Insatiable 2

by J. D. Hawkins

  So tonight, after Crutcher beats Miller in an upset, a big win for me for sure, when Tyler tells me that some kid is in for $10,000 and has disappeared, I tell him he’s got to have it wrong. “I would never have let Jamie McEntire run up that kind of tab,” I say. “I’ve seen him around. I wouldn’t give him ten dollars, let alone ten thousand.” When I took over running fight night two years ago, I did a little cleanup from the mess my predecessor left. No five- or six- figure debts to people we don’t know, no credit to anyone who’s welched more than once. We may be an underground operation, but there are standards. There’s also a dress code: women in heels, men in collared shirts, and our crowd is the type who likes to drop a lot of money on both. We have security guards. The bartender will call you a cab if you get too drunk. I run a tight ship. Even the police think so. That’s why they don’t hassle me. Sometimes they even take a try in the ring.

  Tyler shrugs. “It’s been gradual. Losses on a couple fights, loans to cover him,” he says. “I hate to be the bearer of bad news. But I double checked the ledger, and it adds up.”

  “Fuck me,” I say, and a blond woman in high heels and a dress so tight she must not have exhaled all night turns toward us. She raises an eyebrow at me, smiles like she might take me up on the offer.

  And with the way she wraps her mouth around the neck of that beer bottle, keeping her eyes locked on mine as she takes a drink, I might just let her.

  Tyler’s voice yanks me back to the problem at hand. “So what do you want to do?” he says. “He’s offered his house as collateral.”

  I shake my head. “This isn’t a swap meet.” Sometimes people think that just because I run an illegal fighting circuit and betting ring, I must be dishonest or inattentive to keeping the books, or maybe just dumb. So they try to take advantage of me occasionally. They think I won’t notice or care if they siphon a little cash or don’t pay in full or don’t pay at all, that I’m just a guy who made his money beating the shit out of strangers while debutantes and their dates made their bets. All brawn and no brains. But they’re wrong.

  In the ring, I didn’t mind being underestimated. It helped me win. Some spectators think when you look like me, tall, muscular, broad-shouldered, you won’t be agile enough to dodge a right hook. So they bet against you. They don’t realize those muscles aren’t just for showing off to the female members of the crowd—not that I minded when they noticed. Those hard biceps mean you’re strong, and those washboard abs make you quick, and it all adds up to making my bank account big.

  But as the boss outside the ring, I can’t have people not take me seriously. The Armani suits I wear on fight nights look damn good on me but they don’t come cheap, so when I loan money I expect to get it back when the handshake said I would. It’s only fair. I’ve got a reputation to protect, not to mention a legitimate business career to support, owning two of Atlanta’s most popular nightclubs, a cocktail lounge, and Altitude, a bar some buddies and I run together. I got to the top flying like a butterfly in the ring, but I stay there because I sting like a bee outside it.

  And Jamie McEntire’s about to feel what I mean.

  “You know where this kid’s house is?” I say, clapping Tyler on the shoulder. He nods. “Good,” I say. “You’re driving then. Grab Valero and let him know that as soon as this crowd clears, we’re making a visit.”

  Tyler leaves, and the woman in the tight dress with the lucky beer bottle approaches. The dip of her neckline is as low as her skirt is short. “Someone should wash your mouth out,” she says.

  “Sorry if I offended your delicate sensibilities,” I say, smiling. We’re at an underground bare-knuckles fight. Fuck is hardly the most offensive thing she’s been exposed to tonight.

  “Not at all,” she says. “I like a man who talks dirty.” She takes a sip from the bottle, tipping it toward me. “Want some?”

  I don’t think she just means the beer.

  Over her shoulder, behind her in the crowd, I see a guy in a decent-looking grey suit. He’s standing with a few other people but his attention is clearly fixed on her, watching. I tilt the bottle back toward her with my index finger. “Who are you here with?”

  “No one special,” she says, taking a step toward me. “Unless you want some company.”

  Women. They smell good, they look good, they taste good, but they can be so bad for you.

  I’ve been Grey Suit back there. Even in the shadows of the warehouse I can read the look on his face, the narrowed eyes, slightly turned down mouth. He’s a guy who knows that just because he’s the one who’s taking this girl out tonight it doesn’t mean he’s going home with her. Back when I was fighting, my girlfriend at the time used the hours I was knocking guys’ blocks off to get her rocks off. She even slept with some of my opponents, who I beat anyway, but still—I don’t know if she was just bored or mean, didn’t love me or herself or both, but when we broke up two years ago, I swore off relationships. My motto is get in and get out, in all ways possible.

  So Tight Dress standing in front of me, just the right size to straddle my lap in the front seat of my Audi, would usually be the perfect ending to a night.

  But I can’t abide dishonesty, not even from a one-night stand. Like I said: there are standards.

  “Your date’s not doing it for you?” I say, nodding at Grey Suit who’s now standing by the door where people are starting to exit. It must be after two a.m. by now and a weeknight, which means most of these people are six hours away from clocking in at the office tomorrow. Thrill seekers by night, executive decision makers by day, that’s a lot of our audience, and even though I’ve never been able to tolerate living that kind of rigid, conventional lifestyle for myself, their money’s just as good as anyone else’s. They may even have a greater appreciation for the brawls, since bare-knuckles fighting is a far cry from whatever uptight Fortune 500 company or corporate law firm they work at.

  She glances at Grey Suit, then turns back to me. “He’s okay,” she says. That pretty mouth of hers widens. Despite the darkness of the warehouse, her teeth gleam like white stones. “But you’re Ryder Cole.” She runs her hand lightly over my arm. “And I’m willing.”

  My bicep belies my intention to be behave, contracting instinctively as her fingers linger on my suit sleeve. “To do what?”

  “Anything you want.”

  I lean close to her. “I want you to go home with the guy that brought you and fuck his brains out like a good girl,” I say. “But you can think about me while you’re doing it.”

  I cross to where Tyler waits by the door. Security will close up. We’ve got business to attend to.

  TO BE CONTINUED.

  Discover the rest of HARD – available now!

  Love sexy, thrilling serials? Check out The Exposé series by Roxy Sloane!

  Sexy mogul Dax Ryan has secrets he'll do anything to protect. As owner of the most exclusive club in New York City, his members trust him with their wildest fantasies -- but a mysterious blackmail plot threatens to bring his hard-won empire crashing down.

  Wannabe reporter Zoe Warren is after the scoop of a lifetime. An exposé from The Underground could be the break she's been waiting for -- she just didn't bet on the hot-as-hell owner watching her every move.

  A cat and mouse game with red-hot stakes. New from the USA Today bestselling author. Prepare to get exposed!

  The Exposé 1

  The Exposé 2

  The Exposé 3

  The Exposé 4

  CHAPTER ONE

  ZOE

  What do you wear to an interview at a sex club?

  I rifle through my crappy wardrobe and groan in despair. I’ve been living in jeans all through college; I’m out in the ‘real world’ now, but without any cash to buy a new wardrobe, I’m stuck with a laundry basket of sweatshirts and a couple of glittery Forever 21 tops that are shedding sparkles over everything they touch. I’m all out of luck.

  I catch sight of myself in the mirror. I look like a fresh-faced ki
d who just got out of school—not the kind of classy, sexy woman Dax Ryan would hire. But I need this job, it could be the break I’ve been working for.

  Time for plan B.

  “Hey, Tasha?” I call to my roommate. I don’t have to call far. In our shoebox of an apartment, her tiny bedroom is right across the narrow hall.

  Her door swings open. “What’s up?”

  Tasha is leaning over her dresser, applying eyeliner with the kind of concentration I’ve only ever used for finals and new episodes of The Bachelor. She’s squeezed into a skin-tight mini-dress, with her long brunette hair styled into a perfect sleek cascade that only forty minutes with a hairdryer can achieve.

  I would know. I’m the one who helps her get it just right when she can’t reach the back.

  “Can I borrow something to wear?” I beg. “Pretty please? I’ve got my interview at the club,” I explain, “And I don’t have anything that’s right for it.”

  Tasha’s eyes drift over me. “You can say that again.” She tuts at the sight of my ratty old sweatpants and stretched out T-shirt. Even at home, she always looks like she just stepped out of a Victoria’s Secret ad, in tiny short shorts and silky tanks. But under all her mascara and lipgloss, Tasha is really a sweetheart, which is why she takes pity on me tonight.

  “Try this.” She says, pulling down a tiny tube of black fabric and tossing it across the hall. “You’re taller than me, but a little extra leg never hurt anyone, especially when it comes to tips.”

  I struggle into the dress. It’s a glorified band-aid, with half the back missing and black straps wound all across the bodice.

  “Don’t forget the girls!” Tasha says, throwing me a strapless padded bra that could double as a flotation device. But it does the trick: when I yank everything into place and check out my reflection, I could almost pass for someone with curves. The dress is cut low on my chest, and high on my legs, and with the straps and some boots, it’s sexy, kind of a bondage look.

  Perfect for where I’m going tonight.

  “Thanks girl,” I tell Tasha gratefully. “And I promise, I’ll have the rent by the end of the week.”

  “No worries,” she says sunnily. Her brand new iPhone buzzes on the dresser, and she lights up. “Ooh, here’s my ride. Have fun!”

  Tasha picks up her Coach purse, slides her feet into a pair of epic designer heels, and grabs a leather jacket that probably cost more than all my possessions combined. “Remember, you’ve got to wiggle in that thing,” she tells me on her way out the door. “Walk like you’re trying to keep a watermelon clenched between your thighs.”

  She winks and swans out.

  I head to my window. Down on the sidewalk, five flights below our Brooklyn walk-up, an anonymous black town car is waiting for her.

  I let the old bedsheet I’m using as a curtain fall closed. I don’t ask where my roommate gets her money, but I’m pretty sure auditioning for Broadway shows isn’t paying for those new shoes. She’s got a different date every night of the week, but she always meets them at some fancy hotel downtown, and never brings anyone home.

  You do the math.

  Still, I can’t judge. At least she’s able to pay rent on our rodent-infested shoebox. I’m the one a month behind and still no closer to getting a job.

  I flop back on the bed with a sigh—landing right on a loose spring.

  “Oww,” I curse, rolling over. “Dammit!”

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I graduated college with a portfolio full of student newspaper clips and dreams of being the next big thing in journalism. My boyfriend, Troy, was a year ahead of me. He’d already moved to NYC and got a great gig at a news blog; he said as soon as I came out, we’d get a place together and he’d help hook me up with a job.

  But I guess his plans changed. Because when I arrived on his doorstep with my beat-up old Civic packed full of my worldly possessions, he had a change of heart.

  And that change was a six-foot model-slash-DJ named Anya.

  “I didn’t think we were serious,” he said, shrugging off every long-distance promise he’d ever made. “It was just talk, you know?”

  I sold the Honda, found a roommate and a waitressing gig, and turned all my rejection and anger into pure determination. I’d show him exactly what I’m made of. I applied for every job going and papered the city with my resumé, certain my big break was just around the corner. But here I am, two months later, I can’t even get an interview for an unpaid internship, let alone a real job.

  ‘We’re not hiring.’

  ‘Your application has been added to our list.’

  ‘We’re seeking candidates with more experience.’

  It’s a catch-22: I can’t get experience if nobody’s willing to hire me, and nobody’s hiring me because I don’t have experience! I spent four years on my college newspaper, working my way up to editor. I freelanced for blogs, even had a couple of stories published in the local paper, but here in New York City, all that work means nothing.

  I’m back at square one.

  Today was my last hope—and my best shot. The New York Daily called me in for an interview: my first time actually getting in the door. I was so excited when I walked through the newsroom and felt the buzz of all the ringing phones and people typing at their computers. But my high lasted about as long as it took for the news editor, Charlie Granger, to glance at my portfolio and toss it on his desk.

  “I’m sorry, we’re cutting back staff right now, not hiring more.”

  I blinked at him, my hopes crashing to the ground. “But, why did you even call me in if there’s no job available?”

  He gave me a sympathetic smile. “Look, I like your clips. You’ve got some good stories here. Good instincts. But I can’t use instincts. What I need is stories. Bring me something good, something juicy, and maybe I can swing something.”

  Which is why I’m trussing myself up in this ridiculous outfit, layering on the mascara and squeezing my feet into Tasha’s knee-high stiletto boots. Because I need the story of a lifetime to get my career off the ground, and right now, getting this hostess position is the best chance I’ve got. My instincts say there are some serious stories to be discovered at The Underground, and my instincts are never wrong.

  I grab my purse and go downstairs, wincing at the boots digging into my toes. But my budget doesn’t stretch to a cab, so the subway it is for me tonight. I head for the station, my stomach jittering with nerves.

  What kind of interview is this going to be? Will I have to do regular hostess things like showing customers to a table and checking for reservations, or does the position come with other demands? I mean, it’s not a regular club. The Underground is a super-secretive sex club, catering to the most exclusive clientele.

  It was Tasha who turned me on to the place. She heard about a sex club uptown, private members only. The place where New York’s elite go to indulge their dirty secrets. Where politicians, celebrities, and Wall Street hide away under the cover of darkness and let their inhibitions go.

  She laughed it off like it was an urban legend, but I did some digging, and quickly found out it’s the real deal. Ruled over by Dax Ryan, the club is totally secretive, completely exclusive—and my ticket to the biggest scoop in town.

  If I can get a job here, I’ll be able to snoop around and discover everything that’s going down. If I can get proof of a few big names who use this place, and just what kind of scandals they’re hiding, that should be more than enough to get me a job at the paper, and my first big byline as well.

  I can see it now: Zoe Warren, junior reporter, the New York Daily News. I’ll be able to write stories that really matter, pulling in an actual paycheck and learning from the best in the business.

  “Aight, sugar?”

  A voice snaps me back to reality. A couple of guys are checking me out from across the subway car, their eyes leering. Even under my jacket, this dress is giving them plenty to stare at. “Where you goin’?” One asks. “You got a man ton
ight?”

  Thankfully, we reach my stop and I quickly get out, hurrying to the exit.

  There’s only one man I care about tonight: the one guarding all the secrets I’m out to expose. He’s the one I need to fool if I’ve got a hope in hell of pulling this off.

  Dax Ryan.

  Discover the rest of the erotic series, available now!