AN: The song Zoe is singing to is called Bitch! By Meredith Brooks.

Chapter 2: Karaoke

Zoe stood center stage with the spotlight on her. Like a deer-caught-in-headlights, Zoe stared at the crowd. The logical part of her brain ordered her to pull herself together and run. But then the music began, and she looked at her "friends", Brenda and Susan were screaming, "you go girl, let it all hang out . . ." and Kate with a huge smile on her face, she felt ecstatic. The catcalls were encouraging, though thinking to herself that she was going to regret this, she threw up her hands and grabbed the mic. With her feet shoulder width apart, she gave the crowd a wink then flipped her hair back.

With a shimmer in her eyes, her half smile on her lips, she sang as she walked a predatory walk across the stage, her catlike demeanor enamoring the crowd.

I hate the world today
You're so good to me
I know, but I can't change
tried to tell you but
you look at me like maybe
I'm an angel underneath
innocent and sweet

Yesterday I cried
You must have been relieved
to see the softer side
I can understand
how you'd be so confused
I don't envy you
I'm a little bit of everything
all rolled into one

Spotting her target, she strutted right to him, a cowboy accessorized to the brim. As she reached him, she grabbed his bolo tie and pulled him close as she belted out the chorus.

I'm a bitch, I'm a lover
I'm a child, I'm a mother
I'm a sinner, I'm a saint
I do not feel ashamed
I'm your hell, I'm your dream
I'm nothing in between
You know you wouldn't want it any other way

Turning away, she grabbed his cowboy hat and put it on her head, winking at him and swishing her hips as she walked away in time to the music.

At the bar, John's first instinct was to rub his eyes, as if he couldn't believe what he was seeing. But instead, he was gaping, complete with his jaw hanging open, at the scene on the stage. He sighed heavily, closing his eyes, then opening them again fully expecting the spectacle to be a figment of his imagination. Only, it wasn't.

His heart beat harshly in his chest, his eyes bugged out as Zoe, his . . . what? He wasn't sure what to call her, sashayed her way up and down the stage.

"Man, that is one hot . . ." John aimed another death glare at Leon, who held his hands up in surrender. "Not gonna say it, but hell man, she's smokin'"

Zoe wasn't sure how to explain what was happening but damn it, she was having a good time. She flipped her hair again and with her best come hither look she alluringly slipped into the next verse.

So take me as I am
This may mean
you'll have to be a stronger man
Rest assured that when
I start to make you nervous
and I'm going to extremes
tomorrow I will change
and today won't mean a thing

Still with the cowboy hat on her head, she turned around and presented her back to the audience as she sang the chorus over her shoulder; giving the crowd a sultry smile.

I'm a bitch, I'm a lover
I'm a child, I'm a mother
I'm a sinner, I'm a saint
I do not feel ashamed
I'm your hell, I'm your dream
I'm nothing in between
You know you wouldn't want it any other way

"Hey buddy, sit the hell down, we can't see!"

He looked around, bewildered. He didn't recall getting up from his seat at the bar. Not only that, be he was half way towards the stage, without realizing that he had moved.

With her back still to the crowd, Zoe smiled invitingly over her shoulder as she slowly unbuttoned her jacket, her hips still rolling and swaying in time to the music. She teasingly shook her jacket of one shoulder and then the other the skin playing a teasing game of peek-a-boo plummeting most of the men in the audience to blubbering idiots. And she still sang.

Just when you think you've got me figured out
the season's already changing
I think it's cool you do what you do
and don't try to save me

When she finally tore her jacket off, there came a collective gasp from the audience which turned into a deafening roar. She let the jacket fall to the ground exposing her naked back. Catcalls and whistles permeated the air.

As if in a trance, John moved forward, vaguely aware of voices. He didn't particularly care. The only thing that mattered to him was getting to the stage as quickly as possible before Zoe did something she would definitely regret when she finally sobered up. With the jacket gone, she had turned around with the mic in one hand, the cowboy hat in the other covering her front.

"Yeah, baby, take it all off," someone shouted as she sang the last repeat of the chorus. Turning her back to the audience again and slowly gyrating her hips until she was kneeling.

I'm a bitch, I'm a tease
I'm a goddess on my knees
when you hurt, when you suffer
I'm your angel undercover
I've been numbed, I'm revived
can't say I'm not alive
You know I wouldn't want it any other way

She ended the song on her knees, back bent looking at the audience upside down.

The approval for her song and semi-striptease was deafening. Quite a few men and women jumped to their feet for a standing ovation. Kate jumped up on stage and started a dog pile which Brenda and Susan, hooting with laughter topped off.

"Oh my God, you were hot!" Kate shouted as they one by one got off of Zoe.

Still upside down, Zoe was laughing uncontrollably. "That was soooo much fun!" she screamed gasping as her eyes focused on one face, then a smile broke out. "Hi hotstuff!" she greeted him and then giggled.

It was all too odd. Everything about that night was surreal. If someone had told him that he would be watching Zoe Morgan singing that she was a bitch and a tease, he would have told them they were insane. He was worried about Zoe, from the little snippets of conversation he had overheard, it was clear that she wasn't drunk by choice, clearly a no-brainer, given her need for full control. Torn between staying and feeling like a possessive boyfriend and leaving to give her space to be with her friends, John took a pull of his beer, half an ear attuned to the heated debate Leon was having with the bartender about of all things, premarital sex, while his gaze roamed the crowded bar.

"Like my grandma used to say, 'why buy the cow when you can get the milk for free'." Leon exclaimed. "After my last trip to Atlantic City, I'm saving myself for my wife. " John found it hypocritical of Leon that he would promise that but still be able to check out the ladies at the bar.

From the instant she'd bumped into him, his instincts had kicked into overdrive. He would keep an eye on her, just to make sure no one would take advantage of her inebriated state, not trusting her "friends" who spiked her drink in the first place to make sure she got home safely and alone.

He had to hand it to her though; even drunk she knew how to cover herself. As soon as her friends got off of her, she hopped onto her legs with a cheeky grin. "Catch you later . . ." she said over her shoulder as she plopped the cowboy hat on her head and walked away from him as if she didn't know him. John didn't feel snubbed like most men would have. He knew that the need to keep their relationship under wraps was important to both of them. The less the number of people that knew their true relationship, the better and safer for them.

He gave the bar one more scan before fully focusing on Leon and the bartender. Something caught the very edge of his vision and he did a double take. Cool as a cucumber Zoe, her jacket never having made it back on her, was riding . . . the mechanical bull? With her seemingly bare naked back and her hair flowing underneath the ridiculous cowboy hat, she looked like the Dallas version of Lady Godiva. He wasn't concerned that probably half the men in the bar thought the same thing; he was more concerned that she would hurt her damn fool head when she got thrown. When she got thrown, not if. And in three short seconds, she was.

She got up amid cheers, flashed her drunken smile and plopped the cowboy hat back on her head as she went back to the bull. She was clearly having a ball. John felt a small smile coming on as he just watched her have fun.