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“Honey, I’m not a fan of the way you’re talking to me,” I warned. “I can’t really help you until you tell me what’s going on.”
“Haven’t you done enough already?” she spat. “But if you want me to spell it out, you and your friend got me fired. Is that clear enough for you,hon?”
“What the hell are you talking about?” I roared.
“Don’t you yell at me, Marcus Donovan! You know very well what I’m talking about. You sent your friend to complain about me soliciting during a lap dance, and thanks to that complaint, Bo was forced to fire me. All I want to know is why. I know you don’t like me being a stripper. But I find it hard to believe that you would jeopardize Rose’s future for such a reason. So tell me why you did it.”
I stared at Celine hard, wondering if this was a joke, or worse, a test of some sort. Why else would she be spouting such nonsense?
“First of all, that wasn’t a friend. That was an acquaintance I hadn’t seen in years. I didn’t even remember his name, just that his face looked vaguely familiar. I think he’s an actor or model or something. But more importantly, is that what you think of me? Do you really believe I would do something so underhanded?”
Celine squeezed her temples wearily. Her eyes looked dead.
“The thing is, Marcus, I’ve only known you for a very short while. I have no idea what you’re capable of doing. All I know is that a customer went out of his way to have me fired from my job which you hate, and when I walked out into the parking lot, I saw you laughing and talking to him as if you knew him well. So, you tell me what I’m supposed to believe.”
I let out a bitter laugh.
This is what happened when you fell in love at first sight, I realized. It led to nothing but disaster. You couldn’t build a relationship solely on lust and liking when the most important element was missing - trust.
“You can believe what you like, Celine. If I couldn’t handle the job you do, I would make sure I never got involved with you. And not to sound arrogant, but I’m not so desperate for female company that I’d stoop to such lows. As for your job, you can sue the club for wrongful termination if you like. I can recommend you to a lawyer.”
She shook her head.
“That doesn’t work for strip clubs. They have the right to terminate any dancer who is accused of solicitation because of the strict license laws.”
She hesitated a moment and then bit her lip uncertainly.
“Bo believes someone put him up to it. He threatened to call the cops if Bo didn’t fire me on the spot,” she said softly.
“And the first person you thought of was me?” I asked in a voice that didn’t sound like mine at all.
I didn’t know I could ever feel so much pain. It felt as if someone had dug into my heart with a pickaxe and was ripping it up from the inside.
“No,” she said hastily. “My first thought was that it had to be Brandon. And then, I saw you talking to the guy.”
“I don’t know about California, but in NYC, just talking to someone is not an admission of guilt,” I said bitterly.
She hadn’t even given me a chance before she judged me guilty. She hadn’t given us a chance.
Celine dug her hands into her thick hair in a gesture of frustration.
“Marcus, I have a baby! I have a mortgage. I have a mound of debt. I cannot afford to be unemployed! Do you even understand that level of desperation? I have no savings because everything I earn goes toward my debts. I am worried Rose and I might become homeless if I can’t make my mortgage payments, so for just five minutes, get off that fucking high horse and think from my perspective,” she snapped. “If you were in my place, you would have jumped to the most obvious explanation, too. And don’t act like you haven’t done anything to earn my suspicion. Did you or did you not go to Bo behind my back and try and stop my lap dances?”
I turned red at her accusation.
“That was different,” I said stiffly.
“No! To me, what happened today seemed like just an extension of what happened before. And why shouldn’t it? You’re a rich and powerful man. And from my experience, the richer and the more powerful a man gets, the bigger his ego. So, why shouldyoube any different?”
Except I was.
I hated the fact that she was a stripper at all because her body was mine! And I didn’t like any other man having the slightest access to it, even if the access was only visual. And yet, I would never get in the way of her or her daughter’s future. Like I said to her, if I couldn’t hack it, I would never have started a relationship with her.
But I’d done whatever it took to make my peace with her job. And it looked like she hadn’t even begun to trust me. No wonder she called it a situationship. That’s all it was to her. I was a fool to think it was anything more.
There was no point in defending myself to Celine because she seemed to have made up her mind.
“You can hide behind your debts and your responsibilities all you like, Celine. But a lot of women deal with that burden every single day, and they still find it in them to trust someone who has done nothing but help them.”
