Say it with me, ladies. STANDARDS!
There’s only one exception around the entire table, a handsome enough Hispanic man that looks to be in his mid-thirties, who hones in on Davies’ boobs the minute he takes his seat.
Ah, so that’s Ramos
.
Ignoring glares from the band of silicone and saline injected Barbie sluts sitting on the plush, cream colored couches, I go about taking drink orders and avoiding sweaty palms trying to slide up the back of my skirt.
Just another day in the trenches.
As I head across the room to the fully stocked bar, the guy behind the counter takes notice of me coming his way. Leaning down and resting his forearms on the bar top, he smiles and offers me a wink as I close the rest of the distance. “Well, hey there, gorgeous.”
I’ve been in Vegas long enough to get a pretty decent read on men. I can spot the red flags from a mile away. There isn’t anything sinister behind this guy’s grin, he is just a natural born flirt so I offer up a friendly smile in return.
“Hey. Nick right?” He is really cute. I’d put him around my age, maybe a year or two older. He has that blond hair, tanned skin surfer boy look to him. His body looks like he spends many hours a day honing it to perfection at a gym and makes sure to take selfies of his abs in the mirrors, but if he’s a nice enough guy, I won’t hold that against him.
“The one and only. And who might you be, new girl?”
“I’m Nell,” I offer him my hand to shake, which he quickly twists around and brings to his lips, placing a soft kiss on my knuckles.
“Tonight your first night?” Nick asks as I pull my hand from his grip.
“Yep,” I answer, taking a peek over my shoulder at the table on the other side of the room. “And I already dislike every one of them.”
At Nick’s deep chuckle, I spin back around. “You’ll get used to it, gorgeous.” I give him my order and he immediately begins mixing drinks like it’s an art form. “Just keep your head down. Pretty thing like you could get eaten alive in here.”
Once he places the last tumbler on my tray, I pick it up, prop it on my shoulder and shoot him a wink. “That’s where you’re wrong,
gorgeous
. If you think I’m capable of being eaten alive, you have a lot to learn. Trust me, I’m not someone you should fuck with.”
“I think you and I are going to get along just fine, Nell,” he laughs.
“Don’t turn out to be a douche and I’d agree,” I return over my shoulder as I walk away from the safety of the bar and back into the lion’s den.
For the next few hours, things go smoothly enough. I’m surprised to see that these guys’ sole focus is on the table in front of them once Davies deals a hand. I walk around refilling drinks when necessary and getting rid of the empties. Despite their scathing looks, I even venture into the den of plastically enhanced pit vipers a time or two to fill drink orders. And bonus, my high heel is holding up like a champ.
Thank you Gorilla Glue.
Hopefully I’ll make enough in tips tonight to cover my half of the rent, utilities,
and
buy myself a new pair of shoes that doesn’t come from Payless. Fingers crossed.
I’m just starting to think that the night isn’t all that shitty after all when the sudden crash of glass shattering against a nearby wall echoes through the suite, startling a jump out of me.
“Goddamn it!” A man yells boisterously. I spin around just in time to see Pockmark Cowboy shoot up from his chair, sending it flying backwards. “This is fuckin’ bullshit! You stacked the deck! You just cost me three-hundred grand, you dumb cunt!”
To my surprise, the furious man is pointing his pudgy finger right at Davies who, shockingly enough, looks like the perfect picture of calm, cool, and collected. “I can assure you, sir. I didn’t do anything to the deck. You just played with a bad hand.”
“You callin’ me a liar, you stupid bitch? I know how the fuck to play poker. I’ve been playin’ for years! I didn’t have a bad hand!”
The man’s chest puffs out like he is ready to pounce and I feel my feet moving in his direction before my brain can catch up. No one else has moved a muscle. If the other men sitting around the table aren’t going to intervene, I sure as hell will. No way am I letting that piece of shit talk to my friend like that.
But before I can even move a foot, a large hand wraps around my upper arm, stopping me in place.
“Wouldn’t do that if I were you, gorgeous,” Nick whispers in my ear. “Just give it a second.”
“Fuck that,” I hiss angrily, tugging at my arm to get free. “If none of you are going to stop him, I will.”
“Relax,” he grinds between clenched teeth. “Nothing’s going to happen to her, I swear. This is all par for the course.”
“This is bullshit, is what it is,” I seethe in response.
Davies actually looks like she’s bored as she replies, “Sir, I’m going to have to ask you to take your seat or you’ll be removed from the room.”
“By who,” the guy laughs hatefully. “
You
?”
At that moment, his paid company unwisely decides to enter the fray, wrapping herself around his arm. “Baby, why don’t you just calm down, huh?”
To my—and everyone else’s in the room—surprise, he rears back and shouts at the woman, “When I want your opinion, I’ll fuckin’ give it to you!”
My chest compresses in a sharp gasp just as the room to the suite bursts open and two men clad in black suits charge the cowboy. One plants his fist in his gut, causing the prick to crumple over in pain before dragging him out as the other man walks the woman out of the room behind her sugar daddy.
And just like that, in a matter of seconds, they’re gone. “Okay, gentlemen. Next game is starting, ante up,” Davies speaks as if nothing’s happened, and the men all start tossing their chips to the center.
“See, I told you everything would work out,” Nick tells me. The tension is gone from his voice and his light, jovial demeanor has returned, but I’m still shaken by the whole situation. And what’s worse, I’m pissed off that Davies just had to stand there and take the cowboy’s shit.
My earlier laid back mood is gone. I’m upset for Davies, I’m upset that I have to resort to refilling tumblers as a living, and I’m irritated at the male race for thinking they can take what they want, when they want it.
That’s why, a half hour later, when Ramos’s hand finds its way up the back of my skirt as I replace his empty Jack and Coke, it takes everything I have not to lose it. Gritting my teeth against the onslaught of curse words that desperately want to escape, I speak past a plastered on grin. “Sir, please remove your hand,” I hiss at him under my breath, knowing full well he can see right through my polite words.
A smug, chilling smirk spreads across his face. He no longer looks handsome, now he just looks like the slimy bastard Davies warned me about.
“Feisty,” he murmurs. “I like it.”
“Please don’t make me ask you again,” I say in the most professional voice I can while still getting my warning across. But for added measure—and because I can’t leave well enough alone—I add, “You won’t like what happens if I have to repeat myself.”
He does as I demand just as Davies says my name in a quiet warning. When I look her way she offers me a discreet shake of her head. I can read the look on her face clear as day and move away from the table before Ramos can do anything else. I’ve overstepped my boundaries when it comes to these men, and Davies just called me out on it.
The fake smile I’ve had painted on my face all evening has disappeared, leaving me ornery and less than pleasant to look at. Knowing this isn’t the best first day on the job, I work the last hour of my shift with a
don’t fuck with me
vibe radiating off my body. Luckily the tips I’d earned from earlier in the night are enough to cover me for a little bit.
By the time the last hand is won and the men collect their winnings, I’ve had enough. I just want to go home, crawl into bed, and forget this night ever happened. Unfortunately, I must have done something in a past life to really piss Karma off, because as I make my way around the table, collecting the empties, Ramos decides to press his luck.
I’m leaning over just slightly to pick up a tumbler when I feel his heat come up behind me. “You know, that attitude of yours really makes me hard, Mami,” he whispers just seconds before his palm lands on my ass with a hard, stinging
crack
. At the instant pain, I spin around, throwing common sense into the wind and letting my instinct kick in.
Before I can think or even stop myself, my knee comes up swiftly, hitting my target with perfect precision. Ramos goes down in a heap on the carpeted floor, clutching his balls as he grunts in agony.
Davies gasps from behind me. “Are you okay, Nell?”
“Oh shit,” is all I’m able to say as I stand in shock, eyes wide on the man writhing in pain on the floor at my feet. If my smartass attitude earlier didn’t do me in, this just did.
“What the fuck just happened?” Nick shouts, running over to us. The moment his eyes land on Ramos he mutters a low, “Ah, fuck.”
“I didn’t mean to!” I shout. “It was just a reflex!”
The door to the suite opens and one of the men in black from earlier steps in, his blank eyes trained on me. Without skipping a beat, he says, “Boss wants to see you, ma’am.”
“But…” I stutter, looking between the suit and Davies, “How…?”
Davies points to the ceiling. “Cameras all over the room, babe. I forgot to warn you,” she offers with a small, sympathetic smile, thinking the exact same thing I am.
I’m about to get canned.
It’s the perfect cherry on the shit sundae that is my life. My shoulders slump in defeat as I step over a prone Ramos and follow after the suit. The silent ride on the elevator does nothing to calm my suddenly frazzled nerves, and when the doors open on the fifth floor, I feel like I’m about to come out of my skin.
I let my feelings take over tonight, rather than my intelligence. I know better than anyone what my given situation is. Broke girls with glued together shoes, desperately trying to make it big in this city can’t afford to think with their heart, they have to think with their mind and decide what is best for them. Clearly I failed at that tonight, letting my emotions get the best of me.
Shit!
I not only need this job, but if I get fired from Hotel Paragon, it will ruin my abilities to try to find any other waitressing job on the Strip. Nerves start to ricochet through my body, and my stomach rolls as a queasy feeling takes over me. What have I done?
I feel like I’m taking the walk of shame as I follow the guy down a long hallway to a closed door marked “Personnel Only.” He swipes his card and I hear a faint beep before what sounds like a lock disengaging. Pushing the door open, he steps to the side and waves for me to enter. I take one step when the heel of my right shoe gives out and breaks right off.
And I lose it.
“Goddamned, son of a motherfucking bitch whore!”
**GAVIN**
Very un-lady like swearing pops out of the most delicious lips I’ve ever seen as Brian opens the door for the little fireball of a waitress. Stumbling forward, she trips on her shoe and I stand up to catch the waitress before she falls face first onto the marble tile of the control room.
“Careful,” I say, examining her facial features up close. She’s even more stunning in person.
She grips onto my forearms and straightens herself, standing tall, one leg longer than the other. Her imbalance peaks my curiosity, so I venture my gaze down her petite body, past her beautifully toned legs, to her scuffed up high heels, where one is shorter than the other. Looking past her feet, I see the heel of the shoe that once was attached. Being the gentleman I am, I bend down and pick it up.
At a closer look, I examine the heel and notice a distinct glob of glue in the center. I quirk an eyebrow at her and hold the heel up in front of her face, “I believe this belongs to you?”
She swipes it out of my hand without a word and puts her hands behind her back, hiding the treacherous heel while trying to stand on her tippy toe to balance her stance. Embarrassment washes over her as her cheeks redden to a deeper hue. “Yeah, that’s mine. Thank you.”
She doesn’t look me in the eyes; instead, her gaze lands on the floor between us. She’s a different woman than the one I watched on screen, the one who singlehandedly brought Ramos down to the ground with a simple thrust of her knee.
Now, she’s reserved, calm, almost submissive in a way. I’m more than fucking intrigued.
“Brian, please open up the B room and escort Miss Prescott into it. I need to look over her file before I join her.”
“Sure thing,” Brian says in a thick Brooklyn accent.
Brian is a beast of a man, his chest the width of a basketball court, and his cue ball head shinier than the fucking sun. He’s intimidating on the outside, but softer than shit on the inside. Want to know his Achilles heel? Watch his three-year-old daughter walk in the room, calling out for him. The man crumbles faster than a hooker on Freemont Street presented with a hundred-dollar bill.
Once they’re gone, I sift through the file that’s marked Penelope Prescott. Thankfully Graham trusts me enough to root through his employee files and not give a fuck what I do with them.
Taking a sip from my tumbler, I read up on the fireball waiting for me in the B room.
Penelope Louise Prescott, age 21, lives in North Las Vegas.
Shit.
I pause. North Las Vegas? What was a gorgeous girl like her doing living in North Las Vegas? I’ve lived here my entire life and I’ve become accustomed to the good and bad parts of town. North Las Vegas is no place for a young, beautiful woman like Penelope to live.
Trying to wrap my head around her living location, I continue reading.
Has worked for Hotel Paragon for the past year waitressing on the main floor, moved from Tennessee.
A southern girl, I like that. There’s something about women from the south that always intrigues me. They’re polite, but have a blaze of fire under them, waiting to be set off. That could explain her recent snap of logic in the high roller room.