Even Better (Stripped 2.50)

It had seemed crazy at the time. Or maybe I’d only hoped it was.

After last night, I’m not so sure.

Maybe one day you’ll come back. That’s what Candy told me.

Even that doesn’t seem so crazy anymore. I feel more solid than ever about my relationship—and more uncertain about my future. I didn’t want to rely on Blue forever, even though he’d let me. And anyway, it’s too quiet in our gorgeous, expensive condo, especially after the overflowing foster homes and then working at the Grand. I’d grown accustomed to people. Having West around reminded me of that.

Hell, I even liked people. Liked dancing with them, liked flirting with them. Except for the worst of the clients, the kind Blue and his security team would throw out of the club, I had liked stripping.

I don’t really want to start stripping again. It will only stress Blue out, and God, it would stress me out too. It was a desperate job, a desperate club. It seems even more desperate now, everything out of place, doors spread wide.

Something is wrong.

Those front doors open, a gaping hole into the club. I can see dust motes glittering in the air. And nothing else. No bouncers, no deliverymen carrying things in.

No reason the doors would be open that way.

My heart pounds.

Blue rounds the corner. His face is set in hard, stern lines, but he stops short when he sees me. “What are you doing here?”

I wave to my car uselessly. “I came to visit Candy.”

Something flickers in his eyes—worry? “Go home.”

Panic filters through my chest. Candy always liked playing with danger, drinking and shooting up. And most of all, toying with the club’s dangerous owner, Ivan. He has way too many ties to the criminal undercurrent in Tanglewood, and for all Candy’s polished perversity, I worry that he’d end up hurting her.

“What happened?”

Blue’s lips press together, and I think he might not tell me. Whatever’s happened at the club, I’ll find out eventually. I’m too deep in it, too invested not to know. I can’t wait to find out from someone else, and I sure as hell can’t go home now. “Tell me, please.”

“Someone got into the dressing room,” he says, finally.

Oh shit. The dressing room? The back room where the girls changed is the inner sanctum. No customers are allowed back there. Hell, even most of the bouncers aren’t allowed.

I swallow around a knot in my throat. “And did what?”

It’s the question I ask instead of the real one. Did he hurt anyone?

Blue understands, shaking his head. No. “He left a message. The cleaning staff almost wiped it away, but West—he was letting them in when he did his morning rounds. He noticed it and thought to send me a picture, just to check.”

A message for who? What did it say?

But I can no longer stand here and wait, tossing out questions. I need answers. And most of all, I need to be sure that Candy is okay. There was that flicker in Blue’s eyes…

Tears already stinging my eyes, I push past him. He lets me.

It seems like every one of Blue’s guys is in the club, studying schematics or pointing up at the ceiling. Oscar is there, and West. Some kind of security upgrade is happening, but I can’t think about that.

Candy is sitting at her padded bench in the dressing room. Her face is white as a sheet, and completely clear of makeup. She stares straight ahead at her mirror—which is scrawled across with a powder pink lipstick I recognize as hers.

John 10:16

Ivan stands behind her, looming, a dark thundercloud over a mysterious, smooth-surfaced sea. His eyes are bloodshot, his suit rumpled. I’ve only ever seen him crisp and in control. He seems wilder now, almost feral.

“Who the fuck is John?” he asks, and I know this isn’t the first time he’s said it.

He isn’t even asking anyone in particular. He’s asking Candy, or me, or Blue who’s followed me inside. He’s asking the very walls, as if pissed that the Grand itself didn’t defend us.