Chapter Two
The Grand used to be a theater, back when the city did more tourist trade than drug trafficking. Back when you could walk down this street without getting mugged. They held ballets and operas and one infamous magic show where a man was killed by a faulty fake gun. Over the years the shows visited less and less. This whole part of the city became gutted, empty. Attempts to revitalize the theater failed because the good, rich folk who had money to spend on theater tickets didn’t want to come to these streets.
Now the building is just a husk of its former glory—faded metallic wallpaper and ornate molding with the gold paint scraping off. Tables and chairs fill the smoky, dark floor. There is a balcony in the back, but it isn’t open to the public.
The rooms for private dances used to be ticket stalls in what would have been the lobby.
They don’t have doors. They barely even have walls. The front window partitions have been ripped away, with only brass rods and velvet curtains to cover them.
The first is occupied by Lola. A flash of red fabric and a long mane of hair between the curtain tells me that much. And I know from her position on the floor and the soft groans that he’s paid for more than a dance.
The second room is empty.
The third room is the farthest from the main floor. The darkest. I can only make out a shadow seated in the chair. All I want is to get the hell out of here, but Blue is standing behind me, crowding me, and the only way to get space, the only place to go is inside.
I slip past the heavy velvet curtain and wait for my eyes to adjust. Even before they do, I know it will be him. Not safe, rule-following Charlie. It’s the other man. The new one. The one with the strange intensity in his stare.
I see the outline of his jacket first. And his boots, forming that same configuration—one leg shoved out, one under the chair. That’s the way he sits, almost sprawled on the uncomfortable wooden chair. He’s watching me. Of course he’s watching me. That’s what he paid to do.
“What’ll it be?” I ask.
“What’s on the menu?” he counters, and I know what he means. He means extra services. The same thing that Lola is doing now. More than just a dance. He looks out from the shadows like the Cheshire cat, all eyes and teeth and challenge. All he’s missing are purple stripes filling in.
And if he’s a cop, he can bust me just for offering it. Cops should have better things to do with their time. But I already know cops don’t do what they should. I know that too well.
I’m running from one.
“A dance, of course.” I run through the prices for fifteen minutes, thirty minutes. No one needs longer than that. They either go to the bathroom to jerk off or come in their pants.
“And if I want more than that?”
Now that my eyes have adjusted, now that I’m up close, I can see the tats at the base of his neck and on his wrists. They are probably along his arms and maybe his chest. There’s ink on his hands too, though I can’t make out what it says.
His black shirt is tight enough to show me his shape, the broad chest and flat abs. Underneath the shirt is a chain or necklace. I can only see the imprint, but it makes me want to pull up the fabric and find out what it is.
He wears his leathers like a second skin, like they’re armor and he’s a fighter. I can’t really imagine him walking through a precinct in a blue shirt. He’s not a cop. But there was that feeling, when I was onstage. I felt his interest, more than sexual. I felt his suspicion. I felt every instinct telling me he is there for more than a dance. I can’t afford not to listen.
“There’s no more than that,” I answer flatly.
He grunts, clearly displeased. But it doesn’t sound like he’s going to force the issue—or complain to Blue. “Then dance.”
Right. That’s why I’m here. That’s not disappointment, heavy in my gut. I don’t expect anything from men except to get paid. So I dance, starting slow, moving my hips, my arms, touching my breasts. I’m a million miles away like this. I’m lying on my back, feeling crisp grass underneath my legs, looking up at the night sky.
It almost works, except that I need to get close to him. I need to climb onto him, straddling his legs with mine, reaching for the back of the chair to shake my tits in his face. And when I do, I smell him. He smells…not like smoke. Not like sweat.
He smells like my daydream, like grass and earth and clean air.
I freeze above him, body crouched, my breasts still shivering with leftover momentum.
“Something wrong?” he asks.
And his voice. God, his voice. It’s gone rough and low, all the way to the ground. It slides along the creaky wood of the chair and the concrete floor and vibrates up my legs. It shimmers through the air and brushes over my skin, that voice. We’re not touching in any place, but I can feel him just the same.
I swallow hard. “Nothing’s wrong, sugar.”
“Then sit down.”
He means on his lap. Touching. It’s against the rules, officially.
Unofficially it’s one of the tamer things that happen in this room. “What if I don’t want to?”
One large shoulder lifts, making the leather sigh. “I won’t make you.”
I hear the unspoken word yet ring in the air.
I should probably refuse him. Whether he’s a cop or not, he’s throwing me off. That’s dangerous. And if there’s some other cop in the building? That’s even more dangerous.
But for some reason, I lower myself until I’m resting on his jeans, my posture awkward and off balance—until he shifts, and suddenly I’m sliding toward him, flush against him while I straddle his legs. Then his arms circle my body, trapping me. Any second now he’s going to grope me. Maybe take his dick out and fuck me like this. It wouldn’t be the first time.
But he just stays like that, arms firm but gentle. A hug. This is a hug.
Jesus. How long has it been since a man hugged me? Just that, without touching anywhere else, without his dick inside me? A long time.
My throat feels tight. “What next?” I ask again, and this time I’ll offer anything on the menu. The real menu, with sex and pain and whatever else he’s into.
“I’d like to touch you,” he says, his breath brushing against my temple.
I know that’s not all. We haven’t even negotiated a price, but I find myself agreeing, silent and still.
I look into his eyes and feel something—familiarity. Do I know him from somewhere?
A hundred men come through here. They are nothing to me, and yet I can’t help thinking I would remember him if he had come in another night. I can’t shake the feeling I’ve seen him before. Met him. Known him.
I should be afraid. And I am, but I’m also wondering about the tattoo on the back of his hand. What does it mean? Then I have other things to wonder about, because that hand is touching me.
He doesn’t start with my breasts or even my ass. Not the obvious places, the important ones. He starts with one hand at the back of my neck. My heart pounds heavy in my chest, almost bursting free. I can’t get enough air. And suddenly this seems like an important place after all, so vulnerable. So small within the careful hold of his hand. How is it possible that his hands are so large?
He slides his other hand under my chin, lifting my face. And looks me in the eye. I can’t look away. His eyes are dark and bottomless, the light glinting like distant stars.
“What’s your name?” he mutters.
Honor. I almost say it, but that’s not who I am here. Besides, they announced me when I went onstage. He doesn’t seem like the type to forget, not when he asked for me after, not with his hands cradling my head, careful with me but faintly threatening. Because he could snap my neck in a second. He knows it. I know it. I even think Blue waiting outside knows it, but it all comes down to trust.
And I don’t trust him.
“Honey,” I whisper.
He repeats my name like he’s never heard of it before. “Honey.”
My gaze drops to his mouth, which is firm and almost thin. A hard man’s lips, with scruff shadowing his jaw. “And yours?”
Those lips curve into a half smile. “You’re better off not knowing my name.”
That much I believe. It makes me trust him more. “I’m better off not sitting on your lap. Better off not taking my clothes off for strange men every night. I guess that ship has sailed.”
His lids lower with something like appreciation. “You can call me Kip.” He must have seen I didn’t quite believe him, because he laughs softly. “It’s my real name. Not like Honey.”
I wince at the pointed jab, but what does he expect? The truth?
There is no truth. Honey isn’t my real name, but as each day goes by, I feel less and less like Honor Moretti. I’m transparent, like a ghost. Insubstantial. That’s what hiding does to you. It makes you invisible.
He relents at whatever expression’s on my face, softening. “It’s short for Kipling.”
Just those few words and he’s given me something. Something personal. Something real. That’s rare in this club. That’s rare in the whole world. It makes me want more. I’ve seen the jut of old bone from the ground. I want to dig deeper, to uncover more truths. “As in Rudyard Kipling?”
His eyebrows rise. He tries to cover it up, but I’ve already seen.
“Are you surprised a stripper has read poetry?” I ask.
“No.”
“Liar.” I’m not mad though. The girls here are mostly surviving. We’re kicking up to the surface. It doesn’t leave a lot of leisure time for reading. “So, your parents were fans?”
“Just my mother, as far as I know.” He gives a rueful smile like I’ve disarmed him. Which only proves he came here armed. “I’m just glad I got Kipling and not Rudyard.”
I like him this way. More open. Less threatening. It eases me enough that I run my hands down his chest, drawing a shudder from him. “Did you grow up with Mowgli and Baloo?”
“Until I was sick of them,” he says. “I had a big book, the kind you can only find in a garage sale. The paper yellow and the binding turning to string.”
“It sounds lovely.” My hands play lower—at the flat, hard plane at the bottom of his abs. Strippers often chat up the customers. Some of them come for more than a rub down. They want to talk, to flirt. They want to use us like therapists and then fuck us after. It’s a kind of foreplay.
I tell myself that’s why I’m talking to this man. No other reason. Not because I want to.
“It was,” he says, “at the time. I’d get lost in them. I wanted to go live in the jungle.”
“And then you grew up and realized you were already there.”
His smile is pleased and sly. He likes this. “Is that where we are? The jungle?”
“The ground is made of concrete and the trees are full of glass. But there are snakes here. There are hunters.”
“I thought it was just a story,” he says lightly.
“Stories are powerful.” They’re life and death. They’re survival. There wasn’t much to do locked up in my room except read. And dance. I am a world away from that life, but that still holds true. I still spend most of my time reading and dancing.
And I’m still locked up, in a different way.
He looks too curious for my comfort. “So what stories do you tell?” he murmurs.
I shrug, for all the world nonchalant. “Same old story. Broken home. Ran away. Now I’m a stripper.”
It’s a sanitized version of the truth.
He frowns, uncertain, a furrow between his eyes. It makes him look younger than his scruff and his swagger and his size would indicate. Not like he feels sorry for me, though. Instead he looks like I’m a puzzle. Something to figure out.
The VIP room is really a miniature of the Grand. And his lap is my stage. His thighs are solid beneath my ass. I’m sitting, legs spread, arms at my side, chin up—totally open to him. It’s dark here, but designed so he can look at my body up close. Except he’s not looking at my body. He’s looking at my eyes, and it almost takes my breath away, the wildness I glimpse in his.
And I need to take this spotlight off me. “So what do you want, Kip? What do you like?”
Dark lashes hide his eyes. “I’d like your real name.”
“It’s not for sale.” And I’m still not sure why I wanted to tell him. It had almost slipped out. He’s like a truth serum to me, and that’s the most dangerous thing of all.
“Honey—”
“I’m here because you’re paying me,” I say, desperate to push him away. Desperate to hide. “Don’t forget that.”
He looks at me, and I watch his eyes harden. I can see the branches and brambles that he grows between us, feel the thorns where they push me out. He wants to dislike me. He wants to hate me. I don’t know why, but I recognize the cold, hollow feeling in my gut when he looks at me. And I brace myself.
“You want to know what I like?” His gaze roams leisurely over my body. Then he looks me in the eye. “I want to fuck you, Honey. That’s what I’d like.”
My eyes fall shut. What is that feeling inside me? Relief? Disgust? It feels almost like gratitude. He wants to fuck, like every other guy wants. He’s not here to expose my identity, not here to drag me back. He just wants to get his rocks off.
“That’s not for sale either. I’m here to dance, to shake my tits. To rub them against you. That’s it.”
His eyes narrow. He doesn’t like how crude I’m being. He knows it’s a weapon I’m wielding, but he’s not injured. He’s fighting back. Oh yes, there is something wild left in him. If he were in the jungle now, I’m not so sure he’d be the boy. He’s much more likely a panther. Dangerous. A predator. “Hands or mouth, your choice.”
“I said no.”
“These rooms aren’t just for dancing. I know that as well as you.”
Yes, these rooms are for more than dancing, but that doesn’t mean I do more. I don’t have to, especially if I don’t like the way the man treats me. That’s a rule Ivan has for us. A twisted form of protection. I start to leave, but his hand squeezes the back of my neck. I grow still.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he says quietly.
Fear races through my veins. He’s already hurting me, by holding me here when I want to leave. “Then what do you call this?” I whisper.
“Keeping you. For a little while. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it?”
God. He makes it sound so reasonable. But it’s not. I know it’s not. If it were any other man, I would have twisted away and run out of the booth. I would have been calling for Blue. We’re a long way from the man who told me about poetry and childhood dreams, but I can’t forget that he did. He’s the same man, light and dark, petal and thorn. “Let me go,” I say, my voice wavering, unsteady.
“Hands or mouth,” he repeats.
I close my eyes. My eyes burn with unshed tears. I don’t want to cry. It’s like waving a red flag at men like him. But the hands sliding down my body are surprisingly gentle. Over my abs and down to my…
“What are you doing?” I jerk away, but he’s got one hand on my hip.
His eyes are dark, knowing. “If you won’t decide, I will.”
“I’m not going to blow you,” I say, feeling small, like I’ve lost all control of the situation.
“I didn’t tell you to,” he says, one hand between my legs. The backs of his fingertips brush over my pussy. The thin strip of fabric over my pussy. “I want to fuck you with my fingers. I want to play with your clit until you come. Or maybe I’ll slide my tongue over your pussy until you’re crying loud enough for the whole club to hear, hmm? Your choice, Honey.”
All the air rushes out of me. I don’t know why it’s so shocking. A blowjob is way dirtier than what he’s asking for. But I’ve never had a man want to get me off. Typically they’d fumble around with my breasts, then come in my hands. I should tell him no again, like I did before. Blue would back me up. Ivan would protect me in this.
But there’s a part of me intrigued by what he’s offering. “Why?”
Amusement glints in his eyes. “The usual reasons.”
It’s so crazy I laugh, and my laugh sounds crazy too. “I’m not going to come, you know.”
He considers this as he turns his hand and cups my pussy. He isn’t waiting until we’ve negotiated a price. He isn’t waiting for permission. And I’m letting him. Oh God. He finds my clit with his thumb and gently circles.
He trails callused fingertips down my pussy and back up again. Slow. Focused. He seems to be making a study of me, mapping out my body. I’ve never had anyone go this slow, this careful. Never had hands so large be gentle.
“I wanted to touch you since I first saw you walk onto the stage. Whether I have to pay or not, whether you return the favor or not, I don’t give a fuck. I’m going to finger this pretty cunt until you gush all over my hand. I’m going to keep going until you’re slick with it, until my jeans are damp with you, until the scent of your sex is in the air.”
I stare at him, somehow shocked, as if I’ve never heard these dirty words or witnessed these dirty acts. And I haven’t—not the words in that order. Not with my body reacting, getting tight and wet for him. I think I actually might come for him.
“No,” I whisper.
His fingers don’t stop stroking me. If anything they slip in deeper. “That’s what I want around my dick. Not your hands or your mouth. I want the juice from your pussy. When you’re wet and coming, I’m going to dip my fingers inside your pretty pussy. I’ll cover my dick with your juices, just like it would be if I fucked you bareback.”
I could imagine him then, cock heavy with arousal, glistening with my wetness. His cock would be large, like his hands and his whole body are large.
In the end it isn’t his blunt fingers against my clit. Not even the dark, possessive gleam in his eyes. What pushes me over is the clean, earthy scent of him. I lean close, pressing my nose to his neck and breathing in deep as I come.
I stay there, pressed into every hollow place in him, somehow finding solace in the hard angles of his body. He is a mountain, and I am the shadows that fill every nook and cave around him.
Reality comes back to me, along with embarrassment. And confusion. I’ve never come in this room. Never in this building. God, I haven’t even masturbated in forever—so worn down from hiding, so shamed by the place I’m hiding in, this strip club.
I’m hiding in him now.
How did he do this to me? One hour ago I had never seen this man, never imagined getting turned on in this dank room. Never sought comfort against rough, whisker-ticklish skin. He’s changing me, teaching me to want more than survival.
Dangerous.
“Okay?” he asks, voice gruff.
Maybe he can tell I’m emotional. But if he thinks I need to feel dead inside to do my job, he’s wrong. Lola is the strong one, the one who performs without feeling a thing. Candy does it too, even if she needs drugs to manage it. But I’ve never been able to find that numbness. I feel it all—every insult, every grope. Every cock. And now I would feel his thick cock too.
That doesn’t seem like the worst thing.
“How do you want me?” My voice trembles, but that doesn’t stop him.
His fingers are cupping my pussy, unmoving, letting me recover. Now he dips his finger inside, where I am the most sensitive and wet. Then he lifts his hand to my mouth. One stroke, painting my lips with my arousal, heating up every nerve ending. His head dips, and I know what’s coming next. But I don’t turn my face away. I don’t tell him kisses aren’t for sale.
I let him taste me on my lips. He licks the wetness, a slow swipe of his tongue that makes me gasp. My lips part, and he takes full advantage. His tongue pushes inside, opening me. His hand at the back of my neck is my only anchor while his mouth claims mine.
It’s almost too much. Too intense.
“How do you want me?” I’m demanding this time. I need to know. Because I need to stop this strange intimacy that only increases with every murmured word and tender touch.
“What are you afraid of, sweetheart?”
My eyes widen. How does he know?
Maybe he’s not really that perceptive. Maybe all the men that come through here can see I’m terrified, but they don’t care as long as I make them hard.
“How do you want me?” My voice is hoarse, pleading. This is all I have to give. Take it.
His jaw tightens. “I want you like this. Spread open. Waiting for me to do whatever I want to you.”
His hand returns to my pussy, and I feel relief. Disappointment too. It hurts that he’s stopped kissing me, because for some reason I liked it. And I know, most likely, it won’t happen again. Not tonight. Not ever again. But it’s for the best. I shouldn’t get used to this.
He pulls more wetness from my core and paints my nipples—first one, then the other. I shiver under his touch. It’s more like shaking, really. Because I know what comes next, the same thing he did to my mouth.
He pulls me up so my breasts are in front of his face. He licks the wetness off my nipple, sucks me until I moan. Then he gives my other breast the same treatment.
And I can’t say anything. Can’t demand to know how he wants me. He dips his fingers one more time, deep inside me, pulling out all the wetness he can find. I clench around his fingers and hear his breath catch.
He doesn’t put my arousal on my body, not this time. Slowly, deliberately, he unbuckles his pants and pulls himself out. He’s as hard as I imagined. As big. As slick at the tip. He runs a fist down his length, mixing my arousal with his precum over his cock.
I can’t say anything, but I don’t have to. How do you want me? I know how he wants me, and I slide to the floor. The floor that’s cold and dusty and damp at the same time, unforgiving against my shins. I’m more comfortable here. Safer. Because this is for sale. And I have the upper hand now. Sex is a battlefield, and this concrete floor is my country to defend.
“What’s your name?” His voice is low—and desperate? That can’t be right. He doesn’t need anything from me. He could have gone to a bar. With that hard jaw and hard body, he would have had his pick. Any girl would have hopped on the back of the motorcycle I suspect he has. And yet he’s here.
He can pay for my mouth. He can even pay for my orgasms. He doesn’t get my name.
“Honey.”
He laughs, a little coarse, a little bitter. But his eyes, they understand. They’re almost soft, tender as they look down at me kneeling. “Pretty little liar.”
But when I lean forward to take him in my mouth, he pushes me away. He fists his cock, fucking himself, still slick from my pussy. He’s taking himself fast and hard—almost like a punishment.
He took his time with me, but not with himself. Now he races himself to the finish line, fist and hips at war until he tenses and comes, spilling into his own hand while I kneel before him and watch.
He collapses back onto the chair, still sprawled but truly relaxed now. Not tense or wary. Not carefully banked power like I felt before. Now he is an animal in repose, a lion spread across a rock, bathing in the sun—even if the rock is a creaking wooden chair, straining under his force. Even if the sun is the flicker of fluorescent lights from the edges of the velvet curtain. It’s still primal.
Still beautiful.
His eyes are closed. His head falls back.
And for some reason I almost tell him my name. I form it with my lips and tongue, but he can’t see. I don’t know why I’d ever tell him…except that I want someone to see me here. To know me here. So that I don’t have to feel alone.
But he isn’t here to know me. He isn’t here to save me either.
Alertness breathes into him again. His expression is sated and…grateful. “C’mere,” he says on a grunt.
And before I can do what he says, he lifts me into his lap. He tucks my legs over the side of his and kisses me—slow, languid swipes of his tongue against mine.
I push away from him, staggering back. I don’t have my balance yet, but it doesn’t matter. I shove aside the velvet curtain and run. He hasn’t paid me, but I don’t care.
“What the hell?” Blue asks, grabbing my arm.
But I break free and keep running. I don’t care what happens behind me. I don’t care about Kip or the fact that I’ll never see him again.
It’s better if I don’t.
I read my mother’s diary until the day she left. That’s how I knew about her affair with the guards. More than one, although it was the last man who got her killed. She thought she loved him.
And she was planning to leave my father.
In that diary I saw her ticket to Tanglewood, West Virginia. There were two words scrawled on the ticket—The Grand. I’d never heard of it then, but it became a kind of North Star for me. As a teenager I had to stay with my family.
And when I’d finally run, I’d known just where we’d go.
I just hadn’t known it was a strip club until I arrived.