“Stay at my place tonight,” Jacob says. “Your house is not safe. You’ve had one break-in and one threatening letter in the space of, what, two weeks?”

I avoid Jacob’s intense, questioning gaze. Instead, I take a good look at my house. The black front door that was wide open when I got home from the date. The mailbox at the end of the driveway where a threatening—not to mention insulting—letter was placed for me to find.

Jacob is right. I don’t feel safe here. Not anymore.

“I can’t,” I hear myself say.

I may have said it in a half-joking manner when I told Jacob it could’ve been him who’s responsible for the break-in and the letter. But there’s still a little voice in the back of my head that tells me not to trust him.

I only got this far by relying on myself and making a clean cut from my past. It wouldn’t make any sense to get myself involved with someone like Jacob.

Especially not now, when I feel like my enemies are closing in on me and mysterious things are happening around me—and it all started from the time I met Jacob by chance on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere.

I mean, everything fits together too well to be a coincidence, right?

“Why can’t you?” Jacob puts his warm, callused hand on my cheek and turns my face until I’m looking straight at him. His hand feels safe and strong, big enough to cup my face.

“I just can’t.” I can’t tell him anything more. He’s obviously not going to take the news that I actually believe he may be the perpetrator very well. And just in case he really is, I don’t want to make him angry.

He stares deep into my eyes, making me feel like he’s penetrating deep into my thoughts, fumbling around in there to find the answers I’m not willing to say. I can’t help but melt into his gaze, into his touch.

We’re not saying any more words, but somehow I feel like we’re communicating more this way. I put my hand over his hand on my cheek and close my eyes. It would feel so good to share my burden with someone… I’ve been dealing with so much on my own for years, for practically my entire adult life.

Jacob leans in and presses his forehead against mine. I can smell the oil, grease, and sweat from his body. He hasn’t had a chance to change out of his heavily stained white shirt from before. I breathe in deeply, drawing his scent into my lungs.

Keeping my eyes closed, I put my hand on Jacob’s face. I feel his jaw clench and his muscles tighten. I can even feel the pulse of his heart when my hand runs over the throbbing veins in his neck. As if in response, my heart hammers against my rib cage. My fingers trace the prickly stubble along his jaw and chin.

I can’t deny it. I want to do more to this man. I want more than my hand on his face. I want to explore more of him.

More than that, I want to see the hunger hidden in his eyes unleashed. I want to see just how much he wants me too, see what he would do to me if I let myself be vulnerable to him.

I’m losing my mind. I’m so attracted to him I can barely focus.

Before I can tell myself to get a grip, Jacob leans in and pulls me closer to him. His lips touch mine. They feel hot, like the rest of him. They’re firm and insistent, like the rest of him.

I try to resist and push him away, but his touch makes me weak. His kiss reminds me of what I’ve been missing, what I’ve been longing for.

He starts by lightly teasing my lips, coaxing me to respond. I move closer and let myself melt into his kiss. God, it feels amazing and I want more.

He traces my lips with his tongue, nibbles on my bottom lip. I open my mouth for him, and he sweeps inside, trapping my face in his hands, pulling me closer.

It suddenly feels so hot here. It could be the warmth of his body, so close to me. Or it could be the furnace that has fired into life within me. I fight to catch my breath when Jacob crushes his lips against mine and ravishes me with his mouth.

I stop holding myself back. I match his force as best as I can. Soon, his fingers are tangled in my hair, my hands are gripping his muscled arms hard, and we’re both fighting for air.

Every part of my body feels alive. Everything within me pulsates along with the rhythm of our kiss. Wetness drips between my thighs as Jacob thrusts my body against him.

I manage to fight through my dizziness and breathlessness, just enough to push him away. When I open my eyes to look at him again, he’s still panting with his lips parted. His dark eyes look even more intense with his pupils dilated.

“We shouldn’t,” I say in between my heavy breaths.

Before Jacob can say or do anything, I dash toward the door and slip inside, closing the door behind me.

Max immediately runs toward me and jumps up, pawing at my legs. I slide down the door until I’m sitting on the floor with Max in my arms.

I hear Jacob’s footsteps getting closer on the creaky porch, heavy and determined. He pounds on the door, calling my name. The door vibrates against my back with every bang.

“Jessica!” He pounds on the door.

“Please, Jacob,” I beg. “I need some time alone.”

The floor creaks as he shifts his weight from one foot to another. Eventually, I hear him walk away from the door and down the porch steps without saying another word.

That doesn’t take long. I guess he doesn’t care that much about my safety after all.

I wonder if I ever really felt safe since the night I found Nancy gone from my apartment, leaving only trails of blood leading out from the guest bedroom into the living room. In that moment, I knew two things: I had to do whatever I could to help Nancy, and I was no longer safe because Stan would hunt me down for that.

I didn’t expect that the cops would find Nancy dead at Stan’s house only hours after I called them. I collapsed to the floor when I got their phone call and cried. Partly because I’d lost a friend, and partly because I knew I was going to have to worry about Stan coming after me from that moment on.

Sure, the police knew he was a threat to me. But what were they going to do? Put surveillance on me 24/7? As if I’m important enough to get that kind of treatment.

I’m sure one of the reasons why Nancy never reported Stan was because she didn’t think the cops could do anything for her.

The cops would file a report and maybe remove her from Stan’s house, perhaps even put a restraining order, but then what? What could they do if Stan were to get to Nancy before she had a chance to call the police? What if Stan were to go after Nancy’s mom instead, because he knew Nancy would do anything to keep her mom safe, including revoking her previous reports and canceling the restraining order?

Some girls at the Pussy Cat didn’t have to strip. They just did it because they could make a lot more money that way than whatever minimum-wage job they could get. They earned a little more spending money while they got their college degrees. They could quit any time they want, and they often did.

Some, like me, had no other choice. I started stripping when Mom got diagnosed with cancer. The hospital bills became way too much for me to deal with, but I wanted her to get all the medical attention she needed. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if she’d died without getting the treatments she’d needed.

In the end, even though she did get the treatments and went into remission for a few months, the cancer still came back to invade her body once more. And this second time, it attacked her body with vengeance.

Not even the best treatments I could buy could save her. I must have spent tens of thousands of dollars on her doctor’s visits, pills, chemotherapy, and other hospital stuff. Still, when they lowered her lifeless body into the ground, I felt like I’d done all I could and I had no regrets.

Nancy didn’t have a sick family member. But in a way, she did need the money from stripping.

After Nancy’s father died, her mom had to cover the mortgage payments for the family home. Bertha had been a homemaker for decades and had no idea how to get the money.

At the time, Nancy was already going to college in San Francisco. She told Bertha she’d gotten a paid internship at a big company that would pay her enough money to cover everything.

Of course, in reality, the job market sucked and there was no way such an internship existed. Nancy stripped for the money and planned to stop as soon as the mortgage was paid off.

But by the time Bertha owned the house free and clear, Nancy had gotten in too deep.

She’d become entangled in an abusive relationship with Stan. And I knew she was using some drugs, too, although I had no idea which ones or how often. I knew, though, that drugs were expensive and she was probably depending on Stan’s money to keep herself well supplied.

Fuck Jacob. I have way more important things to worry about than a kiss. I’m sure I’ll feel better in the morning.

* * *

I gulp down my morning coffee as fast as I can without burning my tongue. I didn’t sleep so well and I didn’t even hear my alarm ring; now I have to rush to school.

I grab my keys, quickly check my reflection in the full-length mirror by the door, and rush out the door. Just as I walk down the steps, I catch something out of the corner of my eye.

What the hell?

There, on the wooden bench on my porch, lays a body. A big, brawny body, covered by a light blanket.

Jacob.

Oh, shit.

Has he been sleeping there the entire night?

I glance at my watch.

Fuck. So much for forgetting the kiss after a good night’s sleep. Just looking at him right now, I feel a pull drawing me toward him, making me want to crawl under the blanket with him and nuzzle into his arms.

I so don’t have time for this. I have a job to do. I’ll deal with him later.