Anywhere with You — Stephanie Hoffman McManus

Ten days. Four friends. One car. 3000 miles cross-country. It's the adventure of a lifetime. Two people might find a second chance at love while two discover what it's like to fall for the first time. In this life, we all make choices that define us, but can we ever be more than the sum of these choices? At eighteen, the choices I made set me on a path I thought there was no going back from. Stripper was never the aspiration for my life, but I learned at an early age that dreams could be crushed and it was better not to hang my hopes on silly fantasies. And so I shed my identity as Cecilia Rhoades to become Cici. I embraced the newfound sense of control and power I found in baring my body, bending and manipulating men as I wished, using their own desires against them. Sex and lust ruled my world, but never love. There's no place for love in the dark, and besides, only one man ever saw me as something more, and I gave up my chance with him when I let myself become this. I did what I thought I had to at the time, but the price I paid may have been too high. What if the cost was losing myself along the way? And what if the only way to find myself again is to return home and face the past I've been running from? But I won't be going alone and I may find something else I never expected on this trip. This is my story, and let me warn you, it's no fairy tale and it's not for the faint of heart.