Dawg sat in a wood chair at the center of one of the private VIP rooms. Though the room had a couch—that he had cleaned on a regular basis—he preferred the chair. Why? Because the dancer had three-sixty access to him.

In a VIP room, the dancer could touch her customer. She could take it as far as she wanted to go, except for accepting payment for sex. Again, he wasn’t putting up with that bullshit, because if the club got shut down, the MC would lose a huge portion of their income. And he had to do his part in keeping the DAMC coffers full.

He had taken Emma to the Red room, rightly named since everything in it was the color of blood and his was certainly pumping right now. His pulse was also thumping in his neck and his dick throbbing.

Emma stood in front of him, her fingers unfastening the rest of the buttons on her blouse, her hips swaying to another Ginuwine song that he had turned on when they first entered the room.

She seemed a little more comfortable in here, but not by much. He figured the large stage had been a bit too intimidating for this woman, who so clearly lost her fucking way.

“Woman, gotta act like I just paid you a Benjamin for two songs. You better make it worth my hard-earned money.”

She glanced up from fiddling with her buttons. “Okay,” she said softly, tossing her head to get her long, loose hair out of her face.

Fuck. He needed to just stop all this right here and now. He needed for her to pull that long, ugly skirt back on and then he needed to push her back out of the front door and lock it behind her.

That’s what he needed to do.

He was just about to tell her all that when the last button popped free and her blouse gaped open. Then she started to move.

Suddenly she was channeling her inner Demi Moore from the movie Striptease. But not nearly as good.

She walked around him, attempting to strut, and placed a hand on his shoulder, then moved around behind him to push her chest against him.

What the fuck?

Her warm breath and her husky voice was suddenly in his ear. “You mean like this?”

Fuck yeah, like that.

He’d seen a lot of fucking lap dances, and hell, he’d done hundreds of auditions, so he’d received them himself. They were simply a part of the job. On a rare occasion, his body would react. But his reaction to this woman...

Fuck.

Like nothing he ever had before during a simple audition. And she wasn’t even good at it. That was the fucked up part. She completely bombed when it came to doing a lap dance. Just like she had done on the big stage.

When she finished circling him, her blouse was hanging off her shoulders, but she was holding the fabric up to her tits, fucking hiding them.

That wouldn’t do at all.

When he opened his mouth to tell her that, she slipped the blouse lower, and the black lace of her bra became visible.

His head jerked back.

When she dropped the blouse to her feet, and he saw her panties, he just about shot out of the chair.

Those were just as lacy. He was right; this was no lingerie set from a discount bargain barn that grandma shopped at.

Fuck no.

He not only lost all the oxygen in his lungs, but the remaining blood in his brain was now pooled in his dick.

The woman was hiding a hot little body on her under those ugly-ass clothes.

Fuck. And those tits...

“Wasn’t expectin’ that,” he murmured before he could stop himself.

She gave him a small smile. “I might be a kindergarten teacher, but I’m not dead.”

Fuck. His dick wasn’t dead, either. Nope, it was fucking telling him just how alive he was.

When she reached back to unhook her bra, he jumped up from his chair and barked, “No!”

She jerked back at his shout and dropped her hands.

“No, that’s enough. Fuck!” He raked his hand through his hair and dropped his gaze to his boots as he tried to slow his racing heart.

There was nothing he wanted more than to sit back on that chair, pull her into his lap and have her ride him until his nuts were completely empty.

But he couldn’t do that.

She needed to get the fuck out of his club.

“Did I do something wrong?”

“Yeah, you came to the wrong place.” He shook his head, trying to clear his lecherous thoughts. She’d probably run screaming if she knew just how much he was struggling to keep his hands off her. “You gotta go. Get your shit an’ get the fuck out.”

Her sweet, little mouth gaped open. “Why? What did I do?”

Scrambled my brain and made my dick harder than steel. “Nothin’. You didn’t do nothin’. You gotta go.”

“Mr. Dawson.”

“Dawg!” he corrected her, louder than necessary.

“Mr. Dawg...”

“Just Dawg! Fuckin’ goddamn it.”

“Dawg. I really need this. Please.”

He shook his head, avoiding her pleading eyes. “No. No. Fuck no.”

“I promise to get better. I’ll work on my moves. I’ll—”

He shook his head even harder. “No.”

“Please!”

She dropped to her knees at his feet and grabbed his thighs, scaring the shit out of him. He jumped back. What the fuck was she doing?

She turned her face up, her light blue eyes brimming with tears, her ivory skin now sheet white. “Please,” she begged again. “Please. I’ll do whatever you want. I just... I—”

He grabbed her elbows and hauled her to her feet. “What the fuck you doin’? You offerin’ me sex for this job?”

Her eyes widened. “No! No! I didn’t mean to—” A tear rolled unchecked down her cheek. “I’m sorry. I—”

He grabbed her upper arms and gave her a little shake. “You gotta be straight with me. What the fuck’s goin’ on?”

“N-nothing.”

He released her and stepped back. “Get the fuck outta my club.”

“I’m sorry, I—”

“You’re hidin’ somethin’ an’ I don’t wanna be a part of that shit. Get your clothes on an’ get out.”

Emma sat in her car in the empty parking lot. She could barely read the large sign she was parked next to, the tears in her eyes making her surroundings blurry. Heaven’s Angels Gentlemen’s Club.

This was what she’d been reduced to. Throwing herself at some big, tattooed biker and begging him to let her strip, for Christ’s sake.

Strip. Her. Emma Jackson. Kindergarten teacher.

She was so desperate for money, she was willing to take her clothes off on a stage and let men toss dollar bills at her. To take strange men into a private room and touch them.

She dropped her head down until her forehead pressed against the steering wheel. She didn’t know what else to do. She had no one to go to.

She only needed to do it long enough to get the money together for a retainer. Problem was, she needed to get the best. And she couldn’t afford the best.

Hell, she couldn’t afford the worst, either.

A kindergarten teacher’s salary was crap. She lived paycheck to paycheck as it was, even living modestly. She never splurged on anything for herself. Not anymore.

She ran her fingers over her second-hand skirt. She couldn’t even afford to buy new clothes. She was forced to shop at consignment shops just to get a decent wardrobe for work.

And now she didn’t even have that job.

She grabbed the plastic hair clip in her lap and, gathering her hair in her hands, she twisted it into a knot and secured it to the back of her head.

She couldn’t give up. She could never give up. She would do whatever she needed to do, or she would die first.

Because if she was forced to live life without her daughter she might as well be dead.

Dawg squeezed his eyes shut as hard as his fist squeezed his dick. Even with his eyes closed, he couldn’t get the picture of Emma out of his head. Her image was burned into the back of his eyelids.

How could a woman who dressed so damn awful turn him the fuck on so much?

It wasn’t just her voice. Even under those Plain Jane clothes, it was the way she carried herself, even when she’d been nervous. The way she faced her fears head-on. The way she was determined to get him to hire her.

But no fucking way was that happening. First of all, she sucked at dancing. Second, even if she was good at it, he wasn’t sure if he could sit there night after night and watch her shake her tits at other men.

He tilted his head back on his pillow and imagined what those tits would have looked like if he’d let her continue to remove that surprisingly sexy bra. Perfect ivory skin, pink hard-tipped nipples. Fuck, he wanted to bury his face in between them. Or his dick. Whatever.

He opened his eyes, spit on his palm and then went back to his fantasy. His hips lifted off the bed with each downward stroke, then dropped back to the mattress on the upstroke.

“Fuck!” he bellowed to the ceiling. His palm sucked. It was nothing like the real thing.

He needed some warm, tight, wet pussy hugging his dick, riding him hard. Tits bouncing and slapping together as she rode him like he was a wild pony. She. No, not just any she.

Emma.

It wasn’t even a sexy name. It matched her kindergarten teacher job.

She’d only be a fantasy. Only be jerk-off material. Because a woman like her didn’t do bikers like him.

He’d learned that lesson the hard way. Never again. That’s why he liked it the easy way now.

He wasn’t looking for another headache. He had enough headaches keeping his girls in line. He didn’t need another one.

Even if she had sweet tits, a bangin’ body, and hair he wanted to wrap around his fist when she was on her knees...

Fuck. Like when she was on her knees begging him for a job.

“For fuck’s sake!” he bellowed again and sat up, giving up on jerking off.

The woman needed help, and he wanted to know why. How could an innocent-looking teacher be so damn desperate? What the fuck did she do to get herself in a jam like that?

Maybe innocent Emma wasn’t so innocent after all. Maybe she was a dirty girl...

He frowned. What the fuck?

He sighed. He needed to get laid. Dropping his legs over the edge of the bed, he glanced at the clock radio on his nightstand. Ten-thirty. Moose should be downstairs by now to unlock the back door for the daylight girls to come in and get ready for an eleven AM opening.

He scratched his balls and yawned. He needed more sleep. He’d probably be up until after closing and Emma’s little audition early this morning had cut into that time.

Who the fuck was he kidding? He wasn’t going to get another wink of fucking sleep until he took the edge off. There were possible two ways to do that. Booze or knocking one out.

Rubbing a hand over his eyes, he moved over to the kitchenette in his apartment and opened a cabinet. He grabbed a bottle of Jack, unscrewed the cap and tipped it to his lips.

Dawg held his breath as the liquor filled his empty stomach then he slammed the bottle onto the counter, wincing through the burn.

Maybe that would help.

Dawg peered down at his still-hard dick. Maybe not.