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“That you should keep your hands where they belong.”

My ass still burned beneath the costume. The fact that the sting had begun to spread into a warmer feeling made me even angrier.

“I decide where my hands belong.”

“That has clearly been working well for you.”

I folded my arms across my chest. “We’re done.”

“No. We’re not.”

I turned toward the curtain.

“Sit down, Vesper.”

I looked back at him. “Go fuck yourself, Sergei.”

His expression remained calm, but it shifted, a subtle darkening that made the room seem smaller.

“We are going to have a private conversation,” he stated matter-of-factly. “Depending on how respectful you are during our talk, little pet, that will determine how red your ass gets tonight.”

For several seconds, all I could do was stare at him.

“Little pet?”

He studied the black velvet wrapped around my throat. My choker suddenly felt much tighter than it had five minutes earlier.

“That conversation is not happening.”

“It isn’t up to you,” he answered.

“Everything involving me is up to me.”

“Not tonight.”

I laughed once, the sound humorless. “You really believe people do whatever you tell them, don’t you?”

His attention shifted past me, a small movement toward the smoked-glass wall behind my shoulder. I followed his gaze but saw nothing except the faint shadow of someone passing beyond the panel.

Sergei tapped a finger against the arm of his chair once. A second later, Theo’s broad silhouette appeared outside the glass. Another shadow moved toward him, then disappeared in the opposite direction.

Sergei looked back at me.

Whatever had happened out there was over so quickly I might have imagined it.

“I believe people show me who they really are when they think no one is watching,” he said.

The words struck too close to my own philosophy.

I didn’t like that either.

He reached inside the jacket I’d attempted to search and removed a black leather money clip. He counted out a stack of hundred-dollar bills, then placed them on the table beside the untouched vodka. It was a good deal more than the cost of an hour.

Far more.

“I’m paying for the full private booking,” he said.

“You own the club.”