RHETT
35
The steel exitdoor clicks shut behind me with a sound too clean for a place that holds so many dirty secrets. Kade’s at my side, both of us dressed in black-on-black suits and leather gloves, faces split in half by sleek masquerade masks that the club requires. Hopefully, those will be enough to keep our anonymity intact.
As we stalk down the expansive hallway, the air hums with a booming sensual bass. Drawing in a breath, the scent of liquor and latex clings to my inhale like stale cigarette smoke does a motel carpet.
“Audio check,” Cole’s voice crackles into my Bluetooth, low and close like he’s standing next to me.
“Clear,” I mutter, adjusting the earpiece just enough to feel it settle in place.
“Loud and bitchy,” Kade adds from beside me. Histone is smooth, but I catch the way his fingers flex at his sides.
Jace laughs through the connection. “Copy that, assholes.”
Pushing through the velvet-curtained threshold, Kade and I step into a room that looks like a sin pit carved out of wealth. He exhales through his nose. “Jesus. You could smell the money before we even walked in.” It sounds like a joke, but he’s not laughing. Kade’s gaze sweeps the room, not to observe the girls or the glitter, but for exits, threats, and blind spots.
I keep my voice low. “Money doesn’t cover the stench.”
“Doesn’t have to,” he quips. “They just spray it with perfume and call it exclusive.”
Scanning my surroundings, my eyes lock on the bar. A dark obsidian ring sits dead center, polished and lit from below, casting soft shadows across glass bottles and bare skin. Men in tailored suits line the circular booths around the room, their expensive watches glinting, cigars glowing like fireflies. This place wasn’t built for men like us.
Kade doesn’t say it, but I know he feels the difference too… between our lives and theirs.We’re a long way from Black River.
Topless dancers twist up chrome poles in slow-motion elegance, all hips and shadows. Suspended cagesswing from the two-story ceiling—satin ropes, long limbs wrapped in glitter and steel.
The walls are mirrored—the kind that stretch from floor to ceiling, catching light like liquid mercury. I’m betting somewhere up there, men with more money than conscience are watching while they drink expensive liquor in the privacy their wealth buys.
“Tell me this doesn’t make your skin crawl,” Kade mutters as we move across the floor.
“You could say that.”
Each step measured, we walk toward the bar. I glance to the left and catch a glimpse of a man pouring a drink while a girl straddles his lap, her eyes glazed and vacant. She doesn’t even blink. I sweep my gaze around the room, looking for anything out of place. Cole’s voice comes through again.
“We’ve got a visual on Marcus and Paulie. They’re fifteen minutes out. Tops.”
“Kade, let me know when they head up.”
“You got it.” He leans against the bar, eyes already moving.
I start toward the stairs, leaving the noise and smoke and perfume behind.
The second floor is quieter, darker. Remembering what Jace said earlier, I stop at the third door on the left. There’s a keypad.Shit!
“Cole. Is there anything about an entry code in their email exchanges?”
“Give me thirty seconds.” I take one deep breath while he searches for it, then another. “Got it,” Jace confirms. “Two seven four eight.”
I key it in, and the lock gives a satisfying click. Pushing the door open, I step into the suite and shut it behind me. “I’m in.”
A mirrored wall runs along one side, and it’s just as I’d suspected. From in here, the club floor is exposed like a stage play of one-way voyeurism. The dancers in the cages move slowly and sinuously in the filtered light.
Surveying the space, I scrunch my nose. Everything in here is designed to seduce—velvet, leather, low lights, and silence. Quickly, I note everything around me from the big bed to a jacuzzi tub, and a marble bar stocked with booze. The bathroom door stands open. At the center of everything, twin couches frame a glass coffee table. A crystal decanter filled with amber liquid sits on top.Perfect.
From my breast pocket, I pull a clear baggie filled with the cocaine Jace and Cole acquired from some dodgy dude they found on Craigslist. Cocaine alone isn’t enough to ensure this goes the way I need it to, so I’ve laced it with a fatal dose of xylazine. Thankfully, I have easy access to that medication for veterinary purposes. It’s commonly found in illegal substances. Even if it’sdetected in their systems, they’ll never tie it to me, and considering the source, there’s always a chance the coke is already cut with fentanyl or something similar.
I crouch beside the coffee table, peel open the plastic, and tap out the powder in slow lines. Shaping them carefully with the edge of my gloved finger, I drag each one until it’s smooth, even, and clean at the edges—the way they’d expect to find it. Prepped and presented like a gift.
