Page 4 of Rum & Coke

“You have more strippers coming?”

He shook his head. “No. We’re driving up to go camping.”

I balked at his answer. “Camping?”

“Don’t worry, it’s not far,” Vinny affirmed. “Once we get there, the driver will bring you back to your car. Shouldn’t take longer than a few hours—tops.”

Few hours? Honey had said they needed a stripper for thirty minutes, not two hours. But it was five hundred bucks, and now that I thought about it, that was a lot of money for thirty minutes. Honey must have not understood correctly, but it was too late now.

I nodded silently as the guys started to talk again amongst themselves. I wasn’t paying any attention to the words. All I could think about was that seeing Vinny in the brightness of the bus’s lights was one million times better than in the darkness of night earlier. He had a buzzed head of what seemed like light brown hair and brown eyes that twinkled when he laughed.

I hadn’t felt this way toward a man in a long time. I never dated because my time was spent taking care of Colton, but as we drove, I had that weird butterfly thing happening in my stomach. I didn’t want to think about what that meant. Plus, I also needed to call Sophia and tell her I’d be later than I’d thought.

“Now,” Paul spoke with a grin, “this is what we need you to do.”

Tessa.

Fuck, she was beautiful.

In my line of work, I’d met hundreds of women. None of them had ever caused that stupid lingering thing to happen like you see in chick flicks. But Tessa …

I never wanted to let go of her hand.

There was something different about her, and I couldn’t explain it. When I’d first stared down into her big, beautiful, blue eyes and she stared back as though she was reaching into my soul, I knew insta-love could be real. I wasn’t in love with her—far from it—but there was definitely insta-lust going on.

I wanted to ask her anything and everything as we drove toward Gabe’s house, but I decided against it. The guys would harass me. Not a single one of them knew what it was like to be in a relationship. Hell, I didn’t either. Saddles & Racks allowed me to have the best life I could have. It allowed me to have the money I needed for travel and concerts, and all the things I wanted to do.

But being a male escort wasn’t my only job. It was my nighttime job—my side hustle. My daytime job was being a special education teacher. Working in special education was very demanding and required me to juggle many responsibilities. I began each day with the standard requirement of responding to parent emails when I arrived at school and preparing each child’s specific schedule, but then it went deeper than just teaching. I was a case carrier for each student. Each child had their own individual education program, and my job was to delegate the different learning groups with my assistants, have intensive one-on-one academic and behavioral support for each student, as well as collect data to add to the individual education programs that the assistants prepared throughout the day when they’d interact with the students.

The eight to nine hours I spent at the school were demanding, so being a male escort was a stress reliever. I could go to a bar and pick up a woman for the night, but this way I’d get paid to do it.

Plus, it was fun.

We only had sex if the vibe was right—and the vibe wasusuallyright. That was why we were hired the majority of the time. The trick was to take the client’s money when the date started, so whatever happened after was between two consenting adults. It was illegal to take the moneyaftersex or when sex was mentioned because that was considered prostitution. Of course, I could see where a parent of one of my kids would have an issue with it. That was why I had an alias for S&R: Duane Wood.

The bus pulled up to Gabe’s house, and Paul left to go inside to grab him. Tessa went into the bathroom as planned, and while we waited, the driver dimmed the lights, painting us in multiple colors as the LED lights shined on the baseboards and ceiling. Nick moved to the bar and poured what I assumed was a whiskey and Coke for Gabe.

“What did you do?” I heard Gabe ask from outside.

“Did you expect me not to drink tonight so I could drive your ass around?” Paul replied.

“I guess not,” Gabe answered.

“Gabe, this is Alfred,” Paul said, and I was confused.Who’s Alfred?

“What?” Gabe chuckled slightly.

“I’m kidding,” Paul exclaimed. “His name’s Roberto, but Alfred is better for our little adventure.”

Oh, he was talking about the driver and was referencing Batman?

“Adventure?” Gabe asked.

“Get on the bus, Gabe,” Paul groaned.

Brad stood and moved to the doors. “Party’s up here, man,” he cut in.

He returned to his seat while Gabe finally stepped onto the bus. As soon as the guys and I saw him, we hooted and hollered and stood to greet him with bro hugs. Without any words, Paul guided Gabe to a seat across from me, and Nick handed him the drink he was making. The doors closed and music started to play as though we were a club on wheels.