by Stacy Gail
Chapter Five
Despite being the weekend, midafternoon at The Toy Box wasn’t that much to write home about when Nikita wasn’t up on the stage. Kyle stifled a wistful sigh as he let his eyes adjust to the cavelike lighting inside the strip club. The door swung shut behind him as Nikita paused at his side, in a bright yellow dress with a black belt, and black heels that he knew she could run in better than most people ran in sneakers. For just a second his gaze lingered on the belt before he followed her gesture toward the bar, and he swallowed the urge to ask her if things like belts aggravated her belly piercing. He’d seen the jewelry before; when it came to showing her body, Nikita wasn’t what anyone would call shy. But he’d never been as painfully aware of it as he was now. Nor had he ever suffered the need to toy with it with his tongue the way he was at that moment.
And dear God, he wasn’t even going to think about how she’d fit into his palm.
“Don’t touch anything in here, Kyle. It might be sticky.” With a quick nod to the bald, tattoo-covered man behind the bar, she headed toward a dimly lit hall all but hidden in the club’s shadows. “I only have one bottle of hand sanitizer in my purse and we’re both going to need it.”
“I’m not exactly a hands-on kind of guy.” Except when it came to her. He could be a hands-on guy morning, noon and night, and the worst kick in the teeth about that thought was that Nikita would be all for it. If she had a sexual itch, she was more than willing to let him scratch it. Or, for that matter, anyone else who happened to grab her attention. Not that he was a prude, and heaven knew he was no choirboy when it came to that sort of thing. But they’d known each other for years. They could even be called friends, in a weird sort of way. Sex with Nikita should be more than just...sex. Sex between long-time sort-of friends shouldn’t be scratching an itch. If a person was going to take a relationship into deeper waters, then it should be for a more profound reason other than being horny.
Damn it all, he didn’t want to be the sex equivalent of a back-scratcher.
“Kyle?”
Blinking, he looked around and realized he’d walked into a closet-sized office with stale air, overflowing desks and a pair of pocket-sized men who appeared to be identical in a Bizarro-World, opposite kind of way. “Yes?”
She gave him a funny look. “As I said, Dibby and Dodie Beirs are the two men you need to talk to about Bambi. She didn’t come in for her paycheck yesterday, Dodie?” Nikita looked to the twin with the bad platinum dye job, while the dark-haired one slumped behind his disaster of a desk.
“Nope, and she missed Friday night, which usually garners more in cold hard cash for the girls than a week’s worth of pay.” He nodded to his sad-sack brother. “Dibby wants to call the police.”
“Might as well, though they already know she’s missing.” Nikita stepped back through the office’s threshold, giving Kyle full rein of the tiny space. “As it happens, Bambi missed a court date along with forgetting to pick up a paycheck, so Kyle’s been called in to hunt her down.”
The dark-haired brother, Dibby, lifted a hangdog face to Kyle. “You’re a bounty hunter too? What the hell is it with you people? Is there some sort of weird rule about being ten feet tall to do your job?”
Kyle shrugged. “Believe it or not, it helps. Comes in handy when I’m looking over large crowds.”
“I’ll leave you gentlemen to it.” Nikita backpedaled down the hall with a wave. “Now that we’re here, I might as well make sure I didn’t leave anything behind in the back.”
“The offer’s still open for you to work the poles, Nikita,” Dodie said, coming halfway out of his seat as she retreated. “And the way you handled those cuffs makes me think you’d make a great Domme. There’s no law that says you can’t have two careers—”
“Nikita. Isn’t. For. Sale.” The office’s lighting flickered ominously, and Kyle thanked his lucky stars Nikita was too busy vanishing down the hall to notice. The sooner she was out of Dodie’s calculatingly lecherous sight, the better. “Do me a favor, pal. Don’t insult the lady by asking that again. What you should do—and I suggest you do it right now—is put her out of your mind. Permanently.”
With a swift glance toward the light overhead, Dodie’s expression turned mutinous. “What insult? She’s a multitalented woman who could make a lot of money. And don’t think for a second that you can come rolling into my office and tell me what I can and can’t say, you goddamn—”
“Don’t.” With a harsh sigh, Dibby scrubbed his hands over his face as if he wanted to erase the tension there. “Give it a rest, Dodie, all right? That chick bounty hunter isn’t the point.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Bambi is missing. Missing, you asshole. Don’t you care?”
Dodie sorely looked like he wanted to say no. Then he hunched into his chair and glared at Kyle. “Do what you gotta do, and get the hell out of here. Unlike Nikita, I never want to see your face back here, you got that?”
“You won’t see either of us back here after today, so enjoy her presence—from afar—while you can.” Dismissing Dodie from his vision as the unimportant slug he was, Kyle crammed his irritation down before he blew The Toy Box’s fuses. “So, Bambi and her missed court date. Know anything about it?”
“That prostitution bust was nothing more than a misunderstanding,” Dibby said, his expression an odd mix of chagrin and outrage. “Bambi is a sweet girl.”
“Is Bambi her stage name?”
Dibby shook his head. “She’s the only one around here who uses her real name as her stage name. People just sort of assume no one would name their kid Bambi.”
“It is unusual.”
“Her parents are granola-chomping hippie academics. She came down here from Athens, Georgia partly to get away from the hoity-toity college-town atmosphere, and partly on the promise of being a model at a great new agency. Of course, that turned out to be some internet come-on. She’s so wet behind the ears she didn’t even realize she’d been suckered into a frigging pimp’s stable until she had no idea how to get out. I was trying like hell to help her find her feet again. We all were.”
“Some were trying harder than others.” Dodie gave his brother a long-suffering look. “Dibby, this guy doesn’t give a crap about Bambi’s hard-luck story, all right? He’s not a judge, or a cop, or even a frickin’ priest. He’s a bounty hunter. Don’t waste his time with trivial bullshit.”
“Nothing’s trivial to me.” With Nikita’s warning to not touch anything ringing in his ears, Kyle hooked his thumbs into the pocket of his shorts and leaned against the office’s open doorway. “I have no idea where to start looking for your girl, so anything you can tell me about her is a potential lead. What food she likes to eat, if she drinks or does drugs, what her favorite music is, habits she might have that caught your attention...anything at all.”
Dibby’s fleshy mouth tightened. “She’s a good girl. No drugs.”
“She likes vodka.” Dodie shrugged. “The good stuff, according to our bartender. Then again, who doesn’t like the good stuff? Guess that’s why you’ve got your eye on Nikita.”
Frying this jerk’s ass was fast becoming a viable option. “The focus is Bambi. I need to know where to pick up her trail.”
Dibby nailed Kyle with a glower. “What, so you can hunt Bambi down like an animal?”
Kyle tried not to snort at the obvious joke. “I thought you wanted her found.”
“I do. Damn it, I do.” He ran a distracted hand over his careful comb-over. “I’ll even put up a reward for anyone who finds her, if that’s what it takes.”
His brother’s head shot up. “Dibby, what the fuck—”
“It’ll come out of my own pocket, so shut the hell up,” he fired back before his brother could have an apoplectic seizure. “I just know in my gut something bad has happened to her. At least if you turn her i
n, I’ll know she’s alive and in a relatively safe place.”
“I take it you and Bambi are close?”
“She’s my girlfriend,” he announced with no small amount of pride. Out of the corner of his eye, Kyle made note of Dodie’s eye-roll. “There’s an age gap, sure, but when we’re together it doesn’t matter. Bambi wouldn’t just disappear on me like this. She would have called by now.”
“She sure as hell wouldn’t have missed her paycheck,” Dodie added, clearly trying to give what support he could to his twin without choking. “I’m with Dibby on this—she should’ve turned up by now.”
Kyle nodded. “Do you and Bambi live together, or does she have any roommates I could talk to?”
“She sometimes stays with me, sometimes rooms with one of the other girls,” Dodie offered before Dibby could answer. “Annie, I think. Or Wanda, maybe? I don’t know, you’d have to ask the girls. They go by the stage names of Blu Velvet and The Wand Mistress, if that helps.”
Kyle bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing. The Wand Mistress was almost as awesome as Sparkle Spanksalot. “Could I have their numbers? Or better still, are they working now so I could interview them?”
“Wanda’s been sick and won’t be in until this evening—The Wand Mistress is one of our main attractions—but Annie’s around now. She should be backstage, I think.”
Something froze in Kyle before he clamped his mouth down on an exasperated curse. No wonder Nikita had been so happy to disappear. With a week under her belt at The Toy Box she no doubt had all the information she needed to be three steps ahead of him already.
Damn that woman.
* * *
Backstage at The Toy Box had always reminded Nikita of the dressing area found in any ordinary high school auditorium—with the exception of the pasties, tassels and various whips and chains as props. The scents of hairspray, powder and makeup were heavy in the air, along with costumes that could use the attention of a good dry cleaner. But the atmosphere, along with the lighting, was much more pleasant than the strip joint’s public space, and Nikita pushed through the door without knocking.
A row of lockers lined the left wall, while the rest of the room was taken up by mirrors, makeup stations and a couple racks of deflated-looking outfits covered in sequins and feathers. A couple women were helping another get into an outfit that looked like it had a peacock theme going on, while another was seated at one of the makeup stations, swathed in a cheap blue satin robe as she pulled off inch-long false eyelashes. Without hesitating, Nikita strolled over to the chair next to the woman removing her makeup and made herself comfortable.
“Well, well.” The woman’s eyes were a gold-green hazel and as hard as river pebbles. “Look who’s back—it’s the punk-ass liar masquerading as a barmaid. I don’t have any warrants out on me, if you’re looking to cash in. Contrary to popular belief, not all strippers have rap sheets.”
“Relax, Blu. I’m here on a mission of mercy.”
“Mercy. Now there’s an interesting concept. I hear it shows up in works of fiction.” Plucking a wipe out of a round plastic tub on the vanity, she began to scrub the scarlet off her mouth. “What do you want?”
“Your real name, for starters. Why not start off on a friendly note? You know I’m Nikita, and yes, I am a bounty hunter from Little Havana. And you’re...?”
“Uninterested in whatever bullshit you’re trying to peddle this time around.”
Nikita sighed. Blu had always struck her as someone harder than the Rock of Gibraltar. Damn her instincts for being right. “Are you pissed off that I’m not a stripper? Because frankly, while being an amateur, I still think I did a pretty decent job of your chosen profession.”
“Chosen profession.” The acidic sneer in the woman’s tone should have peeled the rest of her stage makeup off without the aid of a wipe. “Aren’t you cute, making it sound like stripping is one of those jobs a kid would pick out on Career Day.”
“Then what’s your problem?”
“My problem is that I hate liars.”
Nikita nodded. “Believe it or not, I do too. I hate liars in the worst way.”
“That’s rich, coming from you. When I meet people, I’m stupid enough to respect them by accepting them at face value. You came in here as if you were one of us, only to turn around and show you were doing whatever you could to get what you wanted.” An angry huff escaped her before she turned back to the mirror to resume her scrubbing. “Just like everyone else on the planet.”
“Like your roommate, Bambi Dominguez? Do you think she took off on her own after using you and The Toy Box to get whatever it was she wanted?”
“Aha. So that’s why you’re here.” With her face now devoid of stage makeup, Blu could have almost passed for a teen, but that hard disillusionment in her gaze gave her away. “I have to admit, if I had known what kind of a girl Bambi really was, I wouldn’t have agreed to split an apartment with her. She’s even worse than you.”
“Wow, that bad. Does she eat puppies for breakfast?”
“Bitch.” But there was no heat behind it as Blu shrugged an irritated shoulder. “In a world full of phonies, Bambi is the phoniest. She comes off as this little innocent, you know? Big doll eyes and the air of a lost child. But it’s an act she pulls on and off like one of these cheap costumes.”
Sweet and helpless. Throughout history more than one woman had bent the male mind to her will by employing those stealth weapons. “Dibby believes he’s in a serious relationship with Bambi.”
“Bitch, please. Dibby’s like any other man—easily led around by his penis.”
That hit uncomfortably close to what Kyle accused her of doing, and it brought a frown to her face. “A real manipulator, is she?”
“Manipulation’s a habit most self-serving personalities possess—something I’m sure you know all about,” she added with a saccharine-sweet smile before shrugging. “All I know is that Bambi is one smart cookie who likes to keep her options open. Yes, when she first showed up she basically put herself in Dibby’s hands and let him do whatever he wanted. As a result, she got the best costumes, the best work schedule, the best special assignments.”
“Special assignments? I know I wasn’t here that long, but I’ve never heard that phrase before.”
“Well, you wouldn’t, as a waitress. But if you’re up onstage and there’s a VIP in the audience, the brothers steer some of the girls in their direction to ‘entertain’ them.”
Nikita was surprised at how disappointed she was. “So the Beirs brothers are into prostitution.”
“They’re very careful to point out that they’re not forcing anyone into an assignment, and they don’t get paid anything extra for this service. What the brothers want is a happy and loyal customer who’ll tell his friends about this club. But as far as I’m concerned, giving Bambi the cream of the VIP crop backfired on the boss. He put her in the perfect position to trade up.”
The light went on. “She hooked up with somebody who’s a better prospect than Dibby, huh? Is Dibby aware of that?”
“I haven’t told him, and I doubt Bambi did, either. Like I said, that girl likes to keep her options open.”
“Who’d she hook up with?”
“You know that state senator guy? Floyd Hardy?”
Nikita’s jaw almost hit her lap. “That scarlet-faced tent revival preacher dude who won a seat in the senate last year? The guy who wants to save us all from our sinful ways by making bikinis and stilettos illegal? Him?”
Blu seesawed her hand. “Not him exactly. His son, Paul. And let me tell you, if Daddy is on a rabid crusade to outlaw everything he considers sinful, the first place he needs to start is at home. His boy Paul is off the hook when it comes to breaking Commandments. S and M, drugs, orgies...you name it, he’s done it.”
“A lot of
PKs—preacher’s kids—enjoy a rebellious dip in forbidden waters.” Nikita nodded, feeling a flash of sympathy for the younger Hardy. “There’s no better way to spit in your radically conservative father’s eye than to date an exotic dancer.”
“Exactly. Screwing Daddy while screwing Bambi. The rush must be epic.”
“Do you think Paul and Bambi are together now?”
“Probably. And I hope they stay together.” Blu pushed out of her seat to make her way to her locker, where she shrugged out of the robe and began to dress. “With Bambi gone, I have the apartment all to myself. She’s paid up until next month, so I’m not going to worry about her until the rent is due. That’s her locker there,” she added, nodding her head at the one on the end before she zipped up a pair of jeans. “I think Dibby’s already been through it, but since you’re here you might as well see if there’s anything useful there.”
Nikita made a beeline for it. “You’re being awfully helpful, considering you hate my lying little self. What changed your mind?”
“My mind isn’t changed. I just want to make sure I don’t have to talk to you again.” She slung a utilitarian backpack over one shoulder, looking for all the world like a college student suffering the grumpies over a bad grade. “Any other questions?”
“None.” As the other woman headed for the door, Nikita opened Bambi’s locker. “Have a good life, Blu.”
The other woman paused when Nikita would have bet her surfboard she’d breeze out without a backward glance. “It’s Annie. And thanks, I guess.”
What a ray of sunshine, Nikita thought once she was alone. At least with a forthright personality like Blu-Annie’s, she knew where she stood. But the same obviously couldn’t be said for Bambi Dominguez. A frown pulled Nikita’s dark brows together as she sifted through Bambi’s things. No doubt the missing woman was manipulating Dibby Beirs by showing him the face he wanted to see. But leading him around by the dick...
Her frown deepened into a scowl. She was an idiot for comparing her situation to Bambi and Dibby’s. The relationship between Kyle and herself was a completely different animal. From what her roommate said, Bambi was a human leech. Her main goal in life was to get as much as she could out of whatever sucker she’d latched onto, whereas Nikita wanted nothing from Kyle.
