The girl knew the name. The look of recognition shone on her face as she nodded slowly, keeping that smile intact. She looked past him and to a dark corridor on the other side of the grand room.
“Charlotte’s in one of the backrooms occupied at the moment,” she explained. “When she’s done, I can let her know you’re here waiting.”
He felt a fissure in his apathy. Heat spread throughout his body, melting the ice in his veins as he comprehended Charlotte in a backroom with a stranger. He had to make sure, though.
“What’s done back there?” he asked, hiding any emotion from his tone.
The girl’s smile slipped just a little. She looked him over now, perplexed. “What do you think is done back there, big guy?”
He fought the twitch in his lips. He could almost feel his teeth grind together, but still he kept his feelings at bay. His eyes flashed to the corridor he could hardly see from where he stood. Tinkering in the recesses of his mind was an animalistic urge to tear through the bar and break the doors down to find her.
What do you think is done back there? Asked in such a blasé way, almost to laugh at the absurdity in his question. This little sweetheart didn’t know it, but she had nailed him where it hurt. The smile in her eyes told him she had little clue of it, too.
Only Charlotte with another man could undo years of behavioural change, and a curious girl like this one before him was like a hammer on its head. He was going to shake again, and this time it would be noticeable to anyone looking at him.
Charlotte in the backroom.
Charlotte in the backroom.
He felt the earthquake begin at the centre of his being. That same visceral need to possess her emerged, and now he was close to erupting.
No, but he wouldn’t allow it!
He regained his composure quickly – though it wrecked him inside to do so – and stared back at the girl with a calm smile.
“How do I get a meeting with her?” he asked now.
The girl looked him over, cocking her head to the side. “Charlotte has an exclusive clientele.”
“I’m sure when she sees me, she’ll find I’ll be on it.”
Her smile brightened. “Is that so?”
“It is.”
“Well, give me a few minutes and I’ll find you a room then.”
His lips fell into a line as she left him to serve a table nearby. He watched her bend over to one of the men, whispering something seductive in his ear while he slowly ran his hand up her leg, stopping just below her ass. The men here had boundaries. More so than that, they actually behaved.
Thames knew straightaway where he was.
This was a gentleman’s club. Exclusive, expensive, and very difficult to find. And he had somehow been allowed to just blaze in. He looked around the club, catching sight of more cameras in odd little locations. High end surveillance from within the club, a sign that nothing illegal was to be conducted. Some rich bastard was kicking back on this goldmine, and he had employed Charlotte to take part in its sordid activities.
Slowly, slowly, it was sinking in. Charlotte alone with a man. Alone in a backroom. Alone doing who knows what for god knows how long.
Thames stuck out like a sore thumb, yet no one stopped to ask him who he was. No one cared. He edged to where the bar was and took a seat on a stool. His eyes were fixed on the damn corridor, the urge to go to it pulsing through him worse by the second.
Was this his doing?
Had she turned to this out of desperation?
But how could that be? He left behind an obscene amount of currency in the basement.
What in the fuck was going on exactly?
Laughter came from his right. A group of men passed him from his left. He vaguely heard the bartender ask him if he wanted a drink. The music that was low and sexy suddenly pounded into his skull and the dancer morphed into a wavy blur. He shut his eyes, breathing through yet another sensory overload of images and sounds.
“I win when he’s down?”
“You win when he’s dead.”
He felt a tap on his shoulder. He opened his eyes to find the little thing standing in front of him. “You still want that room, big boy?”
The Hole
“Now, you listen to me,” Conor said to Max as Dom and Jem fell into a conversation