Page 16 of After Midnight

She takes it, holding it in hers, which is incredibly small, just like her. Then I notice she has a pen in her other hand.

I go very still as she scribbles something onto my palm, like any sudden movement will make her vanish in a cloud of glitter.

When she’s done, I pull my hand back and look at my skin.

Ten digits stare back at me.

“You . . . You’re giving me your number?”

Mirage puts one hand on her hip, and looking up at her right now, I get the feeling she could intimidate any man into being small for her. “Don’t make me regret this,” she says, one black eyebrow arching in the corner. “If that ends up on the internet, I swear I’ll—”

“It won’t.” I curl my hand protectively, as if the ink might blow away in the desert wind. “I promise.”

“Good.” Then she holds out her hand. “Now you can pay me.”

chapter 5

Remi

I’M NOT SURE WHAT THE hell I was thinking, giving him my number like that. I never give personal information to clients. That’s one of the top three rules of stripping. But he didn’t even ask for it. And I could tell he wasn’t going to. He was going to walk out of here and into the desert, then fly away to his real life, and I was never going to see him again.

Which should be okay. But for some reason, the thought of it made me feel panicky inside, like that moment you drop a hundred-dollar bill and the wind catches it, and you know you have to sprint after it if you want any hope of catching it, even if you look like a fool while doing it.

I don’t typically let myself play the fool. But for some reason, he’s a hundred-dollar bill that I really don’t want to let blow away. Not because of his dimples and his big brown eyes and his huge arms and square jaw, but because . . .

Because he didn’t even let me take my clothes off. Because he likes peanut butter Cap’n Crunch. Because his dad thinks his music is just a phase.

And because I’m probably being a fucking idiot.

Still seated on the velvet couch, Sebastian pulls a few bills out of his wallet. He moves his hand carefully, like he’s trying not to smudge the number I inked onto his palm. When he puts the money into my hand, he asks, somewhat hesitantly, “Will you tell me your name?”

“You know my name,” I say as I slip the cash into my bodysuit, right against my heart.

The look he gives me is oddly disappointed—brow furrowed, lips pressed into a downturned line. “I mean your real name.”

My name. I’ve never given my real name to a client. It’d make it too easy for them to look me up, to stalk me on social media, to turn my life into a living hell if they wanted to.

But I’ve never given my phone number out either. And I’m feeling uncertain about all of it. Because I’m not supposed to be real, and names and phone numbers break down all those boundaries.

I hesitate for long enough that Sebastian slips his wallet back into his pocket and stands from the couch. Even in my heels, he’s significantly taller than me, and I have to look up to meet his brown eyes.

“That’s okay,” he says with a one-shouldered shrug. “I get it.” A smile pulls on his mouth. “Thanks for tonight. I think this is the most fun I’ve ever had at a strip club.”

I let out a short laugh, trying to disguise the fluttery way his comment makes me feel. “Then you need to go to better strip clubs.”

He eases around me, heading for the door. Quietly, he says, “Not sure that would make a difference.”

His hand touches the doorknob, and he’s about to leave. He’s about to go back to LA, to his big rock star life.

To his ocean and his palm trees.

To a life that has nothing to do with me.

And for some reason, I suddenly find myself saying, “Sebastian.”

He pauses, glancing back over his shoulder at me. The ball cap he wears casts his eyes into shadow under the dim red lights. He waits.

I can’t believe I’m about to do this. I feel like I’m getting ready to leap out of an airplane.