STELLA

I hold it in my hands, feeling the interior’s silk, remembering what it was like to feel him place it over me last night. I’m bringing it back to work with me on the off chance that he comes back for it. Carefully, I hang it on one of the hooks in the bottom of my locker.

“Can you believe last night?” says Lorelei. She’s just arrived, and she’s unwinding a scarf from around her neck.

I’m not sure if she’s talking about the fire alarm going off, which has never before gone off as long as I’ve been working here, or about what happened – or rather, almost happened – to me.

“Last night sucked,” I respond. A safe answer.

“Did you hear back from Mama May about what she’s going to do about those guys?” Her locker door rattles in response to her force. “They better not show their face here again, that’s for sure.”

“I did, actually. She left me a message this morning saying how she reported it to the police. Apparently the cops said they’ll be around tonight to keep an eye out for them.”

“Jesus, Stell. Does that make you feel any better? If I were you, I probably wouldn’t have come back at all.”

I don’t tell her what would really make me feel better – to see the man who rescued me again tonight, and every night thereafter. I know he’d repeat what he did if I was ever unlucky enough to need rescuing again. I saw that goodness in him.

Before I can answer, she says, “What’s that?” She peers around me, squinting at the man’s coat hanging in my locker.

I step in front of it, trying to block her view. “It’s nothing.”

“Is that– is that the coat? The one that belongs to the guy who helped you?” She moves past me, reaching for it. I try to stop her but she slips past me.

She’s going to make this all dramatic, I already know. “Yeah, it is. I want to get it back to him, that’s all. I figure it’s the least I can do.”

“But you have no idea who he is? He didn’t tell you his name, and he just disappeared into the night?”

I nod.

“Stella, come on. This is great.” She stuffs the fabric up under her chin, relishing in the secrecy. “This is a mystery.” Her attention diverts from me, and she takes a sniff of the material that’s already close to her nose. “Whoever he was, he was sexy. He smells sexy.”

I grab it from her. “What the hell? Stop being creepy.” I shake it out, not wanting it to wrinkle. “And it’s not a mystery. There’s nothing mysterious about it. I just have to give it back to him, that’s all.”

“You’re no fun.”

I laugh. “Whatever.” Then I pause. “But he did smell pretty good.”

She jabs me with her elbow. “See?”

“How the hell can you say someone smells sexy, though? What does that even mean?”

She starts undressing, first kicking off her shoes and then pulling her arms out of her sleeves. “Oh, come on. There’s definitely such a thing as a sexy man smell.”

“Like, cologne?”

She shakes her head. “Nope. A natural smell. Clean, soapy, manly musk. That kind of thing.”

Of course, I know she’s right. And he had it. I wait until her back is turned before taking one quick hit of smell off the coat myself.

She’s right. It smells like sexy man. Okay, Stella. This is ridiculous. You don’t even know the guy. Stop smelling stranger’s coats.

Embarrassed, I quickly hang it back up and close the locker door. I glance over my shoulder. Lorelei didn’t see me.

During my night of dancing, the mystery man barely crosses my mind. I don’t scan the crowd for his face or wait for him to walk through the door. When I focus on my work, I usually don’t have a problem keeping my mind still. It’s another trait we had instilled on us at the academy. And right now, I’m focusing on moving my body.

I won’t deny that I want him to show up. I want to be able to speak to him this time, to say thank you and actually exchange a few words. To maybe pick up on a little more of his energy and get another look at his sexy features hidden under that all that manly hair.

At three a.m., my shift is almost over, and he still hasn’t showed. Not that I expected him to, but I had my hopes. We close at four, so I have forty-five more minutes to fill before my night is done and I can get out of here.

I use the music as distraction. The bass beats through me, but as it did last night, and the familiar sensation helps me to move. The club is usually thinning out at this hour, but I still have a handful of incredibly interested men in front of me, watching my every move through their wads of cash and almost-empty beers.

Finally, the clock strikes quarter to four. This is when we stop dancing so the other employees can get everyone out and get the place ready to close up.

“Aw, come on,” a few of them call as I step down from my stage.

“Sorry,” I flirt as I wave my fingers. It’s always good to flirt because you want them to come back; repeat customers are your greatest asset. Lorelei had it right the night of the fire alarm. The more often they come back to see you, the more they think you’re interested in them, the more cash they’ll dish out.

As I head to the locker room to change, I take one last parting look at the front door. All that’s behind the tall pane of glass is the still, dark night sky. I wonder why he never came. I mean, I know it’s just a coat. A coat is no big deal, and I guess he doesn’t care. I just thought he would, that’s all.

I continue past the door and make my way down the hall. From behind me, I can hear the hustle of a group of people, and then the opening and closing thud of the front door as they laugh their way out. That must have been some of the night’s vendors – maybe the DJ or the lighting guy with the rest of their crew.

The sound behind me grows quiet. They’ve obviously gone. Then a set of heavy male footsteps comes to a rest in the entryway. I look down at my thigh as I walk, already starting to undo one of the straps of my garter.

“Oh, you’re looking for Stella,” a distant woman’s voice says. That’s Tracy’s voice. She’s working behind the desk today and she must be talking to someone who just came in.

I turn at the sound of my name. At the end of the hallway, I can see that it’s him.

He’s dressed in dark jeans and a stylish black wool coat, the collar having messily ridden up his neck in defense of the cold. He’s looking at me, expressionless, and holding a dark-colored beanie hat in both of his hands. He’s much taller than I remember, but then again, I didn’t have a decent chance to get a good look at him last night. Not calmly, at least.

I realize I’m staring, so I break my gaze away, nervously darting my eyes back to my garter straps, which hang loosely in my fingers.

Tracy says carelessly, “This guy’s looking for you,” then starts collecting her things to leave.

Despite how exposed I am, he isn’t scanning me up and down the way I’m used to men doing – the way all the others do when I’m on stage, as if I’m a piece of meat. I wore this same outfit last night, and even though he watched me dance, it felt like he was watching me more than he was watching my body. He hasn’t yet watched me with the eyes of a client, and the way he’s looking at me now tells me he never will.

“Give me a minute,” I say, and retreat into the locker room, where I rush to get changed.

“What’s up?” Lorelei asks, sensing my rush. She’s almost completely dressed, so she must have finished her shift early tonight.

“Nothing,” I answer. I toss my heels into the bottom of the locker, under his hanging coat, where they land with a bang. Then I peel off my stockings and replace them with my skinny jeans, a long sleeve top, and a cozy pair of Uggs, then zip my own coat up to my chin. I reach for his, scooping it off the hook.

“What–” Lorelei doesn’t take her eyes off what’s in my hand. I knew I wouldn’t be able to slip past her. She points toward the door. “Is he…?”

“He is.” I nod. “Please don’t embarrass me, Lorelei.”

Her laugh comes close to a snort. “Like I would ever embarrass you.” She’s holding herself back, trying to contain her excitement. “You head out. I’ll stay here until you guys are gone.”

“We’re not going anywhere. I’m just giving this back to him.” I swing my purse over my shoulder. “And you can come out, just, you know. Keep it together. Don’t let him know you smelled his fabric.” And that I did, too.

She throws up a peace sign. “I’ve got it. No secrets. I won’t say a word.” Then, as I’m about to leave, she says, “Hey, Stell. Be sure to thank the guy for saving your life.” Her tone is still teasing, and I’m not sure if she realizes how much truth there is to that.

With a smile, I say, “See you tomorrow.” Then I take a breath before stepping out into the hall.

He’s still standing where I left him. His stubble is now trimmed, and because of that I can see more of his face. I didn’t have the composure to realize it as much as I do now, but he’s strikingly handsome; his jaw is strong and chiseled, and his piercing blue eyes could hold within them an entire world.

“Hey,” I say.

“Hey.” His voice is deep and throaty. Sexy, to match that smell of his. I try to hold back a smirk.

“You have a coat,” I say.

Wow. That was stupid.

I shake my head. “I mean, I’m glad you have a coat, since you left this one with me.” I hold it up, then offer it to him.

He takes it from me, letting it slump down the side of his leg with the weight of his arm.

Lorelei touches my shoulder as she walks by. I didn’t even hear her behind me. “Bye, Stella.” When she’s passed him, she points to his back and mouths to me, “Oh, my God.”

“Bye,” I respond, trying not to laugh.

When I return my attention to where it was, his eyes connect with mine. Waves of hormones stream through my veins, practically igniting them. He opens his mouth to say something, but Tanya appears, interrupting him.

“Are you closing up tonight, Stella?” she asks.

I shake my head. “Not tonight.” I’ll take that as her hint to get the hell out of here so she can get it done.

He’s no longer appearing as though he’s on the edge of words. Whatever it was that he was about to say, he’s now stuffed it away. My heart sinks. I want to know what was on his mind. I want to know that part of him. Lorelei was right; this is a mystery. He is a mystery.

Not only does he now appear quiet, he also looks lonely. That figures. A lot of guys who come to these kinds of clubs all by themselves are.

I shift my purse further up on my shoulder. “Well,” I say, “I’d better be going. But I did want to say thank you.”

“Thank you?” he asks with genuine confusion.

I don’t respond. What does he mean, questioning my thank you? “Yeah. You know, for what you did for me last night.”

He raises a brow. The smallest smile plays at the corner of his lips. “What did I do for you?”

Ah, I see it now. He’s messing with me. He’s trying to get me to come out and say more, to expand on my thank you. He’s milking it because he loves this.

My breath escapes me in a single laugh. “I’m serious. You helped me. I mean, who knows what would have happened if you hadn’t come over when you did.”

He nods, this time in all seriousness. “You’ve got a dangerous job here. Those guys were no good.”

“Yeah, well. Hopefully this is only temporary.” The last thing I want to do is gush on and on about my work. “What do you do?” I mentally shake my head. So you ask about his work? Really, Stella? I know my love life has been in a bit of a rut, but I work with men for a living. I charm men for a living. I should be better than this. But there’s something about being in his presence that makes me lose sight of myself.

He’s still wearing the faintest of play on his lips when Tanya returns yet again.

“I’m about to be out of here, Stella,” she says with a sigh. Now, her tone is less than amused. She’s done.

“Okay,” I answer quickly. “Look,” I return to him and gesture to the coat still dangling in his grip, “I’m just glad I could get that back to you, and thank you. Really.” I’m talking fast so I can get out of here and not create and bad blood between Tanya and me; so fast I don’t notice that he looks like he wants to speak. “Maybe we can finish this some other time. Will you be here again tomorrow?”

He laughs a nice laugh, a strong and controlled one with smallest toss of his head. He holds the door open for me, as I slip past him I take note of his strong, muscular forearms.

I don’t realize until this moment what I just implied with my words: that I think he’s got the makings of a creepy, lone regular. “No, I didn’t mean–”

“I know what you meant,” he says. “But no, I won’t be here again tomorrow. I have no plans to come back, actually.” He takes a look around as though he’s saying goodbye to the place.

“Why’s that?”

The door closes behind us, and Tanya locks it up. We’re making our way into the parking lot. His black BMW, the same one I saw speeding away, sits alone with my car. Tanya’s was parked next to mine, but she’s already getting the hell out of here. She gives us a last goodbye as she hurries by, and I wave as she drives away.

He shrugs. “It doesn’t fit me.”

“So what, were you just trying it on for size?”

“Something like that.”

When we arrive at my car, I pull my keys out of my bag, and when the beep sounds to signal it’s unlocked, he reaches in front of me and pulls it open.

My hand lightly brushes his when I take control of the door. He feels the same, and the memories of holding his hand the other night come flooding back. From where I’m standing, I can see the softness of those hands, and all it takes is a little bit of memory to imagine their warmth.

In the middle of our exchange of glances, he lifts a finger and lightly touches it to my hand. Then, as quickly as it began, he pulls away as though it never happened.

“Do you want to get out of here?” I say. “…With me?” I add quickly, so he doesn’t get the wrong impression about me, “I’m not sure what’s open now, but we can probably get a drink somewhere.”

He’s going to say no. I’m sure of it. He’s not interested in me like that, or he’s got someone else going on. I read him all wrong.

“Never mind,” I say, looking away and sticking one leg into the car. I try to close the door, but he stops me, that powerful grip of his now as forceful as I imagined it to be.

“Yeah. I do.”

“You saved my life and I don’t even know your name,” I say from the passenger seat of his car. We took his because he offered, and my car was almost out of gas. I stretch the seat belt across my body and buckle it into place.

“I doubt I saved your life.”

“Sure you did. Give yourself some credit.”

He holds the steering wheel with one hand. “I’d say you seem pretty resilient. You look like a girl who can handle herself. And there were a bunch of people around. If it came down to it, I bet you would have been fine.”

There’s a lot I could say to that. Like, I can be resilient, but resilience doesn’t count when your body has frozen up on you in response to the fear.

“Cohen,” he says in the silence.

Cohen. I run the name across my mind’s tongue, testing it out. It’s a nice-sounding name. Strong.

The rest of what said was wrong, too. The people who were standing nearby had no idea of the situation I was in. They couldn’t see me, and they couldn’t hear me, either, even if I had been able to bring myself to scream.

I decide to humor him. “So if I was going to be fine, why did you step in then? I guess you’re right, I could have taken care of myself. I keep a knife on me, you know.”

He started to talk before he hears me finish. “Instinct. It was instinct. Wait– you what?”

He doesn’t need to know that I didn’t have it on me at the time. “At least, I try to.”

He raises his brow. “Then it sounds like I was right. I really didn’t need to step in. So if you carry a blade, how did you get yourself in that situation? Why didn’t you shank the punks?”

I try to contain it, but a laugh bursts out of me.

“What? You would have been right to do it.”

Shaking my head, I say, “No, I know. It’s nothing. I’ve just never heard anyone use the word ‘shank’ in real life. Isn’t that, like, a prison term?”

“Is it?” He’s being a good sport. He’s not giving me any weird, condescending looks like some people do when I’m a little too outspoken too soon.

I clear my throat. “Anyway, I didn’t have time to go back and get it with the fire alarm.”

It’s time to change the subject. I don’t want him to think I’m talking about my knife as some kind of threat, like I don’t trust him or something. I know we don’t really know each other, and maybe it’s just because of what he did for me, but I feel safe with him. “So that’s your name? Just Cohen?”

He hesitates. “Thatcher.”

I nod. “I’m Stella.”

“I know.”

I lean forward, confused. If he were anyone else, I would be suspicious right now. That’s what this job does to you, especially after events such as the one I just went through. But I’d completely forgotten that he said my name when he came to rescue me. “That’s right. You knew my name. How did you know that?”

He pulls his attention away from the road, just for a second, to give me a knowing glare.

I sit back. Right. “The club gives out our first names,” I say. And they’re not hard to spot, either. Our names are stamped all over the night’s paperwork and advertisements.

“Yeah. But I didn’t know for sure that was your real name. To be honest, I thought it was your stripper name or something.”

“What?”

“Well, don’t you all use stripper names?”

Boy, he wasn’t lying. Strip clubs really don’t fit him.

I slump against the heated leather seat and gaze out the window. “It’s not a bad idea. But we don’t have to use them.”

I see his knuckle clench at the wheel, twisting it lightly before he realizes what he’s doing. He stops and switches driving hands. “Is that the first time something like that’s happened?”

“Yeah, it is. Why?”

He doesn’t answer, but I can tell that something’s on his mind.

“Why?” I pry. A smile spreads across my face. “Are you going to take care of those guys for me or something?”

He’s quick to brush me off, but not before I catch the returning smile he’s trying to hide. He’s fun to tease. “Nothing like that.”

“Well,” I say, crossing my arms, “it’s never happened before. But like I said, a stripper name wouldn’t be a bad idea.”

“Will you consider it?”

This time, I raise my brow. “Why do you care so much?”

He gives me a corrective glare, like I’m some kind of child and he’s my protector. I smirk at him. “I will.”

He’s smart enough to leave it at that. “Let’s get something to eat. I’m starving.”

“Everything’s closed,” he says, pointing out the obvious as we drive around. I think he knew all along that the bars would be closed and we wouldn’t be getting any drinks.

“I don’t think we’re going to find anything at this hour,” I say. Then I joke, “Except McDonald’s.”

“McDonald’s it is.”

I don’t ask if he’s kidding because I know he’s not. I get that from him – that easygoing, cooperative spirit who doesn’t really mind what he does with his life at this hour, as long as it’s with someone he enjoys, and who, because of that, isn’t embarrassed to take me to McDonald’s. Plus, he said he was starving.

And I’m not embarrassed, either, to be a twenty-six-year-old exotic dancer getting McDonald’s after her shift at four in the morning. Not one bit. Deep down, I live for shit like this.

As I watch the trees zip past my window, I evaluate Cohen out of the corner of my eye. I secretly evaluate his car, too, which is just as smoking hot. I don’t know much about cars, but it looks to be a brand new model, and it’s sporting some upgrades I’ve never even heard of, let alone seen in person. The car is flawless, both inside and out. The seats are thick leather, padded and hand-stitched, colored black and traced with a bright, racer red. The touch screen panel above the center console is bigger than my Ipad at home, and words and symbols dance across the screen alongside a small blue 3D rendition of his car that rotates as we drive.

I wonder what he does to be able to afford this, but I don’t ask out of fear of being too forward. “So,” I say to break the silence, “since we’re going to McDonald’s, can I buy you some breakfast? As the official thanks for saving my life.”

“You’re not going to drop that, are you?”

We pull up to the drive thru and take our place behind a big, red SUV. I can’t believe there’s actually a line at this hour, but then again I guess it is breakfast time on a weekday.

“Well, it’s not like it’s an everyday thing. Not for me, anyway. And if I didn’t know any better, I would have thought you knew what you were doing. You were so calm about it, so… in control. What are you, some kind of vigilante or something?” I’m still trying to refrain myself from asking the obvious: What do you do? Not that I actually think he’s a vigilante or anything. But don’t superheroes always have kick ass cars?

I thought it was funny, but Cohen doesn’t. His jaw tenses. His gaze empties, and the faintest deep, nearly invisible flash of pain glazes over them. Holding his eyes, the hair stands up on the back of my neck, but not out of fear of him; out of a mysterious fear of what he holds within him.

He gives a crooked smile, then exhales and then looks down at his lap. I look away, uncomfortable with the fact that without knowing how, I opened something in him. I went somewhere too deep, way too soon. I breathe out in synch with him, sending the invisible heaviness between us into the air.