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“Ask for Trina. She’ll be in the office at the end of the hall where the bathrooms are. Keep going straight back.” He turned his head toward the line. “All right, who’s next?”
Shocked that it could be that easy, I rushed inside without even paying the cover charge. Damn, were they that hard up for dancers?
Just past the threshold, I stopped and stared.
It was red, everywhere. The walls, the furniture, the lights. The feel was subterranean, as if I’d stepped through the doorway and landed in another world. Pictures of old time pin-ups and movie stars hung on the red walls and red glass tables sunk under the weight of all the alcohol. Pricey stuff that tipped out of iced buckets and cost more per ounce than I made in a week. Scantily-clad women sashayed past, carting trays, hips working, perfect smiles in place.
And the men. Men in suits, men in high-end jeans and deceptively casual T-shirts. Men packing heat under their parted jackets.
Christ, where the hell was I?
Laughter spilled around me, thicker and more cloying than any perfume, though there was plenty of that too. I couldn’t breathe in here. Along with the varied female scents, smoke curled lazily in the air, both from a machine and from the glowing ends of cigars. So much for New York’s light up laws. They must not apply here.
Someone jostled me from behind and I stumbled forward, nearly faceplanting in a fake fern. A strong hand wrapped around my elbow and righted me. I turned to thank them, the words dying in my throat.
Giovanni leaned close and spoke next to my ear. “You shouldn’t have come,tesoro.”
GIOVANNI
She was toobeautiful for her own good. Definitely too good for mine.
Wide blue eyes remained riveted on me as I dragged her up the hallway away from the crowds. Even without looking, I knew she was watching me. I’d grown used to the sensation of being studied long before Carly Anderson had entered my life. She just added a whole new layer of frustration to the proceedings.
Once we were in the relative quiet, I turned toward her and pressed my hand on the wall above her head. “What did you hope to accomplish by coming here?” It took everything I possessed to keep the fury out of my voice.
She had no idea what she was risking by walking through the doors of The Pyramid Club—especially walking through them to get closer to me.
Her mouth opened but no sound came out. She just blinked at me with those ridiculously large eyes, her lower lip jutting outward until I had to fist my hand to keep from leaning down to bite it. I wanted to. Fuck, I did. But I still had some control left.
How much and for how long, I had no clue.
“You came here.” She fumbled for her necklace. I saw the gleam of gold just before she moved her fingers and I realized what kind of necklace it was.
A fucking cross, here of all places.
I nearly laughed aloud. That just capped all, didn’t it?
“I belong here. You do not.” The cross made me angrier than I’d been before, sending my blood pressure into the danger zone. How dare she come there, looking as fresh and sweet as a girl just out of school, wearing her damn tight T-shirt and short flared skirt? And across. That seemed like the biggest insult, to her most of all. “You need to leave.”
Her chin came up, and for a moment, she reminded me of her older sister. Normally, I couldn’t see any resemblance at all between her and Mia. Where Mia was hard and lean, Carly was lush and soft. She was also much more dangerous to me, though Mia tended to view me as something she’d like to pound into dust with her bare hands.
I’d seen the girl fight. She’d probably pull off a pretty good attempt.
Carly, on the other hand, examined me as if I was her chosen meal, and her eyes were a direct conduit to her stomach. Hunger lined her lovely features, making her mouth slack and her eyes glossy. She wasn’t shy about it either. She had no intention of denying what she wanted from me.
If I was the only thing standing between her and impropriety, she was fucked. Just like she clearly craved to be.
“The bouncer let me in, same as anyone else.” Her chin inched higher. “I didn’t even have to pay.”
I swore under my breath in Italian. “What did you offer him,tesoro?”
Twin flags of color appeared in her pale cheeks. With my hand just above her head on the wall, the difference in our skin tones illustrated the stark separation between us. She was light, I was dark. Even her flesh knew what side of the fence she belonged on.
“I didn’t offer him anything. He just assumed I was a dancer, because…” She trailed off and my fist tightened.
“Because of these?” I hooked a finger in the V-neck of her shirt and pulled just enough to make her flush descend to her cleavage. She wasn’t a blond or a redhead but a combination of the two, and her innocence transmitted easily to her face. “I imagine you use these to get your way often.”
Truthfully, I didn’t want to imagine that at all. I hoped she stayed in at night and didn’t attract trouble. But her presence at the club suggested otherwise, as did her relentless insistence on pursuing me. Even if I had encouraged it at first, at least I’d wised up.
