Viper nodded, but all he did was point. And when my eyes followed his direction, I saw that Angel, our Sergeant at Arms, already had his claws sunken into the bullshit excuse for a man.
I waved my hand in the air. “I’ll let him handle it this time. The woman’s back there already asleep. Make sure you check on her before we shut the club down.”
When Viper nodded at me again, I went off in search of another dark corner to perch in.
While my job was to hunt down any nefarious characters that might stumble through our front doors, I also had a nose for picking out journalists. Paparazzi that were undercover and trying to snap pictures of people who paid us a great deal of money to keep them on the down-low for an evening. I hated journalists. I hated the fucking media. They were nothing but a bunch of attention-hungry whoremongers that got their rocks off by making other people miserable for fifteen minutes each night.
And as my eyes flickered toward the bar, I zeroed in on a man in a blazer and faded jeans with his head on a swivel.
He also had his phone panning around the club.
“Gotcha,” I murmured.
I strode across the dance floor, maneuvering around the close bodies. I locked my eyes with the man and he scrambled to put his phone away. He knew he’d been caught, and I sure as hell wasn’t allowing him to go without seeing that phone first.
“So,” I said as I slipped beside him at the bar, “you did read the signs coming in, didn’t you?”
The man grabbed his drink. “Not sure what you’re talking about.”
I nodded toward the phone on his hip. “Not many people clip their phones to their belt any longer. Mind if I take a look?”
He scoffed. “It’s my phone. You don’t get shit.”
“Well, you’re on private property. My guys and I own this building, and the rest of the buildings we operate out of, and we have rules you automatically agree to abide by the second you walk through those doors. So, you can hand me your phone so I can go through it, or I’ll let my friend Viper handle it from here.”
He scoffed. “And who is this Viper character you speak of? Maybe he’d like to give me a quote on something I’m researching.”
“Yes?” Viper asked.
The man’s shadow cloaked the spindly journalist, and as his deep, resonating voice shook my ribcage, the journalist slowly raked his eyes up the massive human being. Viper stared down at him with those dark, brooding brown eyes. The man was a force to be reckoned with, I’d tell you that.
That journalist tossed me his phone like it was a damn hot potato he wanted to get rid of. “Fine, fine. Whatever.”
I snatched it up and swiped across the screen. “Passcode?”
The man rolled his eyes. “9-1-1-0.”
I typed it in. “Wow, you’ve got pictures and videos. Anything else I should know about? Because you really don’t want to make me work for it.”
The journalist licked his lips. “No.”
I leaned toward him. “You’re lying. Viper?”
The mountain man snatched the guy’s arm up. “Come with me.”
“Wait, wait, wait!” the journalist exclaimed. “Th-th-th--there’s interview material, too. In the notes application. You can delete it all, just call off your dog!”
Viper growled, but I held up my hand as I deleted things with my other hand. I gave his phone a nice once-over, making sure absolutely everything had been erased from not only his galleries and his notes, but also from the SIM card on his phone.
“Think twice before you try this stunt again, otherwise I’ll have your job,” I glowered.
I tossed the journalist his phone back and I’d never seen someone run out of the club as quickly as he had.
“Good job, Viper,” I said as I held my fist out.
He fist-bumped me, then headed back into his corner to perch.
“Office time,” I said breathlessly.
