Lucy

 

“So, is Blade your name?” I said after sitting in silence with him back in his office, referring to the patch on the front of his vest.

 

“Oh, yeah, that?” He glanced down and smiled. “That’s what everyone calls me. My real name is Devin, but call me Blade like everyone else.”

 

“Blade it is,” I said, taking another sip of the coffee his bartender had brought us.

 

I had expected him to run me off when he came out and saw me still hanging around his parking lot. He was a big burly biker. He ran a titty-bar for crying out loud! He didn’t need people like me sitting around, bringing everyone down. Sure, he’d been interested in me when I was in his office. He’d been staring at me with those intense gray eyes, but I figured that interest was gone as soon as he rejected me and sent me packing.

 

I continued wiping my tears away even once we got back in his office. I didn’t want him, of all people, to see me crying. Not only was he a complete stranger, but I didn’t want the man I just asked for a job to know I was that new to everything. I had asked for a job stripping and dancing on his stage. I figured letting him find me out in the parking lot crying was a rookie move, showing how inexperienced I was.

 

It was embarrassing to let anyone see me in that shape. I dried my eyes with tissues he handed me, and we waited for the coffee to come in.

 

It was surreal being back in his office. Before, I had been in there because I was looking for a job. He had been a potential employer. My second visit was personal. This man I had been taught to avoid was offering me a brief respite from my grieving and lamenting.

 

As a biker, I expected him to be rough and hard. I could see a little ink on his arms from where his sleeves were rolled back, but he probably had tattoos all over his body, everywhere that was hidden from view. He’d probably been to prison before. He was built. He had broad shoulders, ripped arms that barely fit in his shirt sleeves. His cheekbones and jawline were very pronounced. His resting expression was hard and mean. He looked like he was ready for a fight.

 

As the owner of a strip club, I expected him to have little respect for women. He exploited them on his stage every night. He made money off their bodies. He was supposed to want some sort of favor for helping me and getting me off the street for a little while. I also knew if I refused to perform a favor like that, I was going to be back on the street as soon as I finished the coffee.

 

I had been told to avoid men like him in favor of reputable men with aspirations. I had chased men of reputation the whole time when I was growing up. I had found myself in my current situation after seeing a successful, responsible man. And the two most influential men in my life had both turned their backs on me and slammed doors in my face, while a biker thug had invited me in off the street after sitting on the curb comforting me.

 

That says a lot about my expectations, I thought.

 

“So, do you mind telling me what’s going on?” he finally asked.

 

I nodded. “Oh, that,” I said flatly. I took another sip of coffee and placed the cup on his desk. I sat forward on the couch and told him about the fight with my dad and getting kicked out. I didn’t tell him what the fight was about or that I had tried to chase my lover down after leaving the house only to find that he had left town with his family. I didn’t need to tell a complete stranger all of my details.

 

“You can’t stay with any friends?” he asked me.

 

I laughed. “No. There’s no one to stay with.” I had gone to school all my life with the children of people like my parents, making my peers pretty similar to my mom and dad. Someone might have taken me in at first, but once they started asking questions and learned the reason I was kicked out, they would have distanced themselves from me. What I had done was completely unacceptable.

 

Honestly, if I had been one of my friends, and they were coming to me for help in the situation I found myself in, I wouldn’t have helped them much. I would have sent them packing, as well. This whole thing was providing me with a very generous dose of perspective.

 

I didn’t feel like I needed to explain all of that to Blade. He probably saw some of it already by looking at me and figured it out from what I had already told him about my life.

 

“I see,” he said thoughtfully. “Where have you been staying? You don’t look like you’ve been on the street long.”

 

I sighed again and looked down at the floor. I told him about the hotel and my father freezing my money, because, well, he was on all my accounts. I took that as a lesson learned for future reference.

 

I grabbed the coffee mug and took one last, long sip, putting it back on the desk when I finished. I stood up and reached down for my backpack.

 

“Thank you for the coffee, Mr. Blade,” I said as politely as I could. He wasn’t going to be my Prince Charming. He wasn’t going to save me. He was nice and very different from what I expected, but he wasn’t a saint.

 

“It’s just Blade,” he said, standing up from his desk.

 

“Well, thank you anyway. I need to get going. I need to figure where I’m sleeping tonight,” I told him and started toward the door.

 

“Hey, hold on a minute. No one said you had to leave,” he said, stepping around the desk. He put a hand lightly on my arm. The touch sent shockwaves through me. I felt like we connected briefly. His large, powerful hand carried such a tender touch. He was obliterating my expectations left and right.

 

“But I don’t want to impose. You’ve got a business to run, and I need to handle my situation myself,” I argued.

 

“No, you don’t need to go back out there,” he insisted.

 

“Where else am I going to go?” I asked, stepping away.

 

“I’ve got room at my house. You can crash for tonight. I’m not offering to fix all of your problems, but you can take some time to figure out what’s next,” he said.

 

“No, I can’t. I really don’t want to get in the way,” I said, clutching the strap on my pack with both hands.

 

“No worries, Lucy,” he said. “Look, come back in and have a seat. I can’t let you go back out there on the street. These streets will eat someone like you alive. Hell, they’ll eat anyone alive.”

 

I let him lead me back into his office. I sat back down on the couch and let my backpack fall from my shoulder. I sighed. The only thing I liked less than looking for help was accepting it. I wanted to do everything for myself, but I couldn’t.

 

“I can’t pay you,” I told him.

 

“Don’t worry about it right now. We’ll figure something out,” he told me.

 

I cocked an eyebrow. I figured he was used to taking women in and letting them work it off at the club or something like that. It seemed like the kind of thing he would have done as the owner of the club.

 

“Look, I’ve got a few things to do to wrap up for the night. Just hang out on the couch, lie down, whatever. I’ll be back as soon as I’m finished,” he said on his way back through the door.

 

I looked at the worn out, sagging cushions on the couch. It looked like it could have used a couple good doses of penicillin itself, but it was better than a cardboard box under the interstate overpass. As he stepped out and closed the door to his office, I sprawled out across the couch.

 

I fought back tears as I thought about his kindness. It was unexpected and really unwarranted. He didn’t know me. He didn’t owe me anything. For all he knew, I could have been using my sob story to scam him out of money or valuables. Had I been more seasoned and more cunning, I would have taken the opportunity, alone in his office, to search for his safe and take whatever I found inside it.

 

I wasn’t that girl, though. I lay on the couch and listened to the thumping music through the thin walls of his office. I closed my eyes and let the distant sounds of the club pull me into the darkness of sleep.

 

I wasn’t quite comfortable enough to go just yet. My mind continued to work, to mull over things. I sniffled and wiped my eyes again, trying to keep the tears at bay.

 

I felt my body relaxing while I lay there. I had a roof over my head. I was probably going to end up spending time with more colorful people. I wasn’t going to have to sleep on the street. I was safe for the time being.

 

Something about Blade seemed very trustworthy. It seemed like he was a man of his word. If he told me it was okay to sleep in his office, I knew I wasn’t going to be disturbed.

 

“Hey, come on, get up,” Blade said gently at some point, coming back into the office and waking me as I finally began to doze off.

 

I sat up and grabbed my bag from the floor.

 

“Let’s get you out of here and somewhere that’s actually comfortable,” he said, helping me get up from the couch.

 

I rubbed my tired, swollen eyes. “Yeah, let’s do that. And thank you again.”

 

“Don’t mention it.” He walked me out of his office with a hand on my back.

 

I wasn’t going to have to worry about a place to sleep, and I was grateful for that. After some of the people I had seen, especially some of the girls I’d seen coming and going from the club, it wasn’t lost on me how lucky I was to find someone like Blade who was willing to help me out pretty much at random.