Chapter 1

{Hailey’s Pov}

I stopped believing in family the day my mother bled through her mascara and still made dinner like nothing happened. That was the kind of love I learned, quiet suffering served on a chipped plate. Richard was never a father. Just the drunk bastard my mother married before she died trying to survive him. I stayed because I had nowhere else to go, and he knew it. But I’m done playing the weak girl. Tonight, I’m poisoned with heels on, and anyone who crosses me better be ready to bleed.

“All you do is shake your ass in a club like a damn whore,” Richard growls behind his beer can.

“It’s a club, Richard. I strip to pay my bills, what’s your excuse for existing?” I mutter, dragging lip gloss across my mouth in the cracked hallway mirror. “And let’s be honest, the crowd would rather throw cash at my sin than throw up looking at you.”

I hear him storm closer, and I smell the whiskey. “You think shaking your ass makes you feel better than me.” I finally looked at him. Gut hanging over stained jeans face red from rage or alcohol, or both.

“No Richard, I know I’m better than you, all you do is drink to stupor, You rot I do think of how my momma was able to be with a low freak ass man like you, I’d rather strip until I’m seventy, than end up with men like you, eww.”

He tosses the beer can. It slams against the wall. I don’t flinch.

“You ungrateful little bitch.”

“I’m not yours to be grateful to.” I step past him and grab my purse. “You married my mom with your fists and lies and drove her to her early grave. You don’t get a thank you for that.”

“You're lucky I didn’t kick you out years ago,” Richards jeered. I never bought the idea of living with this wrecked old man.

His face twisted, “You’re nothing without me.”

I paused at the door. “Point of correction, Richard, I’m nothing because of you. But that ends tonight.”

I slammed the door shut before he could say another word.

****

Bourbon Street is five blocks away, five blocks between who I am and who I’m pretending to be. I light a cigarette with shaky fingers. Not to the taste. For control. Breathe in. Burn it out. Again. And again. I’m not a girl anymore. I’m armor stitched together with pain and bad decisions.

A group of drunk hoots looks at me from across the street. One of them whistles. I flick my middle finger without even looking. Let them drool. They don’t get to touch. They don’t even get to dream.

Inside the Bourbon Club, the air is thick with sweat, smoke, desperation, and perfume that smells like lies. But in here? I matter. In here, I own every set of eyes like a puppet master with no strings attached.

“Hailey!” Kiara waves from backstage, already half-naked and adjusting her thong. “Thought you weren’t coming in tonight!”

“Changed my mind, Richard ran his mouth.”

“Again?” she frowns. “That man needs to get hit by a bus.”

“Tell me something I don’t fantasize about.” I grab a dress from the curtain. “Give me five minutes.”

I grab one of the red velvet dresses from the hook behind the curtain and slip into it like it’s war paint. Rip off the jeans, throw on the thigh-highs, smear on fresh lip gloss shade: venom. When I step on that stage, I’m not the broken girl from the trailer. I’m a goddess men beg for and can never keep.

The bass drops. The lights slice the room like a blade. The crowd roars.

I move like I’ve got every secret they’ll never know. Slow. Deadly. A whisper of skin and shadow. Let them watch. Let them ache. That’s all they get. This body? It’s mine. Their fantasy? Leased. Nothing about me is free.

Halfway through my set, I spot him. Black suits. Clean cut. Watching like he’s dissecting the room.

He was not the usual drunk pervert; he was studying me.

I walked backstage again, and Kiara handed me a water bottle. “You see the guy in the suit?”

“Black suits, with no smile?” Yeah

“He’s been here for weeks. Never tips. He just watches.”

“That’s creepy.”

“So creepy, like money-drenched creepy,”

I shrug. He can creep for all he wants. I’m not for sale.”

She raises a brow. “Girl, we all are. For the right price.” I don’t answer because sometimes, I’m not sure she’s wrong.

We’re shutting down with drinks and cigarettes when Joey, the bouncer, waves me over. “Hailey, someone left this for you.”

He hands me an envelope—heavy, cream paper. My name is Calligraphy. Not a stage name. My real one. Hailey Vale.

I glance toward the crowd. The suit guy is gone.

I rip the envelope open.

Inside: a single sheet of parchment and a gold-embossed card.

Miss Hailey Vale,

You are hereby summoned to the reading of the will of George Lachlan, to be held at Lachlan Estate, New York.

Attendance is mandatory.

—Harrison & Leach, Attorneys at Law.

“What the fuvk?” I whisper.

George Lachlan? I don't know him. I never met him.

Why would I be summoned to his will Kiara?

“This letter looks fake, We got a lot of con artists here in New Orleans, so chill out.”

“Right?” I crumple the letter and toss it in the bin. We continued to chill out in the dressing room.

Later at night Kiara and I went to her home because I could not stand to see that old wrecked man called Richard.

Kiara lives in a four-storey apartment building, and she lives on the third floor. We got to the door. And she was knocking on her own apartment. Kiara was high. I busted out.

“Yo! Give me your bags, let me get your keys, you are drunk." We both laughed. When the door swung open, I froze to have seen this son of a bitch called Craig.

“I can explain, Hailey.” Kiara looked at my face. I walked in and shoved him on the shoulder.

“Are we doing this now, You ended things with the mother fucker, what the hell is he doing here Kiara?”

“Watch your mouth bitch.” Craig snaps.

“Oh, what’re you gonna do—hit me?” I step up. “Come on, tough guy. Hit me. I’ll rip your balls off and mail them to every side chick you cheated on her with.”

Kiara jumps between us, grabbing my arms. “Hailey! Chill, please. I’m sorry. I couldn’t tell you—he came back… begging. And I—I still love him.”

I stare at her like I don’t recognize her. “Do you hear yourself? Is that how good his dick is that you can’t let go, mmm… tell me, Kiara, that bastard doesn't respect you. I'm out of here. Give me the keys to the truck, and I will sleep there.”

She tried to stop but I took the keys from the table and walked out. I couldn't stand seeing Craig. I hate him. For all the pain he made Kiara go through.

I pulled in the truck and lowered the driver's seat and I slept off.