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This was the kind of performance I only did for myself. On the rare mornings when K let me in to practice here, or Maggie and I got the living room clean enough for me to use my own pole.
The performance of a fucking lifetime.
Hoots and shouts came from the crowd, and Clementine picked up the scattered money on the stage. I went over to the sound system and changed it to the song I wanted. TJ, the guy who ran the music, wasn’t here yet because it was so early. But I needed something different.
Smooth and melodic that eventually fell into electronic beats that got under your skin. As soon as Clementine gathered the last of the money, I hit play. I couldn’t dwell on this or think about it. My mind couldn’t be on Silver and the others, racing to try to save my life.
Focus on the here and now, girl. Just like always.
The men in the room went quiet when the music started, and I shut my mind off. I went to the stage andleapt, catching the pole and swinging around it, bringing myself to a cupid position with no hands. And that was the last of what I had planned.
Someone turned the music up, and I closed my eyes, letting the pole slow its rotation before I bent backwards, gripping it and inverting myself slowly. Fluidly. Arching my body against the metal like it was a body I craved.
None of the men I craved were in this room, but they were still with me, and I imaginedtheireyes on me now. They would fill with heat and unspoken words. Promises that might finally be fulfilled.
No sound other than the music—no catcalls or comments—but I had them. I knew I did.
Still mortal, I didn’t have any power. But times like this, I wondered. I felt something deeper that I couldn’t quite reach. Could I strike these men? Hypnotize them and hold them spellbound?
Twisting, I climbed the pole again to the top, letting one movement flow into the next the way I wanted to on pure instinct. Not just arousal and sexuality.
Artistry.
I swung, flaring my legs out in a pinwheel before wrapping them around the pole and letting my upper body fall backward once more, the picture of a woman in the throes of the passion they would never fucking have from me.
Around me, the world took on a shimmer. Like everything clicked together. Every movement and breath coalesced, and I was somehow one with the world and everything in it.
Gripping the pole in both hands, I walked around it like the air was solid before flipping my back against the pole, arms above my head, legs twisted around the metal. The pose hurt like hell, but it felt incredible too, the power that came with it.
The song was coming to an end, and I ended it with my legs around the pole, melting my body to the floor, limp and spent to fuel their fantasies.
A lone clap sounded from the audience. “Well done, hybrid,” Fang said. “Again. And remind me to buy a pole for the clubhouse so she can give us the same kind of shows whenever we like.”
I cut off my glare and found Jessie’s eyes across the room. She started the next song, and I kept dancing. Song after song. My body began to ache, but I didn’t stop, disappearing into myself. Just me and the music, nothing else.
There were comments now, and I ignored them. Or tried. Every time Fang’s voice said something about what he was looking forward to, I almost lost it. If there weren’t so many club members in the room, I would have tried to kill him already.
Come on, Shadows.
My body dripped sweat to the point where I couldn’t stay on the pole anymore. I sank to my knees as the song ended, glaring at Fang when he hollered, “More.”
“No,” I said.
A smirk. “I don’t think you’re in a position to say that, Skyla. You belong to me now.”
“She’s in a perfect position to say that,” a rich voice said. My head snapped to the left where Silver stood in the doorway, backed by the leadership of the Iron Shadows, and more members.
“You can’t be in here,” the Legion’s Road Captain snarled. “It’s not your day for the Petal.”
Grave smiled andspoke. “It seems like it’s a day for everyone to break the rules then, isn’t it?”
Delta crossed the room with a duffel bag and threw it at the Legion’s treasurer. If I remembered right, his name was Bear Cub. The bag hit him in the chest with athud. The thing had weight to it.
“Five hundred thousand,” Delta said, returning and climbing up onto the bar. He perched there like a gargoyle waiting to strike, the gleam in his eyes betraying how close he was to snapping. “Feel free to count it, though I’d never waste my time with that bullshit.”
Half a million dollars? That’s how much Kramer owed them?
I froze. That was how much I was worth to them? More than? Fuck me.
