Miranda
“Good morning!” Katie walks into the kitchen of our office.
“Hey, girl! What’s up?”
“Not too much. Listen, we need to plan another girls’ night out. Kara’s pissed we didn’t invite her since she’s twenty-one now and can drink and hang with us.”
“Um, isn’t she working at the club?”
“She will be, but she just finished her bartending course and is starting next weekend. Shane told her he can’t give her a ton of shifts at first, but he’ll get her as many as he can.”
“That’s cool. I have to get going for a meeting with Tanya and the web design team to discuss Vixen. Do you want to do lunch?”
“Sure, I’m free today,” Katie says.
“Cool, see you in a bit.” I grab my coffee and files for Vixen. When I get to the conference room Tanya is just getting there, but Jett from web design is already here as is our creative team. I guess we’re working on the logo as well today.
Jett looks up from his laptop. “Good morning, ladies.” We both say good morning and take our seats. “I’m not sure who designed this website, but it sucks.” He shakes his head as he scrolls through it. “The pictures are crappy, the girls look cheesy, and the place looks empty. This does not scream a hopping strip club to me. Not to mention half the links don’t work.”
“I noticed that as well. Let’s come up with a plan for me to show him. I plan on setting up a meeting with him as soon as we’re done here to go over what we think needs changing first, because not only does he need his website fixed, but the outside of the club needs sprucing up. His sign is damaged.”
“Not to mention the logo doesn’t scream private, sexy club at all,” Michelle adds.
“Okay, okay, we all admit we have a lot of work to do for this club. Let’s slow down and take this one step at a time,” Tanya calls out. “Jett, what do you need to get this website up to par?”
“I need his passwords, better pictures, and I need to figure out what he’s going to do about the private rooms he has available. If he wants them to be for VIPs, then he needs to set VIP prices and maybe come up with some packages he can offer them.”
I’m taking a ton of notes as Jett and Tanya go back and forth discussing the private rooms and the website. If Mr. Higgins wants this club on the up and up, he has some decisions to make. “He mentioned hiring some new dancers and a choreographer. Maybe we ask him to take individual shots of the girls, then the people renting the VIP rooms can have their choice of a dancer. That would mean you would need to add a section to the website for that.”
“That’s a breeze,” Jett says. “Maybe we do a Meet Our Dancers section. We list them with their stage names and their bios. It’ll look good for the club if he has some that are dancing to put themselves through school.”
“What if they don’t want their faces plastered all over a website?” Lauren spits out.
“They would wear pretty masks that cover their eyes, but why would it be an issue if their face isn’t covered in the club?” Jett asks.
“I’m just trying to look at it from the dancers’ side,” she says.
“Fair enough, we’ll run it by Mr. Higgins and see what he says,” Jett says to Lauren, and once again I’m making tons of notes. “The last thing I’ll need is a go live date. I need to know when everything that will be added to the site will be available. If he’s going to paint those rooms, then I don’t want to list the new VIP stuff yet. I can add the new logo and begin the process of switching it, but if we’re doing a grand re-opening, it would be better to wait and load it all at once.”
“Makes sense to me,” Tanya says.
We continue on with the design team, discussing logo ideas and what we think would be hot, but also have some sense of privacy for high profile clients. It’s not good for a governor or a senator to be seen walking into a club that screams strip club, but hey, they’re human too.
After another two hours of back and forth discussion, we have come up with a few ideas. The design team is going to create some sketches that I can take to the club. In the meantime, I’ll begin the process of writing up everything we want to change and our vision for the final product. Tanya adjourns our meeting, and I’m so glad because I’m starving, and can’t wait to go to lunch with Katie, but first I have to set up my next meeting with Mr. Higgins.
When I get to my desk, I see flowers there with an envelope peeking out from the top.
“I invited Lila to lunch with us. I hope you don’t mind.” Katie approaches my desk.
“Not at all.” I pluck the envelope from the flowers and take the card out.
“Those are nice. Stone is so sweet.” Katie leans in to smell my flowers.
“They’re not from Stone.” I sigh. “Listen to this.”
Miranda,
Thank you so much for bringing your beauty into my club. I can’t wait to hear what you and your firm come up with for ideas on how to make my club better. Please tell me you’ll grace us with your presence again soon.
Mr. Higgins
“I just finished an email to Mr. Higgins confirming our meeting for Thursday morning.” I look up at her with shock on my face.
“What a sleazeball.” She pulls away from the flowers, making a face like the flowers smell like shit instead of the beautiful roses they are. “Forget him. Let’s go, Lila’s waiting.”
When we get to the restaurant, we’re pleasantly surprised that it isn’t packed, and we’re seated right away. The waitress comes over with some water for us and tells us she’ll be with us in just a few minutes. As soon as she walks away, Katie’s phone starts to buzz. “Hey Shane, what’s up?” Lila and I both sit quietly so Katie can hear her conversation with Shane, but things are not sounding good. As soon as she hangs up, I ask her what’s up. “That was Shane. He, Stone, and Jonah are on their way to Club Heat because apparently it’s been vandalized and Logan wants to call a meeting.”
“Vandalized how?” I ask, concerned.
“Graffiti all over the outside. Shane doesn’t know too much yet because he hasn’t gotten to the club, but he wanted to let me know he was going to work and would meet me at home later.”
And now my phone is ringing. “Hey, Stone. I heard. You’re on your way to Club Heat.”
“Yeah, how do you know?” he asks me.
“I’m with Katie and Lila at lunch, and Shane just called Katie. Is it bad?”
“I don’t know yet, baby, but I’ll see you tonight. I shouldn’t be gone long, but I have a bad feeling about this, so you girls be careful.”
“Stone, I don’t know if this is related, but I got flowers from Higgins today.” My voice shows I’m nervous about this situation.
“What the fuck?” he growls. “We’ll figure this out, in the meantime watch your backs.”
“We will.” I cut the call. My man is always concerned and so protective of not just me, but my friends too. He was one of the guys who really helped keep Katie safe when she was being stalked by the loser her father put in jail.
The waitress comes over and we all place our order, making sure to pick things that won’t take a long time since we only have an hour.
“I want to thank you guys for inviting me out this weekend. It was a lot of fun, and your friends seem really sweet.” Lila looks down. She’s a bit bashful.
“They really liked you.” Katie nudges her with her shoulder.
Lila smiles. “I liked them too.”
“Good, because we have to plan the next night out. Katie’s sister is bent because we didn’t invite her out with us.”
Lila laughs. “Sounds good, just let me know when and where.”
“How would you girls feel about hanging at Club Heat? I know it’s not male strippers, but I wouldn’t mind checking it out since that’s where Stone will be working soon.”
They shrug their shoulders. “I don’t care, I won’t be tipping any strippers anytime soon, but to just hang and have some drinks is fine with me.”
I burst into laughter. “You mean you don’t want to put ones in some chick’s thong?”
“Yeah, no…but you’re my girl, and if you want to hang there to see your man, then I’m down with it.”
“Me too,” Lila says.
“You two are the best.” I fist bump my friends.
The waitress delivers our food and we all begin to eat. We only have a little bit of time left before we have to head back to work and we don’t want to be late.
***
Stone
I pull up to Club Heat and instantly I see graffiti written all over the front of the club. Fuck, it’s worse than I thought. Logan is standing there with a few cops. One of them is Detective Cooper, who I’m assuming he called directly. I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t have come out to the club had Logan just reported it. I approach the guys as I see Shane’s truck pull in. “Logan.” I nod, shaking his hand before turning to Katie’s father. “Detective Cooper, how are you?”
“Hey, Stone, I’m not bad, but you boys have a mess on your hands.” he shakes my hand.
“Yeah, I can see that. Do we have any idea who did this?”
Logan says, “I don’t want to point fingers yet, but I have a feeling it’s Higgins. The owner of the club your girl is working to promote.”
“Fuck, I was worried about her taking this on.”
“Yeah, well, he’s pissed at me. I have no doubts about that. I’ve gotten a few calls telling me to watch my back, but I didn’t think he’d start pulling this shit.” Logan shakes his head.
“Hey guys.” Shane approaches, shaking hands with everyone. “This isn’t pretty.” He points to the door. The cops are taking pictures of it so they can see if the graffiti matches anything in their database.
“No, it’s not. I’m already working on getting some cameras installed in the parking lot so we can try and nail down whomever this is. If this is Higgins, then it could be hired help. I don’t think he’s the type of guy to get his hands dirty, though I don’t know him that well,” Logan sighs.
“Has he said anything to Miranda about wanting revenge on Logan or anything?” Cooper asks.
“No, not that I know of, but he did send her flowers today. I can ask her tonight when she gets home from work if he mentioned anything.”
“She said something to me at the club the other night, but you should see if he’s said anything more,” Logan adds.
“Please do and let me know. I’m going to question him today, but I doubt he’ll give me any info. Guys like that play stupid. He’ll point me to another strip club in the area to send me on a damn goose chase.” Cooper already sounds frustrated. Cooper tells us he’ll be in touch, and as he leaves, Jonah pulls in. The three of us make our way inside to discuss the situation.
When we get to Logan’s office, we all take a seat and he growls, “Cameras will be going up soon.”
“Logan, this is your club, so you do what you want, but you may want to reconsider that. If some of your high profile clients get wind that there are cameras outside the club and that they can be recorded walking in, that could really mess up business for you. This isn’t Club Thrive. Some of your clients don’t want it out there that they’re at Club Heat getting a lap dance while their wife is at home cooking dinner,” I warn him.
He sighs. “Fuck, you’re right, so what do we do? I can’t have the club getting painted every other night. It looks shitty and it’ll be expensive to keep cleaning it.”
“Security outside the club?” Shane questions.
“That could be an option,” Logan says. “I would probably only need it from three o’clock in the morning until around eight. By then it’s plenty bright out that no one would want to risk being seen.” He turns to Jonah. “How quickly can you have a new bouncer at Thrive?”
“I’ve just hired a new guy and he starts Friday,” Jonah says. “He has plenty of experience and great references, so I’m not too worried if you need Stone here. The guy has been wanting to get into a nicer place, so he applied with us and I took him.”
“Good. Stone, you’re meeting the team this Friday anyway, so plan on staying to work that night, and then you’ll be on Saturday too. I want you keeping an eye out for anything suspicious.”
“You got it, man.” I nod. Now I have to see how Miranda feels being there all night with me. When we originally discussed her coming to work with me on Friday, I was just meeting with the team, but now I have to stay.
“Okay, I have to get someone to clean up my club. You guys get the hell out of here and make sure Thrive is taken care of,” Logan growls in frustration.
The three of us walk out together, taking one last look at the outside of the club. Shane looks at me. “Do you think this could be that Higgins guy?”
“God, I hope not. I don’t want my girl mixed up with a guy like that. She said he was sleazy and weird, but she didn’t seem threatened by him.”
We all quickly man hug, the guys walk off to their trucks and I to my bike, but before leaving I quickly call Miranda.
“Hey!” she answers, sounding excited to hear from me.
“Hey, baby. Listen, I have to work at Club Heat Friday night. I know I promised to bring you to the club to introduce you around. Are you okay with staying, or do you want to meet everyone another night?” She giggles into the phone. “What’s so funny?”
“I was just asking the girls how they would feel about hanging there to have some drinks. Of course they’re awesome friends and are down with it. I’ll tell them to meet me there and we’ll hang out until you get off the clock.”
“It’ll be a late night. We won’t be out until at least three.”
“No worries. If they want to leave early, it’s all good.”
“Okay, I’ll see you at home in a little while. Be careful,” I stress to her.
“I will, you too. I love you, Stone.”
“I love you too.” I cut the call and slip on my helmet to get home so I can make our dinner.