Kill Me (11 page)

I slid a bill out of my pocket, not even looking to see what it was. I’d not come prepared, so I had nothing but larger bills. The green-eyed dancer stopped gyrating and pulled her money-keeper further away from her body. As I slipped the bill under the fabric, I could see the manicured slip of dark hair which dipped into her dewy pink folds.

My breath caught in my throat and I jerked my hand back like she’d bitten me. She regarded me for a long second before she kissed me full on the mouth. I was confused. I didn’t think strippers did that? Or was it hookers I was thinking of? Damn Julia Roberts for not making that clear.

While she collected her tips from the stage behind the bar, I pulled another bill out of my pocket. I threw the twenty on the bar and stood to go get another drink, since they were obviously helping me out so far.

A hand clasped mine and I turned to see the dancer whose vagina had recently been in my face. She pulled me toward the private rooms with a smile.

“Come with me,” she said, wrapping her arm around my waist and guiding me down the dark hall. It felt awkward, me walking like a normal person, with a mostly-naked goddess draped around me. Worse still, her breasts bobbed as we walked and I couldn’t take my eyes off them in all their jiggling-splendor.

In a moment of self-consciousness, I scanned the room as we left to see if Cassidy and Vera noticed my wanton display. I didn’t see them anywhere and I could only hope that they hadn’t seen me. I wasn’t worried about them telling anyone. I mean really, what could they say that wouldn’t also place them in a strip club too? Rather, I was more worried about what they would think of me. Hell, I was beginning to worry about what I thought of myself. Looking in the mirror wouldn’t be the same tomorrow—that I was sure of.

A stripper took the stage sporting spiked hair, a dog collar and a pink ballerina skirt over four-inch-heeled combat boots. On cue with her entrance The Dollyrots belted out attitude. As Bad Reputation rocked the room, I smiled at the timing and entered the hallway with
my
stripper clinging to my side.

Chapter 12

Once in the darkened hall, I felt the stripper’s hand slip under my jacket and cami, stroking the curve of my hip. She must think that I’m loaded, I thought. Why else would she be corralling me into a private, high-priced room? Oh well, I went with it.

At the third curtained room, she motioned for me to go ahead as we passed through the narrow opening. I felt her press up behind me, her arms snaking around my waist as I stopped. It felt both comforting and clingy at the same time, almost like she was hiding behind me. Of course, the room wasn’t empty.

Why hadn’t I considered that?

Inside the ten foot square room was a low bench that ran along three of the walls. A handful of people were seated on the bench, scattered around the room and partially obscured by deep shadows. To my left were two dark and handsome men in tailored suits that looked somewhat familiar, and in the back a pretty blonde socialite lounged, each with their own private dancers. To the right was one more person, seated alone like she was waiting.

“Ah, Morgan, I see you found my Clara!” Bette said.

The dancer, whose name was apparently Morgan, peeked around me to nod quickly before hugging me tighter.

“Bette.” I nodded. My vocabulary was stunted by the press of Morgan’s breasts into my back.

“Please, have a seat,” Bette waved her hand to the stretch of bench between herself and the back of the room.

With Morgan still attached to me, I crossed the room and took a seat down the bench a bit from Bette. Morgan sat on the other side of me, curling up under my arm. I wasn’t sure what was going on with her. She’d gone from a confident temptress to clingy child in less than a minute.

“Have you met Clive and Gregor?” Bette nodded to the two men across from us. Both men leaned out from behind their matching strippers and offered up a cursory “h’allo.”

I wasn’t sure which one was Clive and which one was Gregor. The men were similar in height and athletic build, but that’s where the similarities ended. With black, gelled hair, the man directly across from Bette looked polished and decidedly upper crust. The man across from me however, had closely cropped hair, a five o’clock shadow, and a slight scar interrupting his brow line.

The first guy was a bit creepy, but the second man was hot. I nicknamed them Dark and Dangerous almost immediately. I’d take dangerous any day over dark. There was no trusting a man that took that much care with his appearance—you’d always be second in the relationship.

“And China, an old friend,” Bette motioned to the blonde woman in the back, whose stripper was oriental. Talk about irony.

“Nice to meet you all,” I said quickly. Something in Bette’s tone told me that she was on edge. Was it because of the talk she promised me, or her other guests?

A waitress entered the room with an obscenely large bottle of champagne and five glasses. “Will there be anything else, Miss?” she asked Bette.

I stifled a laugh. While Bette was stop-traffic gorgeous, she obviously wasn’t a “Miss”. I guessed her age to be near mine, or maybe just a couple of years older.

Bette sliced me with a steely gaze before returning her attention to the waitress. “Yes, send me a girl. A healthy, bubbly one.”

The waitress crinkled her forehead at the strange turn of phrase. “Sure, I’ll send one right in.” She hurried from the room.

“So, Clara, tell us a little about you,” China said while the stripper bobbed up and down on her lap. I was becoming grumpy and thirsty again.
Imagine that
. I had to talk to Bette and doing the whole cocktail party introduction thing wasn’t my style. I only forced myself to smile and make small talk when it was my job, which this clearly wasn’t.

I looked to Bette who was uncorking the champagne and pouring it into the glasses. She nodded indicating that I should answer.

“Well, I’m an account manager for a boutique advertising firm,” I started.

“Humph. Blue collar,” said one of the men, the one I’d nicknamed Dark.

I ignored him, afraid of what I might say if I replied. People who couldn’t be cordial had a way of getting under my skin. I continued, trying to keep the bite out of my reply.

“I live in coastal Virginia and I have an eight-year old daughter named Quinn,” I said.

Bette almost dropped the glass she was holding. “You can’t have a child! You are not wearing a wedding ring.”

What century was she from? Gawd.

“Well, Bette, I am married, but separating, so I’m not wearing the rings,” I said, hoping that made sense. Only I knew the real reason my fingers remained jewelry-free. Specifically, that I’d had to borrow money against my entire bridal set last month to cover the mortgage and I’d been stressing over it ever since.

“So you like men?” said China, looking pointedly at Bette.

I started to point out the obvious, like the might-as-well-be-naked girl stroking my neck, but I was too tired for snark. “I married a man, so I guess I like them well enough most of the time.”

“Elizabetta, did you not know of the husband, or the child?” Dangerous said.

Bette looked bewildered and it was odd to see her not totally in-control at the moment. “No, I did not,” she said.

“Quite the predicament you’ve placed us in,” said Dark.

“Are we sure this conversation is even necessary?” said China.

“China is right. We are getting ahead of ourselves,” Bette agreed.

What they hell were they talking about? I was having a hard time following. Their voices seemed to be faster, like I was hearing the frequency wrong or something. Maybe the alcohol was finally kicking in like it should have an hour ago.

“Clara, talk to me. What questions did you have?” said Bette, passing out the filled champagne glasses.

A new stripper entered the room. She was a southern belle, all the way down to her peach-colored bikini and seductive drawl. “What can I do for y’all?” she said.

Bette summoned the girl to her, and she complied by mirroring the actions of every other stripper in the room, except for Morgan. She had regained some of her charisma and was using it against me. She’d pressed her bare chest to me and was stroking my thigh, tracing just fractions of an inch higher with each loop of her hand.

That made it so much easier to think.

“Well, I thought we were going to talk in private,” I hedged.

“We are,” said Bette, “the ladies are not paying us any attention. So ask what you will.”

It was Bette’s friends that bothered me, not the strippers. I’m sure they’d heard all kinds of things in their line of work.

“But I don’t know where to start,” I said, swatting Morgan’s hand away when she skimmed the tender skin just outside of my bikini line.

“The beginning will do,” said China with a trace of impatience in her voice.

“Okay. What is with that violin of yours Bette? How could I play it?” I asked.

I heard the men murmur to themselves. China remained silent, but stared at Bette.

“I told you, that instrument is enchanted. It called to you; it is how I knew you were the one,” Bette said.

“I’ll pretend that makes any sense for now. But how could I play it?”

“Only those destined for our life can play it,” Bette said simply.

Well, that was helpful. Since I was striking out on all fronts, I decided to push on until I learned something useful.

“Okay, I’ll come back to that too. Why don’t I remember a single thing from last night? I know I had a lot to drink, but if I’d had enough to black out, surely I would have had a hangover this morning.”

Dark and Dangerous pushed their strippers to the side, to pay better attention to the conversation.

“We’ll come back to that in a moment,” Bette hedged. “What else did you want to ask?”

“Uh, okay. Did I do something to Domino earlier, like he insists?”

That got China’s attention. She tossed aside her doll as well.

“I am not sure, Clara. If you did, it is outside the scope of my knowledge.”

Well, this was going swimmingly. “Okay, how is it that after a night I don’t remember, I haven’t used the restroom once, I have no desire to eat but I could drink everything in this building and still be thirsty, and when I cry my tears are pink?”

“So you did do it!” Dark addressed Bette in a congratulatory fashion.

“Has she really had nothing to eat yet?” China got up to study me like I was some experiment on display. She leaned in, too close for comfort, staring at my mouth. She looked like she wanted to dissect me. “How is she so...so composed?”

“That is why I brought you all here. Did you think it was for the oppressive heat and the loose women?” Bette said.

“I’m sure China did,” sneered Dark.

“Would somebody please tell me what you guys are talking about? You’re creeping me out.” I wasn’t kidding either. My skin crawled with dread and apprehension. Something bad was coming. I could practically see the storm-clouds rolling in.

My spidey-sense was right on the nose, and for once, I figured it out ahead of time.

Chapter 13

Bette caressed me with her gaze, her features softening. “Last night, we made love, Clara. And you begged me to do it. Do you truly not remember?”

I shuddered. I hated that phrase—
make love
— it was too cutesy, too Pollyanna. Real people had sex. The act was a verb and deserved an action-word. One couldn’t invent love by getting naked. Therefore love was not possible
to make
. It already existed or it didn’t.

Really though, I was just avoiding the topic at hand. I had slept with a woman. And I didn’t remember a second of it. Damn.

“Great, so my first time with a woman and it might as well of not happened,” I complained mostly to myself.

One of the stupid men gaping at me snickered—who cares which one found my girl-virginity amusing. “Wait, what do you mean, I begged you to do it? Do what?”

“I turned you, I think. Or I tried, but it doesn’t seem to have taken, at least not fully,” Bette explained.

“Turn me into what, a pumpkin?” My humor missed its mark apparently, because nobody seemed to get the joke. Have I mentioned that I make stupid jokes under stress?

“One of us. Like me,” Bette was being vague and it scared me. She was usually uber-direct. She continued, “I fed from you, drained you of most of your blood, and then I fed you.”

“That sounds like a homo-erotic vampire flick. Seriously, what happened?” I said, wringing my hands.

“I have already explained. You are vampire. Maybe,” she said, shrugging her shoulders and looking so very nonchalant. We could have been discussing weather or current affairs.

“So you killed me?” I deadpanned.

“Do you feel dead?” Dangerous smirked and slapped his stripper on the ass. The echo sounded through the room.

“Ok, let’s say for the sake of argument that you are serious and I’m a baby vampire. Shouldn’t I be stark-raving mad, biting anything that moves, gorging myself on blood?” I still didn’t believe. Not at all. No way, no how.

“That is the maybe part. You seem to have taken on some of the characteristics of vampirism, but not the more unsavory ones. I’ve never encountered this before, so I cannot explain it.”

I sat there, my mouth slack. I could feel Morgan shiver against me. I placed my arm back around her instinctively and tried to ignore her flinch. She was scared again, but of me instead of them.

“I don’t believe it. Prove it,” I said. “Do something Vampy.”

Dangerous laughed and I shot him a cold look.

Bette considered my challenge, and then crooked her finger at the stripper seated on the floor. She got up and climbed onto Bette’s lap, offering up her creamy skin. Bette traced the delineation of her neck, pressing down like one would do if checking for a pulse. She whispered something in the stripper’s ear and the girl went limp in Bette’s arms. Casting a glance at the velvet curtain to our room, Bette waved her hand at it, and the curtain stilled. I swear it looked more solid than it had ten seconds earlier.