Breaking the Rules Read Free Page B

What’s your stage name?” she asked, appraising Eden.
    Her stage name. Instead of admitting that she didn’t have one yet, Eden blurted out the first thing that came into her head. “Jennilyn LeMay.” It was her brother Danny’s new girlfriend’s name, and right from the first moment she’d heard it—in an e-mail from her other brother Ben—Eden had thought it sounded like a stripper name.
    The large-breasted woman seemed satisfied with that information, because she nodded and stomped away.
    And okay. Now Eden was in a panic, because the CD that she’d given the DJ had started, which was her cue to take the stage.
    She’d always thought she was well endowed, but compared to the twin basketballs … Holy crap. This audience was going to look at her and laugh.
    “Go!” someone whispered as they put two strong hands on her back and pushed her out from behind the curtain.
    Where, oh sweet Lord, she froze.
    She’d thought, with the lights, that she wouldn’t be able to see the audience, but they were lit, too. And she realized that Alan, the manager who was considering hiring her, had told her as much.
It’s the eye contact that’ll get you the biggest tips
, he’d told her, when offering her pointers.
    “Dance,” someone shouted, because she was just standing there, gaping at them, as her life all but flashed before her eyes.
    All the crap she’d been through, all the garbage, all the pain. And Izzy, who’d married her when she was pregnant, even though he wasn’t the father of her child … 
Don’t think about Pinkie, don’t think about Izzy …
    But she couldn’t help thinking about them both—the baby and the lover that she’d lost. What would either of them think to see her here, now? But Pinkie was dead, and Izzy was gone.
    Eden could see Alan in the back, in the DJ’s booth, shaking his head in disgust.
    “Get off the stage,” someone else yelled.
    She was blowing this. She needed this money. And it really was no big deal. She’d been putting on shows for men ever since she’d realized that if she washed her face and wore one of those silly dresses that her grandmother bought for her, her chances of being bought an ice cream rose exponentially. What was she, three, when she’d learned that? This was just a variation on that exact same theme.
    She could see a man in the audience who could’ve been the brother of Mr. Henderson, her high school chemistry teacher, who’d let her know that a visit to him at home could significantly raise her grade for the semester. And there, at another table, was a man who had the same sleaze and smarm level as Mr. Leavitt, the sanctimonious father of one of her many high school boyfriends. He’d disapproved of his son dating her, but had turned around and propositioned her one night when he’d “accidentally” bumped into her at the video store, where he damn well knew that she worked.
    And, there. Over there was a look-alike for John Franklin, who, at nearly four years her senior, had pledged his undying love before taking her virginity in the back of his car when she was only fourteen. He’d immediately dumped her—laughing because she’d been stupid enough to believe him.
    This place was crawling with predators, with men who wanted a piece of her—and not the part that held her brain. But they weren’t just in here, they were outside as well, scattered across and around and all over the world.
    And she would have to put up with their unwanted attention and inappropriate comments while she worked for slave wages at BK or Micky D’s, or even just walked down the street.
    Or she could get rich off of them, working here, taking advantage of the fact that she had the ultimate power. She had what they wanted, and they could look, but they could not touch. Not unless they wanted to slip a five- or, no, a
ten
-dollar bill into the elastic strap of the red satin thong she’d bought just yesterday, as an investment for her and Ben’s future. And