I was ready for the flight from Las Vegas to San Francisco to be over before it even started.

I'd spent the past several days trying to forget about my uncle's ultimatum. He wanted me to spill the beans on the porn industry, and he'd made it painfully clear what would happen if I refused. As if that wasn't enough, Blake Emerson, my manager and someone I considered a friend, apparently suspected I might be a narc.

That hurt more than I wanted to admit.

Blake had been one of the few people who looked out for me since I got into the business. He knew what my uncle was capable of. He knew I hadn't asked to be dragged into any of this. Yet somehow, I was the one he was worried about.

I couldn't really blame him for being cautious. But there was a big difference between understanding why somebody didn't trust you and being okay with it.

The whole thing was exhausting. I was eighteen years old, making more money than I'd ever imagined, and somehow I'd gotten myself caught between a district attorney who wanted to destroy the porn industry and a manager who thought I might be working for him.

The flight was a little over an hour. I spent it doing arithmetic. Five days until my uncle expected an answer. Five days until I had to decide whether to talk about the business that had made me, in front of a man who wanted to be a senator. 

We came in over the water and banked hard, and the bay went by underneath us, gray and choppy, with the bridges sitting on it like somebody had dropped them there. Then the wheels, and the brakes, and the usual slow crawl to a gate that took longer than the flight.

I got my bag out of the overhead, walked up the jetway, and started looking for a cab.

I found a chauffeur instead.

He was standing at the end of the concourse with a cardboard sign, and the sign said MITCHELL, and he was dressed in a dark suit and tie, looking like someone who spent his days driving around people considerably more important than me. I glanced down at my T-shirt, jean shorts, and Converse All-Stars. I probably looked like a college kid whose parents had forgotten to pick him up.

For a moment, I expected him to look me over, apologize, and explain that he was waiting for a different Thomas Mitchell. Maybe a businessman. Maybe somebody who actually owned a designer suit, not something my mom bought at Sears.

Instead, he looked me straight in the eyes and smiled.

"I know who you are, Mr. Rodz," the chauffeur said.

That caught me completely off guard.

In public, I was just used to people calling me Tommy.

When we reached the carousel, he insisted on retrieving my suitcase himself. I offered to help, and he politely waved me off. Apparently, carrying my own luggage was no longer part of my job description.

A few minutes later, we stepped outside and walked toward a long black limousine parked at the curb.

I'd ridden in limousines before, but I still wasn't used to having somebody open the door for me. I thanked the chauffeur, ducked my head, and climbed inside.

Then I stopped.

Sitting across from me, looking perfectly comfortable with a cigar in his hand, was Blake Emerson.

Of all the people I expected to see waiting for me in San Francisco, Blake was probably the last, especially after everything Ashley had told me about his suspicions.

As the limousine pulled away from the airport, he opened his briefcase and took out a manila folder. There was no hello. No handshake. Not even a question about how filming had gone in Las Vegas. He just sat there going through the papers like we were about to have a business meeting.

Meanwhile, I was practically shaking.

He took a puff of his cigar before finally looking up.

"I hired a private investigator to check you out," Blake said.

For a moment, I couldn't believe what I'd heard. Then I got angry.

I'd spent the last few days worrying about my sister, my uncle, and whether my whole life was about to fall apart. Now I was in the back of a limousine being told that one of the few people I trusted had been investigating me behind my back.

"Did you find anything?" I said.

"I found out you're eighteen," Blake said. "I also found out your uncle has been leaning on you."

"So you had me followed because of him," I said.

"I had you followed because of Traci King," Blake said.

He slid a sheet of paper across the seat. A photocopy of a birth certificate, and the name on it was not hers.

"Last year the Traci King scandal nearly tore this industry apart," Blake said. "She was sixteen when she started. When it came out, distributors pulled tapes, producers started counting years, and everybody who had ever hired her started wondering whether they were going to end up in a courtroom."

"And my uncle saw an opportunity," I said.

"He saw a headline," Blake said. "He was going to be the district attorney who cleaned up the porn business."

"What stopped him?" I asked.

"She had a driver's license. A birth certificate. A United States passport. All of it under another woman's name." Blake tapped the folder. "The federal government had issued a passport with somebody else's information on it, and we were supposed to have known the difference."

"So you thought I might be sixteen," I said.

"I thought you might be working for him," Blake said. "Which is worse."

I opened my mouth, ready to tell him exactly what I thought of him. He didn't give me the chance.

"I love this business, Tommy," Blake said. "I've spent years defending people who get treated like criminals because they take their clothes off. I've watched politicians build whole careers out of going after us. I'm not taking chances."

I folded my arms and stared at him.

He turned the folder around. My mother's death certificate. My sister's school records. A photograph of the two of us outside our building in Santa Monica.

"Somebody talked," Blake said. "And some interesting documents found their way to a reporter."

"Found their way," I repeated.

"It's amazing what people leave lying around," Blake said.

My uncle had threatened to destroy my career, hurt my sister, and possibly send me to prison. Now I was finding out that Blake had apparently convinced people connected to organized crime to help bring him down.

"Jesus Christ, Blake," I said. "Who the hell are you?"

He laughed.

"Your manager," Blake replied.

For the first time since I'd met Blake Emerson, I wondered how much I really knew about him. I was also beginning to think that having him on my side was a very good thing.

Blake dropped me off at the Fairmont Hotel on Nob Hill. Compared to the hotel in Vegas, this one was heaven. As I stepped out of the limousine, the chauffeur handed my suitcase to a bellman before turning toward me.

"Enjoy your stay, Mr. Rodz," the chauffeur said. "And don't worry about Mr. Emerson. He takes care of his people."

I wasn't sure whether that was supposed to reassure me or make me nervous, especially after everything Blake had told me during the ride.

I thanked him and followed the bellman toward the entrance. Looking up at the building, I wondered how much Essex Films was paying for my room. Whatever it was, I hoped they weren't planning to deduct it from my fee for the film.

The moment I stepped inside, I felt like I'd wandered into somebody else's tax bracket. The lobby had high ceilings, enormous chandeliers, thick red-and-black carpeting, red velvet chairs, and enough gold trim to make Liberace jealous. Everything looked expensive, including the people. Men in tailored suits stood talking near the elevators while elegantly dressed women relaxed in the lobby.

I approached the front desk, half expecting someone to ask whether I was delivering a pizza. Instead, a woman at the desk greeted me politely and asked for my name.

"Thomas Mitchell," I replied, figuring this was one place where Tommy Rodz probably wasn't appropriate.

She located my reservation, explained that everything had been arranged by Essex Films, and handed me an actual room key. Then she reached under the counter and came up with a folded slip of paper.

"This came for you this morning," she said.

I opened it. One line, in handwriting I knew from a stack of birthday cards.

Tick Tock. Time's almost up.

Five days, and to him that was already almost up. That was the kind of man my uncle was.

I folded it and put it in my pocket and did not think about it again for at least four minutes.

I was heading toward the elevators when I heard a familiar voice shout my name.

"Tommy!"

I turned around just in time to see Dana Lynch hurrying across the lobby toward me. Even from a distance, I recognized her big blonde hair and beautiful smile. At five foot four, she was petite, with a slim figure that made even the conservative outfit she was wearing look attractive. She had on a white blouse tucked into a navy-blue skirt that fell just below her knees, a matching cardigan, and a pair of sensible low heels. Her blonde hair was teased high, framing her pretty face and big brown eyes. She looked like a young woman who might work in an office, although I doubted many secretaries could make a conservative outfit look quite that good.

Before I could say anything, she hugged me.

I'd thought about her smile, her laugh, and how comfortable I'd felt around her, even though we'd barely known each other. During the flight from Las Vegas, when I wasn't worrying about my uncle or wondering whether Blake was going to force me out of the business, I'd found myself thinking about seeing her again. Now she was standing in front of me, looking even prettier than I remembered.

"I've been looking forward to seeing you," I told her.

"Really?" Dana asked, smiling.

"Really," I replied.

She leaned forward and kissed me on the cheek.

"What's your room number?" Dana asked.

I glanced at the key the clerk had given me.

"Twelve fourteen," I replied. "Why?"

Dana smiled.

"Just wanted to know where to find you," Dana said.

I laughed.

"Well, now you know," I replied.

She gave me another hug before letting go. After the week I'd been having, seeing her was enough to make me forget about my problems for a little while.

When I finally opened the door to my room, I began to wonder whether Essex Films had accidentally booked me into the presidential suite. The room was enormous, with thick carpeting, elegant furniture, and a king-sized bed covered in pillows that looked too expensive to sleep on. There was a polished wooden desk, a pair of upholstered chairs, and a television tucked inside a cabinet. Heavy drapes framed a large window overlooking San Francisco. I walked over and pulled them apart, revealing a spectacular view of the city and the bay in the morning sunlight. Even the bathroom was impressive, with marble countertops, brass fixtures, and towels so thick I was almost afraid to use them. Then I noticed something that really got me. There was a telephone mounted on the wall next to the toilet. I'd never stayed anywhere that had a phone in the bathroom. Apparently, the people who stayed at the Fairmont were so important they couldn't even take a shit without somebody needing to talk to them.

I dropped my suitcase beside the bed and looked around. A few months earlier, I'd been living in Michigan and wondering what I was going to do with my life. Now I was staying at the Fairmont, making adult movies. Life certainly had a funny way of working out.

After taking another look around the room, I decided to call Ashley. I sat on the edge of the bed, picked up the telephone, and dialed her number. She answered after several rings.

"Hello?" she said.

"Hey, it's me," I replied. "I just got to San Francisco."

"That's nice," Ashley said. Her voice sounded distracted, and I could hear something playing on the television in the background.

"How was your flight?" she asked.

"Fine," I replied. "Listen, I've got some good news. I talked to Blake, and it looks like the situation with my uncle might finally be coming to an end."

There was a brief silence.

"What do you mean?" Ashley asked.

"I can't really explain everything right now, but he's in some serious trouble, and I don't think he's going to be bothering us much longer," I replied.

"Tommy, you can't just tell me something like that and expect me not to worry," she said.

"I know," I replied. "But trust me, it's good news."

"I'll believe it when I know Annie's safe," Ashley said.

I couldn't argue with that.

I tried changing the subject.

"So, what are you doing this morning?" I asked.

"Not much," Ashley replied. "Listen, Tommy, I've got some things I need to take care of today. Can we talk later?"

I was a little disappointed. After everything that had happened, I'd been looking forward to hearing her voice.

"Sure," I said.

"Oh, and one more thing," Ashley added.

"What's that?" I asked.

"Don't fuck Dana Lynch unless there are cameras rolling," she said.

I nearly dropped the telephone.

"What?" I asked.

"You heard me," Ashley replied. "I know she's there, and I know you like her. Just remember the difference between work and your personal life."

I stared at the telephone, wondering how she always seemed to know exactly what I was thinking.

"Ashley, I just got here," I protested. "It's not even lunchtime."

"Uh-huh," she replied. "And I'm sure you're being a perfect gentleman."

Before I could defend myself, there was a knock at the door.

"Who's that?" Ashley asked.

I glanced toward the door. Considering Dana had asked for my room number less than fifteen minutes earlier, I had a pretty good idea who was standing on the other side.

"Room service," I replied.

There was a pause.

"Room service?" Ashley repeated.

"Yeah," I said. "I ordered some breakfast."

"Of course you did," Ashley replied, sounding completely unconvinced. "I'll talk to you later, Tommy."

"Love you," I said.

"Love you, too," she replied.

The line went dead.

I put down the receiver and looked toward the door.

I immediately opened it and found Dana standing in the hallway, smiling at me. Before I could say anything, she walked right past me and closed the door behind her.

She threw her arms around my neck, and I pulled her close. Then we kissed like two long-lost lovers who hadn't seen each other in years, instead of two people who'd only met a few days earlier.

Somewhere in the back of my mind, I could still hear Ashley's voice telling me not to fuck Dana unless there were cameras rolling.

The warning had been delivered less than a minute earlier, and here I was, already doing a pretty lousy job of following it.

I picked her up and carried her to the bed. She was lighter than she looked, and she laughed into my mouth the whole way there with her arms locked around my neck like she was worried I might change my mind and set her down. Her left heel came off somewhere on the carpet and stayed there. I dropped her onto the mattress, and the pillows went out from under her shoulders and scattered, and one of them slid off the end and landed on the floor, and neither of us went after it.

We kept making out. My knees sank into the comforter. Somewhere behind us the drapes were still open, and the whole city was sitting out there in the morning sun, and neither of us looked at it once.

Her cardigan came off first, shrugged back off her shoulders and tossed behind me, half on the chair and half on the floor. Then the blouse, one small pearly button at a time, my fingers clumsy enough that she finally reached up and did the last two herself, which meant her hands were in the way and then out of the way and then the blouse was open, and I could see the plain white bra with the little bow in the middle of it, the kind of thing nobody was supposed to see, and that somehow made it better than lace.

She had little gold hoops in her ears. When I got my mouth on her neck, one of them caught on my chin.

"Ow," Dana said. "Hold on."

She reached up and took both earrings out, one at a time, and set them on the nightstand beside the lamp. One of them rolled, and she had to catch it, and she put it back with the other one and pressed them both flat with her thumb like she was making sure they would not go anywhere. Then she lay back down and put her arms up over her head.

"Okay," Dana said. "Go."

She lifted her back off the bed so I could get at the clasp, and I fumbled it twice before it gave. Her breasts were small and pale, with a scatter of freckles across the top of one that I had never seen on camera, because on camera nobody lights the top of a tit. When I got my mouth on the first one, she made a sound like she had been holding her breath for a week, and her hand came down hard on the back of my head and then came off again immediately.

"Sorry," Dana said. "Am I pushing?"

"A little," I said.

"Sorry," Dana said.

I took my time. On a set you learn to move fast, because there's a crew waiting and a schedule to hit and somebody standing there with a light meter, and you get in the habit of doing everything in a hurry and calling it passion. I wasn't in a hurry. I kissed her neck, the soft place under her jaw, the hollow at the base of her throat, and worked my way down, and by the time I reached her stomach she had both hands in my hair. She wasn't looking out the window. She wasn't checking anything. She lay there with her eyes shut and let me do it, and her mouth was open in a shape I had never seen it make, and every so often she made a small correction, lifting her chin, tilting her head, moving my hand a half inch lower with two fingers on my wrist.

I found the hook and the zipper on the side of her skirt and worked it down over her hips. Underneath, she was wearing pantyhose, the kind with the seam up the back, and that was the first thing all morning that had to be negotiated.

"How attached are you to these?" I asked.

"Very," Dana said. "Give me a second."

She got both thumbs inside the waistband and rolled them down, got them past her knees, and then had to sit up and pull her feet through, and one of her toes caught and there was a stretch where she was bent almost double with her hair in her face and her ass in the air. Then she got them off and threw them, and they landed on the lamp.

"Sorry," Dana said.

"For what?" I asked.

"The lamp," Dana said.

Her panties matched the bra. I hooked those down her legs slowly, and she lifted her hips to help and then dropped them, and the other heel went off the end of the bed and hit the floor a second later.

Then she was in front of me, her blonde hair fanned out on the pillow and her knees still pressed together out of habit. I got my hands on the inside of each thigh and opened her up. She watched me do it. That was the thing about her face. She watched everything.

She was already wet, and she gasped when I put my mouth on her, and she gasped again when I didn't move. That was the difference. On camera, you eat a girl out for a minute and a half, and then you move on. I stayed down there. I used my tongue flat and then pointed, and I found the rhythm she liked by listening instead of guessing, and about a minute in she reached down and moved my head about an inch to the left.

"Sorry," Dana said.

"Stop saying sorry," I said.

"Okay," Dana said.

Her hand stayed in my hair after that. She came with her other hand pressed over her own mouth like she was embarrassed about the noise, and her heel drummed twice on the mattress, and when it was done she pushed my head off her with her palm because it was too much and then pulled it right back.

Then she pulled me up. She got my shirt off over my head. Then she stopped.

"Hold on," Dana said.

She put a hand flat on my stomach and looked at it. Two days on, the bruising had gone purple and yellow-green, and it covered most of the space between my ribs and my navel, and from six inches away it looked worse than it felt.

"What happened to you?" Dana asked.

"I fell down the stairs," I said.

"How many stairs?" Dana asked.

"All of them," I said.

She laughed. Then she looked at me a little longer than the joke deserved.

"You're a terrible liar," Dana said.

"I'm a great liar," I said. "You laughed."

"That's not the same thing," Dana said.

She pressed two fingers into the edge of the bruise, carefully, and watched my face while she did it. Then she let it go.

"Fine," Dana said. "Keep your secrets."

Then she pushed my shorts down past my knees, and when my cock came free, it hit her in the stomach, and she just looked at it for a second and shook her head.

"Jesus Christ," Dana said. "I think your dick got bigger."

She got her hand around as much of me as her hand could hold and stroked me slowly, and I had to close my eyes. She was small enough that the head of me sat in her fist like a doorknob. I let her play with it longer than I needed to, mostly because I liked the way she looked doing it, which was with her bottom lip between her teeth and her eyes going back and forth between my face and what her hand was doing.

I moved over her and got a knee between her legs and she reached down and guided me. I put the head of my cock against her and pushed in about an inch and stopped. She was tight, and warm, and I could feel her stretch around me like she was making room.

"Slow," Dana said.

So I went slow. An inch at a time, and every inch of it she took with a little hitch in her breathing, and at the third one her eyebrows did something that was almost a wince, and she said, "Keep going," before I could ask. When I was finally all the way inside her, she let out a long breath she had been holding since the first inch.

I stayed there. Fully buried, not moving, just feeling her pulse around me. On a set, this is where you'd cut.

"You can move," Dana said.

"I know," I said.

"So move," Dana said.

When I started to move it was slow and deep, and I didn't count. That's the thing I noticed most. In a scene you always know the count, because somebody is counting for you, and the count is what tells you where you are in the shot. Here there was nobody counting, and I still knew it, the way you know a song you've heard too many times. She counted out loud for a second, under her breath, one, two three, and then stopped, like she had remembered there was no reason.

She talked the whole time. That was the other thing about her.

"Okay," Dana said, to nobody.

"That's good," Dana said.

Then, "You're heavy."

"Sorry," I said.

"No, don't get off," Dana said. "Just put your arm under."

I got an arm under her and took some of my weight, and she hooked one ankle over the back of my calf and left it there. Her other hand was flat on my chest, and every time I came down, she pushed back a little, not hard, just enough to feel it.

When I put my palm flat on the pillow beside her head, I got a fistful of her hair by accident, and she had to reach up and pull it out from under my hand.

"Sorry," I said.

"Stop saying sorry," Dana said.

Her stomach growled.

"Was that you?" Dana asked.

"That was you," I said.

"That was me," Dana said.

"Are you hungry?" I asked.

"I haven't eaten since six," Dana said. "Don't stop."

She came again about a third of the way through, and this time she didn't cover her mouth. The sound was not the sound she made on film. On film it's a scream. Here it was low and long, and it came out through her nose, and her eyes were open and then shut and then open again, looking at me like she was checking I was still there, and then her hand came up and got me by the jaw and held my face still and made me watch her while it happened.

Then her leg slid off my calf, and she said, "Cramp. Cramp."

I stopped and got off her, and she sat up and grabbed her left foot and pulled her toes back with both hands and swore quietly at the ceiling.

"Calf?" I asked.

"Calf," Dana said.

She worked it out with her thumb, sitting there with her hair stuck to one cheek and her chest still going, and it took about fifteen seconds, and then she lay back down and pulled me on top of her by the wrist.

"Okay," Dana said. "Where were we?"

"You were cumming," I said.

"Oh yeah," Dana said. "Keep doing that."

The third one came about four minutes later, and it was the one that undid her. She grabbed the comforter in both fists and pulled it up over her face and left it there while she finished, and the noise came through the comforter, and it was not a nice noise; it was almost a complaint, like something was being done to her that she had not agreed to.

She reached up and pulled my mouth down to hers and wrapped her legs around my back, and that changed the angle, and it stopped being slow. I went at her for a while without thinking about anything at all, which had not happened to me in a room with a woman since I was seventeen years old and didn't know any better.

The headboard started hitting the wall. Not hard, just enough to make a sound every time, and after a while it was the loudest thing in the room.

"What day is it?" Dana asked.

"Wednesday," I said.

"Huh," Dana said.

I was close, and I said so, and she said, "Not yet," and I said, "How much not yet?" and she said, "A minute."

"That's not a minute," I said.

"It's almost a minute," Dana said.

It was closer to two, and the whole time she had one hand flat on my stomach, just above the bruise, keeping me from going as deep as I wanted, which was its own kind of mean, and then she came one more time and went quiet and tight all at once and pushed up against me, and that was the end of my minute.

"Dana," I said.

She opened her eyes.

"Cum in me," Dana said.

So I did.

The last time I had been inside her, at the orgy, I had pulled out and came across her and the other girls' faces, because that is what you do, and there had not been a camera anywhere in the room. This time I didn't.

It started somewhere behind my balls and came up through me like a cramp, and my knees locked and my ass went tight, and the whole thing got away from me about a half second before it happened, which is the part you can never explain to anybody who hasn't done it. I put it in as deep as it would go and held it there and came, and the first one was hard enough that I made a sound I did not plan on, something between a grunt and a word.

Dana watched my face the whole way through. Her hand was flat on my lower back, and she was not letting me pull out, and she had her chin up and her mouth open and her eyes wide and fixed on mine, and there was a flush coming up her chest and into her throat that had not been there a minute earlier. Her hair was stuck to her forehead in two places. About halfway through she felt it, and her eyes went wider, and her whole face changed, and she said it in a completely ordinary voice, like she was reporting the weather.

"Oh," Dana said. "Oh, I can feel that."

Then she said, "Keep going, keep going," and I was already going, and she locked both legs around my back and pulled me in and pushed her hips up against me like she was trying to get it further in than it would go.

She counted the pulses. She actually counted them. Her mouth was against my jaw, and she was going one, two, three, four, half a beat apart, and she got to six and stopped counting and just held on.

Somewhere in there my arms gave out, and I came down on her with all of my weight, and she took it and did not complain, and her hand went off my back and up into the back of my hair and closed into a fist.

When it was over, I was shaking. Both arms. Her legs were still locked around me, and her heels were dug in over the backs of my thighs, and she had not let go.

I got an elbow under me and lifted my head and looked at her. Close enough that I had to pick an eye.

She was already looking back. Her face was flushed down into her throat and her hair was stuck to her forehead, and she was not doing the thing she did on camera, where you keep the face working and check the corner of your eye for the light. She was just looking at me straight on with her bottom lip pulled in between her teeth, with nothing riding on it.

She got her hand up and pushed the hair back off my forehead with two fingers and left her thumb on my cheekbone.

"You are wonderful," Dana said before kissing me on the nose.

"Then call me Mr. Wonderful," I replied.

She laid her head on my chest.

"I would love to be fucked like that every day," Dana said.

"If you were my girlfriend, we could," I replied.

Dana lifted her head and looked at me.

For what felt like the longest second, neither of us said anything. I hadn't intended for that to sound like an invitation, but judging by the expression on her face, that was exactly how she'd taken it.

Eventually, she broke the silence.

"Don't you have a girlfriend?" Dana asked.

"I honestly don't know what I have," I replied.

"What does that mean?" Dana asked.

"It means I'm with a girl who won't even admit we're in a relationship," I explained. "We see each other every day, sleep together, and tell each other we love each other. But whenever I try to figure out what we actually are, she changes the subject."

"That sounds complicated," Dana said.

"Tell me about it," I replied.

"Do you love her?" Dana asked.

"Yes," I replied without hesitation.

Dana looked disappointed, although she tried not to show it.

"Then what's the problem?" she asked.

"Sometimes I don't think I know her at all," I admitted.

"Do you know her real name?" Dana asked.

"Yes," I replied. "But sometimes I think it's just another stage name."

Dana went quiet.

"That's pretty sad, Tommy," she said.

"What's sad?" I asked.

"Being in love with somebody and wondering if you really know them," Dana replied.

"Have you ever felt that way?" I asked.

"Sure," Dana replied. "Back in high school, I had guys tell me they loved me just to get a piece of ass. The only thing they cared to know about me was my reputation, but they couldn't tell you my favorite color."

"What's your favorite color?" I asked.

"Blue," Dana replied.

"Good to know," I said.

"What's mine?" I asked.

"I have no idea," Dana admitted.

"Neither do I," I replied.

Dana laughed.

"You're an idiot," she said.

"I've been told that," I replied.

She settled against me again, but after a few moments, she lifted her head.

"When you said that if I were your girlfriend, we could do this every day, were you serious?" Dana asked.

"I wouldn't have said it if I hadn't thought about it," I replied.

Dana smiled, but it wasn't the big, mischievous smile I'd gotten used to seeing.

"Tommy, I really like you," she said.

"I really like you, too," I replied.

"But I don't want to be somebody you sleep with because you're unhappy with somebody else," Dana explained.

I hadn't expected that.

"That's not why I'm here with you," I replied.

"Then why are you?" she asked.

"Because I like being with you," I explained. "I liked being with you before we ever got into bed."

She studied my face.

"Really?" Dana asked.

"Really," I replied.

Dana leaned forward and kissed me.

"Then maybe you should figure out what you have with Ashley before you start offering me the job," she said.

I laughed.

"You're making it sound like I'm interviewing girlfriends," I replied.

"Well, I have excellent references," Dana said.

"I'm sure you do," I replied.

"And I'm available for a second interview," she added.

I laughed and pulled her close. Then she sat up and looked at me with the smile gone.

"You're a sweet guy, Tommy," Dana said.

"Don't let that get around," I replied.

"I'm serious," she said.

She looked at me for another moment, almost as if she were deciding whether to say what was on her mind. Then she finally spoke.

"Tommy, you need to be single," Dana said. "We're both eighteen. You're supposed to be out there having the time of your life. I'll fuck you any time you ask, but for the time being, I don't want to be in a relationship with anyone, and neither should you."

For once, I didn't have a smart-ass response.

I just lay there thinking about everything she'd said, trying to rationalize my relationship with Ashley. We lived together, slept together, and told each other we loved each other. Yet whenever I tried to put a name to what we had, she wouldn't give me a straight answer.

Maybe Dana was right. Maybe I was spending too much time worrying about a relationship that technically didn't exist. Then again, I loved Ashley, and that wasn't something I could just turn off because a beautiful blonde told me I should be enjoying myself.

Dana must have noticed that I'd gotten unusually quiet.

"You're thinking too much," she said.

"That's what happens when somebody gives me good advice," I replied. "I'm not used to it."

She laughed.

Then somebody knocked on the door.

"Now who's that?" Dana asked.

"I have no idea," I said.

It turned out I had ordered breakfast after all.

I found my shorts on the floor and got into them and opened the door, and a waiter wheeled in a cart with eggs and toast and a pot of coffee and a little glass of orange juice, and he got about two steps into the room before he noticed Dana sitting up in the bed with the sheet pulled to her waist.

"Good morning," the waiter said.

"Good morning," Dana said.

He set the tray on the foot of the bed, had me sign a slip, and left without asking a single question. Dana got the sheet around her and sat cross-legged in front of the tray and ate like she had not eaten since six.

"There's a lot of food here," she said.

"I ordered for two," I said.

"Liar," Dana said.

"Lucky guess," I said.

She ate with her fingers off the tray and talked with her mouth full and handed me half a piece of toast.

"So what's the deal with your family?" Dana asked, mouth full.

"Which one?" I asked.

"Yours," Dana said. "You know everything about mine now. Tell me something."

So I told her.

"I live with Annie, my sixteen-year-old sister," I said. "She's a good one, although sometimes I think she's more responsible than I am."

"That's not exactly setting the bar very high," Dana said.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence," I replied.

"Does she know what you do?" Dana asked.

"She knows," I said. "She thinks it's hilarious."

"Good," Dana said. "Kids are supposed to think their big brothers are funny."

"There's also Laurie," I said. "My older sister. Pre-law at Wayne State, and she's got her eye on Harvard."

"Smart family," Dana said.

"One of us had to be," I said.

Dana laughed and reached for the coffee.

"So what's one thing about you that you've never told anybody?" she asked.

I thought about it. There were plenty of things I hadn't told people, although most of them involved my uncle and weren't exactly appropriate for pillow talk.

Then I remembered something I hadn't thought about in a long time.

"I used to be fat," I admitted.

Dana stopped with the cup halfway to her mouth.

"Really?" she asked.

"Yeah," I replied. "In elementary and middle school, everybody called me Tubby Mitchell."

"Tubby Mitchell," Dana repeated.

"Yep," I replied. "Not exactly the kind of nickname you want following you around when you're twelve."

"I never would've guessed," she said.

"That's kind of the point," I replied.

"What happened?" Dana asked.

"I grew taller, lost weight, and discovered that girls were suddenly a lot more interested in talking to me," I explained.

"That's terrible," Dana said.

"The girls talking to me?" I asked.

"No, you idiot," Dana replied. "The way people treated you before."

I shrugged.

"Kids are assholes," I replied. "I was an easy target. I was fat, awkward, and didn't know how to stand up for myself. The other kids figured that out pretty quickly."

"Did it bother you?" Dana asked.

"Of course it bothered me," I replied. "When you're twelve and everybody calls you Tubby, you start thinking that's who you are."

Dana put the cup down.

"That's awful, Tommy," she said.

"It wasn't all bad," I replied. "I got pretty good at making people laugh. I figured if everybody was laughing at something funny I said, maybe they'd forget about laughing at me."

"Well, you're still pretty funny," Dana said.

"See?" I replied. "Years of childhood humiliation finally paid off."

She shook her head and went back to the eggs.

"Do you ever worry about gaining it back?" Dana asked.

"Sometimes," I admitted. "I know I don't look anything like that kid anymore, but every once in a while, I still feel like him."

Dana set the tray aside and rolled onto her side facing me.

"That's probably the saddest thing you've told me all morning," she said.

"Really?" I asked. "I thought my relationship with Ashley was doing pretty well in that department."

"You're impossible," Dana said.

"I've been told that, too," I replied.

She laughed and slipped an arm across my chest.

Now I wanted to know something about the girl lying beside me that I couldn't learn from watching one of her movies.

"Tell me something almost nobody knows about you," I asked.

Dana thought about it before smiling.

"I'm a nerd," she admitted.

I laughed.

"You don't look like a nerd," I replied.

"My comic book collection tells a different story," Dana said.

I lifted my head off the pillow.

"Wait a minute. You collect comic books?" I asked.

"Don't sound so surprised," Dana replied. "What, you think all I do is have sex and get my hair done?"

"Well, your hair does look like it takes a considerable amount of time," I joked.

"Asshole," Dana said, and slapped my chest.

"I collect comics, too," I said.

Dana sat up and looked at me suspiciously.

"Bullshit," she said.

"I'm serious," I replied.

"Okay, Mr. Wonderful. What's your favorite?" she asked.

"New Teen Titans," I replied without hesitation. "Yours?"

"X-Men," Dana answered.

I shook my head.

"Marvel?" I asked. "I was really starting to like you."

"Oh, fuck you," Dana said. "The X-Men are awesome."

"I'm not saying they're bad," I replied. "I'm just saying the Teen Titans are better."

"Better than Wolverine?" Dana asked.

"Nightwing could take him," I replied.

Dana burst out laughing.

"You're out of your fucking mind," she said.

"That's what makes comic books great," I replied. "We can argue about something like this for hours, and neither of us has to prove anything."

"Speak for yourself," Dana said. "I could prove you wrong with about twenty issues."

"Twenty? You really are a nerd," I said.

"I warned you," she replied.

I laughed and pulled her closer.

"So, how long have you been collecting?" I asked.

"Since I was a kid," Dana explained. "I used to spend my allowance on comics. My friends were buying makeup and clothes, and I was trying to get my hands on back issues of X-Men."

"That's actually pretty cool," I admitted.

"You think so?" she asked.

"Absolutely," I replied. "I wish I'd known a girl like you when I was in school."

"You mean a girl who likes comic books?" Dana asked.

"A girl who likes comic books and doesn't call me Tubby Mitchell," I replied.

Dana smiled.

"Well, for the record, I would've shared my comics with you," she said.

"Even the X-Men?" I asked.

"Especially the X-Men," Dana replied. "You obviously needed better taste."

I laughed.

"Think we can still be friends?" she asked.

I looked at her.

"I think we can be a little more than friends," I replied.

I leaned forward and kissed her. Dana smiled against my lips before wrapping her arms around my neck and kissing me back.

When we finally pulled apart, she was still smiling.

"Not bad for a DC fan," Dana said.

"Not bad for a Marvel girl," I replied.

She rested her head against my shoulder.

"What did you think of my parents?" Dana asked.

"From the few minutes I spent with them, they seemed nice and quirky," I replied.

"Nice and quirky are the perfect words to describe my parents," Dana said. "They've always been a little different, but I wouldn't trade them for anything."

"Considering your mom drove you to meet Jim South, I'd say she's pretty understanding," I replied.

"You have no idea," Dana said. "There aren't many things I could tell my parents that would shock them."

"Mine would've had a heart attack if I'd told them I wanted to get into porn," I replied.

"Is it just the three of you?" I asked.

"Nope," Dana replied. "I have an older brother and sister."

"Are you close to them?" I asked.

"I'm really close to my brother," Dana explained. "He moved up here for school, and we're having dinner tonight."

"What about your sister?" I asked.

"Cheryl's a bitch," Dana replied.

I laughed, although judging by her expression, she wasn't joking.

"Okay, what did she do?" I asked.

"When I told her I was getting into porn, she completely lost her shit," Dana explained. "She told me I was embarrassing the family and that Mom and Dad should be ashamed of themselves for supporting me."

"That must've gone over well," I replied.

"Oh, it gets better," Dana said. "When Dad refused to tell me what to do with my life, she stopped speaking to him. Completely cut him out of her life."

"Jesus Christ," I replied. "What did your dad do?"

"Nothing," Dana said. "That's what makes me so fucking angry. He's always been there for her, and now she acts like he doesn't exist because he won't disown me."

"Does she still talk to you?" I asked.

"Not unless she has something nasty to say," Dana replied. "I can handle her calling me a slut or telling me I'm ruining my life. But treating Dad like shit because he loves me? Fuck her."

I could tell how much it bothered her. For someone who'd spent most of the morning making jokes, she suddenly looked genuinely upset.

"Have you tried talking to her?" I asked.

"Yeah," Dana replied. "But I'm not going to apologize for what I do, and I'm sure as hell not going to ask my parents to stop loving me just to make her happy."

"I don't blame you," I said.

Dana sighed and shook her head.

"Anyway, enough about my bitch sister," she said.

"My brother's great," Dana continued. "He's always been supportive, and he's actually pretty funny. I think you'd like him."

"Considering how much I like your parents, I'm guessing I would," I replied.

"So, wanna come to dinner with us tonight?" Dana asked.

"Thank you for the invitation, but I can't go," I replied.

"Why not?" Dana asked, pretending to cry. "Are you ashamed to be seen with me?"

"Absolutely," I joked. "I have a reputation to protect."

"Asshole," Dana said, and swatted my arm.

"I promised Jason I'd go out to dinner with him," I explained.

"Oh, okay," Dana replied. "I'll let you off the hook this time."

"That's very generous of you," I said.

"Maybe you can meet my brother another time," she suggested.

"I'd like that," I replied.

Dana smiled and settled against me. Then she got quiet for a minute, and then she said it.

"Tommy, are you happy?" Dana asked.

"Sometimes," I said.

"That's not a yes," Dana said.

"It's an honest answer," I replied.

She thought about that.

"Fair," Dana said. "What about your mom and dad?" she asked.

I hesitated.

"My mom was nice and quirky," I replied. "But she died earlier this year."

Dana's smile disappeared.

"Oh, Tommy," she said softly.

She reached for my hand and held it.

"Was she sick?" Dana asked.

"Nope," I replied. "She died from a brain aneurysm at work."

I sat in silence as tears leaked from my eyes.

"She was a wonderful mother," I finally said as Dana wiped away my tears. "We didn't always have a lot of money, but she did everything she could for us."

"You must miss her," Dana said.

"Every day," I admitted.

For once, Dana didn't immediately say anything. She just held my hand and let me talk when I was ready.

"What about your dad?" she eventually asked.

"He's in prison," I replied.

Dana looked at me, surprised, but she didn't ask what he'd done. There were things about my father I wasn't ready to discuss, especially with someone I'd only known for a few days.

She moved closer and rested her head against my shoulder.

We sat in silence for a few minutes.

It was odd listening to Dana talk about her family. Her biggest concern that day was meeting her brother for dinner. Meanwhile, my mother was dead, my father was in prison, and I was trying to keep my sixteen-year-old sister safe from a man who was supposed to be looking out for us.

I wasn't jealous of Dana. I was happy she had people who loved and supported her. I just wished my family could've had a little more of that.

"Do you have any other family?" Dana eventually asked.

"Yeah," I replied. "I have an uncle who lives out here."

"Are you close to him?" she asked.

"Not exactly," I replied.

"What does that mean?" Dana asked.

"Let's just say he's not a very nice person."

Dana lifted her head.

"That bad?" she asked.

"Worse," I replied.

I thought about the note waiting in my pocket, the threats he'd made against Annie, and the conversation I'd had with Blake in the limousine. There was a lot I could've told Dana, but I wasn't sure how much I wanted her to know.

For the past few hours, I'd managed to forget about my uncle. I didn't particularly want to bring him into the one good thing that had happened to me that morning.

Unfortunately, Dana had asked, and I didn't feel like lying to her.

"He recently put me in a very uncomfortable situation," I admitted.

Dana did not say anything for a second. Then she got up on an elbow and looked at me.

"My poor baby," Dana said.

She kissed me on the lips. It was not a playful kiss. Her tongue came into my mouth, and her hand went behind me and got a fistful of my ass and pulled me into her, and my cock came up hard against her thigh.

Then she pulled back an inch.

"Remember what I said?" Dana asked.

"About what?" I asked.

"Any time you ask," Dana said. "So ask."

"Right now?" I asked.

"Just ask," Dana said, laughing.

So I asked.

She did not wait for anything else. She put a hand flat on my chest and pushed me onto my back and got up on her knees over me, and she looked down at my cock standing up off my stomach and shook her head.

"Still can't believe this thing," Dana said.

She pulled her hair back over one shoulder and bent down and took the head in her mouth. She was not gentle about it. She spat on it first and worked the shaft with both hands while she sucked, and she got about four inches down and gagged and came off it with a string of spit hanging off her chin, and she did not wipe it off. She went back down and did it again, and the second time she stayed longer, and I put a hand on the back of her head, and she took it off.

"Don't push," Dana said.

"Sorry," I said.

"You're not sorry," Dana said.

Then she sat up and swung a leg over me and put the head against herself and went down on it in one slow move, no hands, and when she was sitting flat on my lap she stopped and let a breath out through her teeth.

"Okay," Dana said.

"Okay?" I asked.

"Shut up," Dana said.

She started moving. Slow at first with both hands flat on my chest, and then faster, and then she leaned back and got her hands behind her on my thighs and rode me with her head tipped back and her mouth open, and the whole time she was watching my face to see what she was doing to it.

"You're just going to lie there?" Dana asked.

"You're doing fine," I said.

"Damn right," Dana said.

She went like that until her thighs started shaking. Then she stopped and got up off me and turned around and put her back to me and sat down again, and I got a view of her from behind, the line of her spine, the small of her back, her ass coming down onto my lap.

From behind she was meaner. She worked me hard and fast and slapped her own ass once with the flat of her hand, and then when she was all the way down she leaned forward onto her hands and ground on me instead of bouncing, and that was worse.

"Hold on," Dana said.

She got off me and turned around and looked at me.

"I want it in my ass," Dana said.

"Have you done it before?" I asked.

"On camera," Dana said. "You don't get to take your time on camera. This is different."

She spat in her own hand and reached behind her and pushed two fingers into herself, and then she spat again and got a handful of me and worked it up and down the shaft, and then she got up over me and lined the head up and started pushing back onto it.

Nothing.

"Breathe," Dana said, to herself.

She pushed again, and the head went in, and she stopped dead and swore.

"Jesus," Dana said.

"Too much?" I asked.

"Half," Dana said. "You're getting half."

She stayed there and let it sit, and her back was already shining with sweat, and her hair was stuck to the back of her neck. Then she started rocking on it, small rocks, and got a little more, and then a little more, and she reached back and got the base of my cock in her hand so it could not go any deeper than she wanted.

"Don't move," Dana said.

"I'm not moving," I said.

"You were about to," she said.

She rocked on it for a long time. It was tight enough that I could feel her pulse in there, and every time she came down she made a small sound in the back of her throat like she was annoyed about something. Then she got her other hand between her legs and started working her clit, and the second she did that the whole thing changed, and she started going harder and taking more of me and stopped caring about the depth.

"There," Dana said. "There it is."

"Can I move now?" I asked.

"Not yet," Dana said.

She came first. Her whole body locked up and she stopped moving entirely with me buried in her, and then she ground down twice, and it broke, and she made a noise that was not pretty and had her hand working fast between her legs the whole way through it.

"Now," Dana said. "Now you can move."

I got both hands on her hips and moved, and she said, "Not much," so it was short and hard, and after about eight of them it got away from me, and I pulled out and stroked myself twice and came all over her ass and the bed.

It landed across both cheeks and her lower back and ran off onto the comforter in a stripe, and she stayed down on her elbows and did not move.

Then she looked back over her shoulder at the mess, put her face down, and licked a stripe of it off the comforter.

"You're an animal," I said.

"You made a mess," Dana said. "Somebody has to clean it up."

She sat up, and there was some on her thigh, and she wiped it with her thumb and put the thumb in her mouth.

"Well," Dana said. "That's somebody else's comforter."

"Sorry," I said.

"You're not sorry," Dana said.

She went into the bathroom and ran the water and came back out and started gathering her clothes, and I watched her get dressed with her hair still wet at the neck.

"Shit. I have to go," Dana said.

"Already?" I asked.

"Unfortunately," Dana said.

She got her pantyhose back on, which took a while, and her skirt, and her blouse with the little buttons, and she sat on the edge of the bed to put her shoes on. Then she picked one earring up off the nightstand and put it in her ear and looked at the other one.

Then she kissed me and left.

After she left, I lay there thinking about Ashley.

I'd told her I loved her a few hours earlier. I'd also promised not to sleep with Dana.

I got up to close the drapes and saw the earring still sitting on the nightstand, one little gold hoop, pressed flat into the wood where her thumb had left it.

She'd been careful about those. She'd made a point of it.

I was beginning to think I wasn't particularly good at keeping my personal life uncomplicated.