It was hard enough psyching myself into my new role of ‘stripper extraordinaire’, without his input, hence his silence was at this time golden. Not that he’d said more than ten words to me after his muttered, ‘fucking fine by me’, nor did I expect him to, but it still rankled. Could he not see all this was for his own good and to save his proverbial bacon? Obviously fucking not, if this was how he was going to carry on. It amazed me that such a smart man could be so stupid, but I suppose there was part of me that could understand how he felt. He loves someone that doesn’t return his feelings, and that shit burns. Intensely.
Finishing off my dance halfway up the pole with my back arched and my head nearly touching the tips of my hooker heels as I call them, I slowly slide down the pole until I hit the ground to a round of applause. Good to know I’ve still got it I think to myself.
I didn’t take classes, nor have I done anything like this before. However, there have been a few times when I’ve been three sheets to the wind and ended up dancing on a bar or two. You can also substitute the word bar with table top, stage, back of a booth, around a chair or stool, and a microphone stand and any of them would fit. Yes, you would be right in assuming I have absolutely no inhibitions after drinking copious amounts of hard liquor. In fact, I’d go as far as to say I’m a little uncontrollable when I’ve consumed my weight in tequila. Which isn’t a frequent occurrence, but is more often than Brookes, Brandt, or any of my other brothers would like.
Taking a bow and shuffling off stage, a young woman whose name I learned is Macy, quickly makes her way on stage to collect my discarded clothing and any props I’d used. When I arrived tonight, Shorty told me it’s Macy’s job to be a glorified, or not in regards to his place, goffer. She is to fetch whatever any of the dancers need, set up and remove props, collect clothing and lingerie making sure it gets back to their rightful owners, and tidy up the dressing rooms at the end of the night. The poor thing looked harried and run off her feet, and all too familiar.
I’d spent almost my entire routine, aside from the parts where I was fantasizing about doing this dance privately for Rob, trying to place where I’d seen Macy before. Leaning against the wall off in the wings of the now lit stage it hits me like a bolt of lightning. My whole body jerks upright at the realization of who she is and what she means to my family.
Macy is to Liam what Rob is to me, except more. Much more. Almost seven years ago, a one Macy Mayweather disappeared never to be seen or heard from again. It happened well after I’d graduated high school and enlisted in the Army, but I can vividly remember the articles written about her disappearance. It all but tore our home of Lancaster, just south of Dallas, Texas apart. They all but did ruin my brother, Liam.
Liam and Macy had been friends since second grade when he pushed her into a mud puddle at school and she retaliated in kind throwing a mud pie at him, hitting him square in the face. They’d both been hauled into the principal’s office, covered in mud, smiling like loons, but where Mom came to collect Liam and grounded him from riding his bike for two weeks, Macy’s step-father demanded she publically apologize and work off the value of Liam’s ruined clothes doing chores around our house. Needless to say, my mom didn’t care about the clothes, but the same couldn’t be said for Macy’s over the top step-father.
Swearing her to secrecy, mom let her off without so much as having to lift a finger and decided to take Macy under her wing. Macy’s mom had only died the year before and without any living relatives to take her in, and some that were in fact alive but not interested in a little girl cramping their lifestyles, Macy was left in the care of her step-father, Harold. The man could barely be bothered coming home at night, too wrapped up in his work to check on his seven-year old charge, let alone care for her, so Macy quickly became a permanent fixture at our house after school every day and most weekends.
Liam and Macy’s friendship was the stuff of legends are born from. They loved each other dearly, but that didn’t stop them from pulling pranks on the each other. Pranks that had me and my older brothers shuddering in disgust. Anything from worms and snails in Macy’s backpack that would have her screaming blue murder, to her hiding dead fish around Liam’s bedroom and feigning innocence when he chased her down to deliver his form of tickle torture as punishment. They bantered back and forth like an old married couple, fought more than they got on, and they loved every minute of it.
I was sixteen by the time Macy came into our lives, and even I at my young, impressionable age, could see Liam and Macy were destined for something more than mere friendship. Until she disappeared without a trace that is.
I know for a fact Liam hasn’t let a day go by without searching for her. He has used every resource available to him and EyeSee to look into her whereabouts, and until now she had never been seen again. No one knew why she left, it was all conjecture and assumptions. There was one letter left for Liam, but even that didn’t hint at where she was going and what she was going to do. Harold ticked all the boxes by filing a missing persons report, calling her friends, and trying to interrogate Liam, which we put an end to as soon as it began seeing as he was doing nothing but blame Liam for leading her astray. Not that we had any delusions that the man actually cared for his ward, he just didn’t want to come across as an even bigger asshole than he already did, hence the half-assed attempt to find her.
I had about ten seconds before she came back stage to consider my options, not a lot of time I know, but I was well-versed in making important decisions under pressure and this one was no different than the thousands before it. Macy aside, I peeked my head out from behind the curtain taking in the room, searching out the man I was here to apprehend. Sure, if I was being truthful I wasn’t actually here to apprehend him, but I doubted the MC would have an issue with me detaining him until they could get him to wherever he need to go, and do whatever they intended to do with him. And if they did care, well, stiff shit because if I saw an opportunity I was going to take it.
Waiting for Macy to finish up, we walked side-by-side back to my dressing room, coming face-to-face with the one and only, Elias ‘Demon’ Walker in the process. In his early sixties the man was still a force to be reckoned with. None of his bulk had turned into the paunch that a lot of older men carried, and he still looked as fit as he would have been in his forties.
Feeling Macy shiver beside me I push her gently behind my body, effectively cutting her off from his view and whisper,
“Hey, Racy Macy,” I say calling her by the nickname Liam used for her in order to calm her down. “Take a deep breath, then slowly and carefully reach behind you into my purse hanging on the back of my chair, and feel around for my gun, okay?”
I shuffle us backwards a few steps until I know she’s as close to the chair where my purse is hanging as we’re going to get without being detected. I can only hope that she’s got it together enough now to follow my directions. Murmuring her agreement, I turn and see her giving me a slight smile while I also notice her hand moving awkwardly behind her. Tilting my head back slightly and dropping my voice again, so that only she can hear, I say,
“When you’ve got it tuck it in the back of my thong, and while you’re at it hand me that shirt you’re holding would you?” It wouldn’t do to have my thong playing peek-a-boo for the world to see when it pulls tight as my gun is stuffed in it now would it?
I turn back and focus my attention on the man that’s top of the MC’s ‘to be killed’ list and ask as sweetly as I can.
“Is there something I can do for you, sir?”
The dark gleam in his eye tells me there is indeed something I can do for him, and I’m not going to like it. Not one little bit. Taking the white business shirt from Macy’s outstretched hand, I slip it on only having time to fasten three of the eight buttons before he replies.
“Yeah, slut, there’s something you can do for me alright. Ditch the bitch and you can dance for me private like. I wanna see what else you’re hiding under that tiny, pink, pussy
patch you’ve got on.”
Macy gasps behind me trembling in fear, and I can tell I’ve only got minutes to diffuse, disarm, and detain the big asshole before she completely loses her shit, or we’ll be even more fucked than we appear to be right now. Guys like this get off on control and power. They don’t care how they get it as long as they get it in spades, and by the looks of this one particular asshole he’s worse than most. I don’t need to know his background to assess his character. He’s broadcasting it via his body language and evil smirk loud and clear.
Squeezing Macy’s hand in what I hope is a reassuring gesture, I reply,
“Unfortunately it’s my first night here, sir, so I don’t do private dances yet. I can find out who’s available to give you one if you’d like, or you can come back next week after I’ve learned the ropes better and I’d be happy to perform one for you then,” I offer.
Taking advantage of my excellent peripheral vision, I scan the room trying to determine which exit point is the most accessible. The entry, Demon is blocking. The connecting door to the larger dressing room is blocked by a stack of boxes four high, two deep, and three wide. And the only other access is a back door which appears to be locked and dead bolted by a lever mechanism at the top that I’ve got no hope in hell of reaching. Neither does Macy even if I could create a big enough diversion. Oh well, through him instead of around it is then.
This isn’t my first rodeo and I doubt it’s his either. We’re both sizing each other up checking for weaknesses. Deciding to slide off my shoes, which may give me height but detract from my agility and speed, I keep my focus on his movements only to see him draw his own weapon and level it on a spot just below my right shoulder. If he fires it’s not a kill shot, but it is center mass and it’s going to hurt like a sonofabitch. I’ve been shot before and it’s not my favorite thing in the world to do on a rainy day, but they say what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, and I can only pray in this case that holds true.
I’m giving it five minutes, if I can distract him for that long, for the five men, Rob being the fifth, to play conquering hero before I kick Demon’s ass myself. My feet are killing me, my ass is cold being left out in the breeze without the proper protection of panties that are bigger than dental floss, and I’m freaking starving. I mean, what does a woman have to do to get a cheese burger and fries after a workout like that?
“I don’t give a fuck if you started working here ten minutes ago, you know your way round a pole, so how bout you come back with me and show me what you can do with the pole in my pants that’s wanting your attention,” he sneers.
How original I muse. Seriously, I’m not kidding when I say, I’d laugh out loud at how fucking stupid that sounded if I didn’t have a big ass hand cannon pointed at my chest. I mean, can men get any more disgusting? In his case, probably not.
This is one of the times like I mentioned before when you need to make important decisions at the drop of a hat. You take in all the available information, review the facts you’ve been given prior to engaging the target, and assess the best course of action with the least impact on human life and the greatest chance of success. What that really means is, you decide which option is less likely to get you killed and go with that one. In this case, taking him out before he can do me the privilege of blowing a hole in my chest the size of the Grand Canyon is looking like my best bet.
In saying that, I totally get this is going to be a big issue for the MC. Not because they give a shit whether he lives or dies, actually I’m pretty sure this guy is ending up as fish food after they’re finished with him anyway, but they will care that they didn’t get a chance to end him themselves. But faced with limited viable options, and I’ll have you know I choose life, mine and Macy’s above all else, right now I don’t really have a choice now do I?
Feeling the safety that only my SIG Sauer P226 can bring me in a situation like this being tucked into the band of my almost non-existent thong, I pray now that none of the guys come through the doorway behind Demon until I’ve gotten a clear shot off. Macy obviously knows her way around a gun, because in less than five seconds I feel her efficiently flick the safety off covering the sound by pretending to discreetly coughing into her free hand.
Deciding there’s nothing to be done shy of forcing his hand, I use all the saccharine sweetness I can must when I address him.
“Look, I’m going to level with you because it looks like we’re in a standoff of sorts.” His gaze sharpens and his hand tightens on his guns grip, but I don’t let that deter me. “You want something from me, and in return I want something from you.” Noting his interest I go on to say, “You let my friend here go, and I’ll be happy to give you the best private dance you’ve ever had. How does that sound?”
I highly doubt he’ll rise to the bait, which he proves only a second later but it was worth a try.
“Yeah, that’s not gonna happen. Fuck no. That bitch can watch, and if I’ve got anything left to give her when I’m done with you, I’ll give it to her too.”
I can’t help it, I snort at his declaration which causes him to raise his gun wielding arm back in line with my chest. It’s at times like these I curse myself for not being able to control myself better, but come on. Does he really think any woman will just lay down and let him take what he’s so graciously offering? I don’t fucking think so, and I tell him as much.
“Hmm, let me see. How does fuck no sound?” Narrowing my eyes giving him the best glare I can muster I say, “Listen buddy, I don’t know what your damage is and I don’t care, but you’ve got about a minute and a half tops to walk, run, hop, or skip your ass out of here before all hell breaks loose, because when it does and if you’re still standing here you won’t be going anywhere any time soon. I don’t really care how you do it to be honest, all I care about is you turning the fuck around and going back to whatever rock you crawled out from under.”
Muttering under his breath something about mouthy bitches and teaching them a lesson, everything that happens next happens in the blink of an eye. His finger pulling back the trigger. The discharge of his gun. The bullet hitting the tissue of my shoulder sending a burning path fire following in its wake. Macy’s scream. My gripping my gun, pulling it free, aiming, and firing two rounds dead center into Demon’s forehead. And finally the door behind Demon’s slumped over form bursting open and the room filling with super-sized men, all occurs in less than sixty seconds.
Sometimes I think about how surreal it is that in a fraction of a second you can end someone’s life. That the human body, capable of withstanding horrors most people can’t imagine, can be brought down by one small, fast travelling, lethal missile. I’ve experienced the loss of life more often than most, but it still blows my mind or his in this case, that human life is so fragile. Thinking on it, maybe now’s not the right time to have an in depth philosophical internal monologue if the faces of the slack-jawed men staring at me is anything to go by.
Rolling on to my side from my back I do a quick assessment of my injuries, coming to the conclusion that while it does indeed hurt like a bitch and I need to wrap the wound to stop the blood loss, it’s not fatal so there’s no reason to lie around and take a nap or cry it out. Groaning I sit up and reach for the towel I threw on the floor by my makeup table using wrapping my shoulder, and making sure to tuck the spare length of towel into the section of dressing closest to the exit wound to stanch the flow of blood.
Pushing up off the floor painfully I curse a blue streak at the jarring movement that sends shards of fire through my shoulder, and face the men still staring at me gaping. Gesturing to the floor in front of them I say,
“Sorry about that, but while you and your friends were having high tea with the classy ladies of Jiggles in there, I had to take care of your little problem and save our asses.” Cocking my eyebrow I ask, “Can someone lend me their phone? As you can see I don’t have any pockets, and I figure big brother is going to want to hear about this one from me. He might tak
e it better than hearing it from one of you boys.”
And that is no joke. If any of the men in front of me currently standing around like mannequins were to call Brookes, he’d be on the next flight here to rain holy hell fire down on their asses, and that is something all parties would do best to avoid if you ask me. Trust me, I’d know. I’ve been on the receiving end of his ire more often than not, and it’s not my idea of a good time.
Tank comes out of his stupor first opening and closing his mouth a few times before requesting,
“Fucking hell, woman. Are you okay? Nothing irreparable?” At my nod then subsequent head shake he looks dubious, but takes my word for it. “You think you can hold off calling Brookes for a bit? Just till we take out the trash and secure the area. All I’m asking for is an hour tops.”
“Yeah, I can do that,” I agree quickly. It’s not like my bullet wound is going anywhere anyway. “I still need the phone though. I’ve got another brother that deserves a phone call, and this one needs to come from me too.” Looking at Macy I address her now instead of the group as a whole. “You know it’s true, Racy Macy. He deserves to know you’re okay at the very least.”
Forged: A Devil's Spawn MC Novel Page 24
