I brushed off my coat and walked out of the alley like I’d just left a meeting.
The mirrored front door led to a small, shadowy lobby decorated in cool marble and lit by softly glowing chandeliers and wall sconces. A single bouncer in a black jacket sat on a stool behind a podium, while two more guards in suits stood by the wall—arms folded, earpieces in place. Professional. Silent. Watching everything and nothing.
I handed the ID across the podium. The bouncer barely glanced at it.
“Have a good night, Mr. Graves,” he said without meeting my eyes.
Even if he had checked the photo, I would have been fine. I was an expert at bullshitting my way around thick-skulled losers like him.
He was sloppy. Fucking pathetic, given how encrypted their online firewalls were. Like a digital fortress wrapped around a paper door.
Chapter nine
Inside, the club throbbed with bass and blue strobes. Fog machines spilled mist across the floor, which glowed blood-red from harsh uplighting that lined the walls. Fake cobwebs were draped everywhere, and animatronic ghouls writhed around in the corners. The tables were packed with men in suits, frat boys wearing plastic fangs, and hedge-fund assholes drenched in overpriced cologne.
Discreetly, I slipped into a corner booth at the very back. This would put a wall behind me and give me a full view of the stage. I reached beneath my coat, unlatched the Glock from its harness, and clicked the safety off. It stayed holstered but ready—close enough to draw blind.
A waitress in black lingerie and bat wings slinked over.
“Beluga Gold Line. Neat. Double,” I said.
She winked and vanished.
I scanned the stage. A pair of dancers spun lazily around twin poles—routine shit, all spray tan, silicone, and vacant eyes. Thecrowd hooted and howled like they’d never seen a pair of tits before.
Fucking animals.
A few men at a table near the stage shouted something obscene. One threw a bill at a girl’s face. She laughed and batted her eyelashes at him. Trained behavior. These performers were conditioned to always bow down to the patrons.
For a few minutes, I sat there emotionless, scanning the place and taking note of the layout, the doors, and the men running the club.
Then the lights shifted, the spotlights dimmed, and the heavy red drapes closed. A hushed silence fell over the club, everyone eagerly anticipating what might come next. Dramatic music swelled, and slowly, the drapes parted to an empty stage. Purple strobes cut through the darkness, synchronized with low, rhythmic thunder as lightning flashed across the backdrop, revealing swirling, eerie storm clouds.
“Gentlemen…and monsters…” the announcer purred through the speakers, her voice velvety and ominous, like a demon’s lullaby.
“She’s your midnight sin. Your unholy queen. Bow down for…Miss Lyla Laine.”
A single bright spotlight clicked on, aimed center stage.
First came her feet—bare, perfectly arched, poised in the air.
Then her calves, sleek and flexed.
Inch by inch, more of her was exposed as her pole was lowered from the stage’s fly loft into the bright light. Her thighs parted in a wide split while she descended like a dark angel falling from heaven.
The silver pole spun slowly, revealing more of her with every second. The audience couldn’t fully see her yet.
Then she moved—an effortless shift, one hand gripping the pole, the other trailing along her body while she leaned back intothe spotlight. Her chest arched, her back bowed, and her face tilted upward into full view.
The black-jeweled tiara caught the light as she spun in midair.
Her face was painted like a queen of the dead—black lipstick, eyes rimmed in darkness, and a single blood-red tear on her cheek.
Her outfit was barely a costume, just a few thin scraps of black leather that cut across her thighs and waist, and some sheer lace dripping down her back like tattered wings. Sequins traced her ribs. Blood-red crystals shimmered along the beltline of her hips.
Barefoot and powerful, she was beautiful.
She didn’t perform.
