. She isn’t allowed to wash it off.”

I gave her a look of disgust, followed by another of disbelief. “Ever?”

“She can either eat it or have one of the other club whores lick it off,” she said as if the statement were absolute fact.

With my look of disbelief still etched on my face, I moved the hose to the Chalk Live Forevers. “I don’t believe those things actually happen.”

With her back painfully arched and her tits and face pointed skyward, she didn’t bother opening her eyes to respond. “You haven’t read any of those books yet, have you?”

“I haven’t had time.”

She tilted her head to the side and opened her eyes. “Maybe you should. They’re a wealth of information.”

I swallowed heavily. “Sounds like it.”

Wondering if Cash not coming by was more of a Godsend than anything else, I surveyed the remaining flowers. “If that’s what real bikers are like, why would you want to be with one?”

“Sex,” she responded. “It’s all about the sex.”

“Nothing more?”

“It can’t be with them.” she said adamantly. “They won’t stand for it.”

I wanted to challenge her, tell her she was wrong, or provide something to support my belief that Cash wasn’t like that. His absence, however, left me to question myself. The night he left, I would have guessed his return was imminent. After ten days of not so much as a word out of him, I couldn’t help but wonder if Jennifer’s books were written by former club whores who were truly knowledgeable of an MC’s behavior. Meth addicts who had spent their days spreading their bodily fluids on the stripper poles in clubs such as Cash’s.

“I don’t need a man in my life,” I said. “If he stops by, he stops by. If not, I’m fine with that, too.”

She shifted her attention skyward. “If he does, are you going to give him another blowie, or are you going to ride that big dick of his?”

“Probably neither.” I dragged the hose around the porch and started watering the Cleveland Sage on the other side. “At least not until I know him better.”

“What’s to know?” she asked. “Anything he tells you is going to be a lie. Then, if you have sex with him based on those lies, it’ll hurt that much more when he disappears. Have sex with him because you want that dick. Not for any other reason. Then, when he disappears, you got what you wanted, he got what he wanted, and no one got hurt.”

For once in my life, Jennifer’s illogical sexual babble made sense. Not perfect sense, but sense, nonetheless. I’d already established my worth by denying Cash sex when he asked the first time.

I had no further points to prove.

If he stopped by, my focus would be about me and my needs, and nothing more. The last thing I needed was a man in my life that was destined to hurt me again.