1
Staring down at the list of “tasks,” as her friends called them, Mabel Lee Montgomery swallowed the church bell-sized lump of dread that lodged in the back of her throat.
In just one week, Aurora Rose would walk down the aisle on ridiculously high designer wedding heels to her forever, Jeff. Judging by the list clenched in Mabel Lee’s shaking hand, Aurora had every intention of corrupting her tribe with heaps of immoral deeds before she did.
Mabel Lee knew the bachelorette party at Big Shift would be no cake walk, but the list of sexy tasks Aurora expected each of them to complete staring up at her sent a shiver of sheer trepidation down her spine.
Glancing over her shoulder, she searched the inky darkness, thick with stifling humidity that suffocated everything it touched.
Or maybe that was her rising panic.
Her breaths came in shallow gasps, and moisture glistened over her skin. She half expected to find God himself looming behind her with a finger shaking in judgment.
The list in her hand served as a way for her friends to warm up before the Devil took over and the real night of sin started. But for Mabel Lee, she might as well be walking into a swinger house in the midst of a full-blown orgy and being expected to grab the nearest erect you-know-what walking past to get her freak on.
Whatever getting her freak on meant.
She was pretty sure it meant something different to her than her friends.
With a heavy sigh, she winced as she glanced the list.
Wink at a stranger. (Make sure said stranger sees you or it doesn’t count, Mabel Lee.)
Dip your finger in your drink and drag it over your cleavage to attract the attention of a stranger. (You better have left those puritan dresses home, Mabel Lee, and chose something that shows the girls. We know you have busties. Let them live a little.)
Keep eye contact with a hottie while you eat a cherry. (We know you’re not allergic to cherries, Mabel Lee, so don’t even try it.)
Okay, her friends definitely made the list together judging by all the Mabel Lee directives in parenthesis, and clearly, she was the only one not invited to that party.
Just the first three guaranteed that she would either be sending signals to three different men who she’d have to fend off for the next few hours, or… if she directed all those lusty signals toward just one guy, she might just find herself engaged to him before the night was over.
“Come on, Mabel Lee. You can read that inside. We’re missing skin,” her oldest friend Cassidy Delmont called out with a defiant lift of her chin. She eyed her with one perfectly arched eyebrow dialed to full judgment as she held the door open to Big Shift, the single hottest strip club within a hundred miles.
Not that Mabel Lee was supposed to know anything about it. Nope. But she’d overheard her mama and a few of the ladies in her mama’s church group, which was really more of a front for an hour wasted on idle gossip and indulgent desserts. After all, carbs and gossip didn’t count when one was serving the Lord.
At least that’s what her mama told the group before launching into her hellfire and damnation prediction for the good Christian girls being lured from their tight-knit town of Willette twenty-three miles to the very establishment before her eyes on the outskirts of Macon, Georgia.
And of course, since she couldn’t help herself, she’d Googled Big Shift the minute she’d gotten her hot little hands on her phone, which just happened to be while lying on her queen-sized bed with the fan full blast, blowing over her naked skin in her often-stuffy studio apartment.
Those images of practically naked, beautiful men had been popping into her head at the most inopportune times ever since, starting with that aforementioned naked state under the barrage of relentless heat and ending during prayer services for Lolly Jenkins who’d just started hospice care.
Mabel Lee forced her feet to move, her sedate pumps clicking in a slow beat of anticipation in time with the heavy thud of her heart.
What really bothered her mama was the duo of Yankee, highfalutin women who had invaded the south and dared turn the once-derelict and drug-ridden Fox Den into a flashy, sinful display of their wealth.
You’d think that would have been a good thing with the drug element banished and the economic boost, but no.
Because gasp! They’d also had the audacity to stock the place full of naked men swaying weak women to the dark side with their tanned skin and fake charm.
Her mama had delivered the last whispered tidbit behind her hand, but the righteous indignation in her voice had made it crystal clear to Mabel Lee who’d kept an ear pressed to the door.
A sexy tune spilled out the door from inside, and the piercing squeal of women followed. The pounding beat swelled, and before she knew it, Mabel Lee’s hips swayed with the rhythm as she walked.
The rest of the crew had ducked inside, but Cassidy, as usual, waited for Mabel Lee to get with the program. She’d been waiting for the ever-cautious Mabel Lee for fifteen years now, since the first day they’d met on the playground in fifth grade, becoming the glue that bound Mabel Lee to the group.
To this day, she wondered why Cassidy had bothered. Mabel Lee was the one who didn’t fit in. The one always one step behind.
“There you go, girl. I knew you couldn’t hide that inner swagger for long once we got you here,” Cassidy said, giving her a nudge and a grin.
Mabel squared her shoulders and went for dignified. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Ooooh, swagger and now lyin’.” Cassidy clucked her tongue. “And we haven’t even gotten inside yet.”
Mabel Lee bit her lip and winced. “I’m going straight to hell. I can feel it.”
“Honey, there are some shitty humans in this world, and you are absolutely not one of them. A little white lie and display of confidence won’t be your demise.”
“Said Satan’s helper,” Mabel Lee muttered.
“Who knows, maybe I was sent here by one of those angels you give such credit to in order to make sure you live life to the fullest and if you’re lucky, have your first lung-seizing and vision-stealing orgasm.”
“That actually sounds painful,” Mabel said, forcing herself not to wince.
“But it hurts so good.” Cassidy gave her a swat on her behind that had her hopping over the threshold and into the club full of raging women.
Lights flashed and streaked across a stage at the far end of the room. Women bounced on the balls of their feet around their tables, arms waving in the air, sweaty money clenched in their fists as they whooped and hollered at the guy dancing on stage.
Mabel Lee caught a glimpse of his smile, his square jaw, and a wink, but not much more as the clusters of women blocked her view.
Not that she was looking.
“It’s not like I haven’t had an orgasm, you know,” Mabel Lee shouted over her shoulder in a rare show of defiance.
Unfortunately, that stubborn streak had horrible timing, and the words rang out over the fading music.
A sea of glances shot her way, and her ears burned hot as mortification filled her. She spun on her heel, ready to make a hasty escape, because darn it, this just wasn’t a place for her. She’d planned to spend a hundred dollars on Aurora and Jeff’s wedding present, but she’d gladly make it two hundred if that earned Aurora’s forgiveness for bailing on the wild night she had planned.