“Yes.” Eryn pulled her own sidearm free and pushed it under her seat. To his surprise, she drew a telescoping baton from her right boot and placed the weapon under the seat as well. “I thought I would have to tell you that.”
Callan shook his head. “Yesterday, Toby took Daniel and the rest of us out to dinner as part of the bachelor party package. I noticed the restaurants and bars don’t allow concealed weapons unless you’re law enforcement. And most of them check.” He opened the door and got out.
“There’re too many crazies in this town not to be careful.”
When the young valet came over in his ill-fitting vest, Callan handed him the necessary payment and added a twenty-dollar tip. “Keep it close.”
The valet brushed the hair out of his eyes and nodded.
Callan waited on traffic at the street. Impatience stirred in him like a live thing. The pain in Jenny’s voice haunted him. Tense and overly alert, he started just a little when Eryn stepped up beside him and put her arm through his. He looked at her.
She nodded at the club. “It’ll be better if we act like a couple while we try to go in. You draw more attention if you’re a single guy.”
Feeling her fingers curled against his forearm, Callan knew he liked her touch more than he should. He was paying attention to her and not to the job at hand. She was splitting his focus. “You visit many strip clubs?”
“I’ve been to a few.” She didn’t back down from him and held his gaze steadily. “Always on the job. I get tasked to provide close-in cover to high rollers who are male. Most guys seem to have a one-track mind when it comes to recreation time. But the worst experience I’ve ever had—when the whale I was with was tossed out of one of the finer gentlemen’s clubs in the city and arrested—was when I was bodyguarding a woman.”
That surprised Callan.
“What happened?”
“She got drunk, propositioned some of the dancers and ended up taking the stage for an impromptu strip routine. She was high on something and I couldn’t handle her. Her friends got into a fight with me, then the club bouncers. We all got tossed and arrested by the police.” Eryn frowned. “It was the first time I spent the night in gen pop. That’s general population, if you didn’t know.”
“I knew. I was locked up a few times before I joined the military. Usually for fighting and for being where I shouldn’t have been.”
“Bad boy?”
Callan shook his head. “I aged out of the foster homes and ended up losing touch with Jenny for a while. I didn’t know what to do with myself.” He shrugged. “At least here you have a cell. A bed. Heat. Meals. That’s a lot better than some of the places I’ve been locked up. Breaking the law is better than being a political prisoner or a suspected spy.” He glanced at her before she could ask anything. “You said that was the first time you spent the night in lockup.”
She dodged the question by pulling him into motion. They trotted across the street between patchy traffic.
Despite the fact that they were here looking for Daniel’s kidnappers, Callan couldn’t help but be interested in Eryn’s background. She’d surprised him on several levels. What was even more surprising was the effect of the continued exposure to her.
Purple neon letters proclaiming Bare Essentials scrawled across the wall near the doorway. Smaller pink neon letters underneath added A Fine Gentleman’s Club. Ladies Welcome.
Two bouncers worked the door. One took cash or plastic while the other used a wand to search for guns and knives. They were polite but they didn’t talk much.
As he paid their way in, Callan studied the men’s forearms, looking for the flying hawk with the knife tattoo. Both of the men wore skin art, but neither of them had a hawk tattoo.
Once their hands were stamped, Callan took the lead while Eryn held on to his arm. Near the door, he heard and felt the heavy basso booms of rock music pulsing through the audio system. He opened the door and stepped into the smoke-filled room beyond.
Chapter 12
Bare Essentials had a feature stage and two satellite platforms. The majority of the seating was in front of the main stage while the two satellite platforms were set up so attendees only got glimpses of the other girls.
On the main stage, a young hard-bodied woman worked the pole like an Olympic athlete. The mirrored wall behind her picked up her reflection and color from the colored lamps overhead and mounted in the floor. She looked like a plastic toy and the futuristic ensemble she was currently peeling out of didn’t help. Still, Callan hadn’t seen women like those in a club in a long time. Around the stage, men and women hooted, hollered and whistled. Dollar bills rained on the stage floor as the dancer bumped and ground through her routine.
The cocktail waitresses were covered a little more than the dancers, but not much. One of them walked by him carrying a tray filled with drinks. He stepped back and let her pass.
Before he recovered, a young woman dressed only in pasties, panties and a bright red kimono approached him. Her features were Asian and she didn’t look like she was out of her teens. “Hi, handsome. Would you like a lap dance?”
Eryn spoke up before Callan could reply. “Not right now, thanks.”
The dancer took the refusal with a smile that never touched her eyes. “Sure. When you change your mind, just let me know. I’m on all night. My name is Mulan. Couples are a pleasure for me. I’ll show you a good time.”
In disbelief, Callan watched the young woman go.
Eryn pulled on his arm to get him moving again. “Come on. You’re embarrassing me. You’re acting like you’ve never been in a strip club before.”
“I’ve never been to one in the United States, and I’ve never been to one overseas when I wasn’t working.”
Surprise lifted her eyebrows as she guided him to a tiny table in the corner. “Why not?”
“Hanging out in strip clubs didn’t put food on the table. Later, strip clubs didn’t teach you anything about staying alive in the field.” Callan pulled out her chair and let her sit. “I had other things to do.”
“Most guys find a way to fit strip clubs into their schedule.”
Callan sat across from her and started marking the positions of the club’s bouncers. “I count three security guys.”
A cocktail waitress came over to stand by Callan. She smiled and placed coasters on the table. “Hi. What would you like?”
Callan ordered a draft and Eryn had the same. The cocktail waitress left the table.
Troubled, Callan studied Eryn for a moment. “That woman offered the two of us a lap dance.”
“So? For a lot of these women, crashing a strip club is just a lark. Something to do with their friends. For others it’s a sexual thing. Believe it or not, Callan, some women are just as interested in women as men are.”
“Sure. I get that. Sex is a function. You don’t need opposite genders to make it work.”
“Well, don’t hesitate to take all the romance out of it.”
Embarrassed, Callan shook his head. “Romance is not the same as sex. Point of fact, I think there’s more sex out in the world than there is romance.”
Eryn smiled. “You’re a surprising guy, Callan.”
That embarrassed him even more and he didn’t know why. His face felt hot and he knew he should be concentrating on figuring out if one of the bouncers had the hawk tattoo on his wrist.
He looked at her, and his next words were out there before he could stop himself. “You said you used to dance.”
Eryn drew back then, taking her arms from the table and dropping them into her lap. “Dance, Callan. That was all. You can work in these clubs and just dance.”
“Sure.” Callan wished he understood what it was about the woman that made him want to know so much about her. “Did you ever—” Thankfully, he stopped himself.
“What? Lap dance with couples?”
Callan shook his head. He seriously did not want to know. Or, rather, he didn’t want her to tell him. He regretted wha
tever impulsive curiosity had made him speak. She was beautiful, and now all of a sudden he was remembering her as she’d looked in that devil costume and the image was driving him to distraction. “Forget I asked. It’s none of my business.”
She folded her arms. “I wasn’t going to answer that anyway. And you’re right. It’s none of your business.”
For a moment, uncomfortable silence stretched out between them. The cocktail waitress returned with the beers. Callan paid her and added a generous tip, but not so much that she’d be inclined to hover around the table. He closed his hand around the cold bottle just to soak up the chill for a moment, but he wasn’t going to drink it.
He nodded at the closest bartender. “We need to see what those guys know about Invincible Security.”
“If they gave lap dances, checking them out would be a lot easier.”
Callan got up from the table. “I’ll be back in a minute.” He zigzagged through the staggered tables toward the bouncer standing at the end of the bar. Inside the strip club, he felt out of his element.
It was time to flip the script, get the game back to something he knew. His heartbeat slowed a little as he entered his zone.
Apprehension twisted like a fish on a hook in Eryn’s stomach as she watched Callan. She had no idea what he was going to do, and he was too big, too threatening, to move through the club without being noticed. She started to go after him, but she figured that the two of them walking through the room in a hurry would attract serious attention.
Callan chatted the guy up for a moment, then moved on. Since the bouncer wore a T-shirt and his arms were bare from the biceps down, Eryn assumed Callan had easily discovered the man didn’t have the hawk tattoo.
Other people noticed Callan walking through the club as well. Women’s heads turned, and a few of the men. Vegas was a playground for indulging in all kinds of kinks.
Mulan, the dancer, dropped by the table while a new woman took the stage. She smiled at Eryn. “Are you and your friend ready for that dance now?”
Eryn shook her head. “Not yet. Sorry.” As she looked at the younger woman, she remembered what dancing had been like, the long hours that had drained her and the lack of real support from her coworkers and management. It wasn’t like that for all dancers. Renee actually seemed to enjoy what she did for the most part, and her pay every month was more than Eryn brought home from CyberStealth.
“A man like that, you better keep your eye on him to make sure some girl don’t snatch him up.”
“He’s looking for a friend.” An idea occurred to Eryn. “Maybe you can help me.”
Mulan shrugged. “Maybe.”
“My friend is looking for the Invincible Security guys. He’s trying to set up a job interview.” That sounded logical, didn’t it? Especially given Callan’s physique and intensity.
“He’d fit right in with those guys.”
“Do you know them?”
The young woman rolled her eyes theatrically. “Girl, everybody in this club knows Invincible Security. They are crazy, get into fights sometimes, but they tip good. That’s the only reason the owner still lets them come in.”
“Have they been around tonight?”
“I haven’t seen them, but the night’s young, you know? They may come rolling in after midnight. Sometimes they do. They work weird hours, too.”
“Yeah.” Eryn reached into her pants pocket and took out her only twenty-dollar bill. She handed it to the young woman.
“Sorry I couldn’t help you more, but you might want to talk to Bobby.”
“Bobby?”
“The older bartender. He’s pretty tight with the Invincible guys. He’s got some kind of history with them. Girlfriend, wife. Something like that.”
“Okay, thanks.” Excitement flared through Eryn as she surveyed the bartender.
The man looked Native American, big and broad chested. He had long black hair tied back in a ponytail. The flat planes of his features made his face look as if it had been carved from stone. He wore a long-sleeved dove-gray shirt tucked into black pants that showed off his trim backside.
Even though he was busy, he must have felt Eryn’s direct gaze on him. He looked over to her and stared into her eyes without blinking. He had no expression. A gold chain glinted at the open throat of his shirt. One of the cocktail waitresses walked up with a drink order and distracted him.
Eryn looked around for Callan and didn’t see him. She got up from the table and walked over to the bar. She had to squeeze in between two guys, then she had to wait until he acknowledged her.
“Something I can get for you?” His voice was a pleasant baritone. He held a bar towel in one hand and leaned over the bar to listen more closely.
“I was told this was one of Invincible Security’s hangouts.”
“Who told you that?”
Frustrated, Eryn shook her head.
Bobby gave her a knowing grin that was pure insolence. “It’s been real great talking to you, but I got a job to do. Drinks don’t get made and bills don’t get paid while I’m standing around talking. You want something to drink?”
“I’ve got a beer at my table.”
“Let your server know when you want another one.” Bobby strode to the end of the bar where two servers impatiently waited.
Taking a breath, Eryn tried to figure out her next step. She gazed at the mirror and took in her reflection for a moment. She looked tired and her eyes were red. Stacked up against the silicon-enhanced nymphets in the club, she felt definitely out-classed.
No, not outclassed. Outmatched. That thought only made her feel better for a moment.
Pictures were shoved haphazardly into the frame around the mirror. She had to strain, but she could make out photos of the bartender hanging with guys dressed in the black commando uniforms Invincible Security was known for.
Curiosity and the feeling that she was about to get a break if she was brave enough to reach out and take it, Eryn glanced around the club. Callan was nowhere to be seen. The thought that he might be chatting up one of the dancers selling lap dances agitated Eryn, but she told herself that wouldn’t happen. Callan was like a guided missile when he started working, and right now he was looking for his future brother-in-law.
You are thinking about him way too much. Get it together.
Taking a quick gulp of air to muster her courage, and a split second to tell herself that Daniel Steadman’s life was in danger and what she was about to do was worth the risk, Eryn darted to the other end of the bar and walked behind it. The bartender remained engaged with flirting with the cocktail servers. Evidently he was a popular guy. When Eryn saw the bartender quietly dip his hand into a pocket and slide a glassine packet across the bar to one of the girls, the reason for the popularity was immediately apparent.
Switching her attention to the pictures mounted on the mirror, Eryn quickly scanned them. The bartender was in nearly all of them. Most of them were of him and celebrities that had been through the bar. Others were of the bartender and some of the dancers. But some of them were of the bartender and the Invincible Security crew.
Those had been taken in a shooting range. The bartender stood with a pistol in his fist and wearing a cocky grin while the young hard guys that made up Invincible Security flanked him.
A dark-haired young woman who could have been the bartender’s sister or cousin was in a lot of the pictures as well. The link could have been through a person, not just the drugs. Or one of those connections strengthened the ties of the other.
The woman showed up in a handful of other pictures, always in the company of the Invincible Security guys. In one of the other photos, the dark-haired woman was joined by two more women. One had cinnamon-colored hair but Eryn couldn’t see her face as she’d turned to look at the guys behind her.
The third woman in the picture was a pretty woman with her fair hair cut in a bob. Dressed in a gown over bikini panties and no bra in sight, she was wrapped in the arms of one of the Invincibl
e guys. His arm was draped casually around the woman’s neck and his wrist was turned outward just enough to spot the hawk tattoo.
Eryn’s pulse quickened as she stared at the man. He was unknown to her, but he was obviously known to the dark-haired woman that knew the bartender. Six degrees of separation. Kevin Bacon was probably in the pipeline as well.
Studying the photograph more closely, Eryn determined that they were at a party at a strip club. Eryn had been to a couple of those with Renee. Looking at the male stripper’s overly developed body, she couldn’t help noticing the difference between the way he looked and the way Callan had looked while changing clothes earlier. The stripper’s physique was for show, glossed and pampered. Callan’s body was a tool, hard and edged from grinding work and difficult circumstances. And she doubted the stripper had a single gunshot wound or knife scar.
Not that those were sexy, but Eryn thought she liked them on Callan. They showed he was seasoned and real, and that he made mistakes and didn’t let them stand in his way of getting things done. Eryn respected that. They all made mistakes along the way that cost them and shaped them.
She discovered she’d made another mistake now when the bartender’s reflection stepped into view behind her.
“What do you think you’re doing?” His face was a snarling mask of rage.
Eryn turned, searching desperately for some excuse for why she was behind the bar. None came to mind.
In the next instant, the bartender wrapped a big hand around her neck with crushing force. He squeezed and shut her wind down to a whistle. She slammed her hand inside his elbow in an effort to break his grip as she’d been taught. His arm barely moved. When she tried to kick him, he turned his hip and caught her foot against his thigh.
The bartender laughed, but there was no humor in the sound. “You made a big mistake, little girl, and now you’re gonna pay for it.”
Vision blackening around the edges, Eryn bent her knees and let her weight drag the man’s arm down in an attempt to get free. He maintained his hold and followed her down. He’d gotten too close and gotten hold of her. Those were two mistakes she’d made. Her self-defense classes had been just that: self-defense. She wasn’t a kung fu monk capable of fighting ninjas. But she was resourceful. She reached into her pocket for her keys. If she could fist them between her fingers, she would saw the bartender’s arm off if she had to.
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