Stay for Me (2 page)

Emma managed to glance away.

You
know you’re
gonna
look again,
she chided
herself.

 
Ellen, the show’s head manager, walked by just
then and nodded her way. In her sixties but with a youthful outlook that made
her eligible for the forty-something club, Emma usually admired Ellen’s “best
for business” attitude. Tonight, that air meant expecting the impossible from
Sam.

“Have you spoken with Sam yet, Emma?”
Ellen asked with a raised brow and smart, sleek brown hair pulled back from her
face.

“Not yet,” she said, hoping her
crinkled brows made her look serious and not at all the lecherous fraud
who’d
just imagined replacing her best friend’s hands with her
own. “I’ll catch him during the break.”

“I have no problem being the one
to make the request. I know you two are close,” said the woman who had hired
them both that same day two years ago.

But this would come from her, not
Ellen, no matter how uncomfortable it would be.

Good
lord, he got me this job and now I’m the one about to take his away. What is
wrong with the world?

Emma shifted her hip and cleared
her throat.

“It’s just business. I’ll be
fine. Thank you, though,” she said and was glad Ellen dismissed herself,
walking away and leaving Emma there alone.

No, she didn’t want to be the one
to give Sam the absurd choice he’d shoot down without thought. Yes, she had to
take that one last glance upward.

She looked again just in time to
see Sam lined up alongside the others as four sets of white, creased pants
dropped to their ankles and then down came the star-spangled booty pants to make
them appear nude. Four sets of perfect, toned male buns were revealed. Jay and
Donovan’s were white with tan lines and Gabe and Sam’s as tanned and natural as
the day they’d been born. She could have sworn the monitor rattled from the
nearby pandemonium before the stage went completely dark. Taking a stray, worn
tank top in her hand, she grabbed the vision she truly wanted but could never
again admit to out loud.

One uniform.
One Sam Jason.
One Emma Chester.

The three of
them alone in his apartment that overlooked the lights of Boulder City.
One more try.
Just one more to see if they could make it work.

If she thought
about it any longer, she’d out herself there in the hall.

If
we were meant to be more than friends, we’d have made a perfect fit the first
time.
 

A bit of delinquent jealousy
ripped through her just then as the shouts quieted down to a lull, signaling
the ladies would now be lining up to get their keepsake photos, posing in whatever
manner they liked. More naughty than nice, most chose to sit on the guys’ laps.
Emma tossed a shirt up to cover the monitor so her spying session would be
ended, but her aim sucked and it fell back down into her basket.

The time had come to fall back
into the real world and ask him to either fully commit to
S
and quit his day job doing construction, or be put on probation
here at the club. The dark circles under his eyes had to go, according to
Ellen. All they did to Emma was
endear
him to her even
more.

The
good?
 
The monitor looming above wouldn’t be a
distraction with him gone.

The
bad?
 
Chances were, even if she found the nerve to
suggest trying again, no way would he want to go for it with the girl who not
only embarrassed him two years ago but was about to put in a repeat performance
by placing him on probation. There was no way he’d quit his day job. It was the
closest thing he could get to working with kids right now, even if it was just
in construction on the high school.

She needed to rub the skin-crawling
feeling away but wouldn’t make a bigger fool of herself in this hallway.
Another
S
word came to mind.

Sorrow.

If he said no, which he would, he
could be leaving. Her partner in crime would be gone.

Emma backed up, nearly stepping
out of her worn ballet flats. Her toes clenched, keeping them on.
 
 

She closed her eyes and like a
dummy went back to another night a few months ago while the club noises and
energy fell away. A pair of admittedly great legs wrapped around his waist
while he supported a woman on his lap in the single, armless chair located
inside the
S
room, and Emma stood
there like an idiot in the doorway.

“Damn,” she said and shook her
head.

Why couldn’t she stop thinking of
everything she and Sam deserved to have been to each other?

But she knew.
 

Sam Jason didn’t cling to things,
and he wouldn’t take lightly to being given this ultimatum Ellen had issued.
This could very well be his last night at
S
.
Their last night working together.
A fierce yet hollow
rumble gave her the aches. If he left, she knew in her heart they’d never work
through that night. She’d never get to tell him how special it had been to her,
regardless of what had happened. She’d never be able to have that closure,
would never know. Emma did not want to live with an eternity of “What if?” when
it came to Sam.

The next cringe made her temples
pound.

“Don’t let him bring a patron
here tonight,” she muttered. “Not now of all the times.”

She started to knock, curious if
the foreboding room was as empty as the ominous black door implied, but that
would have meant spilling the laundry.

Emma hiked the basket up higher
onto her hip, ignoring the gouge marks already left, and turned away from the
S,
passing it by. She made her way to
her office one door down, aka the Emergency Room.

A pair of booty pants, as she
liked to call them, landed smack dab in the middle of her clothes basket just
as she was about to balance and open the door.
 

Gabe. That subtle sadness in his expression
mixed with the sleepy smile did it, just a little, even to her.

“Hey, little mama,” he called
her, “let me get that.”

The lean, smooth hand with a
snake and apple tattoo slid into view, and the door to her office opened. Gabe
smiled that soft, mysterious, sex-God smile of his. She had no idea how he
stayed so humble. It would have been rude to stand there like a broken twig,
even though her stomach was starting to branch into knots at the thought of
confronting Sam. The power of Gabe’s shy smile prevailed.

One sweeping glance his way showed
her Gabe was sweaty and mostly naked which meant he’d just come off stage.
There was power in that, too, but she’d learned to ignore it.

Her eyes saw the sweet Latin hunk
and all his tanned, alluring flesh, but he wasn’t Sam.

“You need help,” he stated
quietly, holding onto his barely there costume, just barely.

Boy,
did she.

“Thanks, hon.”

He expertly held both the door
and the remnants of his black, stretchy, hot shorts and let her pass through.
She was careful not to knock into the plywood desk some of the guys had put
together for her and moved toward the stackable washer and dryer unit, vowing
to someday outfit this place with proper and professional furniture. Although
she really did love the desk they’d made her.
Maybe just a
real chair to go with it.
One with roller balls.
She set down the laundry and watched as Gabe’s lean and muscled back bled into
that pair of perfect male buns. He came over and kissed her cheek, completely masculine,
yet unaware of his stud-status.

“You okay?” he asked. His voice
was the gentlest spoken of the troupe, and it calmed her every time.

“Absolutely,” she lied. “Hey, did
you need some help there…with that?” Emma pointed at the man-undies which he
was prompted to hold out. She snatched her tin of safety pins from the desk.

She didn’t look down.

Buns were one thing.

Full frontal was another and something
she did not indulge in.
No matter how sweet the kiss on the
cheek or chivalrous the holding of the door.
Plus, how many times did
these guys lose their special socks?
All the time.
Her
temples tensed as she and an equally chiseled but leaner Gabe stood there
examining his torn costume.

To be a man that
comfortable with his nude body.
At twenty-three and three-quarters,
glimpses of herself in the full-length mirror still made her feel more like a
pre-pubescent boy most days than a grown woman. At this rate and with her
current hang-ups, she’d be the only one to ever see her lack of hips and boobs
anyway.

Sam
has seen,
she
thought and blinked at Gabe, embarrassed for thinking those thoughts in front
of him.

The pink burn started over her
chest and crept its way up her neck to her cheeks and ears.
Sam might not even remember. That was two
years ago. God only knows how many gorgeous women he’s seen since then.

She almost let out an “Ugh” but
held it in.

She took a second to glance at
the mock Academy Award statue the guys had gifted her last year. “Best Leading
Lady” it said.

You
have a business degree and help manage Boulder City’s most lucrative nighttime
entertainment. These guys love you like family. That’s what you should be proud
of.

She could keep telling herself
that. But Emma knew she wasn’t all that different from those loud, brazen women
on the other side of the wall. She’d go without just about anything if it meant
finding someone who made her feel like the only girl on the planet.

She wanted to ball up her fists
and scream that he was under this very roof, right now, but Gabe didn’t need to
witness that meltdown.

He gave a nervous little twitch
at the awkward time that had just passed between them. “
Ummmm
,
so yeah, I’m on in three and this wasn’t my rip-away pair.” She barely heard
him, as he was prone to speak in that soft, baritone voice. He held the
material out to her. Hope filled his gorgeous brown eyes that she could save
them and quickly. Emma loved that they came to her with this stuff because as
good as Ellen was, the woman just wasn’t as approachable. What had Jay called Emma?
A “player’s coach?”

“Favorite pair?”
Emma asked,
wanting to make Gabe comfortable in her presence again.

“Only pair.
And apparently not strong enough for these ladies tonight.
My extras are all missing.”

“Hmm.
So the no-tipping
policy isn’t keeping the ladies on their best behavior,” she said. “I’ll have
to come up with some more ideas.”

“Nah, it’s okay. You
wanna
keep the show sexy and welcoming. It’s just for fun, Emma.
We get that.”

They looked at each other, shared
a nod of mutual respect at his graciousness, and then named the missing undies culprit
in unity, “Jay.”

Sexy, silly Jay, always pulling
pranks.

“Don’t worry, I’ll do a quick fix
right now and then stitch them up properly after the show. Then we’ll raid
Jay’s locker before we leave. I’m thinking he needs all his booty pants
exchanged for extra smalls. We’ll give him a whole new appreciation for
tighty
-whiteys.” They shared a fist bump and a much-needed laugh.
“I also think you’re down to two minutes, hon.” She devised a quick fix plan
and filled him in. “Place them how they should fit, and I’ll safety pin them
for now.”

Gabe wrapped the undies around
his narrow yet muscle-lined hips and between his legs, then Emma gave a small
thanks to God that the strip she would fasten lie at one of those fine hips and
not between the legs. Three extra small and well-placed pins later, and he was
good to go.

“You be careful and don’t let
them rip these ones off.
Gotta
protect what your
momma gave you,” she told him, happy for the brotherly feeling she got from the
show’s other military vet.

“I will. Hey, were you looking
for someone?” he asked, startling her.

She was, but…

“Why do you ask?” Sometimes it
felt like this place had eyes and ears everywhere. She glanced at the monitor
above and its live feed streaming on her desktop computer.

He shied away for a second and
then gave her that all-knowing look. “I can always tell when you get that look,
mama.”

They both knew exactly who Gabe
was referring to.

But to save herself from having
to search him out, and besides it was killing her that she might have to find
Sam in the
S
room, she asked. “Okay,
I give. You haven’t seen Sam backstage yet, have you?”