Page 107 of By A Thread

Her brown eyes filled with fire.

“What in the hell possessed you to do that? If you need an advance on your paycheck, just ask. I’ll give you whatever you want. Don’t get up on stage and take your clothes off. Have some goddamn self-respect.”

Oh, shit.

I’d said something so irresponsibly stupid I wanted to punch myself in the face. For a moment, Ally looked like she’d do it for me. But I still had her arms, so the best she’d be able to manage is a gut shot, which I deserved.

“I havenothingbut self-respect,” she said, her voice low and shaking. “Nothing.”

“Why is that? Why don’t you have anything? Why were you so desperate for money that you’d dance for strangers?”

With shaking hands, she peeled my fingers away from her skin. “Just like everything else regarding me from now on, that’s none of your business,” she said coldly.

“Ally—”

“Here’s what happens now. I don’t want you to ever speak to me again. I don’t want my name toeverpass your lips again. If you need something from the admin pool, you call every other person in that room. Because we’re done. No more flirting. No more getting to know you. No more ‘I want you, but I can’t have you’ games. It’s finished. When you see me in the hall, you will avert your eyes and walk in the opposite direction.”

“And if I don’t?” Cold licks of dread settled in my gut.

“I’ll tell Malina that you had a sex dream about her. Now I’m going home. So if you have anything to say to me, this is your last chance.”

All the things I should say, the whys she deserved to know, the feelings I had for her, the way I thought about her at night when I was alone… it all hovered on the tip of my tongue.

“I’ll call you a car,” I said.

36

Ally

Front Desk Deena pounced on me the second the automatic doors whirred open.

The woman had an entire wardrobe of holiday-themed catalog wear. Today was a Valentine’s Day sweater with lopsided hearts placed directly over her generous breasts.

“Ms. Morales, a word,” she said sternly.

Reluctantly, I followed her buxom figure into the Pepto-Bismol pink office she shared with the much nicer, much flatter chested Sandy, the nursing supervisor.

I thought about running. I thought about that lap dance and Dom hauling me into his car, his home. I thought about the gigantic diamond rings on Deena’s left hand. Mr. Deena must be a boob man to put that kind of hardware on her hand. I thought about a lot of things in the twenty seconds it took for Deena to settle herself behind her desk and take a judgmental sip of tea.

“Your father’s account is past due,” she said, assuming the role of Four-Star General Obvious.

“I realize that,” I said, reaching into my backpack.

“Now what are we going to do about it?” she asked with a smile so phony her lips didn’t even curve.

Nursing Supervisor Sandy, the woman unlucky enough to share an office with Deena, rolled her brown eyes heavenward at her desk.

“If you can’t produce exactly…” Deena swiveled to her computer monitor. The screensaver was of alternate universe Deena beaming at her lap full of grandchildren who weren’t regarding her as an evil, shrewish monster. “$5,327.94 today, then I’m sorry, but we’ll be forced to begin the eviction proceedings against your father.”

She didn’t sound sorry at all.

Sandy shot me a sympathetic look, and I wondered how many of these meetings she’d sat in on.

“I understand,” I said. Sending up a prayer to the goddess of lotteries and cash-windfalls, I reached into my bag and pulled out a check for every cent I had in my bank account and a stack of crumpled, glittery bills.

Faith had dropped off my first-place winnings—was it weird to be proud about that?— along with two bottles of really good red wine and hot wings that we reheated in the oven at four in the morning.

She also brought a check for the private dance. I didn’t accept it. But I did accept the loan. Because of course my best friend walked around with a few hundred dollars in cash.