I looked at myself in the mirror as I put on my makeup. I couldn’t say anything out loud, but my thoughts were doing plenty of talking for me.
What would Mom say if she saw you like this? She wouldn’t be sad. She’d be pissed. Why do you continue to stoop to this level? The man is a monster, and he’s not going to change. You’ve got to get out of here.
I had a way out now, and I was going to have to take it. Fuck being afraid of what might happen. At that point I believed I was in just as much danger if I stayed as I was if I left.
I had to call Jack. With my mind made up, I set my makeup down and walked out to the stage. I was ready to be done with it all. Done with showing my body to strangers. Done with ignoring the lewd comments and disgusting suggestions. Done with Rocco’s violent jealous streak and his controlling bullshit. Things were starting to escalate, and I needed to get the fuck out of dodge before they blew.
There was only one man who could help me, and I was going to run to him at full speed.
I was tired at the end of my shift, and never wanted to see the neon bra again. I had a feeling it was going to be requested a lot – I’d given more lap dances that night than I had ever before.
Each one was worse than the last. I kept visualizing Rocco’s face on the men I danced for, and it was repulsive. It only lasted a second, but it was enough to make me taste bile.
That was one of the only things he had yet to make us do, and I had a feeling it was just a matter of time before we were giving him personal attention usually reserved for the clients.
I gathered my things and headed home as quickly as possible, taking the bus so I could save some time. I wanted to talk to Jack as soon as I could, but I wasn’t sure what his schedule was like. It was a chance I was taking anyway, though it could mean putting my life in even more danger.
Driven by sheer desperation, I found his number in the call log on my phone. Even then, it still took me a few minutes to gather my composure before I had the courage to touch his name and wait for the phone to start ringing.
I briefly wondered if I was waking him or if he was working a midnight shift and I was interrupting something important. Or maybe I’d pissed him off when I’d hung up the day before and he wouldn’t offer me the same help a second time. But he answered on the third ring.
“Sky?” he sounded surprised.
“Hey,” I said. “Sorry I hung up on you the other day. I got overwhelmed with what you said and I wasn’t sure how to react. It was the wrong choice.”
“That’s fine, I understand. What can I do for you?” he asked.
“I thought about what you said,” I replied. There was silence on the other end of the line, and I knew he was waiting for me to continue. “And if you can protect me, I’ll help you.”
11
Jack
I stood in front of the mirror, my heart pounding in my chest. I couldn’t believe Sky had called me the night before, and I was even more shocked she told me she actually was willing to help. I had been almost convinced when she hung up on me that was the end of the contact she and I would ever have, and I wasn’t going to pursue her personally any longer.
I wasn’t about to give up on the case with Rocco. I would pursue him until I had him behind bars. I didn’t care what it took. I knew what I saw that day when he grabbed her by the throat, and even if she was too afraid to reach out, I wasn’t afraid to stand up for her.
I’d kill the guy if I had to. He wasn’t going to keep treating her that way. And the conversation we’d had only proved to me just how scared she was. I hadn’t served on the force for eight years for nothing. I knew when a victim was afraid to speak up, and this one clearly was.
At least she had been, and now she was finally ready to talk.
I had to admit, I was taking my time making myself look good. It wasn’t anything more than meeting an informant to get some information, but I wanted to look better than the men she often had to spend her time with. Hell, the thought of meeting her face to face for even a few minutes outside the club was enough to send shivers down my spine.
This girl is an informant. This isn’t a date. This is an interview for the investigation you’re conducting on Rocco. It’s got nothing to do with your attraction for her, or whether she might be attracted to you in return.
I tried to convince myself I wasn’t thinking about her in any way I shouldn’t, but as I grabbed my wallet and keys walking out the door, I knew that was a lie.
I couldn’t wait to meet with her.
The coffee shop was packed, which surprised me. I’d assumed a place that was as hidden in a little nook of town would be a lot quieter, but I was wrong. I scanned the faces of the people as I walked in, but Sky wasn’t there yet.
Taking my glasses off, I tucked them in my pocket as I walked up to the counter, ordering a black coffee with milk. I honestly wouldn’t have been surprised if she didn’t show up, but I really hoped she would. I knew people who were being threatened often changed their minds several times before making a true decision.
I hoped she decided to show. I wanted to put Rocco away for good. But even more than that, I wanted to help Sky. She needed help, and I wanted to be the one to save her. I wanted to pull her out of that cage she was so clearly trapped in and whisk her away to safety.
Hell, I wanted to hear her screaming my name on my bed beneath me.
Shortly after I arrived, Sky appeared. I was still leaning against the counter and waiting for my coffee as she nervously slunk into the building. She seemed to have so much more confidence when she was on stage than she did off. Her eyes darted around the room and, when they rested on me, she walked over.
But she didn’t smile.
“Officer Thomas?” she asked as she reached the counter. “I hope you haven’t had to wait very long. I don’t own a car, so I’m kind of ruled by the bus schedule.”
“Please, call me Jack,” I said with a smile. “I just got here myself, don’t worry about it.”
She ordered the same as I had, but I didn’t point that out. I didn’t want to cross any lines of being too familiar with her. I was reading her like an open book, and I wanted to break down some of the barriers she clearly had in place.
“Shall we sit down?” I asked, careful to make her feel like she was the one calling the shots.
“Yeah,” she said. She nervously walked to a corner of the shop and took a seat in the booth, but her eyes continuously darted around the room, scanning faces, analyzing everyone who walked through the door.
“Are you afraid someone is following you?” I asked. She gave me an inquisitive look, so I nodded to the rest of the room. “You seem to be on edge.”
“Oh,” she said as she waved off what I said with a brush of her hand. “No, it’s just that you never know who you’re going to run in to, or if someone is looking, you know?”
“Is that something that happens to you a lot? You run into people who know you?”
She smiled and looked down at her cup of coffee, clearly searching for something to say. Instead she looked up at me, her bright blue eyes focused on mine. “What did you want to know?” she asked.
“First of all, I think Rocco –” I started, but she quickly cut me off.
“Can we not use names? Sorry. I know that it might seem paranoid, but there are a lot of people around here who know him, and I don’t want word to get back to him that I was talking about him with someone. He doesn’t like it when we talk about him,” she said.
“We?” I asked.
“Me and the other girls,” she said quickly. “He likes to know that we keep things at work private. He doesn’t want anyone discussing him or his business outside of the club.”
“Right,” I said. I let the word hang in the air. I could already tell she was trying to cover what she had come to tell me with other information, but I wasn’t going to let it slide. At the same time, I noticed she was mirroring my body language. Subtly, sure, but it was still there.
&n
bsp; Every time I took a drink of coffee, she would take a drink of her own. Every time I would glance around the room, she would do the same. She had one of her hands on the table, laying palm down and partially open, but it was extended lightly toward me.
All body language cues that were telling me she was attracted to me. I tried not to let it excite me as much as it did, but the thought of her truly being as affected by me as I was by her outside of her work environment was enough to make me hard where I sat.
Shit, this wasn’t going to be an easy interview.
“So, your boss, is he involved in anything illegal that you know of?” I dropped my voice so no one else in the shop could hear our conversation and watched her intently the entire time I spoke.
“I’ve suspected before he might be,” she said. “But he’s really careful. When shady looking people come to see him, he shuts the door to the office and we aren’t to interrupt until they’re done.”
She broke eye contact as she spoke, and I had a feeling she knew more than she was letting on.
“What kind of ‘shady looking people’ come to see him?” I asked.
“They usually wear suits though some of them look like they don’t belong in them. I don’t know anything about them except for the fact that they don’t like us to bother them, and he tells us to do whatever they like for free.”
“Do you always have to do as he says? Even when you aren’t comfortable with the request or the person you’re entertaining?” I asked.
“It’s part of the job,” she said, almost defensively. “He doesn’t pay us to stand around.”
“I see,” I said. She looked around the room again. It was clear she was afraid of something, but I didn’t know how to approach the subject. Her cooperation was tenuous at best. She had been so quick to shut me down before, I didn’t know how to bring it up again.
“Would you be willing to do something for me?” I changed the subject. “I would be happy to pay you for your help, and it would really help with what we’re trying to do.”
“What is it?” she asked. She was watching me intently but didn’t hold eye contact for long. I could get lost in the blueness of her eyes. They were flawless. More beautiful than anything I could describe, and I found myself wanting to make her smile just so I could see them sparkle.
“Would you be willing to let me put a microphone on you? It would record what you were doing at work, and if he was to say anything, we could use it against him,” I said. “It would be entirely hidden. No one would be able to see it, and you would only have to turn it on or off at the beginning and end of your shift, that’s it,” I said with a smile.
She shook her head. “There’s no way I could pull that off. You’ve seen what we wear there. It’s not like there’s a place it could be easily hidden. Not to mention, if he found it, he’d kill me.”
Immediately her face changed, and I could see that I was losing her. She had offered to help but I had pushed it too far too fast. I needed to ease into things.
“Forgive me if I’m being too bold, but I think you are our best shot at putting him away,” I replied. She looked at me, her eyes round with a mixture of fear and something else. She was clearly fighting with herself. She wanted to help, but she was afraid for her own safety and after what I’d witnessed in the alley that day, I couldn’t blame her. I needed to push, but I couldn’t do it too far too fast. I cleared my throat and tried again. “Your boss has been tied to several cases in the past. Cases that were violent and involved murder at times. There hasn’t ever been enough evidence to arrest or convict, but he isn’t a safe man,” I said. “I don’t want to scare you, I just want to make sure you stay safe.”
She fell silent, looking down into her cup of coffee with an almost ill look on her face. She shook her head again. “I can’t wear a wire. I’m sorry. I agreed to talk to you, but I really don’t know what more I can do. If you’re going to press me for more, I’m going to have to put an end to this and go.”
“No, don’t do that,” I said quickly. Almost too quickly. I knew she detected the tone of my voice as she looked up with slightly raised eyebrows. I was showing more emotion than a man who was just conducting an interview. Hell, there was almost a desperation in my tone.
What the fuck was wrong with me? I wasn’t one to lose my professional edge over a woman. Ever.
“Okay,” she said. She had started to rise, but she relaxed once again in the seat, looking at me with an expectation to which I wasn’t sure how to respond. Did she sense my desperation? “What’s your name?” I asked.
“Sky?” she looked at me like I was crazy.
“Your real name,” I said.
She hesitated, so I pressed further. “You can trust me.”
“Susie,” she said at last. “Susie Blake. I’ve gone by Sky since I was a kid. My eyes.”
“They are beautiful,” I said. The words slipped out, and the way she looked at me proved they had an effect on her.
“Thank you,” she said shyly.
“Is there anyone you can go to for help or support? I’d love for you to get away from him as soon as possible,” I said. Again, she shook her head. I wanted to ask her about her family. Where were her parents? Any siblings? Any extended family? But she was clearly uncomfortable.
“Then please let me help you. You do have options to get out of there. And if you’re in danger, you should. People like him aren’t going to change, and I don’t want to see you get hurt, so let me give you some numbers,” I offered.
Out of the blue, something suddenly changed in her expression. I didn’t know what it was I said that had offended her, but she suddenly pulled back.
“Look, I’m sorry, but this was supposed to be about my boss,” she rose from her chair. “And I’ve really told you all I know. I need to get ready for work, so I’ve got to get going.”
“I didn’t mean to offend you,” I started, but she shook her head.
“Sorry I couldn’t be a bigger help,” she said as she started to leave. I didn’t know what came over me, but I suddenly reached out and took her hand. A shock ran through my body like an electric current, and she clearly felt the connection, too.
She didn’t pull back from me. In fact, her face changed again and I wondered if she might break down in tears.
“If you need anything at all, at any time, give me a call. You have my number, and I’ll be there in an instant,” I assured her. There were slight tears in her eyes, but she didn’t say anything. Instead, she just nodded.
“I mean it,” I said. “I don’t care where you are or what time it is.”
“Thank you,” Sky said at last. I let go of her hand but noticed she didn’t pull from me. She just let it fall and walked out of the coffee shop, leaving me with my mind spinning. There was so much more to her than I had realized, and I needed to figure it out.
But I already knew I wasn’t going to be able to be around her without wanting more. She was too beautiful, and our connection was too strong. The spark between us had been undeniable, and I didn’t want that to go away.
I’d burn down the whole damn city to make her mine.
12
Sky
It was hard for me to concentrate at work that night. My mind kept replaying what had happened in the coffee shop that afternoon. Rocco was his normal dick self when I walked through the door, but there was nothing in his reaction to seeing me that led me to believe he knew anything about my meeting with Jack.
I had been careful to select a venue where I was certain no one who knew me would see us, and I was careful not to disclose any names. Rocco never liked it when we dated anyway, I knew he’d be pissed if he found out about Jack.
That wasn’t a date. But fuck! What happened when he touched you? Everything. Everything happened, and that’s the problem.
It was true, a thrill ran through my body when he had reached out and grabbed my hand. I didn’t know it was possible to feel that way. I was used to men running their hands o
ver me as much as I’d let them get away with, but nothing ever felt that way before.
I couldn’t deny the attraction that was between us, and the connection I felt when I was with him. When he looked into my eyes, I felt he was staring right into the core of my being. It was almost as though he could see the pain, and he cared.
And that’s why you want him. And exactly why you shouldn’t have him. You don’t need someone to pity you, to save you. You need someone to love you.
“Sky! Lap dance at table four!” Rocco called out. I hated it when he was out on the floor. He would find men and offer us to them, and they were typically the sleaziest ones in the place because they were the most willing to part with their money. In fact, the only good man he’d ever offered me to was Jack, and after that morning, he was the only one I wanted touching me.
“Sky!” Rocco shouted. “I don’t pay you to stand around!”
Reluctantly, I headed out onto the floor to perform the dance, but this time, everything felt different. I didn’t even want to fake it. I wanted nothing more than to walk out. No amount of money was worth it to me anymore. And I was suddenly unafraid of the consequences.
Jack said I could go to him, no matter what. He didn’t care what time it was, or where it was. I looked over the man’s shoulder as I writhed on top of him. It was getting late, nearly ten. In an hour I’d be off.
And I knew exactly what I was going to do next.
“Sky?” Jack sounded surprised. “Hey, I’m glad you called.”
“I just got off work,” I said. “I thought maybe –”
I wasn’t sure how to finish the sentence.
“What’s up?” his words brought me back to the moment.
Men in Charge: A Contemporary Romance Box Set Page 65
