Her eyes widen. “Where?”
“Back to the club.”
“Why?”
Everyone will be celebrating.
As soon as Isaac and Coen head to the waiting area and make the announcement, the Hawke clan will switch over from terrified to ecstatic.
But not me.
The memory of a mop of sandy-blond hair and a man in a leather jacket leaving the club immediately after Allegra got sick flashes through my head, as does Isaac’s warning about Michael McDonald arriving in New Orleans.
No such thing as coincidence.
“There was a guy there tonight, before Allegra got sick.”
“Yeah?” Astrid’s brow furrows. “What about him?”
“He…” I struggle with how to explain to her the feeling I got when I saw him, but words seem to fail me. “I don’t know, there was just something off about him.”
Her eyes darken with concern. “Did you stop him?”
I shake my head. “I had to call Dad, let him know what was going on with Allegra and Jack. The guy slipped out before I could grab him to question him.”
“So, why are you going back now if he isn’t there anymore?”
“To scour the video footage to try to figure out who he is and why the fuck he was there in the first place.”
And why everything about him felt wrong.
TWO DAYS LATER
GAGE
Every club has an energy.
A vibe.
Something you feel the moment you step through the doors that makes your heart pump in time to the music blasting through the speakers and that gets fully absorbed into your bloodstream.
It engulfs you and draws you into a different world from the one outside the doors.
The Hawkeye Club is no different.
From the first moment that deep, rumbling bass vibrates through your feet and chest until the moment you walk out the door and it closes behind you, you’re enveloped by pure elegance.
A rich tapestry of color, light, texture, and sound that swallows you whole and wraps you in a silky sensual cocoon you don’t want to climb out of.
I’ve spent enough time in enough seedy clubs to know the difference between them and this.
What they’ve created at The Hawkeye Club is so unlike those other places that they aren’t even in the same category.
Beautiful surroundings.
Gorgeous women.
The kind of dancers who have talent and class, who don’t rely on shock value to make money off the patrons. They’re actually good. The best I’ve seen in New Orleans, or anywhere else that I’ve been over the last several years, for that matter.
