Thank you for your greetings and kind thoughts. I appreciate it. Also, thank you for your continued interest and support. I appreciate that too.

I do not own Glee or the characters, neither do I own Serving The Billionaire.

MERCEDES

"You're going to do what?" Jocelyn shrieked.

"Shh," I said, looking around nervously. The sales lady had already given me a few pointed glances. I got the feeling we weren't her usual clientele, and we were definitely not up to snuff as far as she was concerned.

"Okay, okay," Joss said, and went back to flipping through the rack. "Seriously, though, you're kidding, right?"

"Maybe," I said. "I haven't decided yet. It's a lot of money, Joss."

"How much?" she asked.

That was Jocelyn... Practical to the bone. She would probably prostitute herself to the president if he paid her enough money.

Girl's gotta pay the bills, she liked to say, and that was the only reason I hadn't immediately told Mr. Evans to fuck off.

I was still being Joss at that point, and my inner Joss had gone wide-eyed at the thought of five thousand dollars.

Five thousand... That's what he'd told me, while I stood there and stared at him.

He wanted me to wear heels, stockings and a skirt and nothing else... Just walk around bare-breasted with a cocktail tray and entertain his companions.

There'd be no touching, he'd told me. Just looking.

It was enough money to pay my rent for several months. And the thought of having that amount of cash, tax-free, under the table, had stopped me in my tracks.

I'd swallowed my first impulse to tell Mr. Evans that he'd gotten the wrong idea about what kind of girl I was. Instead, I'd told him that I would think about it.

And I'd been thinking about it for the last two days...

While I rode the subway...

While I served customers...

Even while I slept.

Mr. Evans kept invading my dreams. I couldn't lie down at night without him appearing behind my closed eyelids.

He looked at me with those green eyes and that fierce gaze that told me he'd like to see me naked. Well, I wanted to see him naked too, so turnabout was fair play.

How bad could it be, anyway?

Saucy and Siren would probably be there again, and nobody would look at me twice when the two of them were buck naked and writhing all over the place.

Tits were nothing compared to bare, shaved pussy. And it wasn't like my breasts were much to look at, anyway...

They were kind of big and brown, with brown nipples...nothing like the expanses of creamy flesh that Saucy and Siren had to display.

"Well? How much?" Joss asked again, pulling me out of my thoughts.

"Five thousand," I said. The amount still sounded obscene to me. It was like Monopoly money...too much to be real.

"Holy shit!" Joss said, a little too loudly, and the sales lady glared at us for real that time.

I let go of the skirt I was touching and said,

"Why don't we go somewhere else?"

Joss rolled her eyes.

"Fine. Coming to Barney's was a stupid idea anyway."

It hadn't been my idea, but I wasn't about to say that.

Grateful that Joss wasn't going to put up more of a fuss, I led the way out of the store and into the cold November evening.

I'd taken the night off and she agreed to meet me after she got off work to help me shop for some new clothes.

I'd been wearing the one outfit she loaned me, washing the one blouse in my kitchen sink every night and letting it air-dry while I slept.

I had cash, now... The thousand dollars Mr. Evans had given to me, plus the extra thousand he'd given me as a tip.

It was time to upgrade.

We walked down Madison Avenue and found some less ridiculously snooty places to shop. I lost count of how many stores we went in.

I was still reluctant to spend much money on clothing...too many years of skirting the edge of poverty...but Joss eventually bullied me into purchasing two wool pencil skirts, three silk blouses and a slinky, retro-style black wiggle dress.

The silk especially was expensive, but I was willing to shell out for natural fabrics, because I thought they would make me look higher-class than anything synthetic.

Plus, I had two thousand dollars of Mr. Evans' money burning a hole in my pocket...

"You look good, girl," Joss told me when I tried on the dress. "If you don't buy that I'm going to beat you with my purse. Get that shit and let's go eat some dinner. I'm starving!"

We ended up at some terrible Irish pub, sitting at the bar with my shopping bags on the floor at our feet, eating greasy appetizers and drinking beer.

I felt like I hadn't seen Joss in about a million years, so it was really nice to have a chance to catch up.

She told me about her latest work drama and about her boyfriend's idiot roommate's new plan to grow weed in their bathroom.

I laughed in all the right places and asked appropriate questions, but my mind was elsewhere...

I couldn't stop thinking about Mr. Evans and about whether I should say yes to his proposal.

I brought it up, finally, after Joss' stories petered out...

"Do you think I should, you know. Do the serving thing?"

"Yes!" she said. "Are you kidding me? A hot, rich fancy dude wants you to walk around shirtless so he can ogle you, and he's going to pay you money to do it? I would be all over that in a hot second."

I hadn't told her Mr. Evans' name, or anything about him other than that he was a client. She already knew where I was working and what sort of club it was, so I didn't think I was violating the non-disclosure agreement.

Yet, I still felt like I probably shouldn't be talking about it with her. But I had to talk about it with someone...

Having a billionaire offer to pay me money to show my boobs was just too insane for me to keep to myself. If I didn't talk about it, I would go crazy.

"Don't you think it's a little, you know. Slutty?" I asked.

"Sluttiness is a concept that men invented to oppress women's sexuality," Joss said, and banged her pint glass down on the bar. "Don't let the patriarchy get you down!"

I sighed... I agreed with her, but once she got started, she was basically impossible to stop.

"Joss..."

"Right, okay," she said. "Not the time or the place. Got it. So are you going to do it?"

I shrugged.

"I guess so. It's a lot money, but..."

"But what?" she asked.

"But it's embarrassing!" I said. "They'll see me naked, all of those creepy guys..."

"But not naked naked," she said.

"Fine. Half-naked. It's basically the same thing. And I'm not sure..."

I realized that I had unconsciously raised my hands to hover in mid-air near my breasts, as if I was covering myself.

I quickly curled them around my pint glass instead and took another sip of my beer.

"You're shy!" Joss exclaimed, sounding delighted. "Haven't you even let a man look at your tits?"

I hadn't, but I didn't want her to know that.

"It's different," I said. "There are so many people, and the dancers, and I...they'll all be looking at me. Whatever, stop laughing! Would you do it?"

"In a heartbeat," she said. "Are you kidding me? So what if you're embarrassed? Do a few shots beforehand and you'll quit caring. Mercedes, babe. It's five thousand dollars..."

And that was the bottom line, really. It was more money than I could justify walking away from.

Everyone had a price, and I'd just learned mine.

I thought about it later that night, riding the subway home to Brooklyn...

What exactly Mr. Evans wanted from me...

How much would he be willing to pay to get it...

Where would I draw the line...

And at what point would the money no longer be worth it to me...

I didn't have an answer.

When I arrived at the club the next evening, Natalie came over to me and said,

"You've got a man looking for you."

My heart leaped...

"Do you know who?"

She shrugged.

"Don't know his name. He was here with Mr. Mach the other evening... You remember... White guy, green eyes. He said he wanted to talk to you."

She formed air quotes around the work talk.

Oh God. It was definitely Mr. Evans.

"He's still here?"

"Yeah. Room 4." She gave me a narrow-eyed look. "You be careful. These rich men are trouble. Don't let him push you into doing anything you don't want to do."

She walked off before I could respond...

I took a deep breath and went to room 4, to see what Mr. Evans wanted to say to me.

Or do...

He was standing beside one of the sofas, reading something on his phone, but he looked up when I opened the door.

I wondered if I would ever get used to him looking at me...

Meeting his gaze felt like touching a live wire... Devastating, electric.

"Mercedes," he said.

"Natalie said you were looking for me," I said.

Dear God, he looked incredible! He'd taken off his suit jacket and his crisp white dress shirt was rolled up to his elbows, revealing his tanned forearms.

With one layer stripped off he looked more approachable, like someone I could actually talk to or get to know, instead of a mysterious business mogul.

"I was indeed," he said. "You've considered my proposition?"

What a way to put it... Proposition. It sounded oily. Like some sort of under-handed deal.

"I thought about it, yeah."

He raised his eyebrows.

"And?"

"What is it that you want me to do?" I asked. "Walk around with my shirt off? There has to be something else."

"I don't get the impression that you would allow anything more," he said. His mouth quirked in a way that was becoming familiar to me. He was amused or...rueful? "I'll try to explain. These are business gatherings...of a sort. They are tedious. And my companions are interested in things that don't particularly interest me. So I'd like to have an aesthetically appealing distraction... To keep me somewhat entertained."

"And that's me," I said. An aesthetic distraction. What kind of weird person had business meetings at a strip club?

Was that something rich people did on a routine basis?

Nothing about Samuel Evans made any sense to me... I could smell his cologne even from where I was standing, several feet away, and it made me feel light-headed.

Not in an overly bad way. I just hated that he had such an effect on me.

It made me feel helpless, like I had no control over myself... Like I wouldn't be able to tell him no.

"Yes," Mr. Evans said, bringing me from my thoughts. "My guests won't touch you, or harass you in any way. Your presence will be for my enjoyment alone."

He was kidding himself if he thought those other dudes wouldn't look at me at all, but I wasn't about to say that to him.

"You want to look at my breasts while I serve you drinks? And that's it?" I asked.

I wanted to be absolutely sure that we were on the same page. No unexpected late-night gropings. Not that I would be opposed to it necessarily if he was doing the groping. I just wanted to know that it was coming.

"That's it," he said. "And I'll give you five thousand dollars."

I looked at him. He was so good-looking and so absurdly rich. He could have any woman he wanted. Any socialite, any actress... Anyone at all who appealed to him. He would just have to look in her direction and she would come running.

So for the life of me, I couldn't figure out why he would spend money to have me, some working-class nobody, stroll around topless for a few hours.

What did he get out of it that he couldn't get elsewhere?

It had to be some sort of kinky sex thing...

Maybe he was in a long-distance relationship and could only get his jollies vicariously.

Maybe he'd had his heart broken and was too deeply wounded to let other women close. That sounded like the plot of a bad romance novel, though; not like real life.

Maybe he just liked feeling powerful.

"I'll do it," I said.

He smiled.

"Good. Tomorrow night, then."

I went back out into the main room feeling a little like I'd been bulldozed. Mr. Evans had such a forceful personality that even being in the same room with him was exhausting.

I'd never experienced that kind of personal charisma before.

It didn't seem to have anything to do with wealth or power, because none of the other clients made me feel like that.

Only Sam.

Not Sam... Mr. Evans. I had to maintain some sort of distance, otherwise I was going to lose myself completely.

I waited tables in a daze, but managed not to completely screw up anyone's order.

Natalie was still limiting me to two, and keeping a close eye on my every move, but at the end of the night, she said,

"You're getting there. I'll move you up to three tables, next time. Just don't turn away so quick after you take their orders. You'll want to linger a bit, like it's hard for you to tear yourself away."

"Thanks, I'll keep that in mind," I said.

Natalie was a nit-picking micro-manager, but I was more grateful for her advice than I knew how to convey. I listened carefully to everything she told me and took detailed mental notes.

By now, I was sure that she was the best waitress in the club and I was determined to learn everything from her that I could.

I made close to a thousand dollars in tips that night...

Every night at the club was like Christmas, and I was like a kid with so many presents I didn't know what to play with first.

I stuffed the money under my mattress, where it would stay safe until I had a chance to deposit it. Then I slept soundly without dreaming for hours.

When I arrived at the club the next afternoon, Mr. Evans was waiting for me in room 4, just as he'd done the first time I served for him.

He was wearing gray wool slacks...a change from his usual shirt and suit jacket...and a navy blue shawl-collar cardigan.

I wanted to touch it to see if it felt as soft as it looked... Groping Mr. Evans' chest would be a side benefit.

He looked up from his phone when I came in, and said,

"Bring five bottles of the usual whiskey. I doubt we'll need that much, but I don't want you leaving this room once my guests have arrived."

Wow! He certainly knew how to cut to the chase. But that answered a question I'd been afraid to ask...

If he'd expected me to go out to the bar half-naked, I would've done it, but I wouldn't have been happy about it.

"What time do you expect your guests?" I asked.

He glanced at his phone.

"I told them 5:00, which means that Ericsson will be half an hour early, and the rest of them will be half an hour late. You have time."

I went out to the bar and brought in the bottles of Scotch that Mr. Evans had asked for, along with several pitchers of water and enough glasses to go around.

When I came in for the last time to set out drinking glasses and napkins, he set his phone aside and beckoned to me.

Suddenly nervous, I went to the couch he was sitting on and stopped just short of his bent knees.

"Is there anything else you'd like me to bring?" I asked.

"No, you've taken care of everything," he said.

He gazed up at me, unspeaking, and I got even more nervous... His eyes seemed to stare straight through me.

I wanted to drop my gaze before he searched out all of my embarrassing secrets... Everything I'd tried to hard to conceal from other people or simply to forget.

Desperate to break the charged silence, I said,

"I could bring some more water or..."

"No," he said, cutting me off. He looked at me for a few more long moments while I did my best not to fidget. Then he said,

"Unbutton your shirt."

I swallowed hard... I knew, intellectually, that at some point I would have to undress, but I hadn't expected it to happen like this, with me standing in front of him, exposed, and him staring up at me so calmly, like he told girls to take off their shirts every day of the week.

Maybe he did, for all I knew.

I raised my shaking hands and undid the first button on my shirt... The soft lapels fell aside to expose my collarbone.

Then, feeling shy and embarrassed, met Mr. Evans' gaze. He was still staring at me intently.

I undid the second button and the silk draped out of the way to reveal the black lace of my bra. It was a new purchase, one that I'd made with him in mind.

I'd stood in the changing room and decided that he seemed like the type of man who liked lacy lingerie. The color, too, had been a conscious choice...

He wouldn't like red, I thought. Too obvious.

And judging from the way his pupils dilated slightly when he saw my bra, I'd made the right decision.

A few seconds in, I realized that I was aroused. At first, the discovery was almost academic, as I noted my quickened breathing, hard nipples and throbbing pussy.

That lasted for only a second, though, before I was overwhelmed both by lust and by what it meant...

I liked having Mr. Evans look at me.

I liked the implicit humiliation of the situation... Him cool and in control, sitting down, fully dressed; and me exposed and subservient, taking off my clothes for a man I knew almost nothing about.

And I wanted it...

I wanted him to humiliate me...

I wanted to beg.

Learning new things about yourself is always unpleasant, mainly because you don't learn good things.

Nobody suddenly figures out that they're beautiful or witty or awesome at giving compliments. If you're beautiful, people tell you. It's not a surprise.

But if you're ugly, people are so careful to never mention your appearance at all, that you might go years before you're struck with the sudden knowledge that something's wrong with your face.

I felt like that... Like some passer-by on the street called me a nasty word and I went home and stared at myself in the mirror and realized that it was true, that I was hideous.

It wasn't normal to think about the things that I was thinking about. Sex was supposed to be white sheets and rose petals, long kisses and sweet caresses. Not this, broken open inside a high-class strip club.

All of this passed through my mind in the few seconds it took me to lower my hands to the third button of my shirt.

Mr. Evans reached out and touched my hip, carefully, with just the tips of his fingers.

"Slow down," he said. "There's no rush. I want to look at you."

That was the problem... I wanted him to look at me, and I didn't want to want it. Maybe if I hurried to get my shirt off, I wouldn't have to time to focus on how much I was enjoying the whole situation.

But it wasn't up to me. He was paying me. I had to do whatever he wanted.

I shivered, thinking about all of the things he could make me do. I would do them. Anything, whatever he wanted, or close enough.

I slowed down. I'd seen one of the dancers giving a customer a striptease just the night before, and I tried to imitate the things that she had done.

I slid the third button halfway out of the hole and then looked at him from beneath lowered eyelids, my hair falling over my face like a curtain.

Then I bit my lip.

It seemed to work. Mr. Evans exhaled through his nose and let his thighs spread apart slightly. So I glanced down at his lap and noticed a bulge in his trousers.

And it occurred to me for the first time, that I wasn't the only one aroused by my performance. He was turned on, too... Maybe just as turned on as I was.

'Well, obviously,' I told myself. It shouldn't have been a surprise. He was paying me to take my clothes off for him. He wouldn't do that if he didn't find me appealing.

But knowing that, rationally, was wholly different from seeing the undeniable proof of his desire for me.

This man wanted me.

My skin suddenly felt hot, like the chandelier overhead was the mid-summer sun.

My pussy throbbed steadily and I could feel my panties growing damp. He hadn't even touched me and I was already slicking myself wanting him.

I exhaled and undid another button...

With the final button, the two halves of my shirt parted fully, hanging loosely at my sides, exposing my bra and my round, brown stomach.

I fought the urge to cover myself with my hands, and instead pulled my shoulders back, shook my hair out of my face, and stood as tall and proud as I could.

Inside though, I was terrified and confused, but outside I was Joss, and Mr. Evans could look all he wanted.

My nipples were rock-hard and I was sure they were protruding through the thin lace of my bra... I watched Mr. Evans' face even as his gaze raked over my exposed body.

His green eyes were dark with arousal, the pupils blown huge. Nobody had ever wanted me like this.

It was a good feeling.

"Take off your bra," he said. His voice was deeper than usual and had a ragged edge to it that sent a shiver up my spine.

I reached behind myself to unhook the clasp of my bra, and slowly drew the straps down my shoulders, taking care to keep the cups in place, covering my breasts.

Then, finally, I let the bra slide away down my body. As it did, I caught one strap in my fingers and tossed it onto the back of the couch beside Mr. Evans.

The cool air in the room felt good on my overheated flesh. I glanced down at myself, trying to see what he saw.

My breasts were big, but firm and round...nothing like the dancers, but not terrible. I still had lush feminine curves that were appealing.

And Mr. Evans clearly liked them, since the bulge in his pants had grown bigger, and his lips parted as he stared at me.

He stood abruptly and stood before me, so close that our bodies almost touched. And close enough that I could feel the warmth radiating from him.

"Gorgeous creature," he murmured. And I watched frozen, as he lifted one hand and set it on my shoulder.

"Mr. Evans," I said, and then couldn't think of anything else to say.

Every cell in my body yearned for him...

He drew his hand down to cup my right breast, then moved his thumb to slide over my nipple...

I let out an involuntary gasp at the way it felt. My skin tingled just from the light pressure of his fingers.

And as he toyed with my nipple, I was almost overwhelmed by the urge to slide to my knees and beg him to fuck me.

I couldn't think of anything I had ever wanted more.

"Your pussy's wet, isn't it?" he asked me.

His voice was so gentle that it took me a moment to absorb what he'd said. But then it hit home and my face flamed.

I shook my head, not denying it, but unable to answer. He couldn't possibly expect me to agree with him.

"Tell me," he said, still gentle, but insistent.

"Yes," I whispered, humiliated beyond measure, but his thumb kept moving, teasing me... And I wanted him. I didn't ever want him to stop touching me.

"Good girl," he said, and the approval in his voice nearly undid me.

Mr. Evans took his hand away as suddenly as he'd moved it there in the first place.

"The others will be here soon," he said. "Will you pour some drinks, please?"

I didn't understand how he could switch gears so quickly. It took me a few moments to redirect my brain from thinking about sex and hunger and his fingers and my pussy.

"Yes," I said, after too long of a pause.

"Thank you," he said. "I need to speak with Brittany."

And just like that, calm as anything, he headed for the door.

When it clicked shut behind him, I shoved my hand down my skirt, inside my stockings and underwear, and stroked myself until I came, thighs quivering and still standing in the middle of the room.

It only took about a minute... That's how aroused I was just from being close to Mr. Evans and from him touching me a little.

I wondered what would happen if he ever touched me with more intent. I would probably melt, or explode.

I definitely wouldn't survive it.

By the time Mr. Evans returned, I had wiped my hand on a napkin, smoothed my hair into place and positioned myself beside the fireplace.

I hoped I looked calm and implacable... Unreadable... I didn't want him to know how he affected me.

I was afraid... I was scared of how intensely I responded to him, and how intensely he responded to me.

I didn't know what would happen. I felt like I was hurtling down a mountainside in a car with no brakes.

He didn't touch me again for the rest of the night. And aside from the fact that I was topless, it was more or less exactly like the last time I'd served for him.

Yes, his guests paid a bit more attention to me, their eyes greedily taking in my body as I moved around the room, but none of them bothered me or even spoke to me much.

They were occupied with the dancers, and when there were two fully naked women in the room, a girl without a shirt on didn't draw much attention.

I was more or less left to serve drinks in peace.

Mr. Evans, unlike his guests, basically ignored the dancers. Instead, he tracked me around the room all night, following me with his eyes even while he spoke with the other guests.

His laser focus on me was both flattering and terrifying... I still didn't understand what he saw in me or why he had chosen me for such particular attention, when I wasn't beautiful or cultured or fascinating.

And that threw me off balance. If I knew what he wanted, I would be on solid ground; but his motivations were totally mysterious to me, and I wasn't sure what to do or say or think or feel.

At the end of the night, he handed me a fat envelope and said,

"You did very well tonight."

I didn't want his approval to matter, but it did.

"Thank you," I said, blushing.

"I want you again on Friday," he said. "Will you?"

I didn't have to think. I said,

"Yes."

Like before, no chance of reading over these days. I'm working seven days a week, so forgive any extreme mistakes or character name mix-ups.

Again, Happy New Year to all!

Stay safe!