Feel Like Making Love Read online

  "For the first fifteen minutes." The waitress took the twenty-dollar bill and gave Audrey a handful of ones with a grin. "These guys are hot with two t's."

  Karen fanned her face and handed over a twenty, too. "I'd better get mine then."

  "Is it usually this crowded?" Audrey looked around as another group of ladies, giggling, followed the host with the blinking necklaces, and took seats at a table on the other side of the room.

  The waitress nodded. "This place gets crazy on Muy Caliente night, let me tell you. Our boys really know how to show the ladies a good time, too. You'll see."

  Karen hooted and clapped her hands.

  "We'll take two shooters to start," Audrey said. "My treat."

  Karen let out another hysterical giggle. "Omigod!"

  "You let me know if you need anything else," the waitress said, and Audrey assured her they would.

  "I don't understand you, Karen." Audrey drank her shooter. "You're usually the one leading the pack."

  "I'm all talk," Karen admitted and tossed back her shooter with a grimace. "Not like you, Audrey."

  "What's that supposed to mean?" Audrey turned toward her friend, surprised.

  "Oh, you know, you're so good with guys. How to talk to them and stuff."

  "Believe me, Karen, I'm not that good at it. You're the one who's had all the dates. Not me."

  Karen rolled her eyes. "You could have dates, if you wanted them."

  Audrey didn't have time to answer because the curtain hiding the doorway to the back room shook. Three young men, casually dressed like they were just out for a night on the town appeared and split up, working the room's other tables. Audrey could hear them giving the same sort of rap Vance had given her and Karen.

  "Wow. I was expecting...you know, construction workers and cops," said Karen. She watched the boys across the room. "A show! An act!"

  "Maybe they'll do that, too," Audrey assured her with a pat on the hand. "We'll see."

  Karen giggled again. "Omigod...they're so cute!"

  They were cute, too. Young and cute. "I feel like a perv," Audrey murmured, watching the boys charm the group of ladies across the way. "They can't be more than twenty-one."

  More women filed in, and music began pumping from the loudspeakers. Audrey didn't know the song, but then she hadn't been out to a club in number of years. She listened to the racy lyrics with some surprise, then a giggle. So that was the sort of song men took off their clothes to.

  "Oooh, I love this song!" The shooter seemed to have loosened Karen up a little bit because she started dancing in her chair.

  When the waitress came back around, they ordered a couple more drinks, and Audrey sat back against the couch, watching as the show began. Vance introduced himself and the other three guys, Armando, Brick and Julian.

  "Think those are their real names?" Karen asked as the four young men gyrated.

  "Heck, no!" Audrey watched them work the crowd and head in their direction. "But who would you rather flirt with--an Armando or a Harold?"

  "Good point," Karen said, and then her attention was taken up by dark-haired Brick, who had his eyebrow pierced and wore a braided leather choker.

  Armando had set his sights on Audrey, and she sat back and prepared to enjoy the display. She'd seen male revues before, and Karen was right. They were usually stereotypical fantasy cops or construction workers, who did some sort of cheesy dance routine to predictable dance tunes. Not these boys. They shimmied and strutted to the bass-heavy tune as they stripped out of their clothes to the whoops and hollers of the now-packed room.

  "Omigod!" Karen wriggled beside now-giggling Audrey.

  This was fun. She whooped, too, when Julian strutted over with a grin on his face. He dropped in front of her in a truly impressive move, doing a set of one-handed pushups that emphasized the muscles in his toned back. When he got to his feet, Audrey clapped and waved a dollar bill.

  Julian leaned over and said into her ear, "You get to put it in my pants."

  She felt a bit ridiculous, but she did it anyway, tucking the bill into the waistband of his low-slung jeans.

  "Thanks, doll," he said with a saucy wink, and began grooving in front of Karen.

  "I thought Vance said there were going to be five guys," Karen shouted over the music as Julian and Brick took turns doing truly impressive gymnastic feats on the silver pole and Armando and Vance danced around the tables.

  "What, these four aren't enough for you?" Audrey hollered back. She sipped her margarita, enjoying the play of light on toned, tanned bodies. By this time, the men in the center of the room had stripped down to boxer briefs.

  "Omigod," said Karen. "Would you look at them? How do they do that?"

  Brick had grabbed the pole, leaped into the air and held his entire body out straight, like a flag.

  "Maybe they're gymnasts." Audrey clapped and whistled. "Wow!"

  Some women there sat and watched without doing anything, not even when the dancers wriggled and writhed in front of them. Audrey didn't get it. If someone was willing to strip off his clothes in front of her for a dollar bill, she was going to do her best to make sure she was appreciative.

  "Having fun, ladies?" Vance, bare chest shining with sweat and the glitter he'd just shaken all over himself to cheers from most of the crowd, sat in the chair next to Audrey.

  "Yes." She smiled. "But I have to ask--are you?"

  Vance grinned, looking around. "Hey, where else could I get paid to dance and drink all night with ladies screaming and hollering?"

  His honest answer made her laugh. "True."

  He looked her over with frank appreciation in his eyes. "We like it when the women have a good time, you know?"

  She tucked a couple of bills into the waistband of his boxers and he thanked her, moving on to Karen, who at least seemed to have gotten over her initial anxiety and was rubbing her hands all over Vance's glittery chest.

  "Sparkles," Karen said when he'd moved on to seduce the next group of women out of their dollars. She held up her hands, which gleamed in the blue lighting. "From his body! Whee!"

  Audrey laughed, her equilibrium returning. They were here to have fun, and she was. It was all a game. Cute boys shaking their asses in front of screaming women in order to earn a couple hundred bucks. She was glad she could relax and enjoy it.

  "Hey, looks like the last one showed up!" Karen nudged Audrey and pointed. "Oooh, he's a hottie!"

  "They're all--" She stopped at the sight of the fifth young man, who'd just come out of the back room.

  It was Joel.

  "Oh, mama," Karen said. "Catholic schoolboy."

  Audrey was pretty sure Joel wasn't Catholic, but the schoolboy description was dead on. He wore dark trousers and a button-down oxford shirt with a tie. His dark hair had been slicked back beneath a ball cap. He looked utterly forbidden, which made it all the more delicious. He swaggered around the room greeting the women, while his cohorts contorted themselves on and off the pole.

  Should she go before he made his way to where she sat? Joel was between her and the exit. He'd see her leaving. Should she hide in the bathroom?

  "Where are you going?" Karen's question made her realize she'd already gotten to her feet.

  The music ebbed and flowed, inviting hips to wiggle and pelvises to thrust. The boys in the middle of the stage traded out with the two who'd been working the room. Joel, perhaps because he'd arrived late, didn't go to the center and start taking off his clothes, but Audrey knew it would only be a matter of minutes before he took his turn. She had to get out of here before then. How embarrassing! Joel was her classmate, a friend, her study buddy...

  And he was standing right in front of her. She looked up, with what she knew had to be an idiotic smile pasted on her face. Joel was grinning, too. He didn't look embarrassed, but then he probably dealt with shell-shocked women on a regular basis.

  "Woo-hoo!" Karen, apparently, had dispensed with the last of her anxiety and was now waving a handful of doll