One Dance for Case (Possessed 2)

Looking around the corner of her small vanity, she asked, “Yeah?”

“Hardy says a man is demanding a lap dance from our spotlight girl.” Before she was even done talking, Ev was shaking her head no. “I know girl, believe me, I know. But he’s paying a huge amount for it, and Hardy is giving you seventy percent.”

If anyone knew her aversion to having men that close to her when she danced, it was Pixie. She’d been the one showing her the ropes of Hardy’s Dolls when she first started three years ago. As the time to practice a lap dance on one of the bouncers arrived, Ev had a panic attack. She couldn’t do it. The thought of a man having such easy access to her body petrified her.

No one ever made a fuss about it before. Sure, there’d been people interested in having her give them one, but Hardy always shot them down before they finished asking. He wasn’t a bad guy, but come down to it, he was all about the money, so this person must be paying an extraordinary amount for Hardy to even ask her.

“C’mon, girl, you need this money. You have to get into a better place. You need to get away from Marcus.”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” she muttered.

Rock meet fucking hard place.

She was in a bind, and she knew it. Marcus had ramped up his attention lately, and she was barely able to shower without him coming through the locked door by accident.

“I can’t,” she whispered brokenly to Pixie.

The other woman came to her side, wrapping Ev in her arms. She held her for a moment before saying to her, “I will be right outside that door, and you know for shit that Tony won’t let nothing happen to us girls, yeah?” At Ev’s nod, her friend began to play with her hair, pulling it up and talking about how she’d do it and her makeup provocatively enough that the client wouldn’t recognize her outside of the club.

After getting ready, Hardy finally showed his face. He knew she wouldn’t be happy that he was making her do it. Leading the way to one of the VIP rooms, he opened the curtain for her to enter.

Her signature song Earned It by The Weekend started. The lights dimmed, and her hips automatically began to sway. When the music played, she always managed to lose herself, but this was the one time, she wouldn’t be able to. This was the one time she’d have to be completely aware of her audience, of their pleasure in her lithe moves.

When he spoke, she realized he wasn’t someone she would ever want to dance for. “About time you show me your moves, Evie,” Marcus breathed out from the chair in the middle of the room.

Walking into Hardy’s Dolls for the first time alone, Case saw one of the girls his woman was always talking to standing sentry beside a bouncer near a room that said VIP. It gave him pause at first, but he knew Evelyn was supposed to be on stage for her spotlight in five minutes so she couldn’t be behind that door.

Besides, he got the feeling she didn’t like the attention a lap dance would give her. He sat at his usual table in front of the main stage. Two rows back so he could see everything. As the waitress brought him the beer he no longer even had to order, he waited.

Ten minutes passed, and she still hadn’t seduced her way onto the stage. He started to get antsy. As the waitress passed him again, he asked her, “Where’s Evie?” When she looked to the side and over to the owner, he knew immediately that her quick I don’t know reply was a lie.

Pushing his chair back, he stormed over to the owner, Hardy, demanding, “Where the fuck is she?”

He refused to answer. It was then that

Case heard a slight commotion behind him and knew she was in the VIP room giving someone a fucking lap dance.

“You slimy piece of shit! Even I know she’s not comfortable with that.”

Fuming, he walked over to where the girl and bouncer were trying to get in the room. “What the fuck is going on?” he yelled, beyond pissed.

“The door’s locked,” the dancer told him angrily, but he could see the worry in her eyes. Which only further pissed him off.

“The door shouldn’t even lock,” the bouncer huffed.

Not bothering to answer, Casey slammed his shoulder into the piece of wood with his entire body, flinging the chair that had been holding the door closed across the room and splintering it into the wall.

A quick survey of the room told him who the dead man walking was that had been terrorizing his woman. Evelyn huddled in a corner with her arms covering her head; her body shaking.

He saw red. His blood boiled with rage.

Charging at the man like a wild animal, Case was on the guy before he knew what hit him. They landed on the ground with a hard crack of the other man’s head hitting the carpet. Fist after fist plowed into his face, rage built up to the point he could no longer see straight.

A soft hand and a whispered, “Casey?” was a plea he couldn’t ignore.

Turning, he stood so fast Evelyn nearly fell. Catching her, he wanted to toss her over his shoulder and carry her out of the club except he didn’t think she’d let him. It wasn’t until she started screaming another man’s name that it penetrated his wrath-filled brain that she was struggling to be let go. When he finally released her, she ran to the other man.

“What have you done? Oh my God! What have you done!” she yelled at Casey.