The next afternoon I’m in front of the camera with my heart in my chest. My back hits the wall just as my shrill scream pierces my ears. And now, I'm trapped. His cold blue eyes narrow on me as he approaches.

Cowering away, I whisper, "Please," as his hand reaches for my throat. 

"That's enough!" The director shouts, and the guy steps back across the room. "Thank you, Ms..." Stefan thumbs through the papers in his lap, "Ms...." 

 "Morgan." I clear my throat as I push away from the wall. "Jemma Morgan." 

"Yes, Morgan." He jots something down on my resume, not bothering to look up at me. "We'll be doing callbacks in a week." 

Stefan called David to ask if I’d be interested, and he can’t even remember my name? What an ass. "Thank you," I say as I grab my purse from the chair in the corner of the room. My stomach churns as I cross the room. "I'll look forward to a call." 

He nods, his eyes still trained on the papers he's shuffling through. A role like this could take me out of the innocent princess turned whore category. Working on his show would force people to take me serious as an actress. If I could land this, my entire life could change, but like I said, he couldn’t even recall my name.

The entire drive home, all I can do is criticize the inflection in my voice when I read my lines, the way I positioned my body, the fact that the scream was too weak. By the time I’m walking into my apartment, I’ve decided that this is my plot in life—being a dildo handler. And that’s fine, but at some point, one wants to believe there is more meaning to their life than sterilizing sex toys.

“Bitch tits,” I yell as I slam the door behind me. “You home?”

I drop my purse on the floor next to the sofa and flop back onto the well-worn cushions before grabbing the remote.

The toilet flushes and seconds later Heather’s standing at the end of the couch with her jeans still unbuttoned. “Fucking periods. Look at this shit!” She flicks her open fly. “I can’t even button them because I’m so bloated. This is bullshit.” She fights with the button for a moment. “So, how did the audition go?”

“Like shit.”

“What?”

I shake my head. “He couldn’t even remember my name.”

“Wait, didn’t he request you to do an audition.”

I nod.

“Well, fuck him.” I can tell by the concentrated look on her face that she’s trying to devise a way to distract me. “Get dressed. We’ll do dinner and then we’re going to a strip club.”

“I’ll do dinner…”

“And you’ll do the strip club. I need some man meat to ogle, and I’ll just look like a weird pervert if I go by myself.”

I glare at her for a minute then sigh. “Fine.”

A few hours later and we’re two drinks and three strippers into a show. Heather whistles as the last dancer struts off the stage with his ass checks hanging out of some chaps. Glancing over her shoulder, I choke on my martini when my eyes land on the half-naked blond guy grinding on some girl.

“Holy shit,” I say, wiping the dribble from the corners of my mouth.

Heather’s mid chug and her eyebrows pinch together. She slams the empty beer bottle down on the table and burps. “What?” she asks.

Nodding behind her, I smile. “Your one-night stand is a stripper.”

“My wha…” She quickly spins around in her seat, nearly toppling over. “Oh, my God. That’s Jack...the porno scum’s roommate.”

“His name is Jake.”

“Look…” She turns back to me. “I got the first letter right. Close enough.”

“Funny, huh? Tyler ends up being a porn star—”

She holds a finger up. “Scum.”

“And…” I roll my eyes. “Your one-nighter is a stripper.”

“What a delight.” She glances back over her shoulder, watching Jake as he lifts the woman’s leg over his shoulder and dry humps the shit out of her. “Meh, stripper’s not so bad. I’d totally fuck him again.”

“You are such a whore.”

“Never denied it.” She grabs her purse from the floor and rummages through it. She lays a handful of tampons, crumpled receipts, a fork, a half-eaten Snickers bar, nail polish, and a vibrator on the table.

“Heather…”

“Hmmm?”

“Why the hell do you have a fucking vibrator in your purse?”

“You never know when the mood may strike,” she says matter of factly as she continues to search through her purse. “I mean, what if there’s an earthquake and I get stuck in an elevator or my car for days? I’d get bored as shit. Plus, I get angry when I have blue vag…”

“Blue vag?” I snort. “You are so classy.”

“Yeah, fucking blue vag. Men get blue balls. I get blue vag. Same concept as whiskey vag, really, well,” she stops digging in her purse for a second. “Kinda. Both end with me not getting off. Hence, the vibrator in my purse.”

“What the hell are you looking for.”

“Ah-hah.” Smiling, she holds up a fistful of crumpled dollar bills. “Really, there is no price too hefty for a good dry humping like that.” Waving her hand around, she whistles.

A few minutes later, Jake is smacking his g-string clad balls over her thigh, and some ginger man is thrusting his fire-crotch way too close to my face. Heather is frantically shoving money in their straps, and I keep shaking my head. Three fucking songs. This ginger grinds on me for three songs, sweat dripping down his hard, freckled chest and salmon pink nipples. I glance over his shoulder at Heather, who is thoroughly enjoying her dance, and just as I’m trying to find something in the room to focus on other than this guy’s pointy nipples, I spot Tyler leaned against the bar and staring in our direction. I shouldn’t care about him, but he brings out that childish, jealous side of me. I want him to hate seeing this guy on me, so I trail my nails over the stripper’s broad back and down to his ass before I slap it. The ginger leans down way too close to my neck, his hot breath fanning over my skin while I’m still glaring at Tyler who is sipping his beer watching, and I do the only thing I can think to do. I flip him the bird.

A few minutes later the song ends and Jake and the ginger dismount our laps and disappear into the dark club.

“Why the hell would you have a ginger stripper?” I say in a hiss as I flag down a waiter.

“Looked like you were digging the ging.” Heather laughs.

“No, not at all.”

“I thought he was hot in a hot ginger way. He may have mad skills in the bedroom. Are you really that turned off by the redhair? His body was banging.”

“His nipples were the color of a dog’s penis.”

Her lip snarls. “You’re a sick bitch, you know it?”

“Like you’re one to talk.” My eyes stray back to the bar. Tyler’s still there. I drag in a heavy breath and Heather’s eyes narrow on me.

“What?” she asks.

“Tyler’s here.”

“Of course he is. Porn scum,” she says with a hiss. Jake walks up behind Tyler, slapping him on the back. Jake points in our direction and Tyler’s gaze follows his finger. Seconds later, the two of them push away from the bar and head toward us.

“Shit…”

“They’re coming over here, aren’t they?”

“God, yes,” I groan.

I train my eyes on the floor, cringing when I see the toe of Tyler’s Converse step in front of me.

“Well, imagine running into you here,” Tyler says.

I glance up and fake a smile. My heart is banging around in my chest like a trapped hummingbird.

“Care if we sit with you?” he asks.

I shrug. “Sure.”

When I look over at Heather, she and Jake are flirting. This is fucking great.

“So,” he says. “Enjoy your lapdance?”

“Yep.”

“That guy is an amateur.”

“Oh, really? I guess you think you could do a better job?”

Tyler smirks before taking a drink of beer. “Yep.”

“God, you’re such a narcissistic asshole.”

A hard, sexy beat booms through the speakers and before I know what’s happening, Tyler’s standing between my legs. “What the hell are you doing,” I yell.

“Proving my point,” he says, dropping his ass and falling between my thighs.

I go rigid. Completely rigid as I stare down at his face. He slides up my body. I can feel every hard muscle under his shirt. Tyler grabs my hand, forcing my palm over his exposed lower stomach. I try to jerk it away from him, but all he does is smile and force it under the waist of his jeans.

“I hate you,” I say.

“I know. You tell me all the time.”

Biting down on his bottom lip, he wraps his arms around me and jumps up, bringing me with him. My natural reaction is to wrap my legs around his waist because my body is a traitorous whore. His fingers splay across my lower back as he thrusts under me, basically fucking me through my clothes. I should hit him or something, cuss him out, but I can’t because fuck my life, this is too hot to actually force him off of me. I catch myself grinding my hips over him and stop myself. There’s a flash of a smirk, and he laughs as his hands slide up to the back of my head. His fingers tangle in my hair before he jerks my head to the side and blows a heated breath over my throat. “I’d fucking ruin you if you’d let me.”

 

He spins around before he falls back into the chair. The second his ass hits that seat, he’s shoving his cock against me, rolling his hips in ways no man should be able to. His hands roam over my front before he flips me over, pressing his body against me. Our eyes lock and for a brief moment, I see that boy I fell so hard for. Emotions well up inside of me. He’s no good for me. I’m no good for him. Everything about this is wrong. Sometimes the things our hearts want aren’t the things our souls need, and that’s a hard pill to swallow.

“I’m stubborn,” he whispers over my mouth. “Don’t forget that.”

I want to kiss him. Fuck I want to kiss him…I flatten my palms over his chest and shove him off of me. “What I won’t forget, Tyle,r is that you’re a porn star.”

He staggers back a few steps then rubs his hand over the back of his neck. I can tell that gesture of rejection stung him. He swipes his beer from the table and shoves his way through the crowded club.

My heart is thumping in my chest, adrenaline buzzing over my skin. I feel like a raging bitch, but it’s a defense mechanism. If I’m nice, if I give him any leeway, I will give into him, and I can’t let myself do that. Do I want to fuck him? God yes I do, but my heart can’t take that.