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Thanks to me, it was.
We were respected by other business owners in the area, despite what we offered here. I liked to think it was because of the serious image I worked my ass off to set forth that we didn’t have the locals complaining about our presence.
There were plenty of sex clubs that were constantly fighting off calls from the cops by annoyed neighbors or jealous competitors, even when they weren’t doing anything wrong.
Not us. We had respect that they didn’t.
And I intended to keep it that way.
I walked away from the one-way mirror and toward the surveillance room. In there was one of our security people, Tony. He was leaned back in his chair, glancing between the cameras.
When I first came up with the plan to hire someone to watch the wall of monitors at all times, I was worried that people would take advantage. That they’d get hired with us and we’d be paying them to sit in a room and they wouldn’t pay attention to the cameras at all.
But, of course, I found the exact opposite. Due to the nature of the club, our security guys seemed glued to the screens. There was always something interesting happening on them. As soon as I stepped through the door, my eyes automatically fell onto a group of three people—one woman with two men—who all had their tops off.
“How are things looking tonight?” I asked Tony.
“Good. No real issues. At one point I saw a guy getting real close on the dance floor to this girl who was looking anxious, so I phoned down to Oscar and told him to keep an eye on them. The guy left her alone.”
“Good man.” I nodded to him. “Keep it up.”
I sat down in another empty chair and started scanning the security cameras myself.
This was one of my favorite things to do when I was at Crave. Unlike Diesel, I had no desire to go down and join the party myself. Seeing everything running smoothly in the club was enough to keep me happy while I was there.
One of the screens caught my eye, making me do a double-take.
It was the security camera for the bar area, where we had a bunch of couches and cocktail waitresses that handed out drinks. I zoned in on one girl who looked uncomfortable on the couch.
I knew why she caught my attention, too… specifically because she looked uncomfortable. I had trained myself to keep an eye out for any woman who didn’t look like she was enjoying herself at Crave. It was something else I did to make Crave as safe as possible. Usually, if you spot an uncomfortable woman, there’s a creepy man not far behind her.
“What’s the story with this girl?” I asked Tony.
He looked at the camera. “She and her friend sat down just a few minutes ago.”
She had long, dark brown hair that fell halfway down her back. She had a drink in her hand she was sipping, but even through the monitor I could see she wasn’t having a good time.
There were no creeps around that I could see, though. At least, not yet. She was just chatting up another young woman that looked to be about her age, a petite redheaded woman. She was pretty, too, but my eyes kept darting back to the brunette.
If I had seen her outside of work, there would be no denying that she was my type. She was absolutely stunning. Had I run into her at the coffee shop or the bank, I certainly would have tried to get her number. Even now, it was tempting to break every single one of my personal rules just to go down and meet her.
But no, I wasn’t Diesel. That was not something I did. I would never hit on a woman at this club. I did want to know what was bothering her, though. She seemed chatty enough with her red-headed friend. Was it the music? The drinks? The service?
As long as it wasn’t another club member, I was content enough to sit up here and watch from a distance.
That was exactly what I did for a while. I glanced at the other cameras from time to time as well, of course, but my eyes kept coming back to her.
Still, I didn’t want to be too obvious. As an owner of the club, I felt it was important to set a good example for my employees, and letting Tony see me drool over a woman—no matter how hot she might be—wasn’t a great idea.
Ultimately, though, I stared at her in the bar a lot more than I’d meant to. She never did look more comfortable, not even as she was on her second drink of the night. She really didn’t want to be here, and I already knew I wasn’t going to be able to think of anything else until I found out why.
Stopping myself from walking down there and getting some more information was taking a lot more willpower than I would have liked to admit.
She had gotten up to chase her friend who had moved toward the dance floor, and the second she turned around, a man moved into the frame and dropped something in the drink she had set on the side table.
Fuck. That.
“Tony!” I called out to him as I stood up. “Dammit!”
