He offers me his hand, and my heart stutters at what I see in it—a white business card. Taking it, I look at it, flicking it over. Before I get a chance to read the card, he speaks, “Come to this address tomorrow. Six p.m. We can talk employment.”
I watch him walk away, but he doesn’t walk back in the bar. Instead, he crosses the street and disappears into the night.
My heart starts regularly beating again, the erratic beat that happened when he was too close slows. Catching my breath, I shake out of my daze. Just then Tracey walks out, her hand clutching mine. “Come back, I’m sure he won’t fire you. That guy deserved it.”
I laugh and shake my head. “I assaulted one very high-paying customer, Tracey. Quitting is the better option. Trust me.”
She leans over, hugs me while I tap her back. Hugs make me uncomfortable, and she knows it, that’s why she squeezes a little extra longer before she pulls back smiling.
“You can’t afford to lose this job.” She’s right, but my eyes look to the card in my hand.
“I just got offered a job, actually.”
“What? Who?”
I look at the door, then to Tracey’s brown eyes. “One of them. He was intense, Trace. Too intense.”
She smiles and the smile hits her eyes. “I like that look in your eyes right now, El. I like it a lot.” Then she disappears, leaving me at the side of the building and daydreaming about a man who has whiskey-colored eyes with a hint of green.3CreedI’ve never met a woman with so much fucking flair as her, and that’s saying a lot considering my choice of work.
Echo walks in the door, his blond hair almost covering his face. His blue eyes look up to me, narrowing as he stares. “Something’s different.” He waves me off, not letting me say a word, not that I was going to anyway.
Soft, sexy, sultry music infiltrates through the club below. My hands scrunch at my sides. Biting my inner lip until it bleeds, I manage to move to go down there. This is the part I hate the most.
We all have a position here. All four of us.
Myself—in charge of the girls and recruiting them.
Echo—in charge of security.
Falcon—handles the money. Plus, finds our Elite customers.
Darby, mainly known as D—who runs everything else.
We came from money, each and every one of us. We attended an elite school and it was only fair our business went that way as well. It’s how we came together, it’s how we will continue.
The business, though, that wasn’t my idea, it was Darby’s. Which is why he runs most of the business and owns a higher-percentage share than the rest of us.
This club, though, it isn’t like your normal bar, or even strip club for that matter.
This is not a place you can walk into from the street—our doors are locked tight, our security even higher.
Everything needs to be perfectly managed with the number of people thinking they can break in. What happens to them after they do so, well, let’s just say, they don’t walk away with their limbs intact.
“I’m fucking off, I can’t deal with this anymore. You fucks deal with the club,” Echo says as Darby walks through the front door. I left them at the bar where they see our high-profile customers, Echo followed me back with Darby soon to follow.
“What the fuck are you talking about?”
Echo shakes his head at Darby, then looks to me. “I’m going. I need to go. I can’t deal a second fucking longer. I’m going mad. I’m going to kill someone if they ask me one more time how the fuck I’m doing. Do you understand?”
I don’t, but I nod anyway.
Echo turns and walks out the front door leaving Darby and myself standing on the red carpeted floor.
“I assumed he would have blown up way before now,” Darby says walking away.
Echo was in love, something we thought we’d never see. Then he lost her, to his brother of all people. She left him broken, and some even think unrepairable.
“He’ll be heading to the beach,” I say to Darby. He nods his head. We don’t live near the beach, we only go because Echo fucking makes us. Why he lives in the city we don’t fucking know, it’s not like we can’t afford to cover his job. This business, well let’s just say, we don’t do badly. We do great.
“You followed her?” he asks me. I pin him with my eyes. One thing you have to learn about Darby is he watches everything, even when you think he doesn’t notice. He always does. I nod my head, he shakes his. “Girls like her will only break your heart. Just like Echo.”
I slap him on the shoulder as I walk past him to start the set-up. “That means you have to have a heart to break, Darby. That’s something I don’t have,” I say.