“What the fuck are you talking about?” I snap.
“Since when do you get your own coffee?” he asks, nodding down at the steaming cup in my hand.
“Since I decided my personal assistant isn’t my servant,” I answer as we make our way to my office. Well, I am going to my office; he is following me as he does.
“And I repeat, go ahead and say it,” he grins. “You’re spending time with her outside of the office. You’ve hung out with the kid. You’re going on coffee dates with her in the morning instead of having her bring your coffee to the office.”
“What’s wrong with that?” I ask. “Maybe I like the walk. I own the fucking place, so I should probably be a little more present.”
“You pay people to be fucking present,” he scoffs. “Just say it.”
I never tell people when they’re right. For one, they’re not usually right, so I don’t have to worry about it. But I’d be lying through my teeth if I said I’m not getting soft over here. And Diego can always tell when I’m lying. The bastard.
“What do you want from me?” I ask, rounding my desk to sit down. “She’s different.”
“There it is,” he grins. “Dalton owes me so much money.”
“Tell me you’re not betting money on my personal life, Diego,” I mutter.
“Oh, we so fucking are. Nobody believed me when I said you were catching feelings. It’s unheard of. But I know you. And you, my man, caught it and bad.” Diego claps his hands together in satisfaction. I’m about to clap a hand across his face.
“Is there a reason you’re in my office other than to give me shit and maybe get your ass kicked?” I snap.
“Sadly, yes,” he sighs, sitting down in the chair across from me. He smirks as he shoots a text, to Dalton no doubt, and then tucks his phone away before losing the cocky smile. That would be both a good and a bad thing. “We lost another dancer,” he says, and I nearly flip the table over.
“The fuck?! When? To who?” But it’s not like I need to ask. Dylan is obviously behind it. Though he knows better than to come around my club again. Which means he has an inside source. Fuck.
“The Diamond Back,” he says and then he nods at my phone. I look it up, and sure enough, it’s a place. “It opens in a week from my understanding. Fucking walking distance from the Opal Room.”
“This isn’t a bar crawl,” I growl. “Gentlemen’s clubs aren’t for the college kids and the tourists.”
“No, but people also don’t hate having two options.”
I scroll through the website. The interior is similar to the Opal Room but flashier. Cheaper. Very Dylan Decker.
“The only question now is how is he snaking the girls out? I doubt he can pay more than us. And our high rollers are going to betray us,” I say as I click my fingers on the desktop.
“I mean, my first thought is word of mouth. All these girls, regardless of where they work, know each other. Maybe they’re talking each other into it,” he suggests.
“Still. Without regulars, there’s no way they’ll make the same out of the gate as they do here. Some of these girls bank close to a thousand a night.”
“Sign on bonus?” he asks, and I shake my head. Then it hits me, and it hits him too at the same time because Diego says it out loud.
“Blackmail.”
Fuck. That has to be it. And it would go for our top clients too. Someone is frequenting the Opal Room, someone with access to the Velvet Lounge, who is threatening to exploit them. One of the girls who left is a preschool teacher. Another is a therapist. Two of the clients who left are married, and their wives think they’re at a steakhouse watching the Raiders games. If they knew where they really were…their lives would be dust.
“So all we need to do,” I say. “Is figure out who is blackmailing them and forcing them out.”
“Oh, is that all?” he asks sarcastically, and I scowl. I know most of the people who go in and out of my hotels and the Opal Room, but I can’t vet everyone. That would be impossible. And knowing Decker, he’s got some low crawling connections. It could literally be a rando off the street that he offered a nice chunk of change to and then threatened to get lost.
Diego’s phone buzzes again, and he stands up. “Well, I gotta run, but if you think of anyone or anything, let me know. It can’t last. He can’t win.”
No, he cannot. Still. I’m irritated that I am no closer to the solution than I was before.
“Somebody looks like they need a drink,” Jocelyn’s voice pours into the room the moment Diego steps out.
“It’s eight in the morning,” I say.
