She Has A Broken Thing Where Her Heart Should Be - J.D. Barker Page 0,163

Jeep’s motor screaming. On one particular stretch in the desert, I broke one hundred miles per hour, not once but three times. I forced myself to slow. A ticket meant my name would appear in a report, and that report would go into a computer and that computer’s data would become searchable… I saw a number of white cars while driving, but none followed me. I wanted to keep it that way. I couldn’t risk them learning where I was, where Stella was.

The moment I arrived in Fallon, I knew Dunk had been right.

She was nearby. The air crackled with her.

Over the past four years, as I followed her around the country, each time I got close I felt her presence, a lingering electricity in the air. Although certainly imagined, there was the scent of vanilla, too. Each of those places, her presence there but slowly fading.

In Fallon, though, it was different. The sense of her waxing rather than waning. Not only was she still in town, but she had been here for at least a week, maybe longer. Dunk hadn’t been specific on that, I’m not sure he even knew, but I could feel it, I could feel her.

When I took the turn onto I-118.

When I pulled into the parking lot of Mike’s Gentlemen’s Club.

I knew she was inside.

I harbored not even the slightest of doubts.

I did see one white car in the parking lot, a Nissan, but I also saw the girl who got out of it in tight jeans and a black halter top, and I knew she wasn’t with the people in white. I hadn’t noticed any of the people in white when I arrived in Fallon, but they began to trickle in. I felt them, too.

On that first night, when Stella was called to the stage as Grace, I fought every urge to get up and go to her. I forced myself to stay in my seat and watch—she was absolutely mesmerizing. At that point, I hadn’t learned why she was here, but I suspected it was because clubs like this offered a cash income and allowed her to live off the radar. That was only partially true. That was before I saw her dance for him.

Yesterday I learned his name was Leo Signorelli, and only a few hours ago, after calling Dunk, I learned just who he was.

Leo Signorelli owned Mike’s Gentlemen’s Club.

He also owned six area brothels. Although legal in Nevada, the conditions were poor. Many of the girls were brought here illegally from around the world and forced to work for him for little to no money in exchange for payment on the debt incurred by Signorelli in bringing them here.

Leo Signorelli was responsible for the death of at least four of those girls. He enjoyed strangling them during sex. The youngest being only fourteen. Dunk said his behavior was well-known among those who skirted the law, but he paid enough to various local officials to remain off their radar.

My first night here, Leo Signorelli took a seat at the side of the stage moments before Stella appeared, and he had been as enthralled with her as the rest of the men in the club. Last night, he brought her a single red rose and placed it on the corner of the stage as she began to dance. Stella only glanced at him, but that had been enough—this man, like me, like all the others here, could not look away. Tonight, he brought another rose, also red, and placed it on the stage. Tonight, Stella not only glanced at him, but smiled.

Oh, how my soul ached at the sight of that smile.

Leo Signorelli looked a lot like me. Same hair, same build. But she smiled at him, not me, and I wanted to jump up from my table and go to her, yet, I didn’t.

I could only watch.

I could only watch as she danced, as she danced for him.

On stage, Stella reached for the brass pole and twirled around effortlessly. Although she wore the dress shirt, it was unbuttoned so low the sides of her breasts were visible, and somehow that was so much more alluring than the dozens of girls in the club wearing little or nothing at all. Others thought so too, because men began to crowd the stage with cash in hand.

Most of the girls wore garters and men would slip money into those garters, their hands lingering a little too long on that girl’s leg as they did.