MAVIS

shone under the shadow of the bar. "How about I take you out for drinks tonight?"

"Sorry, sir," Mavis said. "You're a handsome man, and any girl would be lucky to have you, but it's not professional. Here's the shrimp and caviar you ordered."

She set the tray down, and his eyes narrowed.

"What if I could pay you more than they could?"

They―as in the country club. Her daytime job. This waitressing shift might give her nothing but minimum wage, and yet―

"No, thank you, sir," Mavis said.

He leaned in closer to her, and even sitting down, he towered over her. He cut a striking figure against the expensive granite bar, with the dimmed chandeliers, but Mavis knew him for what he was: a pompous, entitled, arrogant prick.

There was no shortage of them here.

The problem was that they never failed to make her hands shake. Reminding her of him. His name had been Evan, and she had had a crush on him for her entire childhood.

"Oh, honey, come on," he chuckled. "I heard from my boys that you're a . . . how should I put it? A dancer. Just let me take you out for drinks, and I won't report you for inappropriate conduct."

"What I do outside of work is nobody's business."

"It will be," he whispered, leaning in. His breath reeked of the martini in front of him. "Oh, it will be. I heard you're a lesbian too."

Mavis froze. How could he know that?

The only people she had told were her friends―Desire and Ruby―and Robin.

"That is also none of your concern," Mavis said, but her voice faltered.

Like a viper, he latched onto that weakness.

"One drink, honey," he slurred. "Just one. I'll change your mind."

"I said no," Mavis said. Right now, she didn't feel powerful. She didn't feel capable of conquering the world with nothing but a lilt of her hips.

How was it that men always had the ability to make her feel this way?

Small. Worthless. Inconsequential.

It was easy to promise herself―to say, I don't have to feel this way. But here, now, in the presence of someone rich and powerful, who had told her he could change her mind, how could she feel like anything more than a piece of ass?

"Is someone giving you a hard time, darling?"

Mavis stumbled back.

There was Robin, with her short, chin-length red hair. She lifted her chin, pointing a crooked finger at the man.

"Mr. Rotundo," she said, raising a brow. "I hope you're not giving our dear Mavis a hard time. She's very precious to me, you see."

Mr. Rotundo swallowed visibly. He slid off the barstool.

"No, not at all," he promised, straightening his tie nervously.

"Good," Robin purred. As the owner of the strip club and the country club, she was more powerful than almost all of the men here. Instantly, Mavis felt safe.

She had known Robin for seven years. Ever since she was fifteen, when she had told Robin Wallows, multimillionaire and CEO of seven casinos, to fuck herself sideways, upside down, on a diagonal, and with a dog.

against the Spin-The-Wheel machine. Cursing at it in Spanish and telling its mother to go fuck itself.

"Is there a problem?"

Mavis had spun around.

The woman must have been in her late forties. She was sharply dressed, with a pink-striped pantsuit and pale red hair. Her long, manicured nails gleamed with a silky white, and she clutched the gold handbag at her side with ease. Confidence.

Everything about her screamed money.

And Mavis had been right. She replied, "Yes, there's a problem, estúpida. This machine isn't working."

"Perhaps it's because you're hitting it," suggested the woman primly.

"I'm hitting it because it doesn't work!"

"How much money did it owe you?"

Mavis was living in a rent-by-the-night motel. Her stomach was swollen with a slight bump, and most days, she was ravenous.

"Seven dollars," she finally said.

Seven dollars was enough to buy her fourteen cans of chickpeas.

The woman raised a single delicate eyebrow. "I see," she purred. "How old are you?"

Mavis opened her mouth to respond truthfully―and then thought better of it.

"Eighteen," she lied.

The woman nodded approvingly. "Good girl." Between her manicured fingers, she produced a gleaming business card.

Robin Wallows. CEO of Inferno Enterprises and March Country Club.

Inferno Enterprises . . . Mavis recognized it. An enormous chain in Las Vegas. It also happened to be the name of this casino.

She swallowed.

"You will have an interview on Friday," Robin Wallows said. "Prove yourself there―or not. It's up to you. I will not influence the result. Either you deserve this job, or you don't."

Inferno was also the name of a strip club.

"What do I apply for?" Mavis asked.

The woman smiled coolly. "Anything you want, dear. But next time, when you lie about your age, it will be twenty."

Twenty years old. Did Mavis really look that old?

"It's all about the confidence," Robin said in a low, throaty voice.

Mavis was pretty sure she was about to be arrested for smacking the machine Robin owned. Or, at least, she would be berated about it. This had to be a trick.

But the woman only grazed past her, the scent of honey somehow sharp in Mavis's nose―and with a single, pristine white high heel, she kicked the machine.

Seven dollars of change rattled out.

When she strode away, she didn't look back.

gratefully, as she hurried next to Robin, whose long, lean steps were almost twice as great as hers. "He was a creep."

Robin suddenly touched her shoulder. "Mavis."

Mavis blinked up at Robin―her suddenly serious demeanor. "What is it?"

"You're still afraid, aren't you." It was a statement. Not a question.

"You know I hate it when you phrase things like that," Mavis protested. "If it's not a question, don't say it like you're asking it."

"You're avoiding the answer."

Mavis tipped her head back. "Yes, I'm scared. My entire job, I'm surrounded by assholes who feel entitled to women's bodies."

"You said you wouldn't let it affect you."

"I was fifteen! What the hell did I know?"

"You knew well enough to get the job."

"I was a good dancer," Mavis said. "I did ballet. The interviewer liked my dance style, I guess."

"Ricardo told me he loved your passion."

It was true. For many years after that, until she was eighteen, Mavis had harbored dreams of being a ballet dancer again one day. She had practiced lifting onto her toes in her bedroom, and she had stretched out her splits every morning.

But on Isla's fourth birthday, it hit her.

She had a kid now. She had two jobs. She was constantly working to make ends meet, and she was still hiding―from Evan, from her parents. From the straight-A student she had once been, and the night of the party on the 4th of July.

No, she would never be a ballet dancer.

And she had crushed those dreams with the tip of her heel, the same way she used to stamp out the end of a cigarette. Extinguishing that vision of her onstage, dancing in front of thousands.

It got easier. Eventually.

She was twenty-one now, and her dancing at the strip club had become better because of it. That pole―it was her only outlet.

"Ricardo loved my ass," Mavis snorted. "Not my passion."

Robin smiled slightly. "He loved both, my dear. And both are valuable."

"That's the problem, Robin," Mavis said. "That's all I am to men, really. A piece of ass, some pretty tits. That's all they see in me."

Gently, Robin said, "Is that all you see in yourself?"

Mavis paused. No, of course not, was on the tip of her tongue. But maybe, over the years, that line had blurred.

Maybe that was the way she saw herself.

It was, after all, how she had made her money. A beautiful body, a beautiful face. Men were willing to pay for that, and she had felt powerful because of it.

And it was powerful. But maybe―maybe―

"No," Mavis said finally. Softly. "I'm a mother doing the best I can. It's just . . . when I look at all men, I see Evan. I tense up."

"Ah," Robin said, and Mavis knew she finally understood. One night, in tears, Mavis had confessed the truth of why she needed two jobs, back to back. "Evan Powell."

Even his name made Mavis shiver.

She hated that he still had that power over her.

loved Evan Powell.

In fourth grade, when he slapped her childhood bully, a blonde named Sierra, for crumpling her colour-in-the-lines drawing. In fifth grade, he had sat in front of her for all of math class, and during the test, he had asked her for the answers. In eighth grade, she had been riding on her bicycle when she'd flown off―and he had been there, carrying her back to her front porch.

The summer before ninth grade, she had seen him with his baby sister on their front law. There was a baby bird with broken wings cupped in his hands. He had patted it gently, carefully, and his sister had cooed at it.

That baby bird―that moment―that was when Mavis decided he was the one.

At the ninth grade dance, he had asked her if she wanted a drink.

He said, Want to come back to my place?

He said, Are you sure you're ready?

He said, We don't have to do this if you don't want to.

She had nodded tentatively.

That night, Mavis had lost her virginity to her childhood crush. She hadn't exactly understood what the excitement about sex was. It had been, honestly, painful―and she had simply lain there underneath him, while he breathed hard against her.

Afterwards, he had asked, Did you come?

Yes, she had lied.

He never spoke to her again.

Doing that . . . giving herself up to him . . . it been vulnerable. It had been frightening, but she'd been sure, so sure, that it was him. He was the one. In third grade, talking with her circle of friends, they had all discussed their crushes. Mavis hadn't had one. So she had picked out the closest boy she could see, and she set her heart on him―Evan Powell.

He was the one.

He was definitely the one.

Until he wasn't. Until Mavis was throwing up every morning, and the scent of turkey bacon made her nauseous, until it didn't, and she could eat an entire package.

One day, on the night before her fifteenth birthday, she put her fingertips to her belly.

And screamed.

It had been three weeks since she had lost her virginity. Evan hadn't talked to her. But she could have sworn―she could have sworn―

Something inside of her had moved.

She would figure out later that it wasn't possible to have felt anything at only three weeks. But even if she had been delusional, she had been out of her mind with fear. The pharmacy's bathroom, two blocks away, had been where she had squatted and tried out the pregnancy test.

Or rather, five of them.

They had all come back positive.

She was pregnant.

She had almost collapsed right then and there, her heart pounding out of her chest. Panic―pure panic. She was fourteen, about to be fifteen, and she was pregnant. She was going to be one of those teenage idiots on that show, with a toddler in tow and a future they stopped wanting.

Her first thought had been an abortion.

Her Peruvian parents would disinherit her, but―no . . . they didn't have to know, did they? That entire walk home, she thought of ways she could do it . . . ways she could hide it . . .

But the next day, her birthday, she knew she wouldn't.

She respected everyone who got an abortion. She understood why any woman would choose not to have a child. But for her, personally, could she really live with giving up this child?

The answer to that was no.

She told her parents the day after her birthday.

Her mother, sobbing, had slammed the door in her face.

It was evening on the 4th of July, and there was a party at Joshua Gordon's house. She knew Evan would be there, so she had walked the three miles there.

"Evan," she gasped out, when she saw him.

He was beautiful, her childhood crush. It wouldn't occur to her for many, many years later that choosing who she had a crush on wasn't normal.

"Uh, Mavis," he said, glancing quickly around the room to see if anyone was watching them. "What are you doing here?"

"I―I―"

"This isn't the pobre side of town, Griffon!" one of his friends called out. "Go back to your own people."

Poor―the poor side of town.

Mavis's cheeks burned red. She stood her ground.

She shouldn't have.

"I―have to tell you something."

"Yeah, puta? What do you have to tell him?" Eddie Gonzalez had sneered. "He wouldn't be caught dead talking to you."

Mavis wrung her hands together. Biting her lip. "It's important. Please."

But the attitude of the boys in the room had become infectious. With a start, Mavis realized there were no other girls in sight. Only the popular inner circle of Evan's friends.

Evan wavered―just for a moment. Maybe if he hadn't, Mavis would have been able to let go of it. But the fact that he had hesitated, that he had known what he was about to do was wrong?

She couldn't forget that.

She would never forget the look on his face as one of his friends tripped her. Mavis stumbled too far forward.

She landed on her hand and knees.

When she looked up, there he was. Evan Powell. He was the only boy she saw, and he hit her first.

A stinging slap that whipped her head to the side.

"Evan," she cried. "What are you doing?"

Didn't he love her the same way she loved him?

Their baby. Their baby.

Eddie shoved her. Joshua yanked her head back. It was only a few of them, but the cheers of the crowd made everything seem louder, hotter, brighter.

There were tears in Mavis's eyes.

Evan kicked her stomach. Once. Twice. His sneer tightened when he saw the look on her face. Maybe it was pathetic to him. The third time he connected with her belly, she curled in on herself.

"That's enough," said one of his boys, pulling him off her. "Let the puta go. She'll cry to Mommy."

Mavis's mother had just told her to never come back home.

Later, she would never fully comprehend what it was that made her rise, on trembling legs, to her feet. What propelled her to run, out that door―right into the wide, open night.

My baby, she thought. My baby, my baby.

How could someone like Evan, someone so gentle, do this?

She could still picture him from the summer of ninth grade. Cradling that broken baby bird.

And she sobbed harder, thinking about how he had cared more for that little creature than he had ever cared about her―or the baby she would have.

That stupid, beautiful, broken baby bird.

Maybe she had thought of herself that way. A beautiful, broken bird.

I'm not a bird, she told herself. And I'm not helpless.

That day, she had broken her own wings. She had left behind everything she had ever known. She tossed aside every judged stereotype her parents had ever talked about at the dinner table, and she made herself again: into the woman she was today.

Not perfect, but―still healing.

take some self-defense classes," Robin suggested kindly. "It might help."

"Self-defense," Mavis repeated. "Right."