“Hi, Pan! Hi, boys!”
“You want a drink?”
“You want a dance?”
“What are we celebrating?”
“One thing at a time.” Pan grins, and flashes a fan of fifties between his fingers as he drops into a seat. “Just a nice little payday is all.”
The girls ooh and ahh as Fox nods and smiles at them, Kit quietly slips into a chair, Blue takes a seat and really takes it, one black-clad leg sprawled out, the other bent and resting ankle over knee.
And I sit by Pan. Right-hand side, as always.
It’s emptyish, as you’d expect on a random Thursday night. A few guys over at the pool tables, a few more at the bar. One Mermaid on the stage, a leg hooked over the pole and her head thrown back so her long hair just skims the mirrored floor. The blue-green lights flow and pulse like ocean waves—I guess—and the craggy fake rocks and hanging silk flowers loom over the bar, faintly gray with their usual sheen of dust.
To my left, another Mermaid drops right into Pan’s lap. No preamble. Pink shell bra, sequined shorts, boots all the way up her thighs.
Blonde hair. Long.
I scratch the side of my head.
“Well, hello.” Pan tips his face up to hers. “Have we met, ah…?”
She scoffs. “You know my name!”
“Emerald,” I mutter, so hopefully just he can hear.
“Emerald!” Pan cries, spreading his arms wide as she nuzzles into him. “And howareyou this fine evening?”
Emerald sinks her teeth into her lower lip, which is plumped with filler and polished a glossy pink. “I’m good,” she says. Almost purrs. “Very good.” She bats her big fake eyelashes. “How areyou?”
“Good.” He grins. Leans back a little to make room for her. “And getting better.”
They do this.Hedoes this. I’ve seen it before, and I’m sure I’ll see it again. Playful, flirty, teasing, his long fingers and leather-clad palms skimming the bare skin of her waist, her thin little wrists locking behind his neck as she laughs at whatever he whispers into the hollow above her spangly earrings. A bill or two finding their way into the band of her hot pants.
But they like him. Genuinely. Theyalllike him, finger-wave when he comes in, giggle when he leaves, fight over whose turn it is with him—except Treasure—in between. They like the rest of us, too—Fox is plenty handsome and about as dangerous as an excited puppy, more likely to hurt you out of enthusiasm than anything else; Kit’s sweet and tips well even if he keeps to himself; and Blue is…Blue.
And me, of course. I’m fine.
I eye Emerald’s swinging curtain of soft, blonde curls, the glint of the charms on her fingernails.
Mermaids aren’t my type.
Even if I were a guy.
Clink.Another Mermaid, setting down a beer for me and bending over nice and low so I can get a view of her cleavage. I arrange my face in an appreciative look and hand her a twenty.
“Thanks, Sapph.”
“No prob.” She smiles. “You want…?”
She tips her head, points from where Emerald is rolling her hips over Pan’s lap and back to me. I shake my head, like she knows I will. No, thanks. I never do. I’m sure Sapphire can’t help but take it a little personally, but tough breaks. There’s at least a handful of other guys in here and she’s got everything they want.
I don’t want to watch. It’s weird to watch. But Emerald clearly wants attention, throwing her head back and flipping all that hair as she body-rolls against him, one knee clamped on either side of him. Pan’s grinning, enjoying it—obviously, whywouldn’t he—even as her movements start to slide from lap dance to practically mounting him.
And that happens. Not out here. But somewhere.
I swallow some beer down a tight throat.
