She’d been in the process of using a sugar packet to gouge a piece of food out from between her teeth when she stopped to stare at me. “Say what now?”
“I propose you spend—” I started the same speech I prepared overnight but she held up a hand.
“Yeah, no, I got the gist. I’m just processing the crazy that came out of your mouth.”
The awkwardness of this topic caused the tips of my ears to grow warm. “I have a roommate too. If that helps.” One who was still angry at how little information I gave him last night.
“Sure?” her head shook back and forth.
“It isn’t—it’s not a sexual arrangement. I’m not interested in that.” She frowned with skepticism but I kept speaking, “I would be interested in adjusting some of your physical attributes and idiosyncrasies in an effort to present you as an academic to a man on a ranch.”
“Come again?” Her voice was lifting along with her eyebrows. “You want to present me to a man on a ranch after you change my outfit? Listen, I appreciate that you think I’m smart enough, but I’m not hanging right now.”
My concentration stuttered. Her presence had the effect of a strong wind on a stack of papers. I needed to catch my thoughts and organize them. “I’m explaining myself poorly.”
I looked up when she grabbed my hand.
“Take a deep breath and start over.” She shrugged. “It’s just me. Short Fuse Suze, Green Valley’s best dancer.” Her gaze bounced around my face like she was worried.
I took her advice and restarted. “Do you like being a stripper?” I tried a different approach.
She frowned. “I’m a dancer. I enjoy dancing.” She considered her answer. “Most of it.”
“Is that the profession you’d like to have long term?”
“I guess. I dunno. Where you goin’ with this?”
I pressed further. “Why do you do what Occum tells you?”
She frowned and crossed her arms. “He’s family and family looks out for each other.”
I tried again. “Funding secures my tenure. That’s what I want and dream about every day. That’s the goal I’m always working toward. What’s yours?”
She braided her hair over one shoulder only to comb through it and start again. “Well, I was hoping to stop stripping.” She flicked a glance to me like she was waiting for the other shoe to drop.
“I’m not passing judgment. I’m genuinely curious.”
She considered me. She uncrossed her arms to pick at a spot on the table. “I want to be a real dancer. I’d like to have my own Vegas style show. I won’t have to take off my clothes. I could come up with real routines. A couple of the other girls said…” She trailed off. “It’s stupid. I just thought…I mean, I guess, that’s what I want. But it’s whatever. Occum said I could stop stripping if I…” She focused on the table.
“If you get me to sign?” I finished for her.
She nodded.
“I have an investor. He said he’d fund my research substantially if I could pass you off as one of the academic elite. A professor, like me.”
“Me?” She started to chew on her thumb until she caught herself and sat on her hand.
“Yes.”
“Well, that’s easy.” She shoved another chunk of doughnut into her mouth. “I can grasp my pearls and speak fancy with the best of them,” she said around a mouth full of food.
“It’s more than that. It’s etiquette lessons, conversation topics, language, education in several areas. Obviously not as deep as someone with an actual degree, but enough to make it believable. And of course, your accent.”
“I don’t have an accent. You’re the one with an accent.” She crossed her arms and it emphasized her cleavage.
I quickly looked up to her face. “To many people, the regional Southern accent is often interpreted as uneducated.”
“Well, shit, I am uneducated.”
