of your best performances and it’s not even an event night.”
“Thank you, Bill.” I smiled at him, proud that he’d noticed my hard work. I didn’t want to do the same boring dance every week so I spent hours on my routine every day.
But Bill wasn’t paying me any attention, already eyeing the money on the table. I sighed. Couldn’t he wait for a while longer to come for his share? Greedy bastard. But he pulled the strings, and he knew it. I counted out two hundred dollars and handed him the bills.
“You keep up the good work.” He nodded at Manolo. “You’re up next. Your routine has been a bit lackluster lately. You could stand to learn a thing or two from Sweet Cheeks here.”
He walked out, and I turned to Manolo, who’d turned pale. “Your routine is always good,” I tried to cheer him up.
“Just not that great.” He shook his head. “I figured my days are numbered. I’ve been here for four years already, so it doesn’t come as a surprise. At least I had a good run.”
“No way. You can’t give up so easily. You come on over, and we can practice together when you have the time.”
He smiled. “How are you so good and decent in the middle of all this?”
I frowned. “What do you mean?”
“Exactly that.” He heaved a sigh. “Look, there’s something you should know. I didn’t want to tell you because Bill swore us to keep our mouths shut.”
“What do you mean?”
He inched over to the door and closed it. “You know how when you just started working here, you only paid fifty bucks out of your tips?”
“Yeah.”
“And the month after the price went up. Supposedly for all of us.”
“Yes. It was after my first event.”
“Bill has this thing about dancers earning above a certain amount,” he said, dropping his voice. “He targeted you because you were making way too much. The rest of us aren’t paying the house two hundred bucks every night. We still pay fifty.”
My eyes bugged, and my jaw almost dropped to my knees. “What?”
He nodded. “I didn’t want to say anything because I didn’t want to get fired, but if the rumors are true and he’s going to fire me anyway, you might as well know the truth. Nobody else is going to tell you.”
I couldn’t believe what he was saying. “Are you sure? There must be some sort of mistake.”
“There’s no sort of mistake, Opie. They chose you to fuck with because they know you’re always short on the uptake. You’re too naïve.”
“I can’t believe it.”
“Does he take tips from you too after you make your rounds for lap dances?”
I nodded.
“Son of a bitch. He’s been fucking you over. The fifty bucks we pay the house every night cover everything. After all, the house doesn’t pay us to dance. We’re basically paying to work here.”
“That’s fucked up,” I murmured.
“Yeah. What are you going to do about it?”
I had every intention of confronting Bill about the way he’d been cheating me for the past couple of years. By my estimate, he owed me a few thousand dollars. But when he approached me after I made my rounds, I handed over the fifty dollars, too afraid to speak up and say anything. I was such a coward.
It was the ass crack of dawn when I entered my apartment, feeling drained, both physically and emotionally. I felt betrayed. I’d always thought Pandora was one of the best clubs to work and that Bill was an honest manager. I’d danced at a few others before, and the money for the house varied, depending on how upscale they were. Pandora was the nicest club I’d worked at. It was always clean, no dingy stage or dressing rooms, and the clientele was always good. Apart from the occasional creep—and they were kicked out quickly—the men coming here were decent, just looking for a night of fun. I’d just assumed the amount went up with the décor. God, could I have been any dumber?
I stripped and crawled under my comforter, feeling alone. I almost knocked on Maddy’s door, but that meant putting on clothes, and I didn’t want anything restrictive on my body. Instead, I grabbed my phone and pulled the comforter over my head.
I shouldn’t call him. After our last talk, he’d given me his cellphone number, explaining he’d be away from the ranch and wouldn’t have access to the Internet. He’d told me I could use the number in case of