Or so I had reminded myself repeatedly over the years since I had first met him. The truth was, other than Kassa, he didn’t give a single damn about anyone else in the universe. His heart was encased in steel against the rest of the world, and he didn’t care if he treated people like they were dirt or not.
One of the guys had called ahead and gotten us one of the VIP boxes, which included our own personal shows. There was a huge round couch in one corner of the boxed-in room with a small stage and dance pole where one stripper was already dancing for us when we walked in. But we could still see the crowd below and the three different stages where others were getting into the show before them.
I sat down on the couch with Jace to my left and Kale to my right. Instead of watching the chick dance on our personal little stage, I pulled my phone out of my jeans pocket and texted Lucy. But after several minutes when she hadn’t texted me back, I gave up. She was probably having a blast with her friends and had her phone on silent, I tried to soothe myself. Marcus was with her, along with Angie, who might have been more vicious to deal with than the bodyguard. Neither one of them was going to let anything happen to my favorite person.
“Dude, relax,” Jace commanded as he sat back and watched the girl dance around the stage in only a tiny pink thong. “Lucy is having the time of her life.”
“Yeah, but is she having that time of her life with some motherfucker’s dick in her face?” I grabbed one of the beers from the tub behind us that two waitresses had brought in. Twisting off the top, I tipped it back and chugged, needing to get the buzz back I had lost on the limo ride from the whiskey bar to the club.
“I’m bored,” I complained ten minutes later.
There was a new girl on our stage now, but she was mostly skin and bones and so tall she would have been on a more even height with me in her bare feet. She was blond and beautiful with the way her makeup was contoured, but I would have bet good money that when she washed her face at the end of the night, she would look like an entirely different person. She was the polar opposite of Lucy, who didn’t need a speck of makeup and was so short she got a neck ache every time she had to look up at me for more than a few seconds.
I missed my tiny little goddess. Last night had been the first night we’d spent away from each other since she’d moved in with me. If I hadn’t been so drunk when I’d fallen into bed, I probably never would have been able to sleep.
“Dude,” Gray called out as he finished speaking to the waitress who had brought more booze. “I just got you a private dance. If you’re still bored after that, we’ll go.”
“I don’t want a fucking private dance,” I groaned. “I don’t even want to be here.”
Kale pushed my shoulder. “Ah, come on, man. It’s just a dance. Not like you’re going to fuck the chick. Do this and we’ll grab steaks on the way back to the hotel, and you can kick our asses at poker over and over again all night long.”
“Jace, I’m ready to leave,” I said, but my friend was fucking around on his phone. When I glanced over to see what exactly he was doing instead of saving me from his bandmates, I saw he was texting someone. The name at the top of the text wasn’t Kin, just that damn 786 area code number.
I didn’t read the messages already there, but from the looks of it, he had been texting her all day. Whoever the fuck this Eden chick was, she was bad news, and I didn’t know if I could keep that shit to myself. If Jace was cheating on Kin and Lucy found out I knew about it, she would go ballistic. Kin didn’t deserve to be treated like this, with Jace sneaking around with this girl.
“Put the goddamn phone down and do your job as my best man,” I bit out in a low voice so the others didn’t hear.
Jace lifted his gaze from his phone’s screen. “What?”
“Gray just bought our boy here a private dance,” Kale informed him, slapping a hand on my back. “Tell him to go get it done, and then we’ll go.”
“I don’t want the fucking dance,” I half snarled. “Get me the fuck out of here.”
Jace shook his head. “Nah, man. Just get it done like Kale said, and we’ll go. One lap dance isn’t going to kill you.”
“I won’t forget this, motherfucker,” I threw at him as I gave in and stood.
The waitress who had stuck around led me from the room and down a wide corridor to a set of doors where different music could be heard coming from each one. At the end of the row of doors, she stopped and unlocked one.
“Just have a seat,” she instructed in a husky voice. “Your dancer will come out shortly.” With a wink, she turned and left me standing there, calling over her shoulder, “Have fun!”
“Fun? Yeah, sure,” I muttered to myself as I closed the door and dropped my tall frame down onto the low chair. “Fuck,” I groaned and scrubbed a hand over my face. I sent another text to Lucy.
Love you, sweetness. Wish I was with you.
Like it had before, the text went unread, and I leaned my head back against the chair to glare up at the bright lights hanging over the tiny stage. “Fuck,” I groaned again. “She’s going to kill me.”
Whether Lu was going to chop off my balls or not was all I could think about until the lights overhead suddenly dimmed and the first strings of Demi Lovato’s “Wildfire” flowed from the speakers on the walls. The singer’s sultry voice stroked over me just as I noticed the dancer who was now standing in the center of the micro stage.
Ah, fucking hell.
Chapter 12
Lucy
As soon as the front door of our apartment was slammed shut, I couldn’t hold back the giggles any longer. Harris had been seconds away from begging to stay home. I saw it in his eyes as he’d stood there watching me pack his case.
There weren’t many men in the world who would willingly give up their bachelor party. Especially not one that was taking place in Sin City. But then again, I knew I had won the lottery when Harris Cutter had fallen in love with me.