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twenty-thousand dollars left of her lottery winnings. The money had to last.
    But twenty-thousand dollars was one lousy year of life
to live. She needed more to keep going. She took this job as a means to
separate the lottery money from the real money.
    Two nights a week, Sara would tend bar in the club.
The other two, she ran a naturist class from the back of a tattoo parlor. The
other three…she spent trying as hard as she could to accomplish this without
breaking her neck.
    “You’re doing it all wrong,” Lace said.
    The sultry Lace stepped onto the stage, jumped onto
the second pole and showed a determined Sara exactly how it should be done.
Lace could wrap her leg around the pole and stick out her left leg, let go of
both her hands from the pole, bend over backwards, and jut out her breasts in a
way to make them swell, enticing the customers. All of this, if done right, was
achieved within a matter of seconds.
    Unfortunately, it took far too much concentration on
Sara’s part to get her body past the act of left leg out. The breast part was
easy. She hadn’t the need to stick them out. They were large enough and young
enough; but she had to get her left leg out and both hands off the pole,
otherwise she would slip to the floor and look foolish. No one would pay for a
pole dance if the dancer couldn’t keep her ass off the floor.
    Sara, frustrated, slid off the pole, planted both bare
feet firmly onto the floor, and sighed. Lace was already into another move,
making it look so damn easy.
    Sara wanted to strangle the woman. Why it was some
were better at gaining success than others? The sinful smile Lace sent back at
Sara did not help matters.
    She grabbed her towel, wiped off her hands, then moved
off the stage in disgust.
    The two friends would sneak in here on their Sunday’s
off to perfect a routine. Sara was frustrated. Lace was perfecting.
    She went behind the bar and poured herself a drink.
    Catching what she was up to now Lace came off the pole
and moved her way. “You can’t be doing what you are,” Lace said, tongue in
cheek.
    Sara smiled at her friend and temporary roommate, said
nothing, downing the shot. She poured two more and slid one over to Lace.
    And first, Lace’s face took on that look that said if
the cops were coming she didn’t want to be in the same room as Sara, or getting
the handcuffs slapped on her delicate wrists. The look passed and Lace downed
the shot, shaking her head to retract the heat.
    Sara poured both another.
    And another…
    Two hours later, a full bottle of tequila reduced to
drops and a dead worm, Sara didn’t care if her ass slipped to the floor. She
was too drunk to care—but at least she could get her left leg off the pole, and
most of the time the hands to follow, without worrying about breaking her neck.
Thank God, the consumption of tequila could achieve all of this.
    Unfortunately, this was also when the door to the
strip club opened and the women were caught in the act.
    Only one spoken word came from the darker shadows put
chills to Sara’s spine. “Ladies.”
    She stiffened, slid to the floor again, stood up on
unsteady legs, and squarely faced the intruder to her actions.
    Though she could not see his face, she knew damn well
by voice alone who it was.
    “Mister Griffen?”
    Sara did not like Casey Griffen…and Casey did not like
her. A mutual understanding of animosity had formed between the two when he’d
hired her. According to him, she somehow made life miserable for a man.
Emphasis had to be put on somehow . He had yet to say how, and she had
yet to ask. But it was there, nonetheless.
    “Care to tell me why two lovely ladies are on my
poles, and quite obviously drunk?” He eyed the empty tequila bottle and the two
shots glasses set on the bar. Neither woman was brave enough to have eaten the
worm—but certainly brave enough to do a little breaking and entering and theft
of spirits.
    Strong legs carried Casey toward the stolen alcohol.
He