Her eyebrows crinkle together over a flat brow bone and she says something else but I don’t answer. Her knees are curled under her and she’s got a purple blanket spread over them. A lamp is on behind her and in the dark room, it illuminates her hair. Falling to her waist in a single braid, her hair is violent red and burns like a torch. It completes the cacophony that is her appearance. Without setting her book aside, she unfurls and begins to stand.
“Minya…Alina…sestra…” I hear sounds but no meaning, and it isn’t just because I don’t speak the same language she does. It’s because she adjusts her thin gold-rimmed glasses, whose wide lenses remind me of the kind the grandfather used to wear. I never knew if he was a grandfather or not, but that’s what he seemed to me when I was eleven, sitting in the park watching him feed the pigeons. Watching him in his small world of happiness is the only thing I can ever remember giving me peace.
“I’m sorry,” she says, this time in an accented English, “do you speak Russian?”
I don’t answer her, but instead push the door all the way open. There he is. Mr. Gavriil Popov, the taller of the two brothers according to his chart and the one in the most critical condition. Slipping from her grip, the blanket pools around her feet revealing long, lean legs whose definition I can just make out through her opaque black tights.
The book falls to the ground and she jumps as it hits the tiles. She turns to look down at it and I use her momentary distraction to peel away from the door. My fierce strides eat up the length of the hallway and I take the first turn, not knowing where it goes or caring. I don’t stop until I’m at my car.
I’m silent for a minute, then I beat my steering wheel until skin comes off of my knuckles. I went off-plan opening the door like that. Careless. Could have been anybody in there – other members of the mafia, members of the cartel… I didn’t expect anyone to find the bodies so fast and I didn’t expect her. I think the worst thing I did tonight was get distracted. I could have closed the door behind me, killed both Gavriil and the girl in the blink of an eye and walked out, though I had hoped I could just smother the fucker. Would displace suspicion for a few days, at least until I had time to go after the other brother. And now I’ve got a witness.
She’s seen my face, she knows the mafia, and it wouldn’t take a detective to figure out who I am. People know me in this town, people recognize me. I wouldn’t have gone into the hospital so openly at all if Knox and his woman hadn’t been here today. With their presence, mine can be written off. But this…opening the door to that room…seeing her…being seen.
I wrench my coat off and throw my guns onto the floor of the passenger’s seat. I roll out my neck, crack my fists and throw the old jalopy into gear. I drive with the windows down and the clean cut of the air clears my thoughts. I’ll go back tomorrow, and every other day to scope out the visitors, see if she’s the only one, see how much the cartel and the mafia already know. See how much she’s told them. Because there’s also a chance that tomorrow, she’ll be gone and she won’t remember my face and I won’t have to kill her.
A chance.
But I don’t hold my breath.
Dixon
It’s been three weeks and no news. No nothing. Just Mer living in the house, occupying too much space. I can’t acknowledge that Clifton and Charlie seem to like her. Feels too much like betrayal. So I content myself instead with remembering the promise Aiden made me when I was at Camelot. Though everything else from that seventy two hour period is hazy, I do remember that much. All I can do is wait for Aiden to work his way through the other names on his list before getting to her.
It’s taking him a while – uncommonly long – he’s been spending hours at a time at the hospital and elsewhere trying to find an in to off the morons that attacked me. That I attacked. One was discharged unexpectedly and spends his time holed up in a hotel two towns over. He’s not the only Mafioso there, which makes entering the place tantamount to impossible. The other one remains in the hospital where he seems to have a constant barrage of visitors, or just one, I’m not sure. Aiden was vague, which is unlike him, but I’m not worried. He always gets the job done.
I spend more time at work than ever. Normally, I’d do all this nonsense from home but my house is occupied by a squatter I can’t seem to shake, so I use the office I keep at Camelot, ass planted too many hours a day in Marguerite’s chair. Between the bar brawls, some chicks doing coke in the dressing area, and others trying to do johns in the bathrooms to make extra cash, it’s our place most deserving of my attention.
Monday morning is sunny for October and I’m squinting against the light that glint off of the storefronts, most of which are closed as this block caters to the after-five crowd. The after-fivers and the delinquents, two of which are stumbling towards Camelot’s heavy black door, likely just as drunk as I am even though it’s hardly eleven. Camelot’s not open to the public quite yet but men’s needs don’t operate on a clock – neither thirst nor hunger – and they wrench the door open while the bell above their heads jingles.
I’m half a block away and closing, and I’m surprised when the drunks don’t walk into the strip club right away but instead canter back, howling. The fatter of the two men rubs his belly salaciously as a girl walks through the door – and she isn’t one of my dancers. I curse. Maybe it’s just the glare or a product of the Jack and Coke I drank half an hour ago, but for a moment I hallucinate the slut who patched up the Russians well enough to cause me this extra headache.
Ignoring the drunks, she begins rifling through her purse though I can tell the act is perfunctory when she doesn’t pull anything out. Instead, she waits a few seconds before looking up, this time directly at me, and I know I’m not mistaken when her skinny arms drop to her sides and her lips part. She stumbles back, nearly falling out of her heels. Paired with a short green skirt, skin tight white tank top and cropped jean jacket, I can’t decide if she looks like she should be up on one of my stages or courtside at Wimbledon.
The slut from that night runs back into the building and the drunks, heeding her unspoken warning, beat it down the block away from me. They glance over their shoulders and I wonder what they see because they look at me like I’m a monster and I’m feeling monstrous as I follow the slut into the strip club.
I slam the door shut at my back and light turns to dark as the stark black walls and floor of the foyer open up to a massive space that is all bleak and tragic opulence. Like the floor, ceiling, and walls, the tables are black but the chairs are gold and so is the stage. Three gold trapezes hang from the ceiling at equal distances from one another. The girls swing on them naked each Saturday and when we have events but other than that, they’re just gaudy decoration.
Glancing at the red velvet curtains framing the gold platform, I’m reminded that my initial vision had been a burlesque bar. However, vision in a city that lacks vision turns burlesque bars into seedy dives where whores strut naked across a stage while men that could never get this close to those kinds of women can do so now…for the right price.
Right now there are no women dancing – there’s just a few guys unloading drinks behind the bar and Marcel, standing at one of those black tables while the slut speaks to him rapidly, hands making quick and frantic gestures.
Marcel has a phone in one hand and his face is wreathed in severity, but when his gaze flashes to mine the tension deflates from his arms and he laughs. “New girl nearly had me calling the cops on you, Dixon.”
He takes my hand when I approach and I follow the girl with my eyes as she shifts behind him and steps away to the next table, careful to keep its width between us. “New girl?”
Marcel lifts a brow and glances back over his shoulder. “Yeah, Donnie hired her today.” I don’t miss the way his gaze scans her up and down. A natural blonde with blue eyes and curves in all the right places, she’s the girl next door. A good hire, but not one we’re making on this day or any other.
“No, he d
idn’t,” I say, pivoting then to glare at the girl around Marcel’s broad body. “Get out.”
Her hands hold her hips and her mouth curls down into a pout. “Who the hell are you?”
Marcel barks out a laugh, which he tries to cover with his hands. Failing, he throws a thumb in my direction. “He’s the boss.”
“Boss?” She shakes her head. “I met the boss earlier. He hired me.”
“And he’ll have to suck my cock for even talking to you.” I’m not usually so vulgar, but the sight of her brings out the animal in me. She saw me at my weakest and in that moment, showed only strength. I still remember the way the blood had glittered like rubies against her white skin.
Her eyes widen, dark eyelashes arching up to touch light eyebrows. She’s wearing makeup, though not enough for a stripper. Nothing about her says stripper except for the fact she was hired as one. “You’re the owner?”
I nod.
Her lips form the word ‘shit,’ but she doesn’t speak it out loud. That irks me because she reminds me of Marguerite in that moment, who hated cursing but couldn’t keep any of the other brothers from it but me. I don’t attribute that to her though. She taught me nothing.
Marcel chuckles. “She brought some of the fire Donnie was looking for – at least that’s what he says.”
“And she can take it with her.” I turn away from them both and head towards my office.
I hear shuffling and a few hushed words spoken angrily before she shouts, “Hey! Hey, hey, hey, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said what I did but I recognized you from that night off Seventh Street and it freaked me out.” She hurries ahead of me and comes to a stop, holding up both hands as if daring me to run straight through her. “You can’t fire me though. I’ve already been hired and signed a contract.”
I curse silently, as she had, and stop in my tracks. My office door is just behind her. I’m so close and so far away and while I can at least respect her honesty – an honesty she doesn’t try to sugarcoat – it isn’t going to get her very far now. “As the owner, I have twenty-four hours to annul a hiring contract put forward by one of my subordinates if the candidate has, in some way, misrepresented themselves in their application or failed to fulfill the full terms of the hiring process.”
The girl scoffs, showing contrition poorly. “And what did I do?”
“It’s what you didn’t.” I pull out my keys and brush past her to reach the office door. Her hair smells like apple and cinnamon and autumn when she moves. I wrinkle my nose. “You didn’t complete the application.”
“I submitted my application online and interviewed with Donnie this morning.”
“I have no idea if you can dance. You didn’t complete a trial.”
“A what?”
“You didn’t dance for us. It’s part of the application and you didn’t complete it,” I say, knowing full well that this particular establishment hasn’t been able to conduct business that way since the previous owners lost the law suit against them for sexual harassment. Along with general mismanagement, it was one of the reasons they had to sell.
“Wait,” she says as I turn the key and push open the door, the stale scent of beer clashing with that of her hair and her skin, which reek of Fall. “But I prepared a routine! Donnie just didn’t ask me to do it.”
That stops me dead. “You prepared a routine?”
She nods, low lights from between the window slats cutting horizontal streaks across her face and hair. For the first time, I take a moment to actually look at her. Narrow chin, heart shaped face, dark blonde hair layered beneath the light. Long lashes blink over eyes that are sapphire blue. “Yeah. I’ll do it right now.”
Sheer disbelief makes me smirk. “Alright, let’s see it.”
“Sure.” She pushes her fingers back through her hair and I notice that it isn’t all dry and tattered at the ends like the other blondes that work for me. Blondes are more popular with this crowd and even without having seen her dance, I know she’d do well for the business. The only reason not to hire her is because of what she knows, but if she hasn’t gone to the police yet there’s no reason to think she will. Maybe I should tell Aiden to forget it altogether. Maybe not. Maybe I should call him to come in a few minutes, once I have her alone…
“Now.”
“Why not?” She shrugs and is pure confidence. Somehow, and maybe it’s just the shadows dancing over her flesh, she looks different than she did before.
She’s paved me into a corner and, unwilling to back down, I relent. Moving back out into the main room, I give her my hand to help her onto the stage. The guys at the bar cheer.
“Gentlemen, out,” I bark, and the ensuing groans commence. If I’m going to torture the girl, it’ll be a private show. “What did you choreograph your routine to?” My tone is mocking.
She doesn’t rise to it. “Do you have Wicked Games by the Weeknd?”
The choice surprises me. Any other girl would have picked top forties and she picks something dark and twisted. “I’m sure we do.” The room clears, I step into the DJ booth against the back wall and she strips off her jacket and moves towards the back of the stage. I scroll through Donnie’s iTunes until I find, not the song she likes, but one she won’t, then I grab the remote control. When I’m sure we are totally alone, I push play and take the cushioned throne reserved for high paying guests in the center of the room.
“Very funny,” she drawls, voice ripe with sarcasm.
“You can adapt, can’t you? One of the requirements of any good dancer.”
I expect her to roll her eyes, stick out her tongue – something. Instead, the fixed grin she wears widens, the one that works better than any mask because I can’t see through it. It bothers me that she uses the same coping mechanism I do. Only in reverse. My apathy to her cheer – I wonder which one comes out on top. I guess in a few minutes, I’ll find out…
“Of course,” she says with a slight nod.
“I think I’m going to enjoy this.”
She winks and I’m annoyed at the sudden sensation tugging at my lips. I’m smiling against my best efforts. “I know you will.”
“Then what are you waiting for? The stage is yours.”
Some terrible song by Flo Rida drifts through the speakers and I turn up the volume until I’m sure the bums can hear it on the street. She backs away from the stripper pole and comes at it in a run, then she leaps. She catches the pole, legs flaring out wide so I get a full glimpse of her white lace panties before her thighs clamp around the pole six feet up.
She works her way higher and higher, then drops all at once, hair grazing the gold stage below. She plants her hands, rises up to stand and as she looks at me with flushed cheeks I’m thankful only that my mouth is closed. The girl actually knows how to dance.
I don’t swallow. I don’t betray any emotion. I don’t want her to know just how right she was about everything and I don’t want her to think that this will change my decision. It won’t. It can’t. Far too much is at stake for me to be swayed by the sight of her twisting around the stripper pole, hips moving with a rhythm most white girls can’t touch. Worse, most strippers dance dead-eyed and make sure not to meet any of the customers’ gazes directly but hers doesn’t let up.
She spins, landing with her back against the pole and while her hair flies around her shoulders, settling against her cheeks, she looks at me and smiles in a way that makes me feel fully exposed even though I’m the one fully clothed and still seated.
“You know you have to take your clothes off at some point, right?” I hack out in an effort to unseat her.
She doesn’t so much as blink. “I’m getting to that.” She slides into a split then, moving onto her back, lifts both legs and crosses them at the ankles. Like this, I get a full view of her panties. They cup her perfect ass and if I pulled them aside an inch, I’d see pussy.
The thought makes my mind wander, wondering what it looks like. Does she hav
e a big clit or a tiny one? What about pussy lips that I can suck all the way into my mouth? I close my eyes for a moment and in the darkness I hear the pounding of my own heart over the sound of the bass and the beat of the treble. I’ve got an erection that makes me feel like a boy because even though I’ve owned Camelot for the past nine years, I’ve never been affected like this by a dancer. Watching her on stage now, I realize I’m not teaching this slut a lesson. It’s the other way around.
On her knees, she lowers her skirt to the stage and kicks it over the platform’s edge when she stands. Pulling herself up on the pole, she bends backward towards me, her leg the only thing holding her up. Forming a perfect U, she strips her shirt off over her head and lets it fall in a loose ring around her hair.
She twists twice more around the pole and I only get a complete picture when she steps in front of it and spreads her legs. She dips her hips and I try to think of painful things, because my cock is an angry pressure against my belt and I don’t have a second to rearrange it with her watching me like that. The girl’s in all white lace and looks like a virginsaintangelsiren and both all wrong and entirely right standing against so much gold and black.
“Stop,” I say, turning down the music. Another song has come on but I can’t remember when the last one ended.
She smiles at me and swings around the pole. With her head tilted to the side, and her ankles crossed, she says, “Had enough?”
The storm in my belly rumbles hungrily. She’ll pay for that one. “You’re not finished yet.”
“I’m happy to continue.”
“You will. Down here. I need to see if you can do a lap dance comfortably,” I say, words leaping from my lips before my mind fully forms the concepts. I just want to make her cringe, make her uncomfortable in the way that I am. It isn’t working.
“Sure thing.”
“Full nude,” I add.
“I wouldn’t have expected anything less. It’s a strip club, after all.” She winks in a way that does nothing to alleviate the tension in my groin and steps to the very edge of the stage.
The Hunting Town (Brothers Book 1) Page 12
