The Substitute Stripper

Bree Simmons held the collar of her wool coat closed as the wind off the ocean blasted past the front of the office building. She should have worn pants
to work, but her little plaid skirt was so much more fun. More fitting to the mood she’d been in when she woke. Flirty. Dangerous. It was Friday, the end of a long week, and she planned to make the most of the beginning of her weekend.

“
Bree, wait up!” Ash Uberman, the hunky graphic artist who worked two cubicles away from hers trotted up. His blond hair danced in the blowing air. “Whew, this wind is crazy.”

“
Yes, and thanks for making me stand in it longer. What’s up?”

He smiled and she forgot how cold her legs were.
“I need a favor.
Huge
favor.”

They were friendly enough to have lunch on occasion, often with a few other coworkers, but other than the major crush she had on him
, she wouldn’t call them friends. Still, with the right kind of favor, that could change. Or she could hope so. “Depends. What kind of favor?”

“
I need a date.”

She laughed
loudly at the outrageousness of that statement. “You need a date? I hear you on the phone all the time, baby this, sugar that. Someone stand you up?”

He glanced around the
n took her elbow and walked toward the parking lot. “It’s a long story. Can I buy you a drink?”

Dying to find out what was going on, she said,
“Sure.”

She followed him to a small pub not far from the office and he found them a small table in a corner near the fireplace, which she was very grateful to find burning brightly. She took off her coat and draped it over the chair while Ash went to the bar to get their drinks. She was a bit surprised when he came back with her favorite, a strawberry stripper. The man paid attention.

He sat and poured his ale into a frosty glass. “Now, then. The favor. I need a date to a wedding.”

She raised an eyebrow.
“One of your sugar babies can’t help you out?”

“
I don’t want to ask any of them. This is important.”

She sipped her drink while she let that digest. It was too important to ask one of his bimbettes, so he was asking
her. She shivered, and blamed it on the cold drink, not the thought that he would ask her to do him an important favor. “So, when’s the wedding?”

“
Next weekend.”

“
Weekend,” she repeated. “Not next Saturday or next Sunday. They have some special ritualistic ceremony or something?”

“
No. The wedding is at the Snowshoe Mountain Lodge. I have to be there Friday night for the bachelor party. The wedding is Saturday. I plan to come home Sunday.”

A weekend at the lodge, and all she had to do was show up at a wedding and
reception.
Hello
. She’d be nuts not to go. If Ash wasn’t interested in warming her bed, she was sure she could find a lonely skier who’d be game. “I pretend to be your date and you pay for the weekend?”

His
cool blue eyes locked on hers as if searching for something. “Well, yeah, if you have to pretend, I guess that still works.”

Aww
. That cute puppy sound went off in her head and tugged at her heart. He wanted her for a real date. He was too cute. “I’m sorry, you said you needed a favor so I assumed pretending to like you was the favor.”

Shit! She should just shove her whole boot in her mouth, since her foot was so far in.
“Wait, I didn’t mean that. I meant—well, I don’t know what I meant. I’m a bitch, what can I say. I know, how’s this? I would love to be your date for the wedding.”

He smiled and took a
quick swig of his beer. “Thanks. I can’t tell you how important this is.”

“
You know, you could have saved me a lot of embarrassing moments here if you had just asked me to go as your date.”

He looked around the room
, avoiding her gaze. “I wasn’t sure you’d go. I mean, I guess I should tell you I’m the best man, so everyone is going to be looking at who I bring to the wedding.”

She was a trophy
date. This kept getting better and better. “And you think they’ll be impressed that you’re with me?”

His eyes widened and mouth went slack, as if she’d lost her mind.
“Well, yeah. Have you looked in the mirror lately? Looked around the room?”

Unable to help herself, she glanced at the other patrons and caught more than a few guys watching her. Okay, so in her little red plaid
schoolgirl skirt, tight sweater and killer boots, she could turn heads. She knew that. But she was far from the most beautiful girl around. When she turned back to Ash, she caught him staring at her boobs. They swelled in acknowledgement and sent waves of warmth through her belly.

“
So, who are the happy couple?” She toyed with her straw to have an excuse to put her arms in front of her. She knew her nipples had to be visible.

“
Mark, the groom, went to UCSB with me, and he’s marrying the girl he met there. They dated a bit in college, went their separate ways, but met up again recently and really connected.”

“
How sweet. And all your college buds will probably be there. The bachelor party ought to be wild.”

He nodded.
“It had better be. I’m in charge. It’s been hard to set up a party at the lodge but we’ve reserved the main room for the night and I’ve arranged for porno and a stripper.”

“
Just add alcohol and stir.” She raised her glass in a toast before taking another sip.

“
There’s something else I should tell you.”

Something in his voice gave he
r pause. He had a girlfriend? He’s gay? The bride was a celebrity? She hated when people used that warning tone over nothing.

“
Mark’s sister is my ex.”

She made a sympathetic face.
“Ooh, you have to see your ex-girlfriend. That hurts.”

“
Ex-wife.”

She choked on the peanut she was chewing.
“You were married? I didn’t know.” She didn’t know anything about him, now that she thought about it. He could be an ex-con, or president of a biker gang. As she watched the emotions working over his face, and really looked at the sweetness there, the scroungy, reddish-blond facial hair that refused to become a five-o’clock shadow no matter how many days he grew it, and the gentlest baby-blues she’d ever seen, she knew he couldn’t hide any sort of wicked past.

“
It was brief. She wanted a CEO and I was just a guy who drew cartoons for games.”

Her jaw dropped.
“Does she know the awards you’ve gotten for those cartoons? How the gamers go on about your characters?” The woman was blind if she didn’t see the talent Ash had.

He shrugged.
“It doesn’t matter. I’m happier without her. She’s happier with Pierce Henderson, the son of the CEO of Middleton Finance.”

Bree wanted to hug him, but instead she just smiled.
“Her loss.”

“
Thanks.”

A week later she rode the elevator in her apartment building with Ash carrying her suitcase. They’d left work early because of a storm heading toward the lodge. They hoped to beat it up the mountain.

Bree had to lean back in the passenger
seat with her eyes clamped shut, and trust Ash to navigate the windy roads. She hated the drop-offs, hated blind curves at night, and when you added in lightly falling snow, she needed a good stiff drink.

“
How are you doing?” Ash reached across and squeezed her hand.

“
I’ll be better when we get there. Although I might need another hour or two to stop shaking.”

“
I’m sorry about the weather.”

“
It couldn’t be helped. What’s your ex’s name?”

“
Jillian.”

“
Well, I hope we don’t run into Jillian until some of the green has left my complexion.”

He laughed and w
ent back to concentrating on the road. Bree opened her eyes and watched him, his face lit by the dash lights. How sad he’d ended up with a woman who couldn’t appreciate him. He was such a nice guy. In a good way. Nice, and hot and funny. She always knew when someone had stopped in his cubicle because of the laughter ringing out.

When Ash turned the car into the lodge parking lot, Bree sat up and sighed with relief. With any luck, Sunday would be sunny and they could leave in the daylight.

Ash carried their luggage and Bree held up her dress bag, away from the dirty snow piled near the walkway. He took care of registration and got their key cards and led her back out into the covered passageway to the wing where their room was.

“
Who plans a wedding in the winter in the mountains?” she muttered, holding the lapels of her coat closed.

“
Mark and Susie are avid skiers.”

“
I like to ski, too, but behind a boat. And with no snow around.”

He grinned.
“I’ll take a Jet Ski any day.”

He opened the door to their room and let her enter. She glanced at the queen-sized bed and wondered if they
’d get any use out of it. She was willing, and she thought he was. She’d even packed a skimpy new bit of lingerie to help things along if he wasn’t sure about her interest.

As she hung her dress and unpacked, he checked his cell phone for messages. After listening to his voicemail, he swore and tossed the phone on the bed. Grabbing his garment bag from where he
’d draped it over a chair, he strode past her to the closet.

“
Bad news?”

“
Nah, just something I should have expected. I’m not the guy you want to plan your bachelor party.”

“
Uh-oh, what happened?”

“
Nothing major. The stripper cancelled, is all. She’s afraid to drive up the mountain and get stuck in the snow.”

“
I’m sorry, Ash. That sucks. But you have movies and lots of drinks, right?”

“
Yeah, but that’s not a real party. That’s a bunch of frat boys hanging out.”

Bree walked to the mini fridge and looked inside. No alcohol, but there was plenty of bottled water. She opened on
e and sat on the edge of the bed. “How close is the town?”